07/02/10

I spent the day just hanging out with the girls. A bunch of them congregated on my front porch to play games or get help with their English homework, so I played music for us from my room. When I told them that after lunch I wanted to nap some declared that they did too, so I brought my straw mat out into the shade and way too many girls piled on it to nap. When it became clear that I was actually going to sleep during this nap time though (probably made evident when I passed out), some of the girls became less enamored with the idea and wandered away while the rest of us enjoyed a nice nap.
Irmã Albertina told me she was taking the Italians (we have three Italian friends of the orphanage visiting right now) to see the river and asked if I wanted to go. I decided to tear myself away from the singing and dancing girls to see a new part of Inharrime I hadn’t yet discovered. We drove for about 30 minutes inland, much of it on a “road” that was simply two tire tracks in the sand. I kept wondering what would happen if we encountered another car, but luckily I didn’t have to find out. We finally arrived at a little resort tucked away on the Inharrime River. There are two docks that lead out into the river (which is huge! I had no idea) and a sandy beach with a collection of some incredibly exquisite stones. It was one of the most idyllic, peaceful places I have ever been in my life. On the way out I introduced myself to the Zimbabwean couple who live there and run things but don’t own it, it is actually owned by a South African. They came to Mozambique two years ago when the situation in Zimbabwe had reached its worst. The woman told me that often they had to Botswana to buy even simple things like sugar because the markets in Zimbabwe literally had nothing in them. And when stores did have things, the prices would double and triple within the same day. I told her I had read in an article that the inflation rate in Zimbabwe had been 1 million % at one point, and she said it all the way up to 250 billion %. Whatever that means, eventually the money simply has no value.
Bruno, the Italian man here visiting, who is probably in his 50s, apparently told his mother that he was going on a trip to a town in Italy. He said that her 86 year old heart wouldn’t have been able to handle the terror of knowing that her son was in Africa! Yesterday he called her and she asked if it had been cold (because it has in fact been cold in the town where he is supposed to have gone), and without thinking he responded “no it’s been really hot!”