GREat Day

Today was a great day.  Everything was just so wonderful.  I actually got up (though very reluctantly) with enough time o slowly get ready and eat breakfast (fruit salad) and drink my morning tea.  Arabic was long but not unbearable.  I stopped with Adelaide to get food after class at two of the multiple sandwich stands all along the main street in the medina.  We got eggplant and green peppers at one and beets, carrots, rice, and a salad salsa sandwich at the other to make our ideal sandwiches for lunch.  We took them to school where we eat lunch and made them with a few additions from the lunch that was being served that day.  They were tasty and delicious and just what I have been wanting to make.

NO CLASS after lunch...but an optional movie, which I stayed for and watched part of.  Then I walked with some friends to explore parts of Rabat we haven't seen yet.  We walked for awhile, which was nice since I've been feeling very lethargic, and we saw some pretty cool things and stumbled upon a beautiful medrasa (school) that we peaked around in for a little.  Since we were walking around I didn't spend the entire afternoon snacking, though of course I did manage to have a prickly pear and some almonds.
Then we went to my friend, Max's house to smoke hookah with his brother and his friend.  We sat on the roof of his house which had a crazy view of the medina and stars.  His brother kept telling us jokes in broken English that were basically all about penises and sex.  So got to experience an interesting side of Moroccan humor...it was a very interesting evening to say the least.

Dinner: BEANS! yummmm. actually so tasty. and my host mom bought pomegranates just for me which was really sweet.  Watched Slackers during dinner (in English), showered after dinner (FINALLY) and had really great, non awkward interactions with each member of my family....guess Wednesdays are pretty good, I wonder what Thursday has in store for me

Raif: I Surrender

....i'm addicted.  it's the perfect combination of sweet and salty....can have it with peanut butter, jam, chocolate, hummus, cheese, you name it.

other delicious treats: pomegranates, mandarin oranges, freshly roasted nuts at every little store (almonds, peanuts, cashews, pistachios, pumpkin seeds, and more), tea WITHOUT sugar, cafe noir WITH sugar when i'm in the mood, prickly pears cuts to order, popcorn from popcorn man, hummus at the train station, fresh orange juice
.....its ALWAYS snack time, literally I don't stop eating all day.  and if I'm not eating I just finished or am on my way to get food.

got to cook for my family last thursday and it was awesome. I, with the help of the older of my two little sisters (who I secretly like better),  made veggies with cashews and rice (surprise surprise) and found tortilla chips, avocado, tasty olives and a MANGO it was so good i think my family liked it too and I told my host mom to tell me whenever she is tired and I will make dinner WHENEVER.....we'll see about that though

Last week was loooong, the weekend was short BUT this Saturday I am going with SIT (the program I'm on) for a week to the south and I'm REALLY excited.  I haven't been there yet and I can't wait to experience it!

Wanted to share this

my friend here is a wonderful writer and i wanted to share his outlook on things we experienced during the week in the village so without further ado......another perspective of the village homestay

ALSO quick update on life in Rabat
it hasn't stopped raining since last friday, the medina is full of black sludge and everything is damp.  I have a head cold and my nose won't stop running.  Besides that everything is just groovy.  While my arabic is still minimal it's pretty cool to be able to read and write it now.  My french is definitely NOT improving BUT I think I can understand what people say more now, so that's also really nice.
The seminar class that I'm taking this week is on public health and the environment and it's really interesting.
I asked my host mom if I could make dinner this week....she said yes, we'll see what happens with that

I peeded in Spain, then jumped back into Morocco

How? Where? Why?
let me tell you from the beginning, because it was quite a journey

Took a train from Rabat Thursday night at 11:45, to the city of Taza, where we arrived a little after 5 am.  From there, myself and five friends took a three hour grand taxi ride (which holds six people plus the driver....two in the front seat and four in the back) through the Rif mountains along a veeeeeerryy windy road.  Around 9 am Friday morning we arrived at our final destination, the wonderful city of Al Hoceima that is surrounded by the mountains and is on the Mediterranean Sea.  Checked into our suite at the Villa Florido, our hotel in the middle of the centre ville.  The owner of the hotel, Mike, spoke excellent English and set up a boat tour along the coast for us.  After a slight issue with the taxi we managed to arrive at the port where our boat captain, Mourad, met us and led the six of us onto his boat where we met his helper/first mate, Jawed.
After driving around on the water we stopped next to one of the three islands that are still technically Spanish territory to swim.  Our driver had us swim to the island, scale the cliff and JUMP OFF INTO THE SEA.  It was terrifying, exhilarating and SO MUCH FUN all at the same time.  I, of course, was last so as I waited for my friends to jump and tried to gather enough nerve to do it myself I squatted and had myself a nice little illegal pee on a small deserted Spanish Island before free falling through the air into the beautiful deep blue water below.

The fall was long, the landing rough, but was worth every second of it.
After climbing back on board the Vedette Rif, our boat, we made ourselves various sandwiches with fresh bread, olives, avocado, cucumber and tomato as the police (Moroccan, or Spanish we are still unsure) "pulled us over" Why? We have absolutely no idea.
We made it back to the hotel in one piece, with plans to call our captain for tea later that day or Saturday.

Exhausted from our loooonng day/night so showered, in an actual shower with actual water pressure, got dinner and BED.
Saturday: Breakfast, bought snacks and squeezed into a grand taxi to drive to Calla Iris, a little port town in the Al Hoceima National Park where we hiked along the coast up monstrous mountains, put my sipsi to good use again and saw BEAUTIFUL sights.

Started to rain during our treacherous climb back down via a dried up river bed to the road where we were meeting our taxi driver.
Back at the hotel we made guacamole, drank wine, and called our boat captain and made plans to have him meet us in the lobby.  We walked with him and Jawed to his house which was a feww blocks away.  We brought wine and my sispi, he provided us with more wine, and other drugs.  Jawed made us a tajine, berber style, of potatoes, tomatoes and onions like his mom had taught him and was absolutely delicious
Traveling back today was a LOOOOONG journey....taxi, two trains, the second of which was so crowded we couldn't find seats  and was stuffy and smelly and we were all thoroughly exhausted when we finally got back to Rabat

Moral of this weekend: everything was a journey and a production but in the end it was all worth it

Somewhere in rural Africa

family portra

oh where to begin.
Left Rabat last Thursday, and just got back yesterday (Wednesday October 6)......so much, yet so little has happened between then. it's indescribable
So the village where I was for the past week was near the town of Bejaad, not far from the middle atlas mountains, named Loutichaina, also known as  dry land.
I was lucky and got placed in a host family with another student on my program, who just happened to be one of my roommates from the first week here aka we get along and can live together.
Our host family: Mom, Tajinia, and two girls, Rabia and Nabila ages 17 and 16 we think.

our house

chobs

So the short version of our stay is chobs, also known as bread, the sugariest tea you will ever drink, sitting around, A LOT, and trying to communicate in Durija, the only language our host family spoke.

making chobs

To elaborate on the short version:
 Our mom was also a migrant worker in SPain for three years so she had random spanish words in her vocabulary which helped a little.
They were very poor (in terms of money and material goods) no electricity, at all, a very small herd of goats, and a small house/complexy living space.  The day basically started when the sun rose and ended when it set, we had dinner around 7 and went to bed around nine.  the time in between was lit by a single candle.
it got SO dark there, Tulsi (my roomie) and I stood outside every night before bedtime just staring at the stars. It was so cleer we could see the milky way, Venus, and more stars than I've ever seen before....including shooting ones!
The world was our bathroom....we could go anywhere and everywhere our heart desired, it was great.
The food was delicious....so flavorful and on such smaller scales....minus the chob, which was never in short supply.

rabia with egglplan tagine

with the program we went on a hike around  the area, and learned about soil erosion and deforestation, had tea and chobs soaked in buttery honey at the chief of a neighboring village's house, played at the school (which goes up to the sixth grade) and helped clean up and paint there, as well as watch women weave.
So basically we had quite a bit of free time, though most of that time was spent in the dark so only a few hours of daylight to explore which was NOT an easy fete.
While our host mom was lovely, trying to get out of the house was a painfully awkward experience.  THe two times we did manage to though, with the help of other students and Badrdine, my arabic teacher and a chaperon for the week, as well as a teacher from the village translating we, along with our rebellious compatriots put my new sipsi to good use.

I didn't shower the entire time I was there, and not because I didn't want to. By the time we left my hair couldn't move on it's own and the amount of dead skin and grim that came off of me yesterday when I went to the hammam was actually slightly repulsive.  The ladies that scrubbed my friends and I thought we were nuts and dirrttty.

Coming back to Rabat was terrible.  It was so fresh and open in the village.  The people were so friendly and happy, the language barrier was not as much of a hindrance, and it was relaxing and beautiful.  Yesterday was rough, I think I suffered from slight culture shock but I'm readjusting and leaving tonight again to hopefully go up to the Mediterranean with friends to be with nature again!