Seattle to Mozambique

There is a plethora of animal life in Beira and beyond that I just love. I think my favorite would be the geckos. Stuck on the wall and eyeing life with constant twitches, they eat all the mosquitoes and never seem to get feverish malaria. Ah the life of a gecko. I was sitting on the steps of my house the other day and notice the twitch of a gecko tail in a small space below the top of the stair railing. I peered in to look at the gecko and noticed that it was sitting amongst its opalescent eggs. They were big eggs for such a tiny gecko and you could see the dark little spots of life squirming in the eggs. I felt privileged to see these little eggs. They were in such a great spot that let the light shine through them but kept them safe from the birds and other creatures that wanted some protein for breakfast.

My next favorite creatures are these giant crow-like birds that fly around Beira. They are not extremely special but they gave me one crackup of a moment when I was pondering them in a car full of Mozambicans. These birds are black on top, white in the middle, and then black again on the bottom. They look like their in prison uniforms. I sat and looked at them and then it popped into my mind—they’re jailbirds!!!! Hahahah. I was giggling to myself in the car. Everyone looked at me funny and I realized it was one of those language moments that translation just wouldn’t do justice. I just looked back and smiled and left them to think I was just some strange white girl giggling to herself about nothing.

Frogs are also top on the list. The other night is rained really really hard here. Sheets of rain poured down and I woke up from my sleep to run around the house and close all the windows to keep water from washing away all the furniture. This resulted in me getting drenched but the rain usually comes with so much heat that this is actually a pleasure. The next morning I woke up to a lake in front of my house and a noise that sounded like one of those nature alarm clocks on crack. It was frogs-gone-wild. The frogs were so happy, so noisy, so crazy that you almost had to shout to have a conversation over their party. It would have been great to be a frog that morning. It would have been like being in Brazil when they won the world cup or in Boston after a world series win. I bet there were some hung over frogs the next evening.

Winston is the name that my friend Shelagh gave to the Beira dogs. They are fine with having one name, they all look the same. They are invariably tan, wiley and with a snout full of the garbage piled on the corner waiting to be picked up. They are Winston, the top of the evolutionary dog world, those who are scrappy enough to thrive in a big, crazy city. My favorite of the Winston crowd is a Winston named Buddha who lives at the HAI guest house in Beira. Winston Buddha is a dog that once belonged to somebody or other and then was passed onto someone else and ended up being the Chimoio HAI mascot. Winston Buddha is a terror—until you get to know her. She almost bit my hand off a number of times until I resolved myself to completely ignore her. Slowly she got closer and closer and put her little Winston head on my lap. Now, every time I go to Chimoio, she wines and barks with pleasure rather than terror and we spend many minutes making sure her belly is good and rubbed before I set my bags down in the house.

The big giant animals that you think of in Africa are sadly lacking. They are still there, they say, but it is rare to see them. But that is ok by me, I like the little, ubiquitous Winstons of Africa the best.