At Vila de Pescadores

Bringing in the catch at Vila de Pescadores, just north of Maputo, about 6pm yesterday. That's too late for the ladies in the foreground to take their plastic crates of fish to market, so the fish would have spent the night covered in blocks of ice, and appeared in the market first thing this morning.

On the horizon is Ilha de Xefina, one of the islands I undertook to circumambulate in my previous post.

Rushing through life and puzzling my friends

As I seem to be playing to a very small audience here, I feel free to do something possibly embarrassing. ("If no one ever did anything silly, nothing intelligent would ever get done" - Wittgenstein.)

Late last year, in the torpid internet surfing I was doing at the end of each day, after my brain had slowed down too much to do anything safely on the servers but before Chimoio branch managed to get its tills closed (Dona Fernanda at Chimoio is a notoriously slow and careful counter of cash, and pre-Christmas is as busy for us as it is for anyone else) - I ran across the internet meme of 101 things in 1001 days.

This notion had me very much in two minds. Looking through a random sampling of other people's lists, I marvelled at the seeming trivia which filled so many people's hopes and dreams. At the same time, my own list of seeming trivia simply wrote itself. The time and energy I put into writing a novel must surely mystify aspiring sky-divers or hair-dyers as much as their passions mystify me.

There's no doubt that writing and publicising a list such as this greatly improves the chances of the items on it being accomplished. Already I've spoken to friends about a weekend trip to Quissico, which I probably wouldn't have done if I hadn't been thinking about places I wanted to include on my list. The other reason to post the list here is that I can use it to post here a bit more regularly. Adventures in getting a necklace made (of which more later) probably wouldn't have blipped my blogging horizon without a prior mention here.

Having said that, I've been here long enough to appreciate the farcical aspect of this - hence the title of this post. This list has brought home to me how completely exotic an animal I am in the Mozambican environment. Nothing about children, for a start, but that's merely the tip of the iceberg. There's arrogance and peril in making such demands from life - which I attempt to defuse with the very Mozambican phrase at the end of my list.

But perhaps it's the sheer lack of practicality in so much of this that is most bewildering. I imagine my Mozambican friends and colleagues reading the list and thinking, what's so special about the waterfall at Namaacha? You can get just as wet in the swimming pool at Hotel Cardoso, and they bring you drinks there. Why do you want a walking safari when it's so much safer and more comfortable in a vehicle? A trip to Bhutan is over in a month. Why don't you buy a nice car that'll last for years?

Why not, indeed? A week's accommodation in Maputo, close to restaurants and transport, for anyone who can give me a good answer.

Then there's de-cluttering, a completely foreign concept, but I'll save that for later.

In fact almost the entire list turns out to be Mozambican-themed, sometimes in subtle ways. Item 9, for example, is a challenge because internet-based bookstores don't accept my Mozambican-issued credit cards. I'm going to have to ask around to find the best way of disposing of the old medicines mentioned in item 51, given the way my garbage gets picked over at every step of the disposal process. As for item 81, yes, Mozambique is a place where you can get to middle management of a bank without ever wearing a suit.

I hemmed and hawed about the absence of less trivial goals - like being a better friend, say - but after some thought realised that much is embedded in the trivia. I can't travel on my own to all those Mozambican locations, for example; most of them require wheels, which means organising trips with friends and making myself a desirable travelling companion.

The office crept in at point 88, but this is otherwise a leisure-time list. There are a sight more than 101 things to do at work, and most of the more exciting ones are confidential. I will mention my over-arching workplace resolution, CULTIVATE EQUANIMITY.

I'll explain all those exotic place names when I post about being there, but a few other items may need quick explanation:
12 and 13 - I'll have to write this list and post it, so that those who plan to visit me can make their choices.
35 and 36 - alfaiaterias are tailors or dressmakers - or (now that I've checked the dictionary) possibly the shops in which they ply their trade. These items, like the other de-cluttering items and reading the Portuguese-language novels listed from 56 to 59, are tasks which I've been meaning to do for years.
37 to 40 - I come to the embarrassing admission that I've lived in Maputo for five years without having visited any of these. I did once go to a buffet lunch in the gardens of the Museu da História Natural.
Item 100 - I thought of censoring this out of fear for my father's health. Please be assured that the mattress strayed because of my misanthropy, not the opposite reason. I sleep on my landlady's mattress, which is better quality, anyway.

I first put the list in the sidebar - and it may yet go back there - but right now the thought of being confronted by it every week when I post has me intimidated. The sidebar is so damnably permanent and judgemental. I'm printing it out and sticking it to my kitchen wall for my own reference, but I post it here as a temporary thing, invisible to the rest of you after a month. If it serves no other purpose it shows what was important to me back in January 2008.

1. Finish drafting and revising City In Spate and start sending it to publishers or agents.
2. Finish drafting Azeviche.
3. Finish drafting Snake.
4. Send drafted chapters to Beck and Luanda Laura.
5. [Censored]
6. Read the Bible, other than 1 Chronicles and Psalms.
7. Read the Koran.
8. Read Economic Literacy. Argue with Valentin about anything I don’t understand. Argue with Valentin about anything I do understand. Cook him breakfasts to make up for the arguing.
9. Buy and read The Healing Hand by Guido Majno and Admiral Rogers’ book on galley warfare.
10. Visit Luanda Laura's cottage in Bulgaria.
11. Visit Bhutan with Minati.
12. Visit a place from my “interesting places in Africa outside Mozambique and South Africa” list.
13. Visit another place from my “interesting places in Africa outside Mozambique and South Africa” list.
14. Walk down Table Mountain.
15. Wine tasting in Stellenbosch.
16. Walk in the Drakensberg.
17. Caving in Swaziland.
18. Buy one of those gorgeous glass pendants from Ngwenya glass in Swaziland for my mother.
19. Visit my family in Australia.
20. Walk up Mount Gorongosa.
21. Sail in the Quirimbas.
22. Walk around Ilha de Moçambique.
23. Watch a sunrise over the Cahora Bassa lake.
24. Walk in the Manica escarpment.
25. Walk in the Parque Nacional de Limpopo.
26. Spend the night in Quissico.
27. Spend a weekend revising my MS at that place on the sandspit opposite Marracuene recommended by American Laura.
28. Circumambulate Inhaca.
29. Circumambulate Xefina.
30. Get wet in the waterfall at Namaacha.
31. Visit Minati’s project.
32. A walking safari.
33. Bookshelves.
34. Curtains.
35. Get six shirts made by an alfaiateria.
36. Get that cloth bag from Melbourne copied by an alfaiateria – at least three times, so I can fearlessly wear two of them to shreds.
37. Go to the Museu da História Natural.
38. Go to the Museu da Revolução.
39. Go to the Museu da Geologica.
40. Go to the Museu de Moedas.
41. Go to the latin dance classes.
42. Chapa research – take the chapa to the end of the line, just to see where it goes. Do this with the Malhazine, Zona Verde, Benfica and Drive-In lines (the lines that take me to the office every day, but I hop off at Malanga).
43. Do twenty pushups in a row.
44. Skip rope 100 times in a row.
45. Find my super payout from DSS.
46. Take care of that other super.
47. Keep my living expenses to less than 60% of my take-home salary.
48. Find a way to put 10% of my take-home salary into my nest egg.
49. Put another 10% of my take-home salary into long-term savings.
50. Clear my wardrobe of clothes I don't wear anymore.
51. Get rid of the old medicines and cosmetics.
52. Get rid of all old papers I don't need anymore. Don’t keep more than the batik-covered box full of papers. Burn or shred unnecessary papers regularly.
53. Buy two of those much-praised bedspreads from that project here in Maputo.
54. Learn enough about electricity to understand what happened when all that hardware fried at Sede.
55. Write up the conjugations for fifty useful Portuguese verbs and post them in the kitchen (not all fifty at once). Learn them. Use them.
56. Read Harry Potter e a Pedra Filosofal.
57. Read Rosa Xintimane.
58. Read Neighbours.
59. Read Vinte e Zinco.
60. Read volume one of UEM’s history of Mozambique.
61. Get back in touch with Eric and Cindy.
62. Legalise my music.
63. Post something to PostSecret.
64. Post a review of Mavelane Airport on www.sleepinginairports.com.
65. Post comments on twenty blogs that have helped me, expressing my appreciation.
66. Install Linux on Delilah.
67. Give away all the books on my shelves which annoy me.
68. Frame the old map of Mozambique American Laura gave me.
69. Find a way to put my postcards on my kitchen wall without them curling up and falling off.
70. Find a way to print my digital photos such that I’m satisfied with the results. Print photos for my kitchen wall.
71. Give chickens and soft drinks to the guards on Christmas and New Year's Eve.
72. Cook a tranquil dinner for tranquil friends on New Year’s Eve.
73. Act in a public production by the Maputo Players.
74. Write or adapt a piece for performance at the Maputo Players.
75. Host a Maputo Players meeting.
76. Get involved in the Maputo Professional Women's Network.
77. Borrow a sewing machine and turn the black fish capulana into cushion covers. Turn batiks into cushion covers. Convince the batik vendors that I really don’t want to buy any more batiks after that.
78. Make the apartment's dining table and chairs go with my furniture.
79. Make a necklace out of one of the mother-and-child earrings which I don’t wear because they’re too heavy.
80. Make a will.
81. Buy two suits and a dress suitable for formal dinners.
82. The 21-day no-complaint experiment.
83. The 21-day no-fidgeting experiment.
84. The 21-day no-monotone experiment.
85. The 21-day no-passive-aggressive-attitude experiment.
86. The 21-day no-envy experiment.
87. The 21-day no-worrying-about-what-other-people-think-of-me experiment.
88. Empty my work and personal Inboxes.
89. [Censored]
90. [Censored]
91. [Censored]
92. Buy decent field guides to southern African birds and southern African trees.
93. Buy a pair of binoculars.
94. Hem those two dresses which have been rolled up in my sewing kit for years.
95. Handle a snake.
96. Let a spider crawl over me.
97. One outing with the ladies-of-leisure early-morning bird-watching group.
98. Figure out a recipe for Amarula fudge.
99. Put up mosquito nets in both bedrooms.
100. Get my mattress back from wherever it is. Buy some decent pillows and blankets.
101. Be able to find and name 100 stars.

PELA GRAÇA DO DEUS

Retorno tímido ao trabalho

"Timid return to work" was a front-page headline in Notícias yesterday. Our placid daily got three columns out of chapa drivers and market vendors recovering slowly from the break. That was the second story, just below the news of rising floodwaters in central Mozambique. I'm having trouble establishing the details: Zimbabwean media reports two deaths in Mozambique, but the local sources say nothing about it.

Once again I managed to evade the responsibility of office devotions - phone calls from users unable to print or unsure about their start-of-year reports ambushed me on cue. No one seemed to miss it. Most likely it felt too much like Monday for a proper devotional meeting, or perhaps everyone was just feeling timid. I had prepared a piece about new year's resolutions, which aren't done here, so it was a kind of show-and-tell about my exotic foreign culture.

Having arrived early, though, I checked the internet news (my only source these days) and saw what was happening in Kenya - specifically in Kisumu, where our sister bank is located. Sophie and Erick in this photo live there - for those who have been following the issues, Sophie is Kikuyu and Erick is Luo. The helpdesk calls interrupted me while I was hastily taking notes and trying to compose suitable messages of peace and hope.

I've sent a message to Sophie (whom I know best of my colleagues there) to find out what is going on, but so far no reply. It's very likely that the bank is closed until the situation calms down.

I don't want to diminish the enormity of what's happening there - though it isn't genocide, as anyone who knows anything about Rwanda or Darfur can tell you, and the sooner the leaders involved stop making such inflammatory statements, the sooner we will all be out of this. But I do want to call attention to an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal pointing out the difference between the violence in Kenya now and kind of violence that has afflicted African countries so much in the past (the article requires subscription, so here is the section I want noted):

Ten years ago, bolstering a candidate's results by a few percentage points would have been no big thing. In fact, 20 years ago, an 85% result for the incumbent would have been de rigueur. Today, there are more stringent regulations; more Kenyans know their rights; more monitors were at the polls; Kenya's media coverage was extensive; digital media are accelerating the distribution of information; and many people have cellphones with which they can pass on information.

This is not the kind of government-sponsored violence, shoring up those in power, which we have seen in the past. As misguided as it is, it is protest violence, and the message is that the President of Kenya cannot rig an election with impunity.