Crazy Markets & the First Ever Youth Conference‏

Hey kids,
   Well, your ol' Ma is pooped! This past week has been a wringer - a fun wringer though...

 
    Tuesday, after my English class, the Relief Society President from the Beira branch was waiting for me to talk to me 'privately.' Turns out, she wants to start a business and asked if I knew someone that would want to invest money in it. Hmm....., no. Bless her heart.....it took like 15 minutes for me to decipher what she was saying and figure out how to answer her without hurting her feelings.             
   I finally got home, made dinner, and then one of the kids that I'm helping apply to BYU - HI called to get help with his essay. I noticed that all three of their essays had just come through on my email, so I asked if all of them were together. He said yes, so I talked to each of them one at a time and edited their essays over the phone.  Felt like I was talking to you guys with your papers, but they were harder to communicate with.....;)

      Wednesday, Dad and Larry went to help pickup bananas - almost 900 pounds - for the YM/YW Youth Conference that was that weekend.

  That left Sandi and I without a truck and we needed to get some things for the Conference, so we did something that we have been wanting to do - we took chapela ride to Maquinino, the big, crazy market that I did the wedding shopping at with Isabel last week. The chapelas are a little dangerous because they are so small and the drivers here are pretty reckless. We've seen a few get clobbered by cars. But they look so fun - like the the pedicabs in New York! We hiked out to the main street, and walked along until we saw one coming, and flagged him down. We took a video of the street while we were driving.  They sound like a Go-Ped but go pretty fast.  

  Me and Sandi with Tito

 

 After we shopped at the market, we went looking for tangerines. We passed a butcher shop that the Dilles had bought some ribs at and decided to go in and buy some.

 

  I cooked them in the crockpot. They weren't Costco ribs but we thought they were delicious! Anything resembling food from home is a big treat!!

 
    Thursday, Dad agreed to go to the Go-To market with me to buy some jeans because I needed some to wear to the youth conference. This place is nutty! Suffice it to say that we were the only muzungos (white people) in the whole market and got our share of stares. The first jeans I fond were out on the street - laying in the street - and I didn't have anywhere to try them on. Dad suggested the car because it was close, so I went in there. While I'm trying them on, other sellers are coming up to the window and holding up their jeans. So much for privacy......

    When I got out of the car to see how they fit and show Dad, a group of guys gathered around to tell me that they looked good. They were Armani jeans but they were kind of big so we said 'no thanks' and went inside the market. After walking around, I found some jeans that I thought might fit me and I asked the guy if he could come out of his stall so I could go in and try the jeans on. I just kind of ducked down behind the jeans that were hanging up. I found 2 pair that I thought would work and we paid the guy the muzungo price of $5.00 each. We told him that we knew that was the tourist price but it was his lucky day and we would go ahead and pay it. 

    We looked for a new ball cap for Dad because his has gotten moldy from the humidity but we couldn't find any.

 

    Friday was the big day - the first day of the first EVER Youth Conference in Mozambique. Super big event for them here!! The kids had to earn 500 metacaiz ($18) and it was so hard for them. And they had to be active and enrolled in seminary.  Boy, were they all excited!! It was an experience unlike anything that they've ever had. Workshops, dinners, a dance, making a group flag and cheer, etc. Of course, this is Africa so things are different - like two of the leaders brought their toddlers with them. I thought "Holy cow! How's she gonna participate, much less watch over the girls, with a baby." But they're so used to having them with them and if they cried, they put them on their back in a capalana. One of the toddlers was a busy one and walked all around the room during testimony meeting on our last day, but oh well, at least the leader was there.

A workshop with President Kretly:

 

Wearing their matching t-shirts that were donated by Eyes for Zimbabwe, the humanitarian group run by the 3 LDS women golfers.  The shirts are probably their favorite thing and they'll wear them until they fall apart.  We'll see them at church for a long time....

 

 
Sports:

 

This was dinner the first night - matapa (a plant that they boil with coconut milk and tomatoes) & rice & fish, complete with the head....:0

 

 Me and Sis. Kretly with the gang

 
 After dinner the kids took showers and they showed videos of Mormon Messages that each branch had made. Some of the branches didn't have a way to videotape it, so they just acted it out for the group. They had fun with that! Then they had a dance, which was a highlight for them because they are a rare thing here.

 

     Saturday started at 8:00 am with an exercise class taught by.......me. The leader that was going to do it got sick, so they asked me to fill in the night before. Erin, your music saved my bacon!!! I stayed up til 1:00 am listening to the CDs and picking the songs to use. They had told me that the class started at 9:00 am but at midnight on Friday, Sis. Kretly called and said it was at 8:00 am. Oh Africa..... It was a 45 minute drive to the camp so it was a short night.  Yawn!! 

 

   After class, was breakfast - bread with bologna - and then we played games. We divided them up into six groups and had six stations set up with a different game at each place. We did a balloon toss, an egg relay, sack race (with rice sacks), human pretzel, pass the string on a spoon down the shirt, and a three-legged race. 

    Generally, the people here are kind of quiet and reserved but we saw another side during the games. They are VERY COMPETITIVE!!! I was in charge of the egg relay and it was tricky to keep track of them because they would run along side the person walking yelling at them to hurry. When I declared one team the winner, the other team argued with the them and tried to tell me that they hadn't won - every single time. Imagine 30 people yelling at you in Portuguese trying to tell you why they were the winners, and not the other team. Yeah, it was intense!! 

    The first time I tried to sort it out, but I quickly realized that it was impossible, so for the rest of the groups I just put my fingers in my ears, smiled, and let them holler at each other. Then I said "You're all winners. It's just for the fun it." That worked, sort of, except one time when a team said started booing when I said that. Haha!!!  They were terrible sports but it was kind of funny. It was a workout for me too because I had to run from one end to the other to make sure that they didn't touch the egg when they passed it and that they stayed behind the line. I'm telling you - they were playing for keeps!!

  

Them arguing, me refereeing - well, trying to....

 

   Dad doing the sack races. When I told him how hard my relay was and asked how his was, he said it was easy because he declared the winner as soon as somebody started before they were supposed to - and every group had somebody that started too soon. His races were short.....;)

 

 After dinner that night, we had a campfire and roasted marshmallows which was a new experience for them. They loved the marshmallows!!

 

   Then they were all blind-folded, joined hands, and were led to a rope that they were told to hold onto no matter what. 

 

  Leaders were on one side telling them to come away and on the other side telling them to hold on firmly. The rope led to the "Tree of Life", a tree we'd decorated with Christmas lights and marshmallows in little bags representing the sweet and delicious 'fruit' of the tree. 

      It was really good and really effective but a few of the leaders got a little too theatrical (another surprise) and scared the bajeebies out of some girls - and boys too. The girls were crying because they were spooked by it all and some boys and girls refused to move down the rope. These are 14+ yr old teenagers but they've never experienced anything like it before. In the U.S., we grow up with Halloween, haunted houses, amusement parks, and spook alleys. We understand the concept of fantasy. They've never seen those things and live in a place where witch doctors, witches, and curses are part of their culture  and believed to be real. So, it was all very real to them. 

    I had to run interference and tell some of the leaders to tone it down, and then talk to the girls and guide them to the end. The actions of some of the leaders was kinda crazy....they really got into the dramatic part and kinda missed the real objective. Oh well, it was a first time/new experience for them too. 

    After everybody eventually got to the tree, they took off their blindfolds and the District President talked to them. 

 

   We got home about midnight - totally beat! 

 

    Sunday, we headed back for church. They had Sacrament Meeting, then classes, and then  a testimony meeting. The kids were racing each other down to bear their testimony. They finally had to tell them that we were out of time and nobody else could come down.

   Here's the Mia-Maid class:

It was a long but fun week!! 

Love you guys lots and lots and LOTS!!!!  ~Mummy(I'm reading a British mystery right now....;)