Masana

The boys from Masana

August 1, was a great day, today we went to Masana, which is a home for street boys who have run away from home and live on the streets. It’s an awesome program, the people who work there work with the kids and families to find out why they ran away hoping that they can get back home and live with their families. So yesterday we had a little preview of the kids that we were going to see today. We went there to go and have a cultural experience by killing some chickens we would have for lunch with them today. It was a very different experience since it was pretty crazy to watch your eventual lunch die right in front of you, and I helped plucked one of the chickens, which was really weird, but oddly fun for me.

            

 Today was one of the best days I’ve ever experienced with the Masana Olympics we did today. So pretty much what we did was show up this morning as school started for them and we got all of our stuff and waited for school to end. Then once school ended we walked about a block up the street to a field that was all dirt. I was a little skeptical at first, especially since when we got there we saw three policeman walking off the field with AK47’s, but then I thought, when am I ever going to get to play soccer in a third world country with a bunch of street kids. So we played a couple of games, one of which was a game that was the Mozambiqueans vs. The Americans. This was a game in which every member of the team made the equivalent of a human knot and everyone had to pull the kids apart. When I sat down to get pulled apart I was thinking, this is going to be the dirtiest I’m ever going to be, and I’m wearing a white shirt. It turned out being a great time, and getting dirty and being able to roughhouse with some kids was a great change of pace today. Then after that we played soccer on this complete dirt field with rocks and glass, and half of the kids were shoeless with was crazy since I couldn’t imagine doing that. Playing on that dirt field was probably the most difficult thing I’ve ever one, but easily the most fun thing I’ve done, and I’d love to do that again. So around noon we went back to the home and we hung out for about an hour and played lots of different games, learned Portuguese, and roughhoused until lunch was served. When lunch was served we had chicken, rice, salad, and beets. The chicken which we had watch been killed yesterday, was so fresh and delicious, and the rice was so amazing, I’m not sure why but it wasn’t just the usual boring bland rice we usually think of.

            So after lunch we hung out for about an hour or so, then we had to leave and the goodbye was really difficult for me because even though I could only understand about two of the kids, it was one of the most fun filled days I’d ever had, and I want to go back there sometime. After that we went to a market that looked very similar to other markets we’d gone to, and at the end of that we parted with our good friend, Rafael. This was a really difficult goodbye since he had been so good to us, with translation, learning Portuguese, showing us around, and just having fun with us. He was a great friend who I’m going to miss and hope that he and his new fiancé do great things for themselves and everyone else they meet because I’m sure they will. After that we got a tour of downtown Maputo and went to an Old Portuguese fort, learned some of the history of Mozambique, and went to the Indian Ocean. It was a great day and will be one that I’m never going to forget.

-Pearce