Bem Vindo a Maputo

In Pretoria and Durban, we felt like we could have been in U.S.; in Capetown, a European city or Vancouver, B.C.; in the cities in Namibia, pure Germany, and in the Namibian desert, Mongolia, Bolivia, or another world entirely. But here in Mozambique – for better and for worse – I am squarely back in Africa.

Maputo, the capital city, feels like a combination of Dar es Salaam (low-lying African city by the sea); Lima, Peru (colonial Latin capital); and Sebastopol, Ukraine (former Soviet outpost and seaside resort), with a bit of Miami Beach art deco through in for good measure. The Portuguese influences – architectural, culinary, and cultural – make me wish that the Southern Europeans did more colonizing than the British, Dutch, and Germans. While many of the old colonial homes are in varying states of decay and disrepair, plenty remain along the wide boulevards of Maputo’s upscale neighborhoods.

Maputo is a great walking city – flat, on a grid, and breezy (the only downside are the Kampala-style holes in the sidewalks). So during my two days here, I did little more than wander the streets, stopping in cafes, parks, and along the seaside to stare at the turquoise blue Indian Ocean. The street names, by the way, are mostly of Communist and Socialist heroes and dictators, depending on how you look at it: from Ho Chi Min to Lenin to Julius Nyerere to Mao Tse Tung. People are very friendly, greeting you with “bom dia” and lots of them walk down the streets singing. I pretended (not usually with great success) to speak Portuguese, basically by speaking Spanish and throwing in the three Portuguese words that I know.

For lunch on Friday, I went to the Feira Popular, a sort of amusement park area in the Baixa (lower) downtown area, which has a number of small open-air restaurants. The choice of prawns in curry sauce turned out to be an excellent one, made better only when I asked for hot sauce and was brought a spicy but sweet homemade sauce made from piri-piri (hot peppers) and Meyer lemons.

After lunch, feeling slightly lethargic, I stopped at the Café Continental, a colonial relic, for a café com leite (like a latte). Before I could even order, the man at the next table (who looked like he was in his mid-70’s) asked me: “Portuegesa o extrajera?” (Was I Portuguese or a foreigner?) When I told him I was from the U.S., he told me he was from Seattle (actually Kirkland, across the lake) and within five minutes, I knew his entire life story. His name was Hassan; he was originally from Mozambique, of Indian heritage; he left Maputo 37 years ago to move to London so the doctors could treat the beginnings of his wife’s life-long battle with schizophrenia. I also learned about every job he had in his life; how much he made, what his two daughters and their husbands did and how much they made, and I saw pictures of his children and grandchildren. It turns out that he was in Mozambique, visiting his cousin, for the first time since he had moved away.

After a lengthy chat, Hassan invited me to have dinner with him and his cousin, Amin (who turned out to be in his early 60’s or so). Thinking that we would try some quaint local place, I agreed.

Around 9:30, they picked me up, both wearing slacks, sport coats, and ties, and me (as usual) in jeans and a sweater. Before dinner, we took a drive around the city and then out to the Costa do Sol, the beach area just outside the city. For dinner, they chose a swanky, brand-new casino, and by the time we arrived it was close to 11:00. Nonetheless, we ordered and dinner arrived around 11:30. Apparently, Hassan chose the casino because he loves to dance, and after trying all of the night spots in Maputo, this was his favorite. So after dinner, we went upstairs to the disco to join the smartly- (and sometimes barely-) dressed, 20-something Mozambicans and Europeans dancing to a mix of house music, rap, and the occasional Donna Summers song. Needless to say, with Hassan and I dancing and Amin snapping photos, we stuck out just a bit. By 1:00 a.m., Hassan was still raring to go, but I was pooped and eventually convinced them to call it a night.

Today was slightly less eventful. After a visit to the Saturday morning crafts market (“amiga, amiga, I will give you a good price”), I headed over to the main food market, where Alex, 18 years old, showed me around, visiting all of his relatives’ stalls for free samples of honey, freshly-roasted cashews, and various hot sauces. Cutting through the park on my way back to the guesthouse (Residencial Palmeiras), there was a wedding party on a photo shoot. While the bride and groom were posing, the rest of the wedding party were singing and doing what appeared to be a traditional line dance. I stopped to watch for a minute and one of the guys called me over; after I demurred a couple of times, I felt compelled to accept his invitation to join them, and even though it was a relatively simple dance, after about five minutes, I felt like they had had enough fun at my expense that I could gracefully excuse myself.

Lunch was piri-piri chicken, a traditional Mozambican specialty and some of the spiciest chicken I have ever had, at a place that looked and felt like it didn’t know that the revolution had come and colonial rule was over.

After another long walk down the tree-lined seaside promenade of Avenida Fredrich Engels, I headed home to organize my stuff in preparation for tomorrow’s 5:30 a.m. mini-bus up the coast to Inhambane.