Moroccan New Year Party

Happy New year!
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Ok...I think I might have gotten a little carried with my description of our New Years Eve experience...let's just say it's very detailed!
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This year our new year's eve was a little more exciting than usual, celebrating it here in Morocco. Back in the States, we don't really make that big of a deal about it. We've never gone to a big party or anything like that.

I wasn't expecting anything special to happen last night. The Islamic New Year was this past Monday, and of course we mentioned Ashora, which is coming up soon as well. From what I heard from my touter today, some Moroccans celebrate the Agorian New Year and some don't. Lucky for us, our family does! It was a lot of fun! I'll try my best to describe how Moroccans celebrate the 31st of December...

It all started off around 7pm. While Jon and I where studying in our room, we started to notice that people where coming over, and a growing commotion in the house. Soon after, our host mom came in a told us to join the festivities. Jon was a little hesitant at first, as he feels uncomfortable around large crowds, but I was feeling rather stir-crazy from all the studying and wanted a little bit of a break. As Usually, neither one of us had any idea what was going to happen until we where in the middle of it.

At first I made myself comfortable in the small living room amongst my mom, grandma, aunt, cousin, and sister (I usually call everyone except grandma by their first names, but I won't for the blog). In other words, the "female room." I've already learned that during a lot of larger gatherings there tends to be a separation by sex, at least at first. Everyone was singing and taking turns playing the new drums bought for Ashora, and my cousin and sister would periodically get up and dance in the small, square, room. After sitting and clapping along for awhile I decided to get my own drum, which was still in our bedroom. Grandma seemed to have the best technique, so I watched her closely and tried to imitate the way she held it, how she hit it, and the complex rhythms she made. I think I got the holding part right and that's about it. Nobody seemed to notice or care. Everyone is clapping or drumming a little differently, and it always seems to work. After a little bit of drumming, mom got out the CD player and we started to listen and clap along with that. Now the dancing could really get started.

(Meanwhile, in the "male room" the music and dancing is well on its way, which is where Jon finds himself.)

My cousin (about 17) and sister (11), coaxed me out of my seat and onto the "dance floor". Ok, so it didn't take much coaxing because I do like to dance and had been wanting to try out some of my cousin's dance moves. I've seen this sort of Moroccan dance before and she seems pretty good. I don't know if I can describe it accurately in just words. It's very sensual looking, there's a lot of "butt shaking," and it kinda reminds me of Hula dancing, only faster. I say hula dancing because although there's a lot going on with the hips and feet, the upper body is relatively still and controlled. It might be belly dancing or a form of it, but I'm no expert in this field. Whatever it's called, it's fun! And can only be done properly with a scarf tied around your hips, that's very important for some reason. I'd like to find out why later.

Next, we all migrated into the Solon with the boys and my youngest sister (7). I say boys because besides Jon everyone was around our brother's age, 18. There where about 10 teenage boys, which sounds like a high-school chaperoning nightmare, but it wasn't too bad. Unlike their counterparts in the States, Moroccan teenaged boys LOVE to dance! And let me just say it is very entertaining!

After a bit, when we where all feeling a little tired, it was time for the first round of refreshments. We all sat down on the ponjes which lined the Solon while mom and sis came around with trays of hot tea, a plate, of pastries, as well as a plate of millowee (a delicious pancake-like delight, dripping in honey). As we ate the boys took turns telling short stories of some sort (they where all speaking very fast, even by Moroccan standards), at the end of which the room would erupt in laughter. I surmised that they might have been telling jokes or stories about the year past, though I'm not sure.

Once we where all feed and happy is was back to the dancing. It was mostly the same style of "dance music" we always hear in Morocco. This time we kneeled in a circle and clapped as everyone took turns dancing in the middle. The person in the middle got to choose who would dance next. Some of the more "shy" boys would pull our 7 year old sister in to dance as well so as to divert attention away from himself. That went on for quit a while until someone decided that it was time for everyone to dance together again.

Refreshments round two. Mom brought out 4 one litter bottles of pop (it's amazing how far it goes when you use little glasses), and a larger variety of pastries. Everything was amazing, but since I was just coming off of the BRATT diet, a little rich for me, and I was starting to get a small belly ache. Again everyone took turns telling stories, but this time we went in order around the room, so Jon and I actually had to participated. We didn't have much time to prepare of course. When it was my turn I managed to say something like, "tonight is good, I'll see you all next year...in one hour." It doesn't sound like much, but trust me, I felt triumphant. These boys where not what you would call "patient interlocutors," at least at that time. The talking continued for a long time. As I sat and listened, trying to pick out as many words as possible, I had an ideal about a cross-cultural exchange. When I felt the time was right I did something that I never do here; I interrupted. As all eyes where on me I looked straight at my brother and said (in Darija), "I have an idea, maybe you and your friend (so and so) can help me. (my brother's friend comes over to the house often and speaks English well). Then in English I explained the custom of new years' resolutions, and my idea for everyone to share theirs. I went first and said in Darija, "next year I want to to speak darija very well!"

Shortly after that, an amazing thing happened, the two teenage boys sitting on either side of me actually started talking to me! It was a funny situation...they'd say something to me in English, then I'd say something to them is Darija, then they'd reply in English. Of course by now there was music on again and everyone talking all at once, so it was very hard to understand much, mostly because of all the noise.

Midnight came and went without a huge fan fare...no one even announced the time. All the boys left as a group around 12:30 or so and Jon and I went to our room. All in all, I had a great time this New Years!

Souq & Blue Bear update

Hi everyone!

I hope that you all had a nice Christmas and will have a fun New Years! Jon and I were invited to spend New Years Eve with a couple of nearby volunteers, but because of a number of reasons we decided to decline. Besides, as it turns out it's a very rainy and foggy day, which isn't very good conditions for traveling on these mountain roads.

One of the reasons that we didn't want to go away was because we where supposed to look at a potential house for rent that our host mother found. We also talked with our counterpart and my tutor about potential houses. We're still waiting, but we have a whole month. That's what Jon keeps telling me! After 5 months of living out of a suitcase, finally having a place of our own will be like heaven.

Yesterday was Souk day. Jon and I finally took an inventory of all the things that we bought from the previous volunteer so that we would know exactly what we still needed to buy. We figured we could buy some of the smaller items little by little (like kitchen supplies and blankets), so that we wouldn't have to do it all at once when we move in. The only things we ended up buying yesterday was a tea pot and some glasses, but we also priced a lot of other items as well.

The thing about Souk is that it's cheap, but you're also expected to bargain on most items, especially the ones we're looking to buy (you don't bargain on vegetables for example, which are already at rock-bottom prices, unless you plan on haggling for a half an hour to save 6 cents). So we'll probably go over the prices we got with our family to determine if they are fair. It's very common for foreigners to be charged more for things, but we've found that people seem to be pretty fair in our small town, maybe because they don't see many foreigners, or maybe because they see us week after week.

At any rate, we like to go to the Souk just to see all the excitement. It's kinda like having a big festival in town every week. Any this week was even more exciting, there where more venders there than we had ever seen. That's because they're getting ready for a holiday called Eashura. We can give more details about the holiday later, but part of it involves giving gifts to children and playing small drums. Therefore, there where tons of venders who sold either the drums or the small plastic toys (the really chintsy stuff found at a dollar store). We saw a few of these drums the other day when our family got some out from years past. they're made out of ceramic and some sort of skin for the part you beat. We bought somewhat large and very nicely painted drum at the Souk, only to find that our family had also bought one for us! So now we each have one. Of course they proclaimed that the bigger one was Jon's. Anyway, it was a beautiful day for the Souk and we had a great time looking around.

So this past week I decided to have a little fun and make an outfit for Blue Bear. It didn't really take very long, I worked on it a little at a time in the evening mostly. I started with the sweater first but then decided that he needed a hat (well, Jon was strongly encouraging me to make a hat too). I thought the pointy design with the tassel looked very Moroccan, since pointy is all the rage here and tassels can be found on many Jellabas (but usually women's I think). As usual, I made up the design myself, not that any patterns would exist for this particular bear anyway. Designing is the part that is most fun for me. And look at how happy Blue Bear is to have a warm outfit for the winter!





Happy New Year!

emily and jon

Jon's Language Progress

Just wanted everyone to know that a wood carver at my association yesterday mentioned that my Darija (Moroccan Arabic) is comparable to his Tamazight-speaking grandmother who knows little Arabic. And I laughed. I think that part's important.

Christmas

Just wanted to let you guys know how we're celebrating our christmas in Morocco.

step one, cookies.
Yesterday, Christmas eve, we (me and some of my female relatives here), baked three different types of Christmas cookies; chocolate chunk with crushed candy canes, peanut butter oatmeal (not too much oatmeal), and gingerbread cookies :) All in all, it kinda turned out to be a culinary catastrophe. Jon was no help at all, but was able to coordinate the "tree" decorating. With our two younger sisters and cousin they strung popcorn and made paper snowflakes, which where taped to the tree (pictures later). Meanwhile, in my limited vocabulary and even more limited cooking ability, I struggled through making cookies with nothing to measure with, limited directions (we didn't even have directions for the gingerbread at all), and no temperature control for the oven. I think i was starting to catch on by the third batch and it wouldn't have been so bad if i could have made all these mistakes in the privacy of my own kitchen. but our Moroccan family was very encouraging, kinda in the way you encourage a five year old when doing something for the first time. So all the cookies are hard as rocks, but tasty just the same...they are good dunked in tea. One of my mistakes was the sugar...way too much, but that's not really a problem here in my opinion. we also introduced things that the Moroccans found very strange for treats...like ginger and nutmeg. Also, there is no molasses in Morocco, so we used this caramel stuff, not a bad substitute. I will begin my intensive cookie-baking training with Mom and Grandma as soon as I return to the states. But before that, i hope to pick up a thing or two from my host mom (like making her amazing bread) and Lisa, the nearby volunteer and culinary master.

Step two; stockings.
so late last night we told our family about "papa noel" and the tradition of hanging up our sock over the window (no fireplaces here folks). Jon and I demonstrated by draping our socks over the curtain rod. Unfortunately our family didn't follow, until after we turned in for the night. Around midnight we gathered the socks and tried to figure out whose was whose....which we where wrong. we got our bothers' sock mixed up with our Moms' and the two girls where mixed up as well...oops. but besides that, the stockings where a big hit.

Step three, presents.
throught the months of november and december i have been making presents for my family here: a wool bag for our mom, scarf for our brother, funny slippers for one sister, and a headband for our other sister. yesterday morning we wrapped them in newsprint, which we decorated ourselves. Those too where a hit. so I guess two out of three isn't bad.

All in all it hasn't been a bad Christmas experience. We're looking forward to a call from my parents this evening and we'll probably take a walk later, I hope. Thankfully I got my wish, which was to NOT have a white Christmas this year! Merry Christmas everyone!

Emily

ps here are some pictures









Our delicious Christmas bricks!

l'3id Kbir, et al.

It snows in Minnehaha! Here's the proof!







In our down time, when it's nice, we take walks around our town. Here's Emily with our town behind her walking on "the road to Meknes!"

Our l'Eid Kbir was great! It's a sacrificial holiday that celebrates Abraham's obedience to God, as when Abraham was about to obey the order to sacrifice his son, God replaced his son with a sheep. Hence, every year, each family that is able to do so purchases a sheep, has it slaughtered, and feasts upon it for about a week!



Unfortunately, the slaughter took place in a very dimly lit part of our house, so we weren't able to get any decent "up close" pictures to show. No problem; if you're determined and resourceful, you'll be able to find slaughter pics and other goodies on other Peace Corps Volunteers' blogs! During the morning of L'Eid Kbir, this was our view from our living room window:

However, we did get some pictures of the l'Eid eve celebration and our family preparing the organs for our lunch: liver, heart, lungs, and other organs deliciously wrapped in fat, flame-grilled to perfection, and served between hand-made bread! Wouldn't this concept do well in America!












We recently visited our friend Lisa, who lives in a town close to Minnehaha. It's not nestled in the mountains like our town is, therefore, it's somewhat warmer than Minnehaha. We took a stroll around her town and ended up in a pretty nice park, which apparently housed monkeys and even lions at one point. The cages looked like they could barely contain a group of teenage boys... Lisa's host mother said, laughing, that the animals all died as a result of the cold. Seems like a big oversight on the part of the animal's caretakers...here's a shot from within the park.



We also celebrated Christmas at Lisa's house with her family. The first night we were there, we made eggnog and started on our gingerbread house. The second night, we made chocolate and mint cookies and finished our gingerbread house. Check out the pictures:

simana luwla dyalna f Minnehaha (our first week in Minnehaha)

Right now, we're at a cyber cafe in Minnehaha, which is pretty inexpensive (4 dirhams/hour, which is the equivalent of about 50 cents). This doesn't seem to be a bad option, as there are at least 10 cyber cafes in our town, and it is much less expensive than having internet in our future apartment (~300Dh/month). We'll see.

Our first full day as volunteers was quite nice. We took a walk around town and went to the summit of a nearby hill to get some photos. Our view was obstructed by some trees, so we decided to walk a bit further along the ridge of the hill. We came upon a shepherd who warned us of his dogs that were ahead a bit. He accompanied us toward a safe spot and after we got some shots, he invited us to his house to "shrb atay" (drink tea). His place was small, but warm. It was made of mud. He also had satellite television. Moroccans LOVE satellite television. It was a strange mix of old and new, archaic and technological.

When asked what we were doing in Minnehaha, we introduced ourselves as American Peace Corps volunteers. He approved. We talked about our families, how long we had been in Morocco, how long we had been studying Darija, etc. We mentioned the man that we were working alongside, and he nodded, indicating that he knew our counterpart from the mosque. After that, we was like peas and carrots. He invited us over to his house for l'Eid Kbir as he vigorously demanded that I eat more olives ("kul zitun! kul zitun! kul! kul! kul!) But I think i'm getting better at resisting the command "kul." Both of us are. If only we had such resistance during the CBT phase; we could have avoided 2 months of GI trauma.

The next day, Sunday, we went with our little sisters to a "running" practice. There are a few men who volunteer as coaches and meet with about 50 or 60 kids. The kids do warm-up exercises, run, stretch, do various training drills, and play athletic-oriented games. We met at a soccer field and walked with one of the volunteers to a small wooded hill about a half mile away from the field. The kids ran. I acted mostly as a photographer; after a short while, Emily started exercising along with the kids. She said it was a good way to keep warm. After a few hours, we walked back to town, and upon departing, the volunteers invited us (or me, I wasn't quite sure) to a cafe for later in the day.

As women are mostly forbidden from cafes, I thought it wise to go by myself. We talked about the Peace Corps, and what Emily and I would be doing in Morocco, and for how long. I don't think they believed me, or maybe it's just that they didn't understand me, because they kept asking for clarification. After that, they started talking among themselves. I don't mind this, because our weakness is understanding Moroccans when they speak. Whenever I get the chance to listen, I definitely take advantage of it. Later, when we departed, one of the volunteers invited both Emily and myself to meet one of his friends and an American student the following day. Of course, I accepted, as I was very curious why there was another American in this small, secluded town in the middle of Morocco.

We met the following day at a cafe and talked about lots of things, mainly Amazigh-ism, and its importance in Morocco today. Many have heard of the term "berber," but that term is viewed as derogatory by Moroccans who identify with their heritage. They would much more prefer to be referred to as Amazighs; "berber" is a term given to them by the French in the early 20th century. It translates, roughly, as "animal." Needless to say, pro-amazigh-ism is an important stance among the residents of the Middle Atlas, especially in Minnehaha.

This week, we also met with the artisans of our association. There are 12 woodcarvers in the co-operative; I got to meet with 10 of them. Emily met with 2 of the women of the adjoining neddy (a neddy is a women's association...its a general term, neddy's can produce any number of things: weavings, crochet, knitting, embroidery, etc).

One woman that Emily met with was working on a cross-stitch pillowcase and the other was crocheting a washcloth that people use to scrub themselves at the Hammam. The men that I met with were working on bowls mostly. Very large low bowls in which women knead bread. It's all very awesome and we will undoubtedly have many pictures later!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!

Unfortunately, we are not going to bestow upon our host family an amazing dinner of turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and pumpkin pie!...hopefully, we'll be prepared to do that for Christmas.

Talk with you all later,

Emily and Jon

site visit, LPIs, cedar forests, and beyond...

I WANT TO PRECEDE THIS BLOG POST BY SAYING THAT IT'S INCOMPLETE! I'VE BEEN TRYING TO POST THIS FOR ABOUT A WEEK NOW, WITH THE CONSTANT HOPE THAT PICTURES WILL UPLOAD (NARROW BANDWIDTH) ONLY ABOUT 1/3 OF THE PICTURES THAT I WANT TO INCLUDE HAVE BEEN UPLOADED. MAYBE LATER. WE'VE GOT TO LEARN TO BE FLEXIBLE. WE ARE PEACE CORPS VOLUNTEERS, AFTER ALL...

Hello friends and family! Emily and I have been back in our CBT debriefing site for some time now. We spent a week in Minnehaha, and got to meet our host family there, our work counterpart, and various other members of the community. Most of the week was very VERY rainy and cold, and we pretty much just stayed inside. However, on the Thursday of that week, it became quite gorgeous! So much so, in fact, that we emerged from our host family's house and took a walk around the town and took care of some business that was assigned to us by Peace Corps (meeting with local officials, finding out where resources are in the town, and laying down some legwork that will generally make it easier for us to integrate into the community).

Roofs are very zwin (good) in Morocco. Most people here DO NOT have mechanical clothes dryers, and "landrymats" largely do not exist either. After either a) handwashing their clothes or b) using their washing machines, the women hang up the clothes on the roof of their house to dry in the sun. Seems pretty efficient to me! Morocco, even in the cold months, has a pretty hot sun!



The picture above was actually taken from the roof of the volunteer that we are replacing! The mountain in the distance (well, a small mountain anyway) offers a splendid almost-360 degree view of the land surrounding Minnehaha!



I had to include a picture of my 2 month old beard. I chopped it recently, but here it was in its full splendor. Note the neck hair and the toothpaste around my mouth! I'm a tenacious brusher! Needless to say, Emily was sad to see the beard go, but not the neck hair.

So, we bid our host family goodbye, and came back here in order to do some last minute preparations for the Language Proficiency Interviews (LPIs). We just took those the other day, and Emily and I both did pretty well! We both have the same rank: Intermediate Low. The rankings go like this:

1. Superior
2. Advanced High
3. Advanced Mid
4. Advanced Low
5. Intermediate High
6. Intermediate Mid
7. Intermediate Low
8. Novice High
9. Novice Mid
10. Novice Low

The highest that anyone got was Intermediate High, and I believe all of those people had prior language fluency in Arabic or other languages, which makes me feel better about our scores!

To give you an ide a of our ability, I'm going to quote a passage from a language book that we recently got:

INTERMEDATE---LOW:

Can speak on familiar topics, ask and answer simple questions, initiate and respond to simple statements, and carry on face-to-face discussions. Can pick out the main idea in a friendly informal conversation. Often speaks incorrectly but by repeating, generally can be understood by native speakers who regularly deal with foreigners. Frequently can understand native speaker if her or she repeats or speaks more slowly.

New topic - HIKING! Yesterday, we went back to the cedar forests that make this city such an awesome place to hike and enjoy nature! We went primarily for 3 reasons: a) we only get one day for exploring per week, b) we wanted to see the giant tree called "Cedar Guru" or something like that, and c) we wanted to see/feed more monkeys! We were successful in all three of these goals, as you will see...



These little buggers are smart! They know how to open bottles of water and actually seemed to prefer beverages over food. For example: I offered a few dirty apes dried bread and sugar cubes and they smacked them out of my hand! THE NERVE! However, one of our volunteer friends was practically bitten until he gave up his delicious bottle of Sidi Ali! I should have brought pop or an energy drink or something. That would have been funny!



Unfortunately the tree was dead. It was big though. It's hard to tell from the photo, but I'm sure it was probably 8 to 10 feet thick at the trunk! The tree was surrounded by little tourist shops. Tons of fossils and gemstones that make our Rock Shop look pretty pathetic. There were ammonite fossils the size of dinner plates and geodes the size of soccer balls!

The forest was absolutely gorgeous. The colors were vivid and the light streaming through the branches laid out shadows in all directions. There was an atmosphere in the forest that reminded me of a fairy tale...like Lord of the Rings or the like. We hiked until we were tired and then turned back to feed the monkeys some more. I managed to capture this shot of Emily with a little one. His mom was near, but he was still very timid.

On our way back home, we came across a herd of sheep, although there was no shepherd. At least we couldn't see one. Continuing our walk home, we had a pretty nice view of the countryside and a few houses among the hills.

I'm going to backtrack a bit. Saturday evening, we had a dance party to celebrate our completion of the LPIs! Americans were teaching Moroccans dancing and Moroccans were teaching Americans dancing as well! Personally, I thought the Moroccan dances were alot more fun! A few girls, including Emily, formed a dance troupe and performed a choreographed dance for all of us! I took a bit of video during the party and later composed it into a movie! However, I couldn't include the movie because the bandwidth here is very narrow and sometimes it's impossible even to upload pictures! You can imagine how awesome it is, right?

Well, to conclude our week, we had a few last-minute seminars and an awesome talent show. We had an super sweet art fight that was inspired by a friend of one of our friends here. Check this link out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdnGqvlzKzU
There was a panoply of talent exhibited at the art show: singing, dancing (belly, choreographed, and many others), spoken word, other musical performances, and even amazing video art!

AMAZING NEWS!!! WE ARE FINALLY PEACE CORPS VOLUNTEERS!

Today, we took an oath to, among other things, protect the Constitution of the US, and to serve the people of Morocco so as to preserve their dignity. We were in a pretty awesome hotel on the top floor, overlooking the older section of Fes, which has been preserved largely intact since the 11th century! We only stayed in Fes for a few hours...afterward, we came back here to our Seminar Site, to spend one more night among our American friends!

Tomorrow, we go back to Minnehaha as full fledged Volunteers! Some of the tasks that we will be working on in the next 2 months include: looking for an apartment, getting our Cart de Sejour (proof of residency), looking for tutors, continuing our language learning, and trying to meet as many people as possible!

Hope all is well at home. I just saw that gas is $1.80/gal! Hope that trend continues! Have a happy Thanksgiving and Christmas if we don't hear from you! We'll try to make some phone calls from public phones, as that is much cheaper than calling the states from our cell phone.

Love

Jon and Emily