There and Back Again- a not quite Hobbit’s Tale of a Journey Home to Canada

Unlike the final installment of the Hobbit trilogy that came out this Christmas, my journey was blissfully free of excitement and dangerous adventure. I left Mozambique mid-December and after a short stop-over in Durban for the Southern Africa MCC regional retreat, I stepped foot in Canada for the first time in 15 months. Besides almost losing my bags along the way home, and a couple good snow storms nothing unexpected happened.  

It is difficult to describe what it is like coming home after being away for a while. Many people wonder if it is ever hard coming back to so many changes. Many things are different. My sister has a boyfriend now; this I knew, but I didn’t know it was possible to spend so many hours on skype! My other sister now drives and took me to the Superstore. Kids who were shorter than me are now taller than me (ok, so maybe not much changes). I haven’t had a bedroom that was mine in a while. The kitchen cupboards were redone so it took me a while to search for where the tea is now kept. Though many things do change, there is one thing that doesn’t; it still feels like home.

It was such a blessing just to be there for a month. I am grateful for the time spent with family and friends. I am thankful for the opportunities I had to share about my life and experiences in Mozambique with my friends, church, and at my Mom’s school. My wonderful mother made every single meal on my page-long list of dinner requests. Never having to wonder what kind of strange meat was on the table. Sitting down for a cup of tea with real milk in it. Completing a 1000 piece puzzle with my brothers and sisters. Knitting socks at the curling rink. Snowshoeing, cross-country skiing, breathing deep the smell of a forest. Being a normal person again, passing normal people on the street with a smile or hello because that’s just what we do.  

I’ll keep my tale short this time but promise to be back soon. I’m in Tete now for a few days, visiting and saying a final goodbye to all my friends and colleagues who’ve been there for me this past year. This coming week I’ll hop on a bus to MCC’s office in Beira and start preparing in earnest for moving to Machanga. In early February I’ll finally begin my original assignment position; teaching conservation agriculture at the technical high school in Machanga. Comings and goings are ever bittersweet. It was hard to leave Canada after such a relaxing month home, and it is hard to leave my Tete brothers and sisters who I’ve lived and worked with last year.  But I am looking forward to the new opportunities, friendships, and experiences that will surely come my way as pick up my pack and set my feet on the path to Machanga.

Until next time.

Family Christmas pictures on Christmas day! I had the matching shirts made for my brother and sisters in Mozambique

On the Dobson Trail feeling very cold on New Years. 

Tea AND and puzzles AND rummio. Notice the winter scarf around my neck!

Skiing in Centennial Park with Mom after a fresh snowfall. 

Changing Seasons

After a very long and very inexcusable absence, I am back in the blog world!

I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before, but one of the things I miss from home is the changing of the seasons. I feel rather disoriented in time without the seasons to guide me. Thanksgiving came and went while I sweated in 40 degree weather and ate shima and beans. How was I to know it was thanksgiving without the bright colours and sweet smell of October leaves? It takes a while being in one place before you start to see the patterns and find new ways to mark the passing of time. With time you begin to change and learn to celebrate what each new season has to bring in different ways. 

Salad Season- In July and August, vegetable harvesting was in full swing. Every day, the extensionists and I would have fresh salad made from the lettuce, tomatoes, onions, and cabbage from our demonstration plots. There is nothing like pulling fresh produce from the ground that you’ve grown with your own two hands. The weather was also cooler during this time. It would go all the way down to 17 degrees at night; curling up in a big sleeping bag felt so cozy! I am thankful for fresh vegetables, cool weather, and the joy of seeing the hard work of community members pay off!

Me with my colleague Romão and lead farmer Sr. Jacinto in Matambo during the hight of the vegetable season. How many different vegetables can you point out?

OK, so this doesn't have a lot to do with vegetables, but I had to fit it in somewhere. Me with a cow at the water pump. The cows are here because there isn't water anywhere else. When you see just how dry it is everywhere, you realize how invaluable the sand dams are as a source of water for growing vegetables.  And if you are wondering, it's not cold; I've just gotten really used to wearing a sweater even when it's 25 or 30 degrees.  

See the difference in colour between kale grown using mulch (right) versus kale grown without soil cover (left). 

 MCC Retreat Season- September 23^rd. Not weeks after my arrival in Mozambique last year we went on a team retreat on a wildlife reserve. This year we got to see another side of Mozambique’s natural beauty- long sandy beaches. Last year I was the new one to MCC. This year I was on the retreat organizing committee and got to welcome two new MCC members to our team. I am thankful for the wonderful support and friendship I have in the MCC Mozambique team. 

Aziza and I at the water's edge. 

 Birthday Season- October 10^th. For the second year in a row I have celebrated my birthday Mozambican style. My host family in Beira sure knows how to throw a party. I celebrated together with my host brother who turned three this year. There were homemade samosas, chicken, fries, shrimp, potato salad, rice and beans, and at least 5 different cakes! A DJ kept the music blaring all evening (at least until the power went out). There was even a bouncy castle for the kids this year! I am thankful for celebrating not only my birthday but also one year in Mozambique with my Mozambican friends, family, and colleagues. 

I mean, just look at that cake. Not to mention the balloons. Not seen in this picture are the three-inch red and black heels I was wearing. 

Training Season- October and November. Time to prepare for the upcoming field crop season. The staff at CCM participated in a conservation agriculture training seminar together with staff from another NGO and government extension workers. The agricultural extensionists and I also worked together to give day-long training sessions in a few different communities where we work. Fields are being prepared for growing maize and millet according to the three conservation agriculture principles: minimal soil disturbance, soil cover, and crop rotation. I am thankful for the opportunity to teach and to learn. 

Explaining how we should look at the slope of the ground before starting to dig holes for planting; you want to make sure any water running on the service falls into the holes.

My colleague giving a training session in the community of Maule Maule. I seem to be distracting a couple of the kids  as I took this picture, but everyone else is paying close attention!

Women from Nhamunhu digging planting basins- they are helping to prepare a demonstration plot by the road. 

It's already November and I can't help but already be thinking about the upcoming season of Christmas. I’ve been away from home over Christmas for two years now, but will be back for a visit this year. As someone who has always loved the Christmas season, experiencing Christmas in very different ways over the last two years has had a profound impact on me. I am both extremely excited and also a little nervous to be coming home for Christmas this year. I am thrilled that I’ll have a month in New Brunswick to see my friends and family and that I get to do so over the holidays. But I can't help but feel some apprehensions as well. Will Christmas at home be as I remember it? Even if it is, what if I have changed?

I remember a quote I heard once when I was a kid, which has always stuck with me.

“Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.” Helen Keller

I used to say that running at top speed down the stairs.  But now this phrase is taking on greater meaning; you have to take the risk of stepping out of your comfort zone away from what is easy, knowing that when you do you might very well change, and that change, though not easy, is often good.  Those are the moments you feel most alive. Now I'm in Mozambique and not only are the seasons different, but in some small ways so am I. There is joy in celebrating seasons we know and love, but there is also beauty in change. 

*Note to my dear friends on the East Coast: if you didn’t catch that, I will be home for a visit from December 20^th to January 16^th and then coming back to Mozambique. The month will go by quickly but not so quickly that I won’t have time to visit all of you lovely people! I’m looking forward to taking some time to relax and catching up with all the latest. Be in touch come December as I start to piece together what I’ll be doing when.

My Favourite Things

How many times have I been asked the question, “ What is your favourite thing about your work overseas?” And how many times have I given the same predictable, unrevealing answers, “Oh, I like working with the communities, the way I’m always learning and growing, getting to use my interests in science in a way that really helps people.”

To get good answers, you have to ask good questions. When a child is in school, it is common to ask them, “What is your favourite subject?” Sure, if you don’t know them at all, this is a great place to start, and will give you an idea of their general interests. “I like science.” My father used to ask me every day after school, “What did you learn today?” This question demands thought every time and has a different answer every time. It reveals what really made an impression on me, what was of great interest and worth remembering, and why it was memorable. “Today we were learning about thermo dynamics in chemistry class and made ice cream by putting a ziplock bag of milk in a container of ice and salt. Now I’ll never be able to eat ice cream without thinking about heat capacity.” 

When people ask me what is my favourite thing about my work, I rarely have a chance to tell the stories; the stories that get to the core of why I love what I do. “What is it about working in with the communities in Mozambique that you enjoy so much? How has your understanding of development; community; religion; politics; truth; happiness; family been shaped by your experiences? What is it about your work that you look forward to every day? What did you learn today?"

I want to take some time today to share with you some of my “favourite things”. These things are too small, too seemingly insignificant on their own to earn a place in a response so broad as “the favourite thing about my work”. But these are the true, deeply meaningful experiences from my agriculture work in rural villages that I will carry with me always.

I feel so welcomed when community members remember me by name and greet me in their local dialect. It is my favourite thing when I return to Maule Maule and someone asks me where I’ve been for the past three weeks and then takes me to show how things are going in their garden.

It is my favourite thing when a kid climbs up the closest maçanica tree, shakes the branches, and I get to join everyone in picking up and eating the fruit.

It is my favourite thing to share an inside joke with my colleagues. 

It is my favourite thing when I get to show people that I’m actually just a normal person too. Maybe normal is a stretch, but when a group of people were digging a pit in the river bed to access water for irrigating their vegetables, I took my turn with the shovel too, to the surprise of many. In the hot of the afternoon I can fall asleep on the ground under a tree with the best of them. Just because I've not yet mastered the art of carrying water on my head doesn't mean I've never watered a garden before. Eating with my hands? No electricity? No big deal. Sadly, I somehow don't have many pictures of me being normal, but you'll just have to trust that I right after taking this picture I took the shovel from the guy on the left.

It is my favourite thing just to be with people. Yesterday I was sitting on the ground with a group of women and picked up the baby of the woman beside me and started playing with him. It touched my heart when my colleague translated what one woman said; “We can’t speak Portuguese so it is hard to talk with you, but we can see that this baby is very comfortable and happy to be with you.”

It is my favourite thing when people teach me things. Last week, this woman in Matambo was teaching me how to bundle kale using strips of wet bark.

I don’t want to give the jaded impression that my work is all “raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens.” There are times when the dog bites and the bee stings. These things should not be overlooked nor their importance undermined. The answer to the question “what did you learn today” is not always as delicious as ice cream. The roses have thorns and the kitten has claws. These lessons should be learned and not ignored. But at the end of the day it does the heart good to dwell on those things that are good; to give praise for the simple blessings that we experience everyday.