Vida na estrada

Life on the street.

For a late breakfast I went to a Turkish restaurant that I’ve long been eyeing. I eschewed a typical Turkish coffee as I wanted my mouth to retain some cells, but had delicious and foamy milk in a fantastic silver pouring pot. There are a few links between Mozambique and Turkey mainly due to the extractives industry, and it’s whetting my appetite for exploring more of that country.

I picked up a recommended Maputo history and architecture book from the tourist information office. Written by a dude who worked here for a period in the German embassy, it has been excellent wandering with it today. I set out from the apartment to the quiet streets and the security guard Manuel and I agreed with each other that nos domingos não tem movimento (on Sundays there’s no movement).

One hundred metres up the hill I encountered a young lad of about 12 sobbing his heart out. I chatted to a fruit seller nearby, who said he was likely crying from hunger. I bought some apples and bananas and went back to deliver them, by which time some young women were trying to cheer him up. It transpired both the nuts the boy was selling and the money he’d made so far (400 meticais - around 6 dollars) had been stolen by a man. He was distraught because he feared a beating from his parents if he returned empty-handed.

The fruit seller and I offered to write him a note by way of a testimony to explain to his parents, if it would help in any small way, and between a group of bystanders we all chipped in so he almost recouped what had been lost. We instructed him to head directly home, with one of the vendor’s safety pins now used to clip the money safely to the inside of his clothes. The boy said his parents can read but we have no idea whether they’ll understand the fruit seller’s scrawl or my fairly dodgy written Portuguese, or whether they will have phones with credit or charge in order to call the fruit seller’s number. Or whether they’ll even establish the facts before taking their frustration out on the boy.

How gravely sad, firstly that the boy suffered such an injustice, and secondly that there’s no guarantee that he’ll avoid a beating for something he was powerless to stop. Bystanders acted kindly but we couldn’t even be sure that we’d resolved the situation to mitigate the violence, given that his fear shows it’s clearly the norm for him. His situation went from marginal to very sub-marginal back to less than marginal. I truly hope he went home because this is how kids end up on the street permanently. They’re eking out a subsistence life when they suffer a setback and can’t face returning home because poverty breeds desperation and violence that they eventually flee.

I discussed with the group who had chipped in, and thankfully they think instances of robbery against street vendors are very rare. In Maputo which is quieter and more organised than most African capitals, it can be easy to forget the desperate circumstances in which people live. Mozambique remains an extremely poor country, and many, like kids selling things on the streets, struggle on the margins of survival.

I’ll be dwelling on this incident for a while, and hope I see the kid again selling things in my neighbourhood, as I’d like to buy from him.

In the evening a bright spark uploaded the Tory party leadership debate on YouTube as soon as it was over. I don’t know how I feel about it at the moment, other than that I’d prefer Rory Stewart or any of them to either Boris Johnson aka the vacant lectern or Gove as he simply isn’t likeable. I read a Guardian article that stated that Jeremy Hunt looked less like a leadership candidate and more like a cabin crew member on an overnight flight. This provided one of the very few moments of mirth. I revisited the same feeling I had during the 2016 Brexit debates when Amber Rudd was speaking earnestly about how Conservatives want to support fairer health and education services for every citizen. People said very similar things tonight. HOW can people who have been steadfast supporters of Tory policies voice this rhetoric without choking on their own words? Cuts per capita and closures of multiple services are a key feature of the Tory government years, under the banner of austerity. This can’t realistically wash any longer. The wealth and resources of the UK could easily be rebalanced in favour of more people than who currently benefit from them. The candidates may say things like this, but their actions in parliament do not demonstrate the same commitment. I am fascinated by the leadership contest but this is politicking is why I could never support this party myself.