Dia do Agradecimentos 2012

So I know that normally thanksgiving is the 3rd Thursday in November  But who chose that? The man probably. As a rebel nonconformist, I cannot accept this and am instead fighting the power. I, Samuel Harris Bar, am declaring today, the 4th Tuesday in November as my personal day to give thanks. My first amazing year in the Peace Corps has given me plenty to be thankful for, so here it goes. Viva a revolucao!

-Cold water
-Ice cream

It's much easier when they're drunk

-Frozen turkeys
-Refrigeration, in general
-Clever hand turkeys
-Incorrect stereotypes about Africa
-Trustworthy and loyal friends
-Loving family that misses me
-Movitel fiber optic, and how it can make distant friends and family feel closer
-How easy hammocks are to make
-Finding a perfect pair of new jeans while searching through bales of clothes in the market
-Temperature regulated ovens
-Being kept busy
-Gutters for collecting rain water
-Coco, despite the stressful moments
-Woks and Soy Sauce
-Capuala hoodies (yes, they exist!!)

-Never having to call PCMO or go to the ER of the HDAM for a ME
-Acronyms

Chiure thanksgivings 2012

-Low expectations, high hopes
-Refrigeration again, its just that good
-Having one’s achievements recognized, even if only by a couple people

-Dancing to flag a car down for a boleia (ride)

Last step of our boleia dance

-Seeing the sun set into the rolling hills of Zambezia from my front porch
-Students who are excited to learn
-The Broly Trinity
-Being able to look behind you and see how far   you've come
-Being able to look forward and have an idea of where you want to go


Phew, that was a mouthful. Good thing I didn't try to do this on the "official" thanksgiving. My bloated stomach wouldn't have been able to handle it. I hope everyone had a wonderful thanksgiving full of food, friends, and family. See you all in the states in 2 weeks!

Back to the Namachaa

One year later and where am I? Back in the Namaacha for training.

Me and the host family

Though most of the activities were the same, my point of view was sooo different. I still ate meals with my host family, went to mind numbing tech sessions with the other trainees, practiced Portuguese with the language trainers, and spent a ton of time celebrating every day of training with my friends Manica, 2M, Preta, and Capitan Morgan. But where last time I was a scared little newbie portugeseless trainnee, this time a grissled and chiseled bearded veteran volunteer.

Just like during my PST (pre service training), each the 10 weeks has 2-3 of the current volunteers visit to share their experience. Though many volunteers apply, a couple months ago I was surprised to find out that I was one of a handful of 17ers selected to attend training. Like all of the visitors, I taught model lessons, explained what I do at site, and helped out the trainees with their Portuguese. But I had the great luck to also be there for site placement, aka when they find out where they'll be spending the next 2 years of their life.



Non-formal education with trainees

Arriving Sunday with my fellow training volunteer Amanda Moore, I went straight to a family dinner at my old homestay house. Mama Laura, Cecylia, and Lina were happy to introduce me to the newest member of the family, Mimosa the cat. Not only was the food as good as I remember it, but sitting at the table with my Mozambican family felt like being home again. Since I had left, Mama had built a whole knew room on the house which she was especially proud of, my sister Cecylia had gotten a job at the German bakery, and Lina had graduated 9th grade. Of course, I brought them the standard mozambican gift of a capulana, and they all approved of my fashion choices.

Monday and Tuesday I attended teacher and Portuguese training sessions, which all went well, though I think the math and science trainees were disappointed to get a French lesson. Wednesday brought hub day, and the all important site placement.

19ers seeing their site placements

After surrounding the giant map of Mozambique, the Moz 19ers, 12 of which are transfers from the recently closed Peace Corps Cape Verde, were handed their site placement envelopes. After an agonizing pause where they read the cover letter from country director Carl, we counted down from 3 and they ripped open their packets. Of the 68, 32 are headed to the north, 6 to Zambezia, and 1 to Alto Molocue. I'm very excited to get to know my new site mate, Eric Wilburn, over the next year. It'll be great to have another volunteer in Alto and even better to have another at my school. Afterwards, everyone went out for celebratory drinks, and I got to answer a ton of questions about the various sites and site mates for the 19ers. Much to their credit, almost none of the trainees were unhappy with their placement and I didn't hear anyone complain about being far from friends, amenities, or beaches.

The Newest residents of Zambrozia

Thursday and Friday held more tech and language sessions, meals with the family, and bar outings. Saturday I left with a bunch of trainees in a Peace Corps car to Maputo for my Sunday morning flight back to Namupla. Unfortunately, the LAM pilots decided to go on strike, which is why I'm in the Peace Corps office in Maputo right now righting this post. All in all a great week at training, and I can't wait till this newest group of volunteers swear in in a couple weeks.



Snow Men Jokes

Jennea and Victor with their personal
Alto Molocue tour guide

So it's been almost a month since my last post, mostly because of an insane amount of travel and a seemingly unending stream of visitors. First, I had a several day trip to to Quelimane with the exclusive purpose of coming back with a fridge (great success!!). After enjoying my cold water and home made pickles for a few days, I then embarked on a 4 days of overland travel to Xai Xai for the 2 day Science Fair handover meeting, then 3 days of  travel back. After maybe 24 hours of relaxation at home, Steph from nearby Nawela arrived in preparation for our Moz 19 site visitors. Once they had arrived, I endeavored to show my 2 visitors everything Alto Molocue has to offer in 3 days. Needless to say, I haven't had much time for blog posts.

But do you know what I have I had time for? Starring off into the distance blankly, eating greasy travel food, getting sexually aroused by memories of air travel and high speed trains, and making up bilingual snow-men jokes.

Yay cold everything!!!!

Predictably, a snow-man joke is a joke involving snow men, women or babies. Some of them are lame (what is a snow-man's favorite breakfast cereal? frosted flakes), some are clever (what did one snow-man say to the other snow-man? smells like carrots), and some are sexual (what is the difference between snow men and snow women? snow-balls). But in my opinion the best ones take advantage of similarly sounding words in different languages. In my case, Portuguese:

• What is a snow man's favorite desert? Gelo
• How often do snow people brush their teeth? Neve
• How much do you pay a snow-hooker? Nothing, they're frio

If you think of any others, Portuguese or otherwise, please let me know. I promise to laugh out loud embarrassingly once I read them.

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On a side note, I've been getting alot of thumbs up and back pats since the election. Politics aside, it's great for American's living abroad when our nation continues to elect diverse and dynamic presidents.