all in all i have to say that today was pretty amazing. the other day i was chatting with papa jim taylor and he told me very emphatically, “we love it here." it shows in everything that they do. their home is always open, they never grumble or complain, they love their lives here. and you can tell. i want to be like that. i DO love my life here and i am quick to tell you about it. i am also quick to complain about the lack. all the lack. and the reptiles. rodents. lack of water. mold. stinkin’ poverty. but i want to be the kind of person who loves. i do think less and less about “home”and, other than friends and family, i don’t miss much. i used to pine away for the South somethin’ awful,tear stained Southern Living magazines, but even that has waned a little. it’s all perspective and attitude. and it’s not my perspective or attitude, but God’s. He loves this place too and that’s why He sent me here. so as i step into my new place of revelation and am embracing all that He has for me here, I have to say this day was a record day. it is the type of day missionaries write about in their newsletters.
the sewing school is going incredibly well. i have big plans for it and see the potential for it to grow. it makes me smile just thinking about it. wednesday, my three female employees got Baptized in the Indian Ocean!i was so honored to be a part of that. i am blown away at the transformation of these women. i wish you could be here to see our school. we meet in an outdoor gazebo, with extension cords all over the place. every student pitches in and assumes their roles as they sew away. they iron and rip out and sew and stitch and speak Makua so fast. and they laugh. i show them pictures and the Etsy site and they are in awe. they don’t use cloth napkins. some don’t sit at tables. most sit on rope beds and eat with their hands. so table runners are foreign but they are amazed by them. and the sell of one could provide them with rent for a month. yep. if we can create a product line that can sell somewhere even kinda remotely big and we can sell 6 runners a month, we can help them tremendously. it is such a feasible business proposal. so all day long i am running it all around in my head. (along with the scrutiny of wardrobe choices. see previous entry).
after i left Galeria dos Sonhos i went out to Kauri to check on our Vocational School students doing internships at Kauri (The Indian Restaurant). it is a dumpy little place with a view that will take your breath away. as soon as i drove up i saw our boys in their white and black (thanks to Mana Andrea for traipsing all over the village to find black pants. btw, Zito has requested a new belt), goofing off out front as they changed shifts with the other boys. Luis, the gentle giant, was wearing a pale green eyelet Baby’s cap. where he found it i want to know. he was in street clothes because he works in the kitchen. he told me he’d learned to make hamburgers. he may as well have said coq au vin. i beamed. then rofy and henrique greeted me, standing so tall and proud. henrique asked me for curtains in his house because he said he gets cold at night. rofy told me the evening staff isn’t nice to him and they only let him watch and not do. “how am i ever going to learn anything if they don’t let me do anything?", he sounds so identical to me i have to smile. nobody likes to be pushed around, including Rofy. “sister grace. i think you need to find me another internship at another hotel next month after this one is over." “i will look into that rofy. in the mean time, bring me a menu." i ordered a large water and sat by the sea and shook my head. it’s all happening. all because i said yes. because of nothing that i have done of my own will or my own ability. the boys got these internships all because i wanted pancakes and i brought them to Kauri for us to eat them. and out of that a little internship arises and Andrea and Tim come along and share the labor and it’s happening.
Fran came along because God said, “Go." now we are running a sewing school and a shop and people have jobs and i am shaking my head again. it was easy, coming here and living. and it was so so so the hardest thing i have ever done. kinda like childbirth maybe. you don’t think about the pain, you just see the good and you just smile and look at it adoringly.
i’ve told you already about my little card on my vanity in my sister’s handwriting on Robert Brown Interior Design stationary. it was written at the cabin the day before i left. “Counting Down the Days until July 17." that date has come and gone and i am still here. in the little house with mold and no running water. but wait, i am not supposed to complain. i couldn’t leave in July, it was way too soon and we had too many things going on and there was no way I could abandon it all. so an impromptu and completely surreal trip to South Africa granted me another few months here. if my visa will permit, i would like to stay until November. i can spend more time with Liz and Tim and show them everything i know as i begin to train them in the area of Vocational Training Pemba style.
So the long range planner in me has to have dates and a calendar and that is absolutely as far as it goes, November-ish. Visa permitting, IRS permitting (i filed for an extension), rental house permitting (it needs a new roof), Georgia Department of Labor filing mistakes permitting (they think i worked a job i didn’t). All those demands from “home” will have to wait. We’re busy changing the world over here in Mozambique.
PS. i got to talk to Laura and Betty today. Laura seemed a little shocked to hear my voice and Betty even got a little annoyed and hung up on me because the call wasn’t going through. it was funny to hear them finally recognize it was ME, but also kinda sad, they used to know my ring and answer with”I was hoping that was you." now we never get to talk. but we did this time and it was so beautiful to hear familiar voices, Laura was driving the mini van with babies in the back and Betty was in Belk. i’m too many miles away from Belk to even count. but not near as many miles away as from babies in the backseat.
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