Fringe Benefits – iCats Program 

One of the great things working as an iCat in new countries, cities, and continents are the endless options for exploration. This last week I jumped on a plane and in two hours I landed in Maputo. Maputo is the capital of Mozambique, which has had a turbulent past and sits on the East Coast of Africa on the Indian ocean. I worked my way up the coast landing in fishing villages, townships, and small cities where I visited with people, ate local cuisine, and relaxed on the 25 degree Celsius water of the Indian ocean.

Being fluent in Spanish helped me break the language barrier as the majority of the country speaks Portugese as it was under control of Portugal until 1975. I lived in Argentina for five years, and often visited Brazil where I noticed that suddenly Portugese makes sense after picking up Spanish. The people in Mozambique are super nice, intense, and willing to help with anything.

One of things I noticed was the excessive amount of garbage spread all throughout the country. I asked around and it turns out that the sanitation process was never properly developed and thus the streets are the dumping grounds. It’s sad to see as the city of Maputo has potencial to be a great place and is missing a proper system of waste disposal. The majority of the waste seemed to be plastic, and it seems like a posible solution could be a plastic-to-energy solution as much of the southern tip of Africa is also lacking sustainable amounts of energy and is hindering overall growth.

Regardless of issues the country might have, it’s a stunningly beautiful place: