6 days to go.

It's 6 days to until I leave Johannesburg for Tete, so in between packing, paperwork and Christmas, I thought it was about time I published a new post. A lot has happened since my last post, but the most significant thing is that I completed a TESOL course and am now a qualified ESL (English Second Language) teacher. Yippee! 


ESL teaching is going to be my bread and butter in Tete, and there are already potential clients who are extremely keen to begin classes as soon as I get there. I absolutely LOVED teaching on our course, so I can't wait to begin teaching 'for real' in Tete. On the course, I was one of the teachers assigned to the 'beginner' level class. This was a very daunting task at first because simply giving an instruction to the class was a battle in communication. However, we came to have a very strong and positive relationship with the students. The majority of them are refugees from Somalia, the DRC (Congo) and Angola, and so they had a very high motivation to learn English which was a huge advantage for us teachers. 

Me, in class, prepping the students for a group activity.

One particular student from Somalia has a better grasp of English than most of the other students, however he can only read and write in Arabic. In order to encourage him to learn the letters and sounds of the Roman alphabet, we gave him extra worksheets to complete and would assist him in pronouncing words where ever possible. As a result he felt a little more relaxed with the teachers and wasn't as shy as some of the other students. He is very enthusiastic and would often arrive early for classes. On one particular day, I had gotten to the class early in order to set up for the lesson; none of the the other teachers were there yet. This Somalian student arrived and was very chatty - asking me how I was and began telling me about his day. We had recently done a lesson on transport and he was excitedly yabbering on about 'car, bus, taxi... boom!' in between various Arabic words. I couldn't really make out what he was saying, so asked him to slow down and said I would help him with the words. He slowly pieced together the sentence, "I see very bad thing when I walking here". I encouraged him to continue. He mimed the actions of a car crashing into a bus and then a taxi crashing into the bus and car. "Ah, I see", I said, "it was an accident". "Yes, yes, yes!", he exclaimed excitedly, so pleased that I'd understood him. But he didn't stop there; there were more details that he wanted to fill me in on. Again, he filled in the gaps between his English words with Arabic, and I was lost. Exasperated, he finally burst out, "Teeeeasha (teacher), they go 'BOOM!' and LOTS OF MOTHER-F*@KERS DEAD!" I had to try very hard to keep a straight face, and very gently told him that that's not a very nice word.I then excused myself and went and laughed my butt of in the bathroom! LOL! Bless him!

Me with a bunch of the 'beginner' level students who I taught on the TESOL course.

I hope I'll have just as dedicated and interesting students in Tete. Between daily life, teaching and filmmaking I look forward to sharing all my experiences with you.

Wishing you all a very happy festive season and all the very best of luck for 2011!

Love,

Tash.

Bye Bye Tete Airport?

Chingodzi airport, in Mozambique may be located over a coal deposit   [ 2010-10-08 ]

Maputo, Mozambique, 8 Oct – Australian mining company Riversdale Mining plans to check if Chingodzi airport, in Mozambique’s Tete province is or is not sitting on top of billions of tons of coal, under the terms of a memorandum signed Thursday in Maputo.

The memorandum, which was signed with airport management company, Aeroportos de Moçambique, will lead to the Australian company carrying out detailed studies to assess the quantity of coal in the area, with the possibility that the airport will be transferred to another place, if the deposits prove to be of commercial value.

Last June, Riversdale Capital Moçambique officially informed the Mozambican government of the possibility of there being coal underneath the airport, and since then has been in negotiations to find the best way of exploring them.

Jennifer Gravey, the company’s legal director, said, after signing the contract, that the board of Riversdale Capital Moçambique was of the opinion that it is a very significant coal deposit, “probably the biggest in Tete province and the country,” based on preliminary studies already carried out.

According to Mozambican daily newspaper Notícias, Chingodozi airport in 2009 benefited from significant investments, including assembling VOR equipment, as well as modernisation of its control tower.

At the moment Riversdale Mining has 22 mining licenses in Tete, one of which, the Benga project, is due to start exporting coal in the third quarter of 2011. (macauhub) 

Whirlwind tour of Tete continued...

Le Petit Cafe - the best bakery & coffee shop in town.

Inside Le Petit Cafe.

A typical street in the centre of Tete.

Another street in downtown Tete.

One of many abandoned buildings.

A new building being erected - notice the "scaffolding"!

Abandoned administrative building.

Site of the new hotel (The Rezidor Park Inn).

My favourite of all the buildings... I wonder what
 it could have been? A school perhaps?

One of the flee, tick & mange infested packs of
stray dogs. I would happily put them all out of
 their misery myself, but apparently they're
the only thing that keeps the rat population
in check. Poor things!

An abandoned home in suburban Tete.

The flat where I might live.

Tete's fresh produce market beneath the famous bridge.

Fresh, organic, colourful fruit & veg. Yum!

Market stalls.

Whirlwind tour of Tete (June 2010)

When I traveled to Tete to see my boyfriend in June this year we spent most of our time in neighboring Malawi, up at Chembe Eagle's Nest on the lake, which was wonderful! The two days we spent in Tete consisted very much of a whirlwind tour of the town, with me taking copious numbers of photo's, and eating LOTS of seafood. Yummy! 


I keep going back over the photo's I took looking for details I might have missed while there, pondering who or what could exist beyond the cement and mortar of each building, wondering if I will one day meet any of the subjects in the photo's, and  running through scenarios of what my new life up there will be like. Here is a small sample of the pics. They should start to give you an idea of what the hot, dusty, busy, lazy, frontier-town of Tete looks like.

From Hotel Zambezi looking North

From Hotel Zambezi looking North-East towards the river

From Hotel Zambezi looking South-East towards the river

From Hotel Zambezi looking South

Hotel Zambezi

"Polly" the Hotel's resident cockatoo who we rescued from being
traumatized & blinded by two idiot maintenance staff using an angle-
grinder to remove part of her cage while she was still inside it!!!

Yours truely in the Hotel's restuarant

Hotel Zambezi bar/ cigar lounge

More to follow...

Info on Mozambique & Tete.

Mozambique, officially the Republic of Mozambique (Portuguese: Moçambique or República de Moçambique, is a country in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi and Zambia to the northwest, Zimbabwe to the west and Swaziland and South Africa to the southwest.

The area was explored by Vasco da Gama in 1498 and colonized by Portugal in 1505. Mozambique became independent in 1975, and became the People's Republic of Mozambique shortly after. It was the scene of an intense civil war lasting from 1977 to 1992. The country was named Moçambique by the Portuguese after the Island of Mozambique, derived from Musa Al Big or Mossa Al Bique or Mussa Ben Mbiki, an Arab trader who first visited the island and later lived there.

Portuguese is the official and most widely spoken language of the nation, but only 40% of the population speak it. 33.5%, mostly Bantus, speak it as their second language and only 6.5%, mostly white Mozambicans and mestiços, speak it as their first language.Bantus speak several different languages, the most widely used being Swahili, Makhuwa,Sena, Ndau, and Shangaan

Mozambique is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, the Community of Portuguese Language Countries and an observer of theFrancophonie. Mozambique's life expectancy and infant mortality rates are both among the worst in the world. Its Human Development Indexis one of the lowest on earth.

Tete is the capital city of Tete Province in Mozambique. It is located on the Zambezi River, and is the site of a one-kilometre-long suspension bridge. A Swahili trade centre before the Portuguese colonial era, Tete continues to dominate the centre-west part of the country and region, and is the largest city on the Zambezi. Tete is a word for "reed".
The region was an important Swahili trade centre before the Portuguese colonial era. On the east coast of Africa the Portuguese were drawn to Mozambique and the Zambezi river by news of a local ruler, the Munhumutapa, who has fabulous wealth in gold. In their efforts to reach the Munhumutapa, the Portuguese established in 1531 two settlements far up the Zambezi - one of them, at Tete, some 260 miles from the sea. The Munhumutapa Kingdom and his gold mines remained autonomous and mostly isolated from the Portuguese. But in this region of east Africa - as in Portuguese Guinea and Angola in the west - Portuguese involvement became sufficiently strong to survive into the third quarter of the 20th century. Under Portuguese influence Tete had become a market centre for ivory and gold by the mid-17th century. Given a Portuguese town charter in 1761, it became a city of the Portuguese Overseas Province of Mozambique in 1959. After the Portuguese Colonial War in Portuguese Africa and the April 1974 military coup in Lisbon, the then Portuguese Overseas Province of Mozambique become an independent state. The newly-independent People's Republic of Mozambique, created in 1975 after the exodus of Mozambique's ethnic Portuguese, descended into civil war between 1977 and 1992.

Portuguese Fort in Tete circa +/- 1546

Portuguese Fort in Tete - now houses a language school

The beginning of the beginning of a new adventure.

So, the decision has been made. I am moving to Tete in January. Why the long wait you ask? Well, there are a number of things that need to be organised, rehashed, boxed, moved and dusted before I leave. Notably, the following...

1. I'm working on a large scale reality TV series as a content director until the mid-October, so can't leave town 'til then.
2. There are no TV studios or stations in Tete, nor are there any very fascinating things to report on in the town. Hence, I've had to consider an alternative career option. Since there are many locals, Brazilian mine workers, students & business men and women in Tete who would like to learn English, it only makes sense that I learn to teach the language. In Nov/Dec I'll be studying a TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) course through my old university Wits. As the course is part time and will be my bread and butter up in Tete, I obviously can't leave 'til I've finished it! Dah! :-)
3. My boyfriend is on leave from the mid-December until just after Christmas and wants to come back to Johannesburg for that period, so it only makes sense for me to remain here until then; after which I can travel back to Tete with him.
4. Then there are all the little arbitrary bits and pieces of paperwork that need to be filled in, faxed and filed. Yugh! Admin so boring & yet so annoyingly necessary.
5. Also, I need to pack. This could take me a while. Which shoes? How many dresses? What's pretty? What's practical? What's not? Decisions! Decisions! And all vital ones as any woman will appreciate.

So why on earth am I starting this blog now if I'm only actually going to be in Tete in 2011? Well, I've always been one to prepare as much as possible for any event. Besides fueling my pyromania, the only thing that came of me being a Brownie (junior Girl Guide) was the phrase "be prepared" being embedded in my brain.  So, in an effort to prep for my new adventure, I am going to be collecting information, ideas, facts, dreams, and much more over the next few months that will (hopefully) assist me in my new venture/s. Sharing these with you, and hearing your thoughts on each of them, will hopefully bring them to life in a most meaningful way.  I hope you'll enjoy sharing these exciting times and being part of my new adventure.