The Engine Catches

Susanna Lewis

Little by little, people can make a difference.

Thirty people, including four teachers and twenty-six eighth- and ninth-grade girls, are crowded behind a rusty, light green, open-back Toyota truck, our bodies poised to push. “Um! Dois! Tres!” and we jam our bodies against the truck. We use all of our strength, but the truck only moves in almost imperceptible increments until—at last—the engine catches and we hear the whir of the motor. We chase after the truck, grab at the green metal and pull ourselves up and in.

Once everyone is in the truck, we are packed liked sardines—girls are sitting on each other, their hands are around each others’ waists, and we are clinging to the sides of the truck to keep from falling out.

The wind blows at the girls’ hair; their smiles are unrestrained, broad and toothy. Palm trees and mud houses blur past us as we make our way to Ilha de Mocambique.

I am the assistant coach of the Escola Secundaria de Monapo girls soccer team, and we are on our way to a game against the team from Ilha de Mocambique. Ilha is a 500-year-old town forty-five minutes from our own village, Monapo. It is a tiny place situated just off the Mozambican coast, and it served as the first Portuguese capital of Mozambique until the turn of the twentieth century. It is a hauntingly beautiful place of 300-year-old churches, navy and green waters, and women dressed in colorful capulanas and iridescent earrings. Ilha’s gently crumbling, centuries-old Portuguese buildings and sturdy Mozambican mud-and-reed houses are a fascinating juxtaposition of this country’s past and present.

We can see, hear, and smell present-day Mozambique as we drive across the one-lane bridge to Ilha. It is low tide, and female figures walk on the water more than a mile into the sea, on paths worn into the sea floor by thousands of fishermen before them. They look for fish with nothing but a pail and a free hand. The air is fresh and fishy, and shirtless men ride bicycles with sacks of charcoal and cassava between their knees.

We make our way to the soccer field, which is next to the Portuguese Forteleza and the glimmering water of the Indian Ocean. The girls and I change into our uniforms inside the Forteleza and they giggle in excitement—this is their first “real” game against another team and they are nervous. The coach says a few words and I say a few more, to build their confidence and to remind them that together we are strong and that we can win this game.

We play a bigger, tougher opponent on sandy dirt, and the girls play barefoot, though I play wearing sneakers. The girls play better than they ever have before; they do what we taught them to do in our practices, and they play like mature soccer players. They pass the ball well, talk to each other on the field, and dominate the other team. During halftime, the coach and I tell them how much they have improved, and how proud we are of them. When we score the girls do cartwheels, hug, run over to me with their arms open and clasp my hands in theirs. I can’t help but smile and hug them back. I have never felt so comfortable and like myself with Mozambicans before. The girls flash their big smiles and we are in the moment, we are a team.

We do the unthinkable, achieving a resounding victory, 5-0.

After the game, we push the truck to start its engine, pile into the back and make two victory laps around the island. The girls sing to taunt the other team, their voices nasal and imperfect, but somehow the disharmonies are beautiful. They sing, “Silencio toda a gente, Monapo esta a passar!” (Everyone be quiet, Monapo is passing!). They sing, and I sing with them. Next to me a girl blows on a whistle to accompany the singing, on my other side another girl has her head on my shoulder. Sea salts are in my nose, and the gravelly road throws us up and down against the metal of the truck. The girls’ glee is palpable and my own happiness is pure. We drive back to Monapo in the fading light of the day, and when we reach our town the girls sing again, “Silencio toda a gente, Monapo esta a passar!”

As we pass by their different neighborhoods and girls jump off of the truck, they say to me, “Goodbye Teacher!” and give me big hugs. Even though I had been running team practices for a couple of months, and teaching these girls English for nearly a year, it was only after that game that I finally felt like I was a part of their team and a member of their community.

To me, being a Peace Corps Volunteer is working hard every day to belong, every day to learn new customs and change your perspective. You don’t know that you are changing or that your community is slowly accepting you until, like those pushes that finally get the truck’s engine to catch, you have an amazing, surprising moment where everything comes together. For me, the soccer game was the moment that, after months of pushing, the engine caught. After that game I finally felt confident that I was a member of my community, and knowing that I had taught my girls to be better, more confident soccer players made me feel that I had an effect on them, too.

Progress as a Volunteer is slow and often difficult to detect. Even though it may seem impossible at times, serving in the Peace Corps guarantees you one thing, that you will change and you will see change in others—even if to realize it you need a ride in a rusty old truck, a soccer ball and twenty-six wonderful girls.

Susanna Lewis served as an English teacher at the Escola Secundaria de Monapo in Mozambique. She was a part of the tenth training group in Mozambique and her service was from September 2005-07. Susanna now lives in Baltimore, Maryland and is teaching English to refugees, as well as pursuing a master’s in Social Work at the University of Maryland.