Marie Skara - Maputo, Mozambique

After being part of AIESEC in Trondheim for 2 years I decided to go on GIP exchange. I have been living in Maputo now for 3 months and I still have 2 and a half months left (From 1st of February to 30th of June). This blog post includes some of my experiences from living and working here. If you want to know more about my experience you can check out my blog http://marieskara92.wix.com/maskara

The first thing that hit me when I got of the plane was the heat. We left the ice-cold Norwegian winter and arrived to hot and humid Mozambican summer. My body was in shock, but after a couple of days I managed to adapt.

Siri (my travel buddy) and I were greeted by our project manager, Tania, at the airport after 20 hours of travelling and taken to our home. We live in the 13th floor with the most amazing view. We live in a three-bed room apartment in the center of the city with 3 AIESEC alumni. The people we live with soon became some of our best friends here. Ivandro, our host showed us around the city and explained all the most important things we needed to know about Maputo.

My room mates

My work

I started my work a couple of days after I arrived. For the five months I´m staying here in Maputo I will work for a marketing agency called On Spot. It was founded in Portugal in 2003 and in 2011 they expanded to Mozambique. Here they work with big companies like Coca Cola, Toyota, Millennium BIM and MCEL.

Last year On Spot worked with Save the Children to create a campaign called De Mãos Dadas (Holding hands). It was an awareness campaign, which aimed to prevent unsafe migration from Mozambique. Children from rural areas are sometimes being trafficked into child labour and even prostitution in South Africa. The goal of the campaign was to create awareness and equipping children, families and communities with the knowledge and tools to prevent unsafe migration.

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Since the campaign was a huge success, On Spot wants to continue working with other humanitarian organizations with similar goals. They saw that there is an opportunity to take their expertise and apply it to social programs through NGOs. So my job is to research and contact NGOs here in Maputo, and then develop strategies and projects to help these NGOs reach more people who can benefit from their work. On Spot wants to contact NGOs working within the areas of sexual education, prevention of HIV/AIDS, health education, nutrition education and women empowerment.

Culture shocks

I been living here now for 3 months, but I still have culture shocks. In the start of my stay here everything seemed so different to me, just going to the market to buy food was a culture shock. Now I’m finally starting to get a grip of how things work. All small things that shape the every day life are totally different, and I had to slowly learn everything.

Walking down the street here in Maputo is a culture shock for me on its own. People are constantly stopping to talk to each other. In Norway I’m used to people not talking to each other in public places. We don’t talk to stranger on the bus or anywhere else unless there is something we want from them. We prefer to stay in our own personal bubble. Here, personal space is not even an expression. Just try to take the local bus and you will find out pretty soon that there is nothing called personal space.

Bus in Maputo

My AIESEC experience

The months I have been here I have gotten quite close with AIESEC in Mozambique and I have had the chance to see how they work. I even got the chance to be a facilitator in an international conference they were hosting in April. All over the world AIESEC is hosting conferences to teach about leadership and how to become a global citizen. I already been to 6 conferences in Norway and one in Greece, but they cannot compare to this one. After this conference experience in Mozambique I know for sure that AIESEC is changing lives.

Faci Team

At the Global Village

Travelling

I have been so lucky that I could travel around Mozambique and the countries around. This country has so many beautiful places to go, but so far I only travelled two places in Mozambique. The first time to a beautiful island outside Maputo and the second time to a place called Ponta D’Ouro which means the golden point. Since I have to go to the boarder of Mozambique every month I always try to make a vacation out of it. First time I went to Johannesburg, second time to Swaziland and the third time to Ponta D’Ouro, which is at the border of South Africa. There are so many things to discover here. Next week Siri and I are going to Johannesburg to do bungee jumping (if I dear) and in the end of this month we are going to Swaziland for one of Africa’s biggest festivals. I’m so excited!

Inhaca Island

Ponta D'Ouro

Last words

It’s hard to sum up all of the amazing things that I have experienced during these three months in only one blog post. Going on exchange changes something in you. I can´t really put my finger on it, but things change. You get another outlook on your own culture. You learn to love and accept the differences in people. You break stereotypes. You change your opinions. You get to know yourself in a totally unique way. And at the same time you get to contribute to the society. I know that the impact that I’m making is not very much in the big picture, but if I can change someone’s life just a little bit to the better I think I done something right.

I can honestly say that these three months has been some of the best months in my life. I met so many people that will stay in my heart forever. I had experiences I never dreamed of. I changed for the better in so many ways. I have fallen in love with Maputo and the people living here.