Africa Calling – Why Africa?

I was always mad about Africa and the tropics. As a child, I read exciting books about monkeys in jungles and tropical flowers and fruits. I dreamed of having a Papaya tree in my garden after my childhood friend moved to Indonesia with her parents and sent me letters about this fruit I had never heard of. Since my first visit to former Vendaland in South Africa in 1995, I kept wanting to go back to Africa. I was lucky that, when I met Gerry, he was quite willing to come along. Many trips and holidays to Africa followed, and here we are, living in tropical Mozambique.

What makes Africa special?

People often asked me, what attracts you so much to Africa? What makes it so special? Why go there? I could never put that into words very well. I had a strong feeling to return to this ancient continent. It is something that touches you, an abiding attraction, perhaps a longing for the unknown and a world we seem to have lost in Europe? A world where the concept of time has a completely different dimension, a world of primal nature, with primal trees and primal animals. But above all, it’s the people.

So why Mozambique?

When we returned to Mozambique in 2021, we decided to start Mindwise, to put mindful living more into practice and help people learn more about their minds. We felt Mozambique offers the perfect setting for this: One of Africa’s best kept secrets it’s still unspoiled, peaceful, warm, relaxed and simply beautiful. I have always admired Africans who, often in very ordinary conversations on the bus or somewhere along the way, mention things that make me think; gosh, we do all kinds of academic studies on this very topic. They are a wise people and it seems like we have to learn that wisdom all over again.

It’s as if the basic human values that everyone has, are more visible here, simple but purer; in Europe often snowed under or buried under a layer of external factors and distractions such as a profession, job, status or position. The difference between doing and being. Gerry pays a lot of attention to this in his mindfulness work and we developed a beautiful retreat together to learn more about this.

Vilanculos, Mozambique

We have been living in Mozambique for three years now and I am sitting and reflecting on the veranda of the house we rent here, overlooking the Indian Ocean. Many beautiful birds and butterflies pass by. I am not much of a morning person – never have been – but the mornings are the most beautiful here and I get up much earlier that I used to.

The sun rises in the east. Here, that’s the ocean side, a red ball climbing up from the sea. From our garden runs a dense path full of bushes, plants, trees, and butterflies all the way down to the beach, where fishermen in the morning cast their nets or repair the dhows (traditional fishing boats).

Vilanculos lies in a bay behind the De paradijselijke Bazaruto Archipel so there are no waves really, and it is lovely to spend the mornings to sit on the little boat in front of our house and listen to the sounds of the birds, the water and the chatter of the fishermen. Low tide brings me back to ‘the Wadden Sea’ in The Netherlands, though I am a ‘ waldpykje’ as they call it, having grown up in the Frisian woods and not by the sea.

Ubuntu Philosophy

Recently I read Professor Mogobe Ramose’s book Ubuntu. Ubuntu is the root of African philosophy. “The spirit of Ubuntu, that deep African realisation that we are only human through the humanity of other human beings, is not a local phenomenon but has contributed globally to our common quest for a better world.”

In the book, Ramose seeks the connection between African thought and Western science and way of thinking in which vital tenets of Ubuntu as a lifestyle can be incorporated into a new setting. He sees this as a creative process: translating Ubuntu’s traditional core values into modern organisational forms. An inspiring endeavour.

More and more I am beginning to see that our kind of thinking is what creates distinctions and classifications between ‘us’ and ‘them’,  ‘good’ and ‘bad’, or ‘right’ or ‘wrong’.

Connection

Ubuntu is about connection like truly everything else in life as we are all connected. Being and living here makes me more and more aware of how everything is connected and cannot be separated from each other. And, also how my mode of thinking works and, especially, how it often doesn’t work. Africa feels like a mirror and some days you look more beautiful than others.

Inspiration for our work

I like this way of thinking and see it as an inspiration. The thought of working on that (re)connection through Uniek Mozambique  and Mindwise, in a broader sense. is very motivating. There is no short of inspiration here and I am very excited to share that with you!