Near Tete city there is an old Catholic Mission built by the Portuguese at the end of the 19th century. Since traditional life in Sub-Saharan Africa has for so long focused on day to day existence and societies rarely have enough surplus to construct monumental architecture, few buildings of historical existence from the past remain today. Most traditional structures along the river are small and temporary and return to the earth within a generation of construction. So, unlike many places around the world, that are full of temples, palaces, fortresses, and monuments, it’s hard to find physical traces of the past in the places here. Aside from a few settlements and some ancient petroglyphs, there is almost nothing in Mozambique from before the Portuguese era. So at over 100 years old, the Mission at Boroma is a historical anomaly, and one of the oldest man made structures in the region.