Keep your fingers crossed and good luck machines on for me. We will find out on Thursday whether the proposal I wrote for the tea processing project has been approved or not. We got a bit of promising news last week that the proposal passed an evaluation by an internal review committee in Holland; now we are waiting for the results from an external review committee that includes representatives from Mozambican and Zimbabwean officials as well as officers from the Dutch Embassy in Maputo. If the external committee gives the project a thumbs up, come January we would start construction of a factory in Mozambique and the formalization of an outgrower scheme to support family-sector tea farmers.
In other news, the weather has taken a merciful turn and provided Central Mozambique with cloudy skies, cooler temperatures, and constant rainshowers. It has been an unbelievably welcome change from the past week where temperatures soared past 100F (40C) every day. In Tete, the capital of our neighboring province to the north, it got up to about 115F (45C)! Tete is regularly cited as the hottest city in the world on those maps that show ridiculously high and low temperatures that make you pity the poor suckers in Siberia or Chad (or, as the case may be, Mozambique).
Today I am happier than usual for two reasons:
1. I finally got my ass off the couch and hopped on the treadmill for a 45-minute walk. I also got out the green yoga mat I took such pains to stuff in my suitcase when I moved here and did 100 sit-ups. Hopefully, this will be the beginning of a month-long trend leading up to my trip to Rio, land of the bikini-clad gorgeous, in December.
2. I ate fresh coconut for the first time since I was about 10. My mom and I used to buy the brown, dried coconuts at the supermarket in Albuquerque and, with the help of an ice pick and a hammer, drain the milk and crack open the tough exterior to get to the white flesh inside. I love coconuts! Here in Mozambique (as well as in Brazil), it's common to see green coconuts that vendors will split open for you to drink the water inside. Água de coco is refreshing, balances your electrolytes, and is a fabulous cure for a hangover. I have green coconuts as often as possible. But it had been ages since I'd taken the time to hunt down a mature brown coconut, but there they were at Shoprite last week, right next to the giant cucumbers. Last night my housemates and I cracked open the brown shell by slamming the coconut on the countertop, then ate the sweet flesh right out of the shell. Yum!!! Definitely worth the time on the treadmill.
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