simplicity

As an American I have this tendency to try and be busy no matter what. Our culture tends to stimulate our senses however possible and as much as possible. I'd argue that it is pretty successful most of the time. In America busy-ness is easy to encounter in a world of friends, family, work, play, study, movies, cell phones, computers, games, sports, TiVo, music, concerts, shopping, eating, driving, and living.  When I first moved to Mozambique I was struck with the reality of life slowing down in major ways. I no longer had the ability to get in my car and drive over to a friend’s house. No longer the same forms of entertainment whether seeing a movie or going to a concert. Life came down to a simpler level, one of slowing down and sometimes sitting and just enjoying doing nothing.

Something that I have learned about myself is that even if I’m doing nothing I still tend to try to “do” something whether it is to play guitar, read a book, listen to a podcast, or work on lesson plans for school. There is ALWAYS something waiting to be done. Just because I’ve relocated to half a world away hasn’t changed my internal desire to want to be productive and achieve something. American culture is one of doing while African culture is one of being. This was made very real to me this past week as things slowed down and I suddenly had no list of things to do, but had time to spend being. Things felt very simple, extremely simple, for probably one of the first times in my life. 

simplicity

• the quality or condition of being easy to understand or do 
• the quality or condition of being plain or natural 

This past week I had the lovely opportunity to be able to spend a week with a family in the bush. At first I was slightly nervous since I had absolutely no idea what to expect. The house was in the bush and quite a ways outside of the city. (Much like what we refer to as the sticks or boonies in Oklahoma) Not too far away from the main road, but down some bumpy, rutted and almost non-existent dirt roads. Their house is in the process of being completed. Gabriel started building it in 2003. Currently they have two bedrooms and the kitchen finished, which they use as a kitchen and living room combined. 

When one first sees or even hears of a house like this one described you would automatically think it is simple. There is furniture, but not an excessive amount. There is a toilet, but no running water. There is a stove, but no microwave. A mosquito net, but with huge holes in it. These are all very different than the typical standards in America. If we consider the second definition of simplicity it describes something that is plain or natural. Now this house was definitely easy to see and know what it contained, thus being very plain and natural. But life in this house was actually very difficult for me to understand. It is a sort of contradiction. Why is it that sometimes the simplest of things can end up being the most complex?

So I ask that we further consider the first definition of simplicity, as something being easy to understand or do. Living with this family for a week was by no means easy to understand or do. I had to learn how to take a bucket bath and actually wash the shampoo out of my hair. I also learned how to prepare foods like matapa from scratch. And the hardest thing I learned was how to BE instead of DO. Life was no longer on a time sensitive schedule, but instead completely caught up in the people present in the now and here. Not about what is happening later. As an American this was a struggle at first. But I was soon able to relax, chill out, and able to simply enjoy the presence of others and being together. 

I think I was able to walk away from this time with a few useful insights and lessons learned. The first being how to correctly take a bucket bath and actually be clean. Next that it is ok to just be sometimes, and probably more healthy when used wisely. Also how to just sit and wait. Africa is a place where waiting takes up a lot of time and patience is absolutely necessary in order to keep your sanity.

Wait for the LORD;
   be strong, and let your heart take courage;
   wait for the LORD!

Psalm 27.14

The LORD is good to those who wait for him,
   to the soul who seeks him.
It is good that one should wait quietly
   for the salvation of the LORD.

Lamentations 3.25-26

"Be still, and know that I am God.
    I will be exalted among the nations,
   I will be exalted in the earth!"       

Psalm 46.10

The family I stayed with was Gabriel, Nildes (who is seven months pregnant), and their 3 ½ year old son Reuben. Gabriel is an accountant for a couple different companies and Nildes is a student at a local university about to begin her final year. Reuben is full of energy and loves to dance. Their nieces, Ana and Nildes, have been spending the past month with them while they’ve been on holiday from school. They were extremely hospitable and helpful. They are both in high school and live in central Mozambique. The last two nights of my stay we had another visitor, Nildes’ madrinha (or god-mother), Maria and her 1 ½ year old daughter Abi. They have been staying around Maputo visiting various family members and friends and live in Beira (a city several hours north of Maputo).

I'm so thankful for the opportunity I had. These things can not be taught in a classroom. They cannot be simply understood. They must be experienced and lived through. I was able to spend time with and get to know a family with huge hearts. I also was able to learn from them things that would be impossible otherwise. And I'm grateful for their patience with me as I learn portuguese and slowly start to speak. I did make a very large improvement in my portuguese abilities. We had a lot of laughs at my attempts. 

 

reflections on 2009

Things that have happened over the past year...

• started and completed student teaching
• graduated from college
• made friends with people in similar situations as myself serving in every continent (except Antarctica)
• raised enough support to move to Africa for a year
• moved halfway across the world alone (knowing less than a handful of people here)
• attempted to begin learning a new language
• moved into a house with my very first own kitchen
• learned how to cook and bake several things from scratch (including popping popcorn on the stove)
• became a real teacher with my very own classroom
• rode a chappa
• cracked open a coconut
• tried a variety of new things including mango, goat, lichee, mozambican sweet potatoes, shema, and cow liver
• successfully survived my first parent/teacher conferences
• took my first bucket bath
• travelled alone between countries and across borders

As I think of these things I'm reminded of how far I've come in just the past year. The places and things, people and experiences God's given to me. All of these things new. All of these things exciting. All opportunities I'm so grateful I've had. A year ago I had the goal of living in Africa anxiously in my mind, but the reality of it was still hard to grasp. Now I am sitting here, in Mozambique, on a Saturday afternoon writing about it. I'm excited for what is to come. What will happen in 2010 and what is God waiting to teach me? Where will He take me? How can He use this small life for His sake? I think I'm ready for that journey to continue!

un-christmas

This Christmas was different for me than it has ever been before. I know that may seem apparent on the surface, but I say that for several reasons. The obvious ones being that the seasons are opposite here (it is summer right now in the southern hemisphere), it's my first one away from family and friends, and in a new culture.

candy canes

snow

christmas trees

scarves

hot cocoa

carols

christmas lights

presents

A Christmas Movie

shopping

ornaments

ham

snowmen

stockings

nativity scenes

gingerbread

fireplaces

tinsel

sledding

parades

Very few of these things are actually present here.

Somehow over the years these things have become what defines or at least make Christmas feel like Christmas for me. It's the warm, fuzzy feeling of walking/driving through Christmas lights, the rush of finishing up your last minute shopping before it's too late, those smells that are only smelled once a year and bring you back to when you were a young child, the excitement of getting a gift for someone that you know they are really going to enjoy, the fun of building gingerbread houses together, and the numbness of your hands as you pack together snow for a jolly snowman.

Every year I say and think the same thing, that I really want to get to the root of the true meaning of Christmas. Isn't that a typical characteristic of American culture, to want to celebrate the real meaning and not to get caught up in everything else? Yet it is so difficult to do in the hustle and bustle of the season. I feel as if I was forced into the depths of that this year. Honestly, it hasn't been easy being far away from loved ones during the holiday season.

As things got difficult over the past couple of weeks, I was able to spend time thinking on the purpose of it all and the cross. Why did Jesus come? He came to die. The only reason we celebrate His birth is because His death gave us life. That is what the real celebration is about. His death, the fact that He was born to die. And that in His death we can have life. Apart from Him we are left to our sin and the destruction that it brings. But because of His great love He came to this earth, miraculously born of a virgin, to make a way for His people. This is the gospel. What our lives are to be centered on. What my life is to be centered on!

So whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

1 Corinthians 10.31

I then got to thinking this is the reason for everything in my life and why I do what I do, think what I think, work where I work, eat what I eat, and live where I live. This is the reason I am here, in Mozambique. To bring the good news of salvation and hope to those without it. I've been called and sent here with a purpose. That purpose being to bring glory to God and spread the gospel. Christmas is about the gospel, our lives are a portrait of the gospel, and I am here with only one goal in mind. To know Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith— that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings,becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead. Philippians 3.8-11

So even though I wasn't able to celebrate Christmas in the comfortable way that I might have liked, I was sweetly reminded of the meaning of Christmas, which overflows into the purpose of living here and my life. In our field only four out of eleven of us were actually healthy on Christmas day. So we postponed our festivities and spent a couple hours in the hospital, finishing the day off by eating Indian food at a muslim-owned restaurant. It was just a normal day. No different than any other. Throughout the day I was sent little reminders on the true meaning of Christmas and what that looks like in my life. Needless to say I often find myself falling short of the calling I've been given. But God is gracious and faithful to continue the work He has started in those He has called. So this Christmas I'm grateful to have been reminded of the purpose of it all.

"All of life comes down to just one thing, that's to know you, O Jesus, and to make you known."

--One Thing by Charlie Hall

One thing have I asked of the LORD,

that will I seek after:

that I may dwell in the house of the LORD

all the days of my life,

to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD

and to meditate in his temple.

Psalm 27.4

a new normal

Approaching the halfway mark of my time here in mozambique life has been a continual adjustment into a new normal. Things that are now normal didn't become that way overnight, but it has instead been a process and constant transition period. A list of common things that are now normal:

• having dirty feet
• coming home to having no electricity, water or combination both
• traffic that turns a two lane road into a six lane road out of nowhere
• sticking out due to a lack of melanin
• seeing people urinate on the side of the road
• seeing at least a dozen goats on the way to or from school each day
• overcrowded chappas with body parts hanging out the windows
• ducks walking around the neighbors yard
• driving down the left side of the road
• a huge lack of trash cans
• cooking everything from scratch
• sleeping under a mosquito net
• seeing a whole cow head being cooked over coals
• the sun coming up at 4:30 a.m.
• men carrying huge AK-47s around
• being able to pick fresh mangoes whenever I'd like
• seeing women carry a variety of things on their heads including tables, propane tanks, and sacks of potatoes

Despite all of these things I sometimes have the tendency to forget that I am actually living in Africa. That my life looks different now than it ever did before. Yet it is a variety of these new things and experiences that I have come to accept and love about living here. There are very few dull moments. I have a new normalcy in my life and most of these things rarely cause me to even turn my head for another glance anymore.

street serenade

A couple days ago I was visiting with the Blanks (fellow WorldVenture missionaries) at their house and these guys walked up wanting to play a song for Rob. I thought I'd share their talent, or lack thereof, with you. They said they would return when they master another song.

the "Golden" wedding

Mr. Golden is one of my colleagues at CAM. He teaches third grade. On December 4th he got married and had the spectacular "golden wedding." Golden because of many reasons his first name is Golden, his suit was gold, his bride's dress was gold, and the teachers at CAM even got together to give him the "golden" tree. The weddings here typically last two days. We were fortunate enough to make it for the reception (and the delicious food). 

One common Mozambican tradition is for the bride to look as sad as possible. I have heard this is because she is to be mourning the fact that she is leaving her family. I find this something almost foreign to me, since American culture is very emotional and excited during a wedding! Also when the bride and groom arrive they have to do a sort of dance together. 

After the meal, everyone is to present their gifts to the bride and groom. The twist is that every person, or group of people, must do a song and dance as the gift is brought forward. Being a table of foreigners, mostly American mixed with Zimbabwean, Swazi, Indian, Dutch and Russian, we had a difficult time trying to come up with a song and dance to go along with it. So we improvised with a song in Shangaan that about half of us knew.

Who said money doesn't grow on trees?

swaziland

The day after Thanksgiving I was able to go to go to Swaziland with my neighbor, Mary, and her two children, Angel and Angelo. Friday morning we caught a chappa into Maputo and got off close to the bus station. We went into the bus station and found the sign for the one going to Swazi. We got in handed over our passports and waited. Little did I know that the buses aren't on a schedule like they are in America, but just wait until the bus is full to depart. We actually ended up waiting for about 2 and 1/2 hours just to leave the bus station. The trip to Swazi wasn't too bad. I was grateful that they only allow the bus to be filled with one person in each seat, as opposed to as many as physically possible like they do in Maputo. We crossed the border, unloaded the mini-bus, then caught a chappa to the town that Mary's parents live in. When we made it to their house I was shocked at how nice the house is. It had carpet, which reminded me very much of American houses (in Maputo I don't think I've seen any houses with wall-to-wall carpeting. We then sat down to a lovely meal in the formal dining room and I was able to meet the different members of her family. There was a great-grandma, two grandmothers, an uncle, mom and dad, two sisters, three more adopted sisters that were orphans, a younger brother, another adopted brother, and even a friendly dog. They were very hospitable and glad to finally meet me after hearing about me from Mary.

The view from the front yard of their house in Swaziland.

The next day we were getting ready to go a birthday party for a family friend. Much to my surprise it was another 2 hours away. (After a quick run to the mall in Mbabane, which was more like an outdoor plaza, but very clean and highly populated with security guards.) We started on our beautiful and scenic drive through the hills of Swazi to the birthday party. It was at this man's house on a compound in the bush, actually very close to the Mozambican border. By the time we arrived most of the people were already there. We soon started feasting. There was so much food. I was surprised at first by the amount of food that was prepared, but then I was shocked by the fact that it actually fed all of the people there. I'm guessing it was easily close to 100 people. The food was delicious and some of it very foreign, yet new, to me!

My plate of food including salad, chicken, rice, cabbage, beets, potatoes, beef and goat.

I soon asked Mary's mom about how they knew this man as she was telling me that she is close to all of the people. At one point they all lived in Rwanda together, but when the war broke out they were forced out of the country just for the sake of remaining alive. Many people went to many different countries as displaced people. This was the community that went to Swaziland. Over the years they have kept their community strong and helped each other remember their identity as wandis, as well as swatis, living in a new land that is not their home. This was amazing to me as I was seeing how these people were still a sort of family after so many years, and hearing stories of how they depended on and learned from each other as they were in a new place with nothing but what they could manage to flee with. The resilience was astounding! But they still remember, they can't forget, and they still have hope. Many of the people present were educated even having a masters or phD. They have made their new land their own, but they still speak of Rwanda as home. They only gather like this on very special occasions, this day being a 50th birthday.

I was able to take part of and see some of the differences in Rwandan culture, specifically within a community that is located in another country. Africa is Africa, but there are definite differences among Africans from different countries, tribes and regions. Even the Mozambican and Rwandan greetings are different. In Mozambique you give a kiss on each cheek, I've gotten quite accustomed to this now and do it without even thinking about it. In Rwanda they give a hug, and not on both sides, so I had to quickly re-adjust what I've gotten used to.

When the time for cake came everyone sang and clapped for the birthday boy (man), Nsanze. He then had to say a speech. Like most good Africans, it was a little lengthy. He talked about when they came from Rwanda and talked about each of their kids and his wife and how they were the ones who helped him keep going when he was at some of the lowest points. He then talked about different people who were present who also helped him start from nothing and support him and his family during rough times. 

Cutting the birthday cake.