Friday July 8
It’s five years since I’ve been here – and Yes, I’m proudly telling everyone, it’s my third time in Mozambique. I’m here first of all for next week’s Synod meeting of the Presbyterian Church of Mozambique (IPM), our synod’s global partner. Matthew Appleyard, who travelled with me, has come at the invitation of the Church to learn more about their youth work. These first days since our arrival on Tuesday have been mainly settling in – but they’ve given me opportunity to see that some things have changed over recent years.
Getting off the plane is the first thing: walking straight into the terminal rather than down the steps and out into the near tropical heat. (Though as it happens just now the heat is somewhat lacking: it was hotter at Heathrow when we left.) Now you quickly find yourself in a large and well-appointed arrivals hall where the visa queues are much less intimidating than I remember from last time – all part of the airport development undertaken, I’m told, by the Chinese. There’s plenty of building going on in and around the city centre – and again, the most significant appears to be Chinese.
Church officials are busy preparing for next week’s Synod: this is the annual meeting of the whole church, to which people in true Biblical fashion will come from the north and the south. In fact, they will all come to the south: Mozambique is a vast country, but the capital Maputo is at the southernmost tip, and as well as being the most populous area, it’s by far the area of greatest strength of the IPM. We are staying at the Church headquarters at Khovo; and following a series of preparation meetings on Wednesday, Ernesto Langa and José Tovela found time to take us on a tour around the city yesterday morning – in the vehicle which Northern Synod purchased three years ago.
At Matthew’s request we drove out to see the new stadium, built to host the African Games later this year – built, needless to say, by the Chinese. It’s a fair way out of town, dominating everything around, and linked in with the Games Village which, true to form, looks as if the builders are going to be busy till the very last minute. The road along the coast and down to the harbour is as attractive as ever, with the old concrete shell of the colonial era hotel at last removed, and apparently ready for a replacement – to add to the large number of new hotels now opening closer to the downtown area. The traffic everywhere is infinitely worse than I remember from earlier visits; and Mark, who is staying at the Khovo guesthouse with us, reckons that the Government is to blame for the way in which the bus companies have been pressurised into cramming passengers in ever more tightly, reducing the quality of the service and encouraging more and more cars onto the roads.
It’s been good to meet up with people again: José and Ernesto of course, and also Ernesto’s wife Argentina who was part of the first group who visited us in 2004, and stayed with us in Durham. Then Carlos Banza whom we met in Xai-Xai on the first return visit the same year (he’s now head of the Church’s Evangelism Department), and also Reinaldo Sive who looked after me so well when I spent four weeks here during my sabbatical in 2006. Others too who made us welcome in the past, and whom it’s a real joy to meet up with again. And I know there will be more meetings up next week at the Synod: Armando Chihale who was such a good interpreter for us in 2004, and whom Hillian and I visited in Chimoio in 2006, has emailed me to promise that he will be at the Synod meeting and looking out for me.
So Synod next week is the first part of the visit so far as I’m concerned. But I’m hoping there will be specific work to undertake in the time I’m here after that, and am hoping in the next few days for some meetings to be set up so that we can start to plan how I can best use that time so as to strengthen our Global Partnership.
John Durell
