A Christmas like no other…

This Christmas was wildly different from any other than I’ve ever had. Different, but good. It was my first Christmas in Africa, and my first away from Canada. I have made some great relationships with friends and families here so don’t feel sorry for me that I was away from home :) I thought maybe I’d give you all a little play-by-play, just so you get an idea of what Christmas in Mozambique is like…

December 24…

The day started off like most others do here- hot and extremely humid. All of our Christmas decorations (lights, little tree, nativity scene, advent calendar, etc) tried their best to convince us that it was indeed Christmas. By late afternoon a huge thunderstorm rolled in- just in time for the Christmas concert. It went from feeling like the 4th of July to Halloween in a few hours. The Christmas concert took place in the Church – the church has an A-frame roof, but is not fully enclosed- this led to an interesting evening…

The night started off with a group of the girls from the mission singing a few songs for everyone. As they were finishing up, the rain stopped. This resulted in a huge swarm of “flying ants”. During this season of famine, many of the Mozambicans live off of flying ants and mangos. The ants are quite large- the body is pretty fat and almost an inch long, with a two-inch wingspan. The ants come out after rains and are attracted to light -we’ve gotten used to sitting in the dark reading with flashlights :) So anyway, the ants were attracted to the fluorescent light by the thousands. When the girls finished, the next group of entertainment, the boys of the mission wanting to do a dance, went up the front (the dance floor was under the light). Although the boys didn’t seem to mind too much, I was terribly distracted by the dozens of crawling ants climbing up the boy’s shirt and swarming their heads. At one point in the night, the generator went off (and with it the light), and all of the ants swarmed the candles on the tables. At this point I temporarily lost composure and ran to the back of the church.

After the program, we had a delicious meal of potatoes, rice and beef stew. It was really good, and at this point it could have resembled a church potluck back home- with a few little differences. For example, the salt shaker at our table was a guy named Antonio who had a hand full of salt to which we helped ourselves. At the end of the night a couple ladies swept up all of the ants (lunch for the next day), and we headed home.

We came home to discover that the bunny that we are bunny-sitting , BunBun, was in a terrible state of convulsions on the floor (possibly bit by a scorpion?) . We kept a close eye on him for the evening, and asked the Lord to take him quickly. We were surprised to find a completely recovered BunBun the next day. A Christmas Miracle! Anyway, while we watched BunBun that night, we also opened a few presents, ate chocolate brownies, and sang “O Holy Night”.

December 25…

On Christmas morning we went over to one of our favorite families here- a family from Ireland who have been here for 16 years, and who run an elementary school for the local children. While at their house we had lovely pastries, hot chocolate, and got to open another present. We love to be at their house which is equipped with good food, a comfortable couch, and a nice mom and dad.

At about noon we headed off to the local prison. People from the mission go to visit the prisoners once a week, although this was the first time that I had gone. The prison was just one large room filled with about 60 young men. Carlos, my boss, brought his accordion along, and everyone enjoyed singing a few local songs- even the guard, who played his AK-47 like a guitar- this was slightly alarming. After the singing, one of the men gave a Christmas message, and food was handed out to all the prisoners. It was very sad to see the despair in these young men’s eyes, as well as sobering to think of how their Christmas was compared to ours.

When we got back from the Prison we had a nice lunch with Carlos and the family. Later that afternoon we had lovely cake and coffee at a Dutch family’s house- about 6 different kinds of cake, and a good opportunity to spend time with everyone who lives on the mission.

So, it was an interesting Christmas! I hope everyone back home had a great Christmas! I miss everyone and look forward to seeing you all when I get back in February! Merry Christmas (Feliz Natal)!