Mozambique 2003
MENCAP PROJECT RENEW MOZAMBIQUE (May/June 2003)
RAISED THIS TRIP £3,012
CUMULATIVE TOTAL £6,724
After raising sponsorship for Mencap for a trekking expedition in Chile (see the Patagonia page) I then committed to raise at least £2,500 for a second challenge, this time to Mozambique. Project Renew Mozambique was special because two groups of people benefited…
(1) Most of the funds raised again went to Mencap, the UK charity supporting people with learning disabilities, their families, and their carers. Learn more through the link on the right of this page.
(2) Whilst in Mozambique, we worked to renovate a special school in the capital city Maputo, where the infrastructure still suffer the after-effects of the civil war. We then trekked to the north of the city.
Rugby, England to Maputo, Mozambique, as the long distance crow flies, is 5787 miles (9314km). Here is my report and pictures from the trip. You can also see my fundraising report using the link on the right of this page.
Maputo, the capital of Mozambique, was and is still a city ‘in distress’. Having suffered the effects of a devastating civil war, the country was slowly returning to a semblance of normality, even now there is a long way to go. The country’s infrastructure was deteriorating, streets were in extremely poor condition and buildings were falling apart. In short, it was in dire need of outside assistance. Our objective was to renovate a school for children with a learning disability in the city. This involved painting, repairing walls, electrical and plumbing work, cleaning, making the area safe, and providing a more stimulating environment for the children. The building required a lot of attention and although we were only with them for a short period of time, force of numbers and enthusiasm led to dramatic improvements! Mozambique is not a country that receives much in terms of either international attention or aid and so the small changes that we are able to make were received very positively.
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Open manholes, piled rubbish, dead rats, crumbling walls!
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The main “playground” left something to be desired!
(Click on the images to enlarge)
This school is housed in a small former apartment block situated between two high-rise commercial buildings in Ave. Julius Nyerere. It is three storeys high and has virtually no playground space, and as you can see from the pictures, what space there was was apalling. A separate ground floor building at the back serves as a gym, but with no apparatus or facilities at the time of our visit. It has six office-sized classrooms, each with eight to ten rudimentary desks and chairs. There were no other educational aids. The building was in very, very poor condition. This is a school specifically for children with learning disabilities, ranging in age from 6 to 18 years.
We completely cleaned and repainted the exterior of the school. Leanne and other artistic members of the team also painted murals, numbers, and animals to enhance the environment.
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What a difference a few days made!!
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David in the refurbished playground.
(Click on the images to enlarge)
The reaction of the children to the change was fantastic, they loved the colours and to be able to run around and play in a safer playground was something they hadn’t been able to do before. Footballs, balloons, and other gifts from the UK added to a very special day.
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Delight on the face of one of the children.
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David with several of the children.
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A real playground with all the noise you’d expect now!
(Click on the images to enlarge)
After a week of work we took the opportunity to trek for about 70km, in the area of Zongoene about 200km North of the capital city, close to the mouth of the Limpopo River. Here are some pictures from the trek which was over a 5 day period. During this time we were camping, and looked after by the expert team from “Across The Divide” expeditions, in conjunction with guides from South Africa and Namibia.
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Trekking toward the Limpopo flood plains.
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Campsites were at schools in the villages.
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David in one of the villages.
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A bicycle wheel is one of few toys we saw.
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We saw little in the way of equipment or even toys in the village schools, the children were quite inventive though, like this little boy with his wheel. Our gifts of footballs and frisbees as well as pencils and books, soon brought smiles.
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Local children wondered what we were doing.
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Mozambican women with their children.
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We saw some beautiful places.
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Trekking across the plains towards the coast.
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10 miles of beautiful pristine coast and not a soul.
This section of the hike reminded me of the final scenes from “Planet of the Apes”!
(Click on the images to enlarge)
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David Head and Paul Williams trekking back inland.
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Tough going across soft sands …
The latter part of this trek was some of the toughest hiking I’ve done, deep soft sand made every step a real effort and of course the temperature and humidity was high.
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… final camp site on the bank of the Limpopo River.
(Click on the images to enlarge)
Overall this was a fantastic trip, an amazing combination of hard work on the school, satisfaction at being able to help, delight at seeing the reaction of the children (what a result!), opportunity to meet a very friendly people, and to explore a little of their beautiful country, all with a great group of colleagues on the project.
My thanks to all those individuals and organisations that sponsored this venture, you can see the fundraising report for this trip using the link on the right of this page.
Don’t forget, you can also leave a comment on this site by clicking on the “comment” link at the top right of this page.
David Head, June 2003
