My name is Sabine, I am from Germany and have spent the last six months in Mozambique. I worked there as a DI in HOPE Maputo. Hope is a project that combats HIV and AIDS. This is done by taking care of people living with HIV, promoting positive living, educating people about HIV, mobilizing people for HIV tests – in general: make people aware of HIV and AIDS.

It was a big change for me to come out of Europe into Mozambique, life there is a lot different from everything that I had experienced so far. I enjoyed my time a lot. Of course it was hard, especially in the beginning (adapting to the different culture, the Mozambican way of working, learning a new language etc.) to get into “African way of life” but I don’t want to miss any single day that I spent there.

I was working mostly in two of the three centers that Hope Maputo consists of at the moment. There I did, next to the “normal” center work, mobilization for people to get tested for HIV, lectures in hospitals for pregnant women about mother to child transmission, assisting in the training of activist groups in schools and making partnerships for different occasions. Those were my main tasks among others.

A normal working day would for example look like that. I get up at six in the morning, leave the house at seven to catch a chapa (local mini bus) to get to work. That could take between 40 minutes and one and a half hours, standing squeezed with 30 other people in a small bus. It was so much fun, although that is maybe hard to imagine. Then I arrived at the center, talked to counselor and volunteers about what the day will be like. Then leave to the hospital nearby to mobilize people for testing or give lectures to pregnant women. This took usually the whole morning.

After that I returned to the center, on the way stop at the market to buy some food for lunch. In the center meeting a group of activists from a school in the surrounding. Talking to them and to other people visiting the center. Explaining about HIV and AIDS, assisting a video about relationships among youths or other topics. Helping the counselor with his statistics. Preparing actions or games for the coming Open Saturday.

Leaving the center at 4.30 in the afternoon to go home which takes again about an hour. Passing by the market in Boane, the village I was living in. Cooking with other DIs, talking about the experience of the day, sometimes sitting outside with neighbors, teaching some English, or trying to learn some Shangaan, the local language or just talking with our guards. Then I take a cold shower and go to bed. Next day another center and different tasks and new challenges.

I think the DI house I live din is pretty fancy compared to others. We had running water and electricity, at least if not one of the neighbors was “stealing” our water or the electricity broke down. The village I lived in is called Boane, is about one our away from Maputo, the capital of Mozambique. There is a huge market in the center of Boane where I could buy almost everything I wanted. Very friendly people and beautiful area. I wouldn’t have liked to live somewhere else but in Boane.

With my project leader I had a good relationship. She has been a DI herself and let us, the new DIs, do our work, without interfering too much into our work. If I needed help for anything I could always talk to her and also allthe other workers in the project. I liked the team I was working with. All motivated people, that were willing to achieve the best they could.

Also besides the work I enjoyed this half year. Meeting Mozambican people is so wonderful, and I miss everybody that I have met during my stay. I made friendships with people, learned from them as well as they learned from me, and it was hard to say good bye to them, especially because I don’t know if and when I will see them again…

It is so amazing, that Mozambican people although they are poor and have so little, still laugh so much. When I compare to for example German people, Mozambicans have so much better attitude towards life, they know, that they have to fight in their life but have such a wonderful spirit. I wish that also people from the western world could have this qualities that Africans have.

It has been an intense time. With ups and downs. I often thought about the fact, that I would benefit so much more of this whole experience in Mozambique, then I would aver be able to give back to the people. I learned so many thing in this six months, got so many new experience. Now I am back in Europe, but I know that I will always remember my life in Mozambique.