January 13, 2011
Well so much time has gone by since I made the last blog entry-I didn’t know where to begin with this one! I decided to categorize happenings/topics and write about each of those. Hope you enjoy!
Site Mates
I thought I’d give you a better picture of the volunteers around me.
There are two volunteers who live in site with me-Dan (Health) and Eric (Environment). They are both second year volunteers and their service ends in April. So, in April, either both or one of them will be replaced and I will have one or two new co-workers/friends.
Then there is Moses. Moses lives about an hour out of site, heading into the mountains. He is about to begin his second year as a health volunteer. He doesn’t have a souk (market) and there is only one small hanut (shop) in his site. So, I see him every Sunday, when he comes into my site to do his weekly food shop at souk. He usually spends the night at Dan’s, so we all cook dinner together on Sunday’s and hang out.
Christmas/New Years
I hope that everyone had a very Merry/Happy Christmas and an even better New Years. I went to Khenifra for Christmas weekend. There was plenty of delicious food, a handful of new friends, and even some wine. While I have been away from family for Christmas in the past, I have always had some family to spend it with. So this was my first Christmas ‘alone’. Thanks to Skype, I was able to talk to some of you, and that helped a lot. Given the circumstances it was a good Christmas, but next year I will most certainly spend it with some of you!
New Years Eve was a little more difficult. I chose not to go to any of the big gatherings as my house was going to be ready on New Years Day and I was eager to get moved in. Luckily, my site mate Dan was here and we made Kung Pow Chicken, shared a bottle of wine, and watched ‘How to Train Your Dragon’. I was still in home stay during New Years Eve, so all of that excitement was done and over by 10pm. I was fast asleep when the New Year came. I think it was the quietest New Years Eve I have had in ten years! I was missing all of my friends and family and a good party ;) I also caught a cold on New Years Eve so I spent the following days moving into my new house with very little energy and in general not as excited about things as I had wanted to be.
Care Packges/Christmas Presents
As most of you know, I was saving these until I moved into my new house. The plan was on the first night in my new home, to have some wine and open all of them. Well, my cold prevented that from happening on the first night, but a few nights after settling in I opened them. THANK YOU. THANK YOU. THANK YOU. I can’t thank all of you enough. Everything you sent means so much to me. Seriously, it was overwhelming to open everything-I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it. I feel extremely loved xXx
New House
Well, I am writing this long awaited blog entry from the comfort of my very own bed! Three months of sleeping on a poonj (Moroccan couch) and I am so happy to be in a real bed! On New Years Day, I got up early and already having a key, made my way to my new home with my rucksack stuffed, duffle bag stuffed and two carrier bags stuffed-it was a looong walk. I had run into my new landlord the day before and he explained that the house was all ready for me, but that the paint was still drying. So that morning, I’ll be honest, I expected to walk into my beautiful, newly painted, all ready for me home. I was wrong. You see the walls are mud, the floors cement, and the ceilings are wooden beams. When they painted the mud walls, they also splatter painted all the floors and the brand new tiled kitchen counter. So, I spent the first two days on my hands and knees with a scrub brush and hose, scrubbing the paint of the floors. The job is never ending. There is still plenty of paint on the floors, but I’m done scrubbing!
Now don’t get me wrong about the house either. MBark (pronounced ‘embarsh’) put more time, effort, and I’m sure money into the house than I expected. I wish I’d had my camera (which I left at Marcia’s in Khenifra at Christmas) to take before and after pictures. The place went from meat cellar, to Maryeem’s home in exactly two weeks as promised. The only minor hiccup is that the light switch in my storage room/closet isn’t working. So, I am using a headlamp for now, but MBark promises to get it fixed for me soon. I’m going to leave you in suspense as to pictures of my new abode. I’m working on a video and promise to have it on here in the next week. Promise!
Landlord and Family
MBark and his family live about eight doors up the shanti (alley) from me. On the first Sunday, I left my front door open as I was sorting things out in the house, around two o’clock, MBark knocked on the door and insisted I come to their house for dinner. I agreed, but was instantly nervous as I can’t understand much of what he or his wife are saying when they speak to me. The one thing I do understand is his wife’s repeated use of the word Meeskeena, preceded by copious amounts of ‘tutting’. Meeskeena translates to ‘poor thing’. I don’t think I am a poor thing, but she does and whenever she stops by and I am eating salad, she assumes I don’t know how to cook, always eat raw vegetables and tuts on about how meeskeena I am, and insists that I come up to theirs for some ‘real food’.
I went that first Sunday evening and they prepared a lovely tagine-I do love Moroccan food. It was ever so awkward though. They have a daughter who is twelve and a son who is in his early twenties. The daughter giggled through the entire meal, and the son kept telling me to eat. As did MBark’s wife, who even when I was chewing was ushering me with, ‘itch, itch, itch’ (eat, eat, eat). MBark, who kept forgetting I have been in Morocco eating with my hands for a few months now, placed a single knife in front of me-as though I would stab the potatoes and carrots like a viking. The son kept reminding him, that I have been eating with Mamaksu and Hayat and that I didn’t need the knife. We had a conversation or two in broken Tamazight, but mostly there was lots and lots of giggling from their daughter. Shortly after finishing, I excused myself and headed home. They are wonderful people and I am very grateful to have them as my new landlords.
Furno/Isherden (Wood Stove/Firewood)
MBark came on the second day and axed a hole in the roof for the pipe to my furno woodstove. He also gave me some of his firewood as I didn’t have any yet, which was extremely nice of him. Then he showed me how to start a fire, which was appreciated too. I’m improving at my fire starting abilities each day.
MBark took me to the donkey/mule firewood buying area of town on Wednesday morning. He looked over all the loads on the animals and decided that a man holding the lead to a donkey and what can only be described as a miniature donkey, were to be my purchase for the day. He stood bartering with the old man for about five minutes or so and turned to me to let me know that the price for both was 75 dirhams. We agreed on the purchase and off we went to my house with two donkey’s in tow. When we got to my front door the old man, undid the string holding the firewood on and dumped it to the ground. I handed him 75 dirhams and IHLASHDIOASHDIOASH!!!!! He started shouting in Tamazight. I jumped back, not sure what was happening. MBark also started shouting back at him. It turned out the old man changed the price to 85 dirhams without telling anyone. I handed him another ten dirhams and off he went muttering. MBark still shouting, shuma (shame on you). Relatively speaking, those ten dirhams are another 1.10GBP or $1.10. Which seems like no big deal, but as I am living on a Peace Corps Dirham budget, it is a big deal when it comes down to it. I just wanted the shouting to stop as people were beginning to gather around us and it was all a bit embarrassing!
If I wasn’t already the talk of my new shanti (alley), I became it the day I got my firewood. After moving it all inside, I went over to Dan’s to get our (shared) axe to begin chopping my new wood. I took a small pile of wood outside, rested my first log on an angle against a large stone and began swinging. PING! I missed and hit the stone. Instantly my neighbor appeared, ‘LA LA LA (NO NO NO)!!’ He grabbed the axe while rambling on, I understood most of what he was saying, which was something like, “You’re doing it wrong, you’re going to ruin you axe, you’re going to chop your foot off, watch me, I will show you how.” Me, “I’m sorry, yes please, show me how.” Me after watching him chop all of my pile, “ohhh, I’m not sure I understand, let me go inside and get some more wood and you can show me again.” Just kidding, I didn’t say that, but I was certainly laughing in my head thinking about saying it. So know I know how to chop wood with an axe, another life skill in the bank.
There are two types of wood for sale, oak and cedar. Cedar is fast burning and needed to get the fire going and then the oak is used once the fire is nice and hot as it is much more dense and it burns much slower. That day I bought about 80% oak and 20% cedar so I am going to have to make a couple more purchases over the next couple weeks, in order to balance things out and to make sure I have a sufficient supply for the next few months. It should be noted that I can only chop the cedar. I have tried twice to chop through the oak, but it is impossible. Maybe not impossible, but as soon as I see someone coming close, I pick up my barely dented oak and run inside. Far too embarrassing to have an audience watch my feeble attempts. So, once my fire is good and going, I plop a long oak log, half in the fire, the other half resting on the ground, and as it burns I push it into the actual furno. Works just fine.
There are two great things about the furno. One is obvious-the heat it provides. The second is that I always have hot water when I have a fire going as there is always a large kettle on top of the furno. This is pure luxury. Hot water to wash my hands, face and dishes. I can’t tell you how exciting that is…
Host Families
While I was eager to get out of home stay and into my own place, I am grateful that once again I was lucky enough to have another fantastic host family. Although, I still don’t really know my host father, as I have only met him twice.
I must say no one will be able to replace Hafida and family in Ait Hamza. I have to return to Azrou in February for a week of training, and I plan to stay for the weekend either before or after the training in Ait Hamza. Ait Hamza is on the way, so it works out well. I miss that family a lot and will be very happy to see them again, especially as my language is better so hopefully we will be able to communicate more than we did in the past.
For a long time, it was clear that Yassmine, my new, one-and-a-half-year-old, host sister didn’t like me. When I would get close to her, she would hit me and tell me to, “ddu” which means ‘go’. After being away for Christmas though, turns out she missed me. In fact, Mamaksu (my host grandmother) told me that she woke up around 4am one morning while I was gone, because Yassmine, in her sleep was repeating, “Am, Am, Am” which is how she says Maryeem. They say absence makes the heart grow fonder…
Work
The women all work out of their homes and in between their daily household activities so it’s not as though I have a place to go during ‘office hours’. That being said, right now we are meeting once a week for a few hours and I am completing PACA Tools with them. PACA stands for Participatory Analysis for Community Action. To date I’ve completed the following PACA Tools:
Community Mapping
I did this during my first meeting and while both of my site mates were away on holiday. Luckily, Rebha, understands most of what I say so she was able to help when the women didn’t understand me. To summarize the meeting, I took a piece of large flip chart paper with me and asked the women to draw a map of their town. I asked them to include all the places they visit both frequently and infrequently. All the women were hesitant at first, but they ended up having a good laugh at each other’s drawings and doing a good job in general. We then ranked how often they frequent each place (by daily, weekly, monthly etc…). Then we marked which places they enjoy being and which places they don’t. The purpose of the activity is to give me an idea of what places women go and don’t go (by seeing which places don’t even make it on the map, like the coffee shops) and how much time they spend at the places.
Seasonal Calendar
The purpose of the seasonal calendar is to help me understand when the women are preoccupied with other tasks (i.e. weddings, birthing ceremonies, Ramadan, etc…) and can’t work on their weaving as much and when they aren’t busy and have lots of time to work. It also allows me to see financial patterns in their year (when they have money to spend on supplies and when they don’t, etc…). Dan, my site mate was here to help translate for me as this was a bit more complicated than the mapping.
Daily Activities
Dan also helped me facilitate the daily activities portion of PACA. This ended up being a bit humorous/shocking for me, as you will soon find out…Daily activities is exactly what it says it is. Finding out exactly what a woman’s day consists of. We began by asking what time they wake up and then on from there. Here are the results:
6am- Wake up (5am summer)
6-12pm- Make tea/breakfast/knead bread/bake bread/wash clothes/clean house/dye wool/cook lunch/pray/(summer work in fields)
12-6pm- Feed children/husbands lunch/wash rugs/clean house/sort grains/errands/school visits/hospital appointments
6-10pm- Prep dinner/chop firewood/weave/prepare wool
10pm- Dinner
11-12ish Bed
Then I asked them about the men…
6.30am- Wake up
7-12pm Work
12-2/3ish- Lunch
2/3-5/6ish- Work
5/6ish- Tea/Relax/Dinner/Bed
It was also noted that they pray five times a day at different times depending on the location of the sun.
Now for the funny bit…Dan was there to help facilitate all of this. So it was me and Dan and a room of 12 Berber women. Dan had to leave at 4pm as he had a Skype date with his family. As soon as he left, the women told me to get my paper, which I had been writing all of their daily activities on, back out, that now that Dan was gone, they could finish it. I was confused, but got it back out. Then a women, who I am guessing is in her early 80’s, came over to me and very seriously told me a whole lotta something I couldn’t understand. But, all the other women though it was hilarious and couldn’t stop laughing. She then asked me if I understood. I apologized and said no I don’t understand. With that all the women began clapping their right hand, flat over a closed fist made with their left hand. I immediately understood and didn’t know what to do-during community based training we were taught never to make this gesture as it means ‘to want to have sex’! Rebha, and the women then began to explain again, “our work doesn’t end at 11-12ish, we try to sleep, but our husbands demand sex and so we must continue to work”. Let’s just say I was in shock, but couldn’t help laughing. It’s just that being in such a conservative place, this came way out of left field! I was not expecting it…I later told Dan what had happened, and he thought it was absolutely hilarious, but sad that they thought of it as work…
I’ve also had a little taste of some cross-sector work, with Dan, the Health volunteer in my site. Two weeks ago, we went to the three outer villages (about an hour away, tucked up in the snowy, cold mountains) to talk to women about prenatal care. We talked to about 100 women in total, and they all seemed pretty responsive, so that's good. The problem is that many never see a single doctor while they are pregnant and then they give birth in their homes. There is a high infant mortality rate in these outer villages, so it’s important for Dan to try to get the women to come down into town during their pregnancy. There is a birthing center here in my site, for women to come to both whilst they are pregnant and when they are ready to have the baby. It's all free, so we took them pictures so they could see that it isn't a scary hospital, it's more like a house. We talked about how to take birth control, importance of washing hands, risky pregnancies, oral rehydration recipes for infants when they have diarrhea, and what to eat when pregnant. It was an exhausting, but a good day. I was invited into countless homes to drink tea...I think I might develop diabetes over the next two years. :)
Aerobics
So, I am officially an aerobics instructor. I know right-how did that happen?? I’m still not quite sure! Hessna, the local pharmacist, had been asking me if I like to exercise, to which I replied yes. So she asked me to join them in their women’s aerobics classes. I went the first Tuesday after moving, but only to watch. I still had a nasty cold, and not a lot of energy, so I just wanted to get a feel for the class. The class was great, they did floor aerobics for about 45 minutes and then 20 minutes of sit-ups and floor exercises. Apparently the women all pay a monthly fee for use of the ‘gym’ (a very small building, room for no more than 20 people, but it does have some weight machines, a decent loud stereo, and a shower).
After the class, Hessna came over to me and said something along the lines of, “ok, so can you please teach on Thursday as I won’t be here?” I was pretty put on the spot, and didn’t want to disappoint, so I agreed (even though I’ve never taught an aerobics class in my life, and was already having an anxiety attack at the thought of teaching women who couldn’t even understand me-most of the women speak Moroccan Arabic and French-no Tamazight!)
So, as I was leaving Hessna came back over to me and said, “eas tisint matta luqt guh Lhamis eh (you know what time on Thursday right?)”
I nodded and said, “jooj uh nus (2.30)”
Hessna quickly corrected me, “La La La, LHamis guh Larbea, JoomooOw guh jooj uh nus, duh Sibbt guh jooj uh nus, Shukran Maryeem!” Which translates to, No No No, Thursday is 4pm, Friday is 2.30pm and Saturday is 2.30pm, Thanks Maryeem!
Wait what, what just happened?!?! I am teaching three days in a row?? I left very confused as to what had just happened and terrified at the thought of teaching.
Turns out I had nothing to worry about. I went and taught all three classes and the women thanked me and said they enjoyed it. On Wednesday, I practiced a routine I remember from the aerobics classes I used to take in Greenwich and that’s what I did with the women. They even asked me to teach the class in English, because they want to learn English. Brilliant. So now, I teach Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday and I am thoroughly enjoying it.
I must tell you-it is kind of a crazy experience. Picture this:15-20 Moroccan women, fully covered, some even in full Burka’s with only there eyes showing. Then when the gym door closes and there is no danger of a man seeing them, the head scarves come off, as do the Burka’s, under which is a full outfit of skin tight Spandex. Then the music (which they provided me with) begins pumping through the room-we begin to do our warm-up run…at this point it’s just the heavy beat of House music (I’m having flashbacks of being in the club in London)…the beat drops, so do we into Squats, and out blares, “I’m in Miami Bitch!!” Which is the main chorus to the song. The women have no idea what is being said, but they Love It and sing along. I have to refrain from a fit of hysterical laughter, as I watch in the mirror as all of this unfolds behind me. I begin to Love my Peace Corps experience even more…
I wanted to say, if there is anything people are curious about, as far as life over here, or if there is a certain topic one would like me to write about, please leave a comment below and I will do my best to make an entry in response.
As I mentioned before, I’m working on a video of the house and promise to have it up in the next week. Until then, take care!
Love,
Maryeem xXx
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| Prepping Christmas Meal |
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| Little Yassmine-Host Sister |
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| Our Moroccan Christmas Food |
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| Our Moroccan Christmas Food |
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| Our Moroccan Christmas Food |
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| Our Moroccan Christmas Food |
