A walk thru Maputo Streets

I would love to take a video of walking down the streets of Maputo.  It is quite an experience.  I haven't quite figured out the focus of a sidewalk here.  I always thought a sidewalk was there as a safety for walkers.  I am not sure that is the focus here. 

This picture shows a boundary across the sidewalk.  Someone drove into it breaking it up.  I thought maybe they were going to take it away so the walkers could have free reign to walk on this sidewalk when it is busy. (This is on a Sunday.  Surprising there are not cars on the sidewalk.)

Sidewalk  outside our apartment on a weekday.

This is the sidewalk when we walk on a weekday.

Sidewalk business

 

 Cars parked on the sidewalk and  in the median.  Walkers are at your own risk.  Don't get too comfortable thinking you are safe.  You are never safe when walking in Maputo.

Walk around the trim from the trees going into winter

on the street. No place on the sidewalk

 These vendors must consider themselves vehicles.  They share the road with the cars.  They couldn't get thru on the sidewalk because the cars park there.

Chova means "push" in Changana

This is the way most vendors get around.  They use these hand carts to haul so many things.  I see these carts filled with pineapple or coconuts or a variety of vegetables. I see them with a load of mattresses, sacks of cement, bricks, steel, etc.   I see them with a loud speaker attached yelling out something that attracts people with metal they want picked up, or batteries they want picked up.  Because the roads in Maputo are hilly, I often see a person on the front of these carts to slow it down and one on the back pulling it back so it does not run away with the driver.  On the other side, I see one on the back pushing and the one on the front pulling with everything they have.  

Quite the parking job

These cars are parked in the median.  It used to be called the city of Acacia Trees because the Acacia trees used to line the roads all in the median.  Now, there are so many cars parked there, many of the trees have given up. 

I like to walk side by side with my husband.  I find it difficult to do that here.  We will walk for a second or two and then have to walk single file because of some blockage on the sidewalk.  You must watch your feet because the sidewalk is not even.  Watch out for the cars.  One you think is parked is actually moving in or out.  Cars have the right of way, even on the sidewalks, not people.