A Conference and A Festival

Early-Mid July, we had another conference, this one about project development, planning and execution.  To attend the conference, we were asked to bring along a Mozambican counterpart, or colleague, from our community. 

I brought a professor named Shek.  Shek is actually originally from the Congo.  He worked with an NGO (non-governmental organization) in the Congo helping the Unaccompanied Children, primarily working to locate their own families or finding other families to take these kids in.  However, as a result of the civil unrest in the country, Shek was forced to flee the Congo and he and his family went to South Africa and then later Mozambique.  His wife and children were later permitted to reside in the USA, in Arizona, where Shek joined them four years later.  For personal reasons, Shek was forced to return to Africa while his wife and three daughters still live in Arizona.  Quite the crazy life this man has lived!

Anyways, Shek loved the conference and is eager to help me out with any projects around the Murrupula community.  We hope to soon begin work on establishing an English library/resource center/language center/student area (can you tell the plans are still in the idea phase?), so I will keep you all updated on that progress!

During this same week as our conference, Nampula city was the site of the 7^th annual National Cultural Festival in which people from every province gather together for dancing, food, art, and music.  Several stages were constructed around the city in various locations, somewhat like a county fair.  (Big stages, like normal American standards with huge sound systems, speakers, etc.)  From what I understand, groups first compete in local provincial competitions before they come to the national festival, and the government pays for all their travel and living expenses during the festival.

I unfortunately didn’t see any of the dance performances due to scheduling conflicts, but I did meander around the “food court” area where each province had some dishes special to their region, sampling a little of this kind of xima or a little of that kind of matapa.

There was also a big art festival set up in the pavilion nearby.  (I was also surprised to learn they had a big pavilion in the city – it is a huge stadium, the size of a basketball stadium.)  Here, vendors from each province displayed their artwork, wood carvings, jewelry, knick-knacks, paintings, etc.  I limited myself to buying a carved and painted wooden bowl with giraffes and elephants, a wooden mask, and a carved rhinoceros.  It was actually a pretty surprising and impressive event for our usually not so impressive, run-down Nampula city!

After an all too fast three week school break, the third trimester will be beginning soon and it’ll be back to actually having work to do again.  It’s hard to believe this school year is almost over!