UPDATED (FINALLY:))Keywords blog: half marathon, addictions, South Africa, Italian trainers-painters-musicians and too many painful hills...please find the link yourself:)
The pictures here above, however, don't refer to my Mozambican running experiences, instead they were taken after an extremely hard half marathon we ran in South Africa (full of hills!) , just across the border. What a contrast with the Moz "corridas"! Starting SHARP, being over-organized, furnishing the runners with water and food along the way, marking the exact kilometers,...it seemed so unreal, so totally different from how things go in Maputo. Starting hours(!) late in the biggest "confusão" you can imagine, in a company of fellow runners, most of them being barefoot or wearing normal "shoes", not getting water along the way (as organizors often steal the available drinks), ...Fraude is also very common in Mozambique, with runners being picked-up by car after a kilometer or two, and then, at the end, you can see them, proudly, not sweating nor exhausted(of course!), receiving the prize...The latter can end up in some swearing and shouting and angry reactions, but people tend to "accept" and let things happen as they happen...(Money)Prizes are very important to the runners, and often the only motivation to run...Some of the runners I talked to try to make their living out of these street corridas...(Would this just be one example, one symptom of some major problems Mozambican society is facing?)But...taken everything together, I really do enjoy Mozambican corridas, as they are a FEAST, with people shouting "força!" along the way (in South African the word seemed to be "strongbaaite", but nobody deemed it necessary to encourage us...), co-runners chatting, dancing, singing,...Moreover, it surprised me as well how "white" and "segregated" the half marathon in South Africa had been, and this in contrast to Maputo where I am often the only white lady running in the Moz street runs...
Hi everybody and especially runners-friends!
Before departure to Mozambique I had-I have to admit-only one big worry: will I be able to satisfy my addiction?:) Living without luxury, on rice and some vegetables, in a tropical heat,...I knew wouldn´t be a problem for me...except for...a life without running...For a non-runner this sounds very weird (maybe some of you already want to send me to some psychiatric clinic:)), but just try to compare it to a life without coffee, cigarettes, sex and rock and roll...guess would be also hard to kick off from for some of you, isn´t it?:)
Well, great was my surprise when I found out that Maputo is a very western style city where you can find almost everything (ok,ok, not the 100 kinds of shampoos-but hey, a smaller choice really FACILITATES life, surely for a person like me having difficulties to make choices:), neither a gorgonzala cheese, but instead we have here delicious sea food, good coffee, ice cream, excellent Portuguese and Southafrican wines, and the more!!! -OF COURSE this is only affordable to us, the xpats and the ´creme de la creme´among the Mozambicans-later more on this).
My surprise even grew when I bumped-by coincidence- into some runners here in Mozambique! Pasquale being the most particular and ´amaizing´one...Over 60 years (am I right, Pasquale?), this Italian is a real hard core runner (and painter, see pic and musician and person-with-big heart and...), who inter alia has run the Comrade, a hundred (!) kilometer run in South Africa in mountain area!!! (isn´t this a nice idea for my DCLA runners-mates?! a nice reason to come to visit me here!) and several marathons. In his previous life he served as a UN peacekeeper in various countries and ended up living in the country of his last mission. As a very dedicated runner-with-a-big-heart he is also the trainer of a very small athletics club in Maputo and training some excellent Mozambican (real) athletes (inter alia Seena, see pictures!). Pasquale helped to introduce me in the runner´s world here and thanks to him I ran my first half marathon in Maputo three months ago...a real experience...
The pictures here above, however, don't refer to my Mozambican running experiences, instead they were taken after an extremely hard half marathon we ran in South Africa (full of hills!) , just across the border. What a contrast with the Moz "corridas"! Starting SHARP, being over-organized, furnishing the runners with water and food along the way, marking the exact kilometers,...it seemed so unreal, so totally different from how things go in Maputo. Starting hours(!) late in the biggest "confusão" you can imagine, in a company of fellow runners, most of them being barefoot or wearing normal "shoes", not getting water along the way (as organizors often steal the available drinks), ...Fraude is also very common in Mozambique, with runners being picked-up by car after a kilometer or two, and then, at the end, you can see them, proudly, not sweating nor exhausted(of course!), receiving the prize...The latter can end up in some swearing and shouting and angry reactions, but people tend to "accept" and let things happen as they happen...(Money)Prizes are very important to the runners, and often the only motivation to run...Some of the runners I talked to try to make their living out of these street corridas...(Would this just be one example, one symptom of some major problems Mozambican society is facing?)But...taken everything together, I really do enjoy Mozambican corridas, as they are a FEAST, with people shouting "força!" along the way (in South African the word seemed to be "strongbaaite", but nobody deemed it necessary to encourage us...), co-runners chatting, dancing, singing,...Moreover, it surprised me as well how "white" and "segregated" the half marathon in South Africa had been, and this in contrast to Maputo where I am often the only white lady running in the Moz street runs...
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