There is no concise way to outline everything that has happened in the time since my last post so rather than trying I am going to finally give y’all an idea what a typical day in my life here in Marrupa looks like followed by a photo dump from the last 2 months and of course ending with a little request.
A weekday:
5-6:00 – Wake up. Now that winter is over it gets light (and therefore hot) earlier so I tend to be up before 6
6-8:00 – Workout. If I get up early enough I like to start my days with runs but if it’s already too hot for that or if I just can’t bear the thought of leaving my house that morning I’ll try to do something active.
8-9:00 – Breakfast. 90% of the time it’s an egg sandwich, and once it’s midweek and I run out of bread I stop eating breakfast :p
9-11:00 – Chores and Preparing for class. There is always some sort of cleaning that needs to happen (dishes, sweeping, just general organizing, etc.) and this is usually the time I spend lesson planning as well. Sometimes I have visitors or I make a quick trip to the market during this time as well if I’m low on food.
11-12:00 – Bathing, getting dressed, packing up for class. Usually forgetting (or being too lazy) to eat and then spending all afternoon hungry.
12:00 – At noon I usually head over to school. It’s a short walk but I like to be there early so I can get in the teaching/Portuguese speaking mindset.
12:15 – Concentraҫão, which is like the opening ceremony to start the school day. We sing the National Anthem and then there is time for announcements. On particularly hot days we don’t do this cause the students start to pass out.
12:30 – First period. Remember that in the afternoon only 8th and 9th graders have class (7:00-12:00 is for 10th, 11th, and 12th), so this is when my school day starts but other teachers (including my sitemate) have classes in the morning. My schedule is slightly different every day but for the most part I’m usually at school from 12-17. Most of my classes are 45 minutes long but each of my turmas has one double block a week so it’s a 90 minute class instead. I have a total of 19 teaching hours a week which is about average among PCVs. Once I’m done with class I’m free to go home and if a teacher doesn’t show up sometimes I can get my teaching done early.
17:30 – Cook dinner. Depending on the day of the week, this is usually rice and beans (or lentils) or pasta. Right now lettuce is in season so I eat a lot of salad as well.
18:30-20:00 – Once it’s dark I lock up my house and settle in for some decompression time. I journal, talk to friends, and watch TV shows until bed which is usually around 20 or 21.
Then I wake up the next day and do it all again! Of course this is just the average of what happens, sometimes I’ll visit a friend and end up staying at their house all morning, or just need a break and watch 5 episodes of Law and Order SVU instead of doing my chores. In general this is the schedule that I have found makes me the happiest and sanest. Weekends are pretty different – we have our library program, do a big market trip, I usually have a ton of students over for English or Math tutoring, I visit friends, do laundry, get my grading done, talk to people back home, and in general mentally prepare for the week.
As promised here are a bunch of pictures highlighting the last couple weeks in no particular order –
Celebrated my 24th year, and my second birthday in country
Went on an incredible trip to the beautiful mountain town of Gurue in the province of Zambezia
Had another visa trip to SA and got to reunite with some far away friends in Maputo
Cailee’s English Theater Group came in first place in our provincial competition for the second year in a row. Lotsa pressure for me next year
Made some banana bread to celebrate some adorable 1 year old’s birthdays. Probably top 5 best days I’ve had here in Marrupa and if you want to hear more about it, text me it’s a great story.
These are the highlights, and in all honesty if I were to make the list of the lowlights over the past 2 months it would be a much longer list. But in the grand scheme of things, life is good. I’m settled in here and have plenty to look forward to as we wrap up our first year teaching and get ready for vacation.
Finally, as usual, I’m going to end with a request. I realize that my life here is pretty foreign to most of y’all back home and while I think I’ve done a pretty good job of giving you a snapshot of my experience, I think it’s pretty interesting to compare and contrast my situation to those in other PC countries and sectors. Therefore, in the next couple months I will be enlisting the help from some of my PCV friends in other countries to be featured here as guest bloggers. My idea is to collect questions from my friends and family who read this blog and then have these lovely volunteers to answer them. So, if you have a question you’ve been dying to ask, send it my way. It would be best if these questions were more general (aka not Mozambique specific) but whatever you want to know, I want to answer! I’m hoping to publish this blog sometime around the New Year to mark my first year of service so you’ve got a couple months to send me any inquires you’ve got!
Hope you’re all looking forward to the Saints taking down the Giants tonight and the return of hockey season this week!
Love Always,
A
Alli Está Allí 