And so it goes, and so it goes, la la la la la la la la...

Well. Just, just well. You know, well in that kind of harrumph-y ruffled englishwoman way.
Things here have turned upside down, AGAIN. I had just established my monday to friday routine in life; get up, work on things at home (teaching tools, toys, guitar, cleaning my room. yes. i do clean it. often, actually.), walk to work, change the baby, do building or drawing or singing or book reading with the kids, feed the baby, put the baby to sleep, walk home for lunch, walk back to work, play outside, teach COOPERATIVE recreation, walk home, go to bed. However, at work on friday afternoon, the chefa (or boss) Josina, happened to mention that the center was closing on saturday and that all the kids were being sent to other orphanages. I, of course, thought she was joking, but apparently not. I spent my last hour with my kids in a daze, wistfully looking at the progress I had made and the routine that was about to be destroyed. The kids were coming up to me and reciting parts of the alphabet, and we had only started that three days ago and they´re only four years old. Rozhinha spoke to me and came to sit by me and hang out with me all of her own accord, and that took a month of coaxing. And now, its gone.

The head Pastor of REMAR, the institution based in Spain, for some reason decided to close the Laulane branch of the Mozambican orphanages, and REMAR here in Maputo was only informed on Tuesday about its eminent closure. So now I am in the position I had hoped never to face. Jobless, with a family I dont like who feed me food I cant eat. (beef, beef, pork, pork, white rice and white bread. AAAAAAAH!!!)
Of course, I have many options, I can work in the completely overcrowded orphanage in Museu, without a quiet corner or any chance to create a routine. I could probably just chill, say that I was working and never show up again, no one would notice or care. But Im not like that, and I think I may have found a solution far better than either option.

Last weekend, not two days ago but the one before that, some volunteers and I went to a work camp in Manhiça, a small town about 100 kilometers from here. We set up camp in the central park, a huge twenty person tent and a few other regular sized ones, stayed up until the wee hours (yes, drinking, although my tummy didnt feel well so I only had a beer and a shot) and in the morning we walked to the central primary school next to the church. There one of the local men who works in MOZARTE, the arts center, gave an incredible ceramics demonstration, I have really never seen anyone make a pitcher that fast in my life. I herded kids and held toddlers up to see, most of them awed, a few of them annoyed, and some of them completely enraptured by the mulungo in their midst. Then we gathered in the shade under a tree to see the music demonstration, where Pati, a dancer from MOZARTE, danced galanga with this adorable little girl who was really really good!! so far as I can tell, galanga, like other types of African partner dances, has a few basic moves and many stylizing options, as does any folk dance. But the defining thing for me about African dances is the release. The way they allow their entire body to shake, to kick, buck, and generally wig out. There is something freer, and yes, more savage, dont tell me im racist, its just a description of the style of movement and certainly not all African dances are like this... Its just the way that they dance like there aint no one there, and thats the style.... Anyways, so in the ever-encroaching crowd of children, the teachers and I were constantly having to move the kids back, which produced the same phenomenon it does everywhere here. One would think that these people are desperately selfish if one didnt understand how simply destitute the majority of them are... Every inch counts for them, and boy, are they willing to fight for it. And how are they to know better when its their own principle poking them back with the handle of a broom?? (and what is it with brooms and child abuse????) So I managed as best I could, mainly by wading in and stopping the trample (nothing confuses little mozambican kids more than an assertive white girl), and pulling out the nastiest of the fighters. Really, the brutality here is horrifying, and when I saw the same kid beating on his peers time and time again, I just grabbed him.
He was a textbook example of an abuse and neglect victim, his only known method of communicating with others was through violence, as Im sure is the case in his home. But irascible Joaquim and I made a good pair. Oftentimes all a naughty child needs is some positive enforcement of positive values. I stood behind him, clasping his arms to his sides and making him dance, for truly, this was the only way to stop him from continually stabbing (with his pen), punching or kicking the children next to him. They all knew his ways and his temper with its 1\2 inch fuse. They would provoke him and run, fast, or respond to his provocation in kind, because just like him, that is all they have ever known. But my recognition of his existence in a positive way, dancing, hugging, even just the mere physical pressure from someone who visibly has his and his peers best interests at heart, plus the fact that this someone was a bit of a celebrity, new, and white and old but much older, all this combined to have him playing soccer, and even sitting and talking with the other children in a totally decent, non-violent, productive, normal way. It was incredible, seeing him go from seriously wailing on everyone in sight to calmly playing ball and sitting in the park with them... Probably one of the more rewarding achievements of my life, and one i´ll definitely remember.
He came to visit me the next day and we talked and drank juice and he actually picked up my phone from where I had dropped it and returned to me without anyone asking, a big deal for someone whos families wages from an entire month might not equal what this phone cost, and I bought it here for only 34 dollars.

The town inspired me, the next day some vols and I went down to the river and crossed it in a tiny boat, walked through the fields on a little insect safari, as we jokingly called it, and said hello to the solitary man living in the bitty power station who operated the two tiny turbines and managed the flow of water and power.
So this town has become my alternate possibility. I am going to visit the school tomorrow and ask them if they might not want a volunteer to help teach english and maybe start an after school theatre program.... (!!!) and then I´ll ask around for a host family. There are several there, the program bringing the immenently arriving English is housing them in Manhiça and I have several Moçambican friends with relatives there.
Hopefully it will work and I will work there during the week and come into town for the weekends and such... It really is a beautiful place with parks and the river and it has a vey relaxed ambience that is rather difficult to find here in this city of five million.

I still feel a bit as though my world has been shaken, I was really and truly in love with those kids, and I miss them so much already. This change opens up many options for me, but I was happy with my job, and could have put up with the family, no problem. Really I just feel sorry for my family, they are all so unhappy so much of the time..... From cholera to cinema, the world is burning people!!! Wake up!!! somebody hit the lights and find the hose and when the fire is out, what will we have lost? What parts will we rebuild and what must we change?
The ever confrontable questions still remain. What are we doing here? What truly matters? Is our manner of existing now wrong or just the fate of a self-destructive species? Should it be left alone, that we may complete our downward spiral and allow the world to re-emerge again without our evolutionary mistake? What the heck is a quark anyways and what good does it do? And for Christs sake. Where on EARTH does the other sock go?????????????????????


:) beijos para tudos,

love you and miss you,

Allie

p.s. pictures soon!!!