I went to Mozambique in 1998 to map a coastline for a development agency that wanted a map. I made the map. As far as I know it sat in a cabinet in Lisbon for a decade and was then digitised by someone who didn't read the notes. That's most of geography, honestly: the notes nobody reads.
What I actually did in Maputo was learn to sail. A Portuguese doctor at the hospital had a twenty-two-foot boat with a cracked deck and no working instruments, and on Sundays we'd take it out into the bay and he'd shout at me until I understood the wind. The bay is shallow, warm, and full of dhows sailing lines their grandfathers sailed, and I have never been so thoroughly outclassed by people with fewer instruments.
By the second year I could take her out alone. By the fifth I could bring her back in the dark, which is a different skill. I bought my first boat the month I got home, in Lisbon, on a mooring I couldn't afford, and I've had one ever since.
The map is in a cabinet. The wind is still in the bay. I know which one I gave five years to.