Idrussi’s Home Visit

I have been looking forward to returning this summer and being able to do home visits with the children again. Our first trip was a visit to Idrussi’s grandmother and the village of Camp 2000; this was one of my favorite visits from last year.

We set out in Pieter and Rika’s new vehicle, which made our travel much easier. It also allowed us to take many people from the team to see Camp 2000. One of the neat things has come out of our first visit to this village, is that Pieter and his team have decided that they are going to start working with the people of this village that is North of Maputo. They have already been out for a couple of nights stay with the people and are building new friendships with these people.

As we unloaded bags and bags of clothes to give as gifts, many people on my team were very wide-eyed because of the drastic difference in standard of living of this village compared to where we have been staying in Matola.

We set out walking through the deep sand with our arms weighed down with clothing and also our special guest Idrussi. This was his first time to return to see his grandmother since I brought him last time. He was unable to visit with Pieter’s team last time because he had come down with a case of Malaria. Walking into a village that doesn’t have many visitors to begin with, with a group of 6 white girls causes heads to turn.

We finally arrived at Idrussi’s grandmothers house, and shortly after the majority of the village had also arrived to greet us. It was neat to return with some of the pictures printed from my previous visit. There was one little girl that ended up being one of my favorite pictures from my trip last year. As I handed the pictures and looked through them with Idrussi’s grandmother, I showed her the picture and asked if the little girl was still here, and she just happened to be standing right by my side. I was able to show her the picture of herself and she smiled so big, it was amazing to see how much she had grown from the previous year.

As the clothes were divided into piles to be passed out, a few of the girls on the team passed out candy and snacks to the children, and I tried to capture the experience through the lens of my camera. Pieter pointed out to me, the there was an extreme lack of men present in the village. The only males present, either came with us (Pieter, Luis, and myself), or they were under the age of eight. It was obvious that there must be men present, because there was not a lack of children or women that were pregnant. It was just interesting to me that they were nowhere to be seen, and I still haven’t been able to make sense of the situation.

This visit was a good one, and it was definitely worth it to see the joy on Grandmother’s face as she held Idrussi. It will be interesting to see what happens as Pieter and men that he is leading continue to travel out to Camp 2000 to build relationship with these wonderful people.