After a fun-packed month at home, people kept asking if I was excited to go back to Mozambique. I won’t lie, “excited” isn’t the word I’d use. When I was headed home to America, I was EXCITED. There were lots of people I was looking forward to seeing, food I wanted to eat, places to go, couches to sit on…. But coming back, not so much. Especially since I’m coming back to a house that is not yet a ‘home’ and a new village where I don’t really know anyone. I wasn’t dreading coming back, but I wasn’t super pumped to come back to a life of dirty feet, no bed, and a house populated by far more lizards that people.
I will say that between the Delta SkyClub in Atlanta (thanks Aunt Suzanne!), the 16 hour international flight, and the hotel in South Africa, I encountered more free wine than I thought was possible. “Well, this isn’t so bad at all” I was thinking… I could get used to this! And then I landed in Mozambique. Bum bum bummm! That’s when the crazy hit me like a ton o’ bricks.
My first stop was our old house. I had promised the other family that lived on our farm I’d come see them as soon as I landed. Plus, they’ve been watching Olive. I figured that between the other 2 cats and 11 dogs (more puppies!), I should get her off their hands. That part of the day was greattt! The farm is so green and beautiful right now. Antonia and I sat out under a mango tree and caught up on the past month. If that had been the end of the trip, I would have been a happy girl. I really liked Moatize – and I would have been perfectly happy to have stayed there (minus one little detail, of course).
I picked up all types of veggies in the market, and some of my South African friends came to pick up me and Olive to take us to Cateme. It took us foreverrr to figure out how to tie my bags on the top of their truck (at which point I was questioning if I really needed to bring back a muffin tin and a magic bullet blender…too late for that thought lol!)
Once we finally got to Cateme, Olive (maybe I should have clarified earlier, Olive is a cat) and I arrived to a house full of bug and spider webs. Also, droppings from what must be GIANT lizards – which I have yet to see. Ok, I thought. Just need to sweep out this house, take a shower, and I’ll unpack tomorrow. Well, apparently the water had already been turned off for the day, so showering was out of the question (very unfortunate considering the state of my hair and 100 degree heat). Then I realized that in the midst of vegetable shopping, I had failed to buy toilet paper. Awesome. Which then reminded me that Olive’s litter box was locked in Helen’s room. Now I was starting to freak out a little. I decided my best plan of action was to just go to sleep and figure it out in the morning. I locked Olive in the bathroom with a makeshift litter box and plopped down on my floor bed (which is just a mattress on a the floor…so fancy). A few minutes later, I got up to make sure the doors were locked and noticed something roughly 9 inches long and the width of one of those giant sharpie markers. Stick? I thought. Um nope, I didn’t bring any sticks in with me. Snake?! (panic.) Well I jumped over it to get to a light switch and came face to face (?) with the most giant millipede slash bug I’ve ever seen. Half a can of bug spray later and that sucker was dead. Being the professional that I am, I left it on the floor to be dealt with the next day.
SO. Here I am. I’ve been awake since 3 am waiting on the sun to come up and the water fairy to switch on the water in my house. Today, I will remove the giant dead bug, access the Olive situaton, find toilet paper, and attempt to unpack. Also on the list: find a bed (I’d like to be as far from giant bugs and lizards as possible….aka, not sleeping on the floor). I’ll keep you posted!
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