Myspace

People in the US famously encounter significant others on the questionable cyber streets of Myspace, Match.com, Facebook, you name it. But I never thought I would be one of those individuals who meet people from online. I have never used a dating service, but of course I’m an avid user of these friend connecting pages like the good ol Book of Faces and Myspace. And yes, I have ‘friends’ on these sites that live in other countries, friends I have never seen face to face. For various reasons, I’ve connected with individuals who share common interests, usually having to do with music in the countries I intend on or already have visited. But like I said, I never thought it would go beyond the computer screen.

The other day I was standing in line at a movie theater on a Saturday afternoon in downtown Maputo. A line, well, perhaps a little huddle of move goers. Five to be exact. It seems few Mozambicans are interested in catching a Spanish flick at a Saturday matinee. Regardless, I was pulling out my 50 Meticais to pay for the entrance to see ‘El Orfenato’ when I noticed a guy talking to two girls. Nothing spectacular, just that I thought I new this man from some where. The logical side of my brain considered this as possible as I know few people in this capital city. Still, I knew him from some place. I was standing there, and noticed that he too was glancing my way and I could feel him thinking the same thing. Then all of a sudden he asked my name, I gave it and req uested his and when he told me he was Matchume, we both started laughing. See, back in September I was doing some research on Mozambican music and found a page on Myspace of a Timbila player who is well known in Europe and in the city. And it was him! We had recognized each other from our online photo albums and here I was, one year later, exchanging greetings with someone from across the world I had no intention of ever seeing face to face. Normally he’s in Europe playing at world music venues, but he happened to be in town for a show at the French-Mozambican cultural association. What a coinkidink.

Similarly a conscious hip hop artists from Maputo extended me a friends invite on Myspace last year, finding my picture connected to another Lusophone artist. We exchanged greetings here and there, I listening to his tracks online, nothing really major. He told me when I arrived in the city I was to contact him, which I planned on doing to check out different events, etc. I sent him a text message and went to the nail shop to get a pedicure where I saw him on MTV. I had seen his music video on myspace, but I didn’t think he was so famous.

And it doesn’t end there. The day I got to Zanzibar I received an e-mail from a guy in Kenya who had read my blog and simply wanted to extend an invitation to Nairobi. At that point in time I didn’t think I was going to be able to make it to Kenya, but in the end I was able to spend a few days outside the capital. I was staying in a city called Ongata Rongai and when I sent a message to him, I found out he also was living down the street. We were able to meet up and it turned out he had produced a documentary film while a student at the university: right up my research alley! We spent a few hours discussing each other’s work and making plans for the future,etc.

As I am writing this I have received a message on Myspace from another musician on tour in Europe who says that she can see on my profile that I am in Mozambique, her country and that although she is not here, I can meet up with her family or contact them if I need something. It’s really quite incredible the ways in which we can interact across oceans, across continents and cultures, through the internet. Through our spaces.

In the Cards

When I was in high school I used to go to the psychic. On Thursdays at the Elks club, they’d give free readings, so Takiah and I would go after class. Consultations occurred like this: you’d sit in a chair facing seven seated psychics. One lead psychic would find the color of your aura and the seven sub-seers would channel into your shade, sort of like a rainbow radio. When in contact with the psychics, one could never cross one’s legs of hands in order to allow all of the telling energy to flow freely.

In retrospect, I never gained any great knowledge from those visits. They only seemed to tell me facts that I already knew or that I was feeling. Obviously, it was cool that a stranger could know something so private, but no great prediction was ever made. Well, except that one time they said something big was going to happen to me when I was 26 years old. But, they would not tell me what it was. That, I had to pay for. So I opted to wait, for free.

Sophomore year I had a friend who kept complaining of a recurring dream involving a spider. Takiah and I tried to convince her to see the psychics, but this friend was an evangelist who called psychics “Satan’s workers”. So, after weeks went by and she could not sleep, she finally decided to contact the devil. Not the devil precisely, but one of his employees.

We took her to the consultation and she described her dreams in every detail she could recall to the seers. The head psychic then proceeded to ask her questions to which she responded. These inquiries were basic wantings-to-know about what had occurred the day before, what she ate, her birth date. He then asked her where her twin sister was. We all knew she had a twin, but the psychic did not, because her sister was in another city. He then said that what he was seeing might be too personal for my other friend and I to bear witness to and asked if Takiah and I should leave the room. But my friend said it was fine, we could listen to what the man had to say.

The psychic told her that the dream was connected to her birth, that there had been complications due to her mother’s addiction to cocaine and that her birth had been a quasi-death and the dream was left over from that time.

That was the end of our trips to the psychics, the novelty of hearing an unknown person tell you tid bits that only you could know, had worn off when we realized that all these recountings of our past did nothing to change anything that had ever occurred. If anything, they opened new wounds that we didn’t know what to do with. I suppose my friend’s dreams went away on their own, not because of any consultation, but because new experiences and thoughts naturally changed the course of her dreams. It’s curious how we always wanted to know what those psychics had to say, but the greatest lesson we acquired from our times there was that it’s best to leave the past where it belongs.

Dockanema

In Economics, they say that there is no such thing as a free lunch. Luckily, in Mozambique, there is such a thing as a free film, thus people are not forced between eating and viewing a movie. It is all about alimenting the mind in the 3rd annual edition of “Dockanema”, the Mozambican Documentary Film Festival to be held this year, 2008, in Maputo from the 12 – 21 of September. www.dockanema.org

Minha Amiga brasileira

I thought I was going to be white. Or at least bear a title to match. In Tanzania and Kenya I was called, among many things, “Mzungu”. “Mzungu” is an East African version of Gringo/a. When I arrived in Maputo, I was sure that I would wear the same name. Mzungu, too, is a term used in Mozambique to describe foreigners. To my surprise upon engaging in conversation with locals they say, “Ah, minha amiga brasileira! Tu és de onde?” (My Brazilian Friend! Where are you from?) If I do not give time for them to guess, they begin asking, “Baiana? Carioca? Ou Paulista?” (Are you from Bahia, Rio or Sao Paulo?)

The first day I said with appropriate accentuation that I was Berkeliana. Technically, it would not be a lie if I said that I saw Bahiana, of the San Francisco Bay Area, not the Brazilian one. My new friends scratched their heads and repeated, “Berkeliana?” Since I did not wish to lie, I confessed that it was a city “que fica na California.” It is at these moments when my actual nation of provenience is clarified and then they say, “A senhora é Americana, mas porque fala brasileiro?” (Miss, you are from America! But why do you speak “Brazilian”?)

Many people here want to know what’s up with this love for Brazil. Why is that so many traveling Americans in Mozambique speak “Brazilian”, as Mozambicans lovingly term the ways in which Brazilians express Portuguese.

In the US, when learning Portuguese, most schools teach Brazilian Portuguese, giving small mentions to the other aspects of the Lusophone world. I, too, was a student of “Brazilian” language, but at the same moment it was the space that connected me to Portugal, Luso-Africa and Luso-Asia. It was what led me here.

Why this so-called “everyone” loves Brasil, is a misterio to me. At least for those dwelling in California, it’s cheaper to fly to than Portugal. People have all kinds of motives for going to Brasil, be it: Carnaval, beaches, futebol, Samba, Capoeira, or learning Portuguese. It’s a place that exudes images of enchantment and sexiness. For many it is a fantasy realized to go there. Clearly, the exaggeration and objectification of Brazilian culture is a major issue, but in terms of traveling style, it is what’s hot, now. Think about Portugal, what do most people know about it beyond Saramango and Port? Perhaps even Fado music, which is gorgeous, but not the type of tune the youth are itching to shake a little something to.

Brasil is the kind of place, like the US, that has outshined it’s European counterpart. Portuguese speaking countries in Africa and Asia need not direct their attention merely to Europe for help, Brazil is doing big things for it’s Lusophone brethren.

Sure, in Mozambican restaurants, the well-to-do sip on Portuguese wine and imported bottles of Pedras sparkling water. But at night, the young drink caipirinhas and listen to Samba, Brazilian pop and other American and African beats. Fado in the club? I doubt it.

On television in Mozambique, there is a contrast between two Brazils: Daily broadcasts of Brazilian soap operas entertain the connected masses, while ambulant street venders sell pirated copies of “City of God” and “City of Men”. When discussing Brazilian cinema with these merchants they affirmed the fabulousness of these films, but also took these fictitious flicks as fact. “In Brazil,” the vendors say, “In Rio, bullets spray through the streets. It is dangerous there.” Even so, I asked if they really thought that was a reality. These same vendors were selling copies of Blood Diamond and Hotel Rwanda. Naturally, these films were inspired by real events, but we can all agree that these high productions over dramatize and embellish the truth to make money. As someone who has lived in Rio, I tried to convince them it was not guaranteed that a person would be caught by a stay bullet while strolling down the spectacular boulevards of Zona Sul. Yes, there is warfare in the favelas, like there is warfare in guettos, but I never knew anyone who got shot in Brazil. But in Berkeley, yeah, I know someone who got shot. More than one.

Media is an exciting weapon, a dangerous tool that can be used in or against the defense of a people’s image. Especially if one only has a limited source of this (mis)information. One time in Portugal I met a man from Angola who said that he would never dare step foot in the United States. Even though he had fled his own homeland due to one of the longest civil wars in Africa, he believed the states to be a breeding ground for indiscriminate violence. “I’ve seen TV, I know what’s going on there,” he told me this at a hostel in Lisbon, “I know that if I go there, people will just shoot me in the streets. That’s how America is, everyone has guns, and the people shoot each other.” His name was Quim, and even though he could speak English fluently, and would totally blend in on Telegraph, he was unconvinced with my assurance that he probably wouldn’t get hurt if he didn’t go looking for trouble. I asked him. “What about Angola? Even though the war is over, people say that Luanda is dangerous. I doubt the US is worse than that.” But oh no, he swore I would never encounter a problem in the Angolan capital. It was my land that was viciously marketing itself as a gun-toting freak fest.

Luckily America’s image has been boosted in East Africa with Obama’s candidacy. Before when traveling we had to hang our heads in shame, pretending to be from Canada. But now, from Kenya to Mozambique, supporters of Obama wear his face on their shirts and say, “Do you like Obama?” If you say yes, and you’re trying to negotiate a price, you’ll pay half. People love Obama. Luckily, they love Brazil, too, because now that I’m communicating in Portuguese, my accent gives me away. “Brazilian?” They say, “Well then, we’re family.”

Maputo: First Impressions

At the edge of the balcony, bellow in the small quart yard there is a place to hang laundry. Had it not been winter right now, the little green fruits on the papaya tree would be large, yellow and ready to eat.

If it were not for the neighbor singing in Portuguese, or the coconut trees that line the coast, I would have thought that I was at home. It is 65 degrees, and this polluted portion of the Indian Ocean looks like The Bay. The section of the city where I live is called Upper Baixa (ironically) and gives an advantageous view of the entire metropolis.

For a capital city, the streets are strangely empty. Coming from Nairobi, I was shocked by the silence. Well, it is not necessarily calm, but in comparison to Kenya's chaotic capital, I might as well be in an urbanized village.

In Zanzibar, when telling people, both locals and internationals, that I was bound for Mozambique, almost all posed the question, "Wow, isn't it poor there?" Like everywhere on the third sphere from the sun, there are those who have what some do not. No matter which city, state or nation, one finds extravagant chic dwellings inches, feet or miles from shacks, tenements or other humble housings.

Walking down Avenida 24 de Junho, there are less people begging for money than on Telegraph Avenue. However, I have noticed that people do not plea for money as much as they try to sell you everything under the East African sun. On my street, Batiks are the product of choice, and even though I have told the same ambulant vendor that I have already purchased ten batiks and do not wish to buy any more, he still follows me down the street trying to convince me to acquire the 11th for 50 Meticais.

I am quite aware that this area of the country is not entirely representative of the lesser developed sections of other provinces, and that despite appearances, most of the population dwells in more modest conditions. Still, if people were to see this city, they might not believe it were the place they thought was Mozambique.

On Lumumba street, staring at the houses one is led to believe that they are in some upscale section of Rio de Janeiro or Bahia, it is only during the brief moments where sidewalks go missing, perhaps destroyed in the civil war, or simple neglect, that the difference occurs. Perfectly gated houses line the streets and all of a sudden a peak of sunlight from the ocean slips through the gapping holes of destroyed, abandoned properties, alongside the satellite dish,/SUV equipped casas of the elite.

Speaking of streets, walking down these curious avenidas is much like a game of “Follow the Leader.” Today I made a journey to the other side of town to the surreal “Summerscheild” neighborhood that houses ex-pats, NGO and other government workers. It seems each street is named after a famous leader. For example, I live near the corner of P. Lumumba and Salvador Allende Past the 24th of June is Nkrumah. You take Nkrumah all the way to Mao and then Mao to Kim II Sung and then take Kim II Sung to Zimbabwe street. Somewhere over there you will find a plaza called East Timor and another called Mugabe. To get to the overpriced shopping center that no local can afford, one need only take a left on Lenin Boulevard. Need to get somewhere? Follow the leader.

To be continued…

Finding Home in Zanzibar

Make a right when you come to a canon, past the men carving wooden boxes and bao games. On the right hand side you will see a gaggle of chickens chilling on a garbage pile beneath a coconut tree. If you don’t see the chickens, they’ve most likely been eaten by ravenous cats. It’s okay, keep gong. At the end of the pathway you will find a group of young men who will probably ask you to marry them if you are a lady. If you are a man, they possibly won’t.

Okay so now you are going to see a red spa that only people with Euros can afford, and if you are as financially challenged as I am, you must keep going straight until you run into the large peace sign. At this point, you make a little right past the guy who calls Glenda “Grenda” and overcharges for his batiks. Keep ahead, don’t forget to say hello to people on the way and try not to get run over by motorcycles, bikes, or wooden carts. When you see the lady who makes delicious mango juice, try some, then say hi to the Kenyan merchant who embroiders “Obama” into all of his merchandise.

Okay, so now you are probably tired, sit and chat for a bit. If you didn’t want the juice, try some ginger or black currant soda. Yum. After you return the glass soda bottle to the shop keeper, pass the ladies who play cards all day long, past the gallery of henna art and when you see the Mozambican seller of Tinga Tinga paintings, say “Ola” and make a left. Go all the way to the end of the street past the rusted fence, through a tunnel, past two bright green and teal doors, and swing a right. Then ask someone for help because you most likely will have ended up a wee bit lost. Then make a left, turn around and I bet that it’s right there.

Two hours in Zimbabwe

Borders are funny places. I thought it was a joke when I was informed mid-fight that our plane was destined for Harare, Zimbabwe before going to Mozambique. It did not quite bother me that I would spend a few hours inside the country recently made famous by mad Mugabe. Still, a little warning would have been nice.One time I went to Spain for twenty minutes. I was in Northern Portugal, near the border, where I took a ferry across the river, walked around for a few minutes and then returned to Portugal. There was very little to do in that part of the city so my professor decided to return our class to our country of origin. How arbitrary, I thought, to move across a miniscule body of water where everything looks, sounds and smells the same to call it different. Another nation. A new world.Anyway, I was coming from Kenya, trying to reach Mozambique, when the pilot announced our stop in Harare. This was funny since when purchasing said ticket in Zanzibar, I was promised that after inconveniently flying to Nairobi, I would be taken directly to the capital of Mozambique, not Zimbabwe. Our plane landed in Harare and even though I never exited the aircraft, it was strange to stop in and stare at a land I had no intention of staying in nor returning to. The un-crowded airport contained one “Air Zimbabwe” plane and a sign that said “Welcome to Zimbabwe.” The few passengers destined for Harare disembarked while the remaining riders waited for Kenya Airways to refuel. From the small Plexiglas window I watched porters unload baggage, while others loaded heavy sacks of snow peas into the cargo hold. Later, Zimbabwean airport employees entered the plane to vacuum the air craft and restock in-flight snacks. The familiar sounds of Swahili were replaced with the intriguing melody of what I assumed was Shona as airport workers chatted amongst themselves and cleaned the plane. When the clean-up finished, the local employees exited the aircraft, and on came the new passengers who would join us to Mozambique. And then, as simply as we had entered Zimbabwe, we took flight and exited. What a weird diversion into a space so close to the others I had been in, yet so isolated, so badly bordered by unfortunate politics, so far from where I intended to be. Now I am in Maputo trying to figure out how this is not Brazil or Portugal. Is it only because it exists within the confines of Mozambique, within the edges of the African continent? Is that what defines us? This reminds me of crossing the Tijuana border. Two parallel worlds divided by languages and bureaucracy. Borders lie along identical land masses, with an intention to trick one into seeing something different. Somewhere else. Borders, essas fronteiras, are funky spaces where one is almost compelled to believe it. .