I am catching myself smiling more often…

So it has been 5 months that I have survived Maputo and I can honestly say I have even surprised myself.  It helps that I am working with children every day and I feel blessed that I have been given the gift to work and help children with all abilities.  I have been writing and running educational programs for a Holiday Club, the moms & toddlers program and the Alphabet Soup Literacy workshop and I have even surprised myself how the creative ideas are flowing out like I have stroked the fountain of youth.  I am not myself until I work or get to be around children, it is the greatest blessing to be around the smartest people on this world.  Every time, I travel to a new place I notice the children’s spirits and how they are getting along there and I thought that New York Manhattan streets were full of some of our best but I am really starting to fall in love with the kids here too.  They are so mature for there years and so calm.  I have met a few little ones that I would like to adopt for sure… 

I bought her some clothes and I allow her to come to the library every chance I can and I try to teach her everything I can from spelling her name to labeling colors.  My love lives with her grandmother and I thought she was going to be very upset when I bought the clothes but she wasn’t she was very happy and grateful indeed.

So I have been at the Library for the last few months running programs for toddlers and children from ages 4 to 11years of age.  It has been a very busy month and exciting at the same time.  I instantly fell in love with all the children coming to the programs and at first I was working with 3 teachers from Zimbabwe, Africa.  They started to come to the school intermittently and then it became an issue of how they spoke to the children when the children were not listening or just bored with the program.  They used words like “punish and naughty or bad boy or girl” then the topic of “beating” children came up.  One teacher told me "That our cultures are very different and in your culture you just hit kids but in the Africa culture they "beat" children to teach them a good lesson." This was said with pride and my response was “Why do you beat kids here what does it accomplish, all your teaching children when you “beat” them is that violence is ok." Then I added, "I wonder if Gandhi and Nelson Mandela thought the same way that violence is ok to instill in our children?"  The teacher just responded with silence and what I really wanted to say was, yes our cultures our different but I am here volunteering in your culture not the other way around.  All 3 teachers eventually stopped coming to teach at the school and that left just me and a wonderful, loyal Zimbabwean assistant who has been with the school for many years.  It was hard work but we managed and the children seemed very happy and would chant my name when I would come in the mornings and jump all over me and hug me.  I tried very hard to individually program plan for each child because we would have no more than 8 children at majority of the times.  I was very tired but I loved it!!!  It is not uncommon here to discover that teachers do not even like children here, it's a job and low paying too.

Things I am learning about the culture are interesting but some things are so international, it is just really about viewpoint whether your right side up in Africa or upside down in North America.  For instance, relationships here are very funny, women and men both cheat, men are more flamboyant about it while women are more hidden about it.  People do not seem to have any close-minded issues about love being monogamous however the desperation for having any type of relationship still doesn’t reside within me.  The women here are still treated very unequal in relationships.  My Portuguese friends back home have the best saying “Its better to be alone than to be in bad company: Amen.

I think I am actually getting use to the streets and the broken sidewalks and the beautiful beaches and scenery available to me.  A lot of people really like Maputo and Mozambique because it has a lot more freedom then other places in Africa.  People here are lot more free spirited and open minded in comparison to cultures where white and black people do not even dare to mix. 

I went to South Africa for a Kundalini Women’s Health Yoga Retreat/Workshop for the weekend.  I went with some other teachers and students and I can honestly say it was a slice of heaven.  We stayed at a country estate and the yoga studio was on the same estate was so beautiful and the women Claudia sharing her home to all 10 women plus the Yogi was amazing.  The little homes were on a land so expansive and full of nature.  There was bird watching on the grounds and I have always wanted to participate in it.  I know a lot of people do not know that about me but its true maybe it comes from growing up with a father that loves bird and tried at times to capture and tame a few wild ones.  It is also quite spiritual to be a follower and an energy sender to birds it becomes profound at times that you cannot even explain it in words.  While staying on this estate I saw an owl, many, many colorful birds (one day I will know their names), hawks, guinea foul, deer’s (doe), antelope, and a monkey while we were driving on the road.  

South Africa is so beautiful and picturesque and home to Krueger Park (a safari where you can see all kinds of animals-my next destination) and has food, stores, shops, clothing etc.  A little civilization that is good for the eyes and soul.  I do have to admit though you do miss Mozambique and just thought of anyone wearing a capalana in South Africa has you eschew from embarrassment.  It is known that South Africans do not seem to like Mozambicans they were many killings of Mozambicans in South Africa a few years ago because of issues like Mozambican taking jobs and not being clean.  So they decided to start fighting racism with more racism.  Racism exits with whites and blacks and blacks with other blacks.  It exists in every culture within every race, skin color, sex and gender and abilities vs. disabilities.  

So back in Mozambique, we decided to take a little tour of the Salt Lake in an outside borough where they make salt and have a little salt factory and also they are flamingos that reside nearby.  Also, part of the tour was a visit to a local artists home and have lunch there.

So I will be starting a Babies & Mom Yoga program at the school this coming week for the next 8 weeks because the kiddies are back in school and the Holiday Program does not begin until November, December and January again. 

I must admit too that I am completely and utterly homesick too.  I miss my life and wonderful friends and family surrounding me but for now I am at my present and I have to go deeper into my journey of self.  This is what it is all about the people you meet along the way and the getting raw with your true self and so far so good.

I had to take a picture of this boat at Catembe it had my mom's name on it ESTER.

Love & Light to ALL of you ALWAYS and please send white light, mantras, meditations and prayers my way and send love to all the people that I may be able to help here.

Beautiful Tofo Beach

So I was able to visit one of the best surfers beaches I have ever seen Tofo Beach a few weekends ago and I am still in awe of what I saw and experienced.  There are places to stay right on the beach but all the places are very eco friendly, very natural settings and they work beautifully syncing with the environment like a sonnet.  It will be my mission here to learn how to surf, it looks like such a peaceful thing to do ride the waves when you can actually get it right and when you don’t get it right you constantly have to get back up and try and try again.