Adult literacy classes are offered at the Women and Youth Vocational Training School, part of the Janene Pennel Education Center in rural Mozambique. UMNS photos by John Gordon.

A UMNS Report
By Linda Green*
April 22, 2009 | BUNGANE, Mozambique (UMNS)

Many women in this remote section of Mozambique seek help, training and education at the place they call “Tinga Tinga.”

It’s actually the Janene Penel Education Center, a United Methodist outpost that offers hope – through life skills training and a secondary education boarding school – to women and their children.

A four-hour drive from Maputo, the center -- built in 2006 with the support of the Virginia Annual Conference– offers classes in cooking and nutrition, domestic economy, family care, sewing, gardening and computer science and other vocational skills.

Center Director Albertina Amelia Tamba says the mission is to “help people, help each other and help other people.” She says that by offering the chance for women to make changes in their lives, the center actually helps “the development of the country, the location and Africa,” Tamba said.

It is a lofty goal. Mozambique is home to 17 million people and an estimated 60 percent of adults cannot read or write. The illiteracy rate is highest among women. And it is that illiteracy which is the biggest obstacle to overcome for women seeking to support themselves and their families.

Tinga Tinga addresses that need by offering free literacy classes.

“We need to develop the lives of the people here, especially the women,” Tamba said, noting that illiteracy keeps people from even the simplest tasks, like reading bus schedules to get to work.

Maria Tatsimba, 42, a leader in her church, enrolled in the literacy classes two years ago to learn how to write reports, sign documents and assist her children in their schoolwork. Learning is “important because sometimes when you do not know how to read and write you look crazy” she said.

Now, instead of depending on others, “when I need to read, I do it myself. And I do in Portuguese or Shitshwa even with some mistakes, but I do it myself,” Tatsimba said.

Nineteen-year-old Helen Asta Zaocossa arrived at Tinga Tinga with a career goal in mind: to become a flight attendant. She is among 40 girls who live at the center, learning to sew, plant and harvest, selling their wares to generate income.

The experience “helps people to know the world, to know how the world is and how to manage the world,” she said, as she and others cultivated the ground with hoes for a garden.

Unlike many such centers, there is no cost to attend Tinga Tinga.

The need to improve literacy also means trying to reach the children before they get lost in the cycle. That’s why six years ago the United Methodist Church of Mozambique opened a secondary school at the center so that the local children would not need to walk an hour to attend school: They can go to school at Tinga Tinga.

One student, Luis Francisco Mawaia, 16, hopes to become a doctor. He said the Tinga Tinga classes in math, Portuguese, chemistry, physical education, biology and geography are “important for my future.”

Antonio Alexangre, the physical education teacher, said it’s really pretty simple: “Education is important for the students because with it they get how to go into society and then get some professional training so they can find a job.”

The center, said director Tamba, is “giving life” to those it helps.

*Green is a United Methodist News Service news writer based in Nashville, Tenn.

News media contact: Linda Green, Nashville, Tenn., (615) 742-5470 or newsdesk@umcom.org.  

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