Xara

“So Anna and Anna, you’ll coordinate the northern regional meeting?”

“Yeah, but Anna, what’s the budget for each region?  Our transportation is gonna eat up a lot.”

            That’s what our REDES board meetings would sound like if we hadn’t eliminated the confusion and started going by our last names.  There are currently four Annas in Peace Corps Mozambique and three of us are on the REDES executive board.  That doesn’t even include some of the Hannahs who have found it simpler to go by Ana at their sites rather than try to get the locals to pronounce the H. 

            Never in my life have I been around so many “namesakes.”  Namesake is such a strange word.  We never use it, and according to Merriam Webster, it applies more to people that are named after someone else than to people who just cooincidentally share the same name.  I am a namesake in the sense that I am the fourth Anna on my mother’s side (specifically named for my great-great grandmother, Anna Isabel Fisher Franke) but I would feel strange calling my fellow volunteer Annas my “namesakes.”

            However, in Mozambique, where it is perfectly acceptable to address someone by their relationship to you, Amigo/a, Vezinho/a (neighbor), Cunhado/a (catch-all familial relation, official or unofficial), there are half a dozen people who greet me as Xará (shah-RAH), the Portuguese word for namesake. Among these are my neighbor, Ana Paula and even Isabel, a secretary at my school who has seen my middle name on some paperwork.  Having almost 400 students, I was bound to have some xarás in the classroom, as well. One of which I noticed even took to spelling her name with two n’s as I do. 

            So here’s a shout out to my Xarás, American and Mozambican!

One Year Later

            In my first post to this blog, I wrote of how much I missed my Mozambican host family.  Finally, after a year at my site in Montepuez, I made it back to where I started this crazy adventure: Namaacha.

            I had been looking forward to this reunion from the moment I hugged my host-mãe good-ye the morning I swore in as an official Peace Corps volunteer. So, the first thing I did after settling in at the hostel in Maputo city was call my host-mãe.

“Hi, mom! I’m here!  I’m in Maputo!  Can I still come to visit you in Namaacha tomorrow?”

“Of course, Anna.  Your Portuguese is so much better.  I’m also in Maputo tonight.  Come to the station tomorrow at 8 and we’ll travel back together.”

            Only then did I realize that I had changed my phone number and not introduced myself when I called her.  Of course, she knew who was on the other end of the unknown number anyways.  Who else would call her sounding that excited and ridiculous?

            The next morning, I found myself with my backpack waiting for my host-mãe to come claim me, much like I did over a year ago.  This time, however, I wasn’t a bundle of nerves wondering what on Earth I’ve gotten myself into. When my host-mãe finally arrived to take me back to Namaacha, we exchanged a kiss on the cheek and true to the no-nonsense woman she is, she reverted right back to host-mãe mode and herded me into the nearest chapa to Namaacha.

            On the chapa ride, we caught up on school and my host-siblings before we both succumbed to traveler’s fatigue and took a nap.  When I woke up, I could see the spot where I knew Namaacha was nestled up in the green mountains.  Once in Namaacha, it was like I had never left.  I walked up the road to my family’s house and into the yard.  At first I didn’t see anyone, but I knew better.  A few seconds later, my host-pãe’s face popped up out of his garden, pretty much right where I left him a year ago.

            Half of free time in training was spent in one of two places:  On a tattered red pleather couch talking with my host-pãe, or in a plastic chair cooking over charcoal with my host-mãe.  While my host-mãe cleaned up from her trip, I plopped down on the couch across from my host-pãe.  Finally, I understood what he was saying and he understood what I was saying.  Amazing how much easier conversations are when you actually speak the same language.  As my host-mãe walked back in the room it only just occurred to me what a funny couple they were.  My host-pãe was all smiles and small talk while my host-mãe, though warm, was so stern in comparison.

            I excused myself from the living room and followed my host-mãe to my other perch next to the charcoal in the outdoor kitchen.  Quickly, we fried up some eggs and heat water for tea.  Meal number1.  Then, tirelessly, my host-mãe immediately started preparing lunch.  Like the first time your parents let you go to the playground by yourself, I knew I’d graduated when my host-mãe handed me some money and asked me to go down to a little store to buy the fish.  Of course, my ability to clean and gut those fish clearly hadn’t reached the level she thought it should have by then.  I didn’t admit to her how often I ate (more like didn’t eat…) fish at site.  The real reminder that I was back with my host family came just as we were finishing up the cooking.  My host-mãe told me to go take a bath before we ate.

            After lunch and what was definitely much too short a visit, I hugged my host parents good-bye and was back on my way to Maputo full and freshly bathed.