Capulana Shopping

While Mark was off adventuring in Mocuba, I stayed back, mostly in Nampula, but I had some adventures of my own!

Due to a complicated set of reasons, while Mark was in Mocuba, I moved in with the SIL director and his wife. I had been feeling a little nervous about living on my own for five days. I was maybe a little bit worried for security reasons. I was especially worried about what I would eat while Mark was gone. While I've been busy planning, preparing, and teaching lessons and surviving the two hours of commuting time to and from school, Mark has been cooking and cleaning and in general doing everything in his power to streamline my time away from school so I can plan all my lessons and possibly still have a little bit of time for some personal recreational activity. So, all in all, although my diet and my free time were no one's main concern in moving me in with another couple during Mark's absence, the situation worked out to my benefit.

I moved in with John and Susan on Thursday after I got home from school and right away felt the full benefit of their hospitality. Susan, like myself, is someone who can drink hot tea just about anytime. She and her husband start their daily hot beverage intake by brewing tea at 5:00am daily. Then (as far as I can tell) Susan often has another cup of tea upon arriving home from work and then possibly another after supper. The tea is brewed from loose leaves in a beautiful little metal pot. I've already told Mark multiple times that I want to get a little pot like that and brew tea in the same way when we go home.

Thursday to Friday was also an adventure because John and Susan were without running water in their house at that time. They know that this happens, so they always have a full barrel of water parked in the kitchen and another one parked in the bathroom. When one needs to flush the toilet, one fills a smaller bucket partway and dumps it in the toilet. In the kitchen, water is dipped out of the barrel for dishes and drinking. I learned a lot of tricks for saving water during that time! Dirty dishes are rinsed in a small amount of water, which (if not too full of food) becomes toilet flushing water. Rinsed dishes are washed in one small tub of water and rinsed in another small tub of water. Altogether, the dishes get clean but by using only a fraction of the water I would use at home in Iowa!

Although the barrels made it possible to live comfortably without water for a day, on Friday morning I woke up fervently hoping that water would be flowing again. I crept out into the kitchen and found John sipping tea and running a hose from the kitchen sink into the kitchen barrel. In the case of water shortages in Nampula, it's not a case of if but when, so the storage barrels must be refilled at the first opportunity.

During my long rides to and from the school, I've had ample opportunities to observe the dress of women in Nampula. One woman could possibly be wearing more than five capulanas at a time. One is wrapped around the large bundle balanced on her head. Another is wrapped around her head in a decorative fashion. A third is wrapped around the baby on her back. The fouth and fifth are wrapped around her waist. And she may have other ones handy to wrap around further bundles or to lay out on the ground for the baby. If a husband is a good husband, he will keep his wife happy with frequent gifts of capulanas. If he goes on a trip, he will come back with a capulana for his wife. If he sees that his wife has acquired a new capulana in his absence, he can be fairly confident that his wife is entertaining another beau in his absence. Women in Nampula are capulanistas, according to another missionary friend-- they are crazy about capulanas!

All this observing capulanas has made me interested in purchasing a few of my own. So, on Saturday morning, Susan and I walked down into the town center to shop for capulana material. Walking through town feels a little chaotic-- so many people and goods jumbled together, and the capulana shops are no different. We visited three or four, most of which were small shops. The front opens off of the shop, leaving it open to the street. Capulana material hangs down from the ceiling, from the doors, and covers the walls. A man or two stand behind the counter ready to pull some fabric off of display and open it up for further observation.

There were soooooo many options! Susan is pretty crafty, so she was looking for fabric of her own to make a dress out of. She gave me lots of ideas for things I could do with my capulana material, so I was feeling pretty inspired by the time we had looked through a couple shops. I finally settled on a design and color scheme I liked, but I feel pretty confident that I will be going back for more capulana material before we leave.

--Hillary