I’m sitting in my bed writing this blog post and playing music and I can hear giggling…lots of giggling. My bed is pushed up against my window and as I peer out around my capulana sheet/curtain I see 4 little criancas laughing and trying to listen to the wonderful sounds of Wagon Wheel (yes Shane, I know you’d be so proud). So I am back in Vanduzi and it is nice to be home but let me tell you all about my trip!
I left site on a Saturday morning, met up with old sitemate from Guija in Maputo and the two of us spent the weekend at a friend, Mindy’s house before I headed out to Europe. Just a side-note, this was my first time back in Maputo after 7 months and boy was it weird! Driving from the airport into the city was more than overwhelming, I forgot how weird a city skyline looks like…and there were so many cars! Luckily, Mindy lives on the outskirts of the city, near the fish market (a quieter area) so aside from a walk in town to the craft market for some souvenir shopping I was able to avoid the chaos of the city. Although I forgot how crazy it can be just to physically be in a city again it was cool to be in Maputo right before my trip because I could compare European cities to it, and it also helped lessen the initial culture shock of seeing buildings that were more than two or three stories tall.
After a weekend in Maputo I set out on my journey to Europe. I flew to Johannesburg and from there got a direct flight to Paris. In Paris I spent one day alone wandering the city, shopping, going into beautiful churches, sitting in random parks/squares people-watching and of course eating some delicious food (yes I did in fact go to the chipotle in Paris for my first real meal!) I ended my first day in Paris with a “picnic dinner” of a mozzarella, tomato and basil on a baguette, a delicious peach and a glass (or two!) of cheap, good, red wine on the balcony of my hotel room where I sat watching the busy train station and reading the most recent issue of the economist. After the sunset (around 9:30 PM) I collapsed in my bed, which felt like sleeping in the clouds, and slept so wonderfully!
The next morning I met up with my family (and the Muhlenberg basketball team players and family members) and we embarked on an 8-day trip through France, Germany, Belgium and the Nethlerlands. In the course of 8 days I got to see so many historically important/famous tourist spots I stopped keeping count of them. In Paris I marveled at the size of the Notre Dame, in the louvre I admired works by Luise Jaques David, I watched the sunset from the Eiffel tower, stood under the triumval arch and was essentially star struck by the amount of detail/beauty and gold that went into constructing the Palace of Versailles. I also did some shopping, drank red wine with my mom and got lost in the endlessly changing, winding alleyways of Paris. It was wonderful.
(jacques louis david aka one of my favorite artists!)
After 3 days in Paris, we traveled to Valkenburg where we would stay for the next 5 days. From this small border town in the Netherlands we did day trips into Germany and Brussels, as well as towns in the Netherlands. Although I loved Paris this part of the trip was much more enjoyable to me. Aside from Amsterdam and Brussels (both of which I loved!) the towns we visited were smaller, and there was a significantly less amount of tourists which is always a relief when you’re used to living alone in a small African village :) Instead of detailing all the places I traveled to (you’ll just have to check my pictures on facebook) I will write about my favorites. In Cologne, my family and I sat in a beautiful, open square and ate lunch while people-watching and enjoying the local craft beer (which was likely my favorite brew of the trip!). I also found a tiny hole-in-the-wall Lebanaese restaurant and bought falafel. After lunch we wandered to the more touristy area and I found a DUNKIN DONUTS. So excited, I got real iced coffee.
(hanging out at a bar in Vaalkenburg with my dad and Morgan)
Also in Germany, we went to a small vineyard, which was adorable. The vineyards are so neat in Germany because the grapes are grown on these huge hills that are so steep they almost resemble a cliff. I wondered how it was possible to actually pick and harvest the grapes, but the wine was good and the view was magnificent.
We also went to a small town called Aachen, which had the most beautiful church (in my opinion) out of the whole trip. Outside the church resembled any other large, medieval cathedral, but inside it was covered in mosaics reminiscant of Byzantine culture/similar to the style in Istanbul. It was so pretty!
In the Netherlands, we traveled to another town, Maastricht, where although it was rainy and cold it was also probably one of my favorite days. it was the one day, where we were not with our tour group for the entire day. We had no schedule and could do whatever. This of course resulted in shopping and some really great food. Also in the Netherlands, we went to Amsterdam and that city was just so cool! I wish I had more time there because it seemed like such a neat, fun, free-spirited place but even a few hours in the afternoon were better than nothing. We ended our day there at the Heinekin brewery where I teased my dad for not finishing his beer fast enough (which resulted in me getting his second beer) and us both agreeing that the Heinekin actually tastes good when you drink it at the brewery.
In Belgium, we just spent a few hours in Brussels, which I’m really glad we got to do. The city has a beatuful square, with buildings trimmed in gold and decorated with intricate designs and statues. We ate delicious Belgian waffles and also drank some good beer at the delirium café. Yum.
So overall, I know it sounds like all I did was shop and eat and look at pretty historical things…and maybe that is true but because we were with a large tour group it was difficult to do things outside of the allotted schedule. This was frustrating at first, being myself, I wanted to wander aimlessly in every city and go into every possible museum/historical building but that of course wasn’t possible, there simply wasn’t enough time. A few days into the trip I decided that instead of being frustrated with the lack of time to see all these things/places, I should view the tour part of my trip as a preview of Europe; a quick taste of each city so I could decide if I wanted to return one day…and instead of focusing on the lack of time to do everything and see everything I just enjoyed the time I had with my family and it was wonderful! It was so nice to tell stories, hear about home, drink beer with my dad, giggle and shop with my mom and gossip with Morgan. I still can’t believe it will be 16 or 17 more months until I see them again—sure you guys don’t want to visit me here? And Nikki, believe when I say you were definitely missed.
After 8 days with the family I said my goodbyes and traveled to Bologna in Italy to meet up with a good friend from college, Joanna, who was starting her first year of graduate school (at SAIS) abroad. Traveling to Bologna was exactly what I needed in-between the eurotrip and return to moz because it was so much more relaxed. I got to enjoy all the amenities of the developed world without feeling guilty for sleeping in, or going for a run because it would mean I was missing out on doing something else. Joanna and I explored her city (which is awesome! Bologna is an old medieval town that somehow missed out on the architectural revolution of the renaissance, resulting in lots of small, narrow winding alleyways, plenty of arched, built up buildings that you can’t see over into the next street, and lots of old churches) maybe I didn’t do justice to how cool the town is but there are plenty of pictures to prove it. So Joanna and I explored town, went hiking in the hills outside of town, and traveled to Venice (which was so cool!!!) we also ate really good pizza, plenty of gelato and drank wine that was made right there in Bologna. We also got to catch up and swap stories from our past year in Africa (Joanna was in Benin so it was neat comparing West Africa culture to Moz). It was really fun.
VENICE.
(the old streets of bologna!)
After two whole weeks in Europe, I packed my bags (full of new clothes, non-perishable food, and some cool gifts from my family) and boarded the plane back to Africa. I spent another two days in Maputo and then traveled back to Vanduzi. At the Chimoio airport I was reminded of the culture here when my Mozambican friend who agreed to give me a ride back to site arrived 2 ½ hours late (even though when I called him to tell him my flight landed he said he was just arriving at the airport) and while waiting for my friend to come I couldn’t buy water because the guy at the airport had no change….I was definitely sad to leave Europe so soon and was not feeling too excited to return to site but as my driver pulled up to my house there were 5 kids jumping up and down yelling “OLA AMIGA!!!!” and shortly after I was greeting with a warm welcome from some colleagues at school and a student who ran up to my house to shake my hand and welcome me back. Teaching my first lessons in 3 weeks yesterday also reminded me how much I enjoy living here. I won’t stay here forever but I am happy that I have another year left in Vanduzi. After a very much-needed break in Europe I am ready to jump back into school and try to do some good work in my wonderful little village in Mozambique.
The most surprising things from my trip back into the west (as culture shock)
-how beautiful every single building is. In Europe people construct things that are aesthetically pleasing…in Africa they just build them
-how nice it is to walk around at night and feel safe (note-its safe in my village but walking around at night is a huge no-no)
-that people can drink in public in a casual way…and not be wasted by 2pm
-how pretty, no wait, beautiful and well-fed the dogs are
-how peculiar Americans are about drinking bottled water
-how “skimpy” some people really dress
-how frustrating it is NOT to know how to greet people in their native language; in Paris this wasn’t much of a problem because most people didn’t stop and acknowledge you when you were walking down the street but in smaller towns it was so frustrating! I resorted to just greeting people in Portuguese while I was in italy---hey it’s a romance language I think they got it?
-similar to that previous post, how wonderful it was to finally BLEND IN AGAIN and not be stared at (and yelled at and noticed) by every single person everywhere…it was fantastic!
and just how wonderful it is to have delicious food (and real coffee) available at any hour of the day in pretty much any town I traveled too regardless of how large or small it was!
And there are probably more but those are the most memorable aside from the fact that I thought every single person’s outfit was fashionable and cute and I wanted to buy everything in ever store, so much for not caring about fashion?
Sorry this post was so long…but it has been 4 weeks?!
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