It is said that last year, when the minister of agriculture was about to leave, Nchiri asked him for a packet of cigarettes. His plane had problems. The delegation had to sleep in Casa Banana, where ants bit them. Burnt land stretches for many kilometres along the road. Smoke darkens the sky, a haze hangs over valleys and mountains.
Abundant booze has been brewed, for the party sometimes lasts two days and two nights.
It is the new moon, so dark you can hardly make out men, women and children dancing, body pressed against body, in a circle around the musicians. The other evening attraction is video-cinema. These have mushroomed all over rural Mozambique, wherever there is electricity or generators. To lure customers, video-cinema is free for now. When darkness falls, villagers gather in awe to watch one of four worn-out, wavy tapes.