Stormy afternoons in the dog days of Ramadan.

Okay, I will admit that returning to America was probably bad for morale. You go home, you see all your friends and family, and then return to isolation. I'm probably making that sound too harsh, considering how lucky I am to be surrounded by so many nice neighbors and friends but I can't help but sincerely notice that I am alone. There's also the fact that I haven't been alone for two months. But maybe it's good to be alone; how else do you notice the condition you're in but when you're alone?

And maybe here's another signal that told me that I needed to do some self critique. I went to souk (outdoor vegetable and fruit market) today, bought my vegetables, then came back and slept for another two hours. It's not superbly hot outside. I've been noticing I've been sort of skipping my usual coping mechanisms of exercise and guitar playing. So it occurred to me that I need to talk to other volunteers in country. For the last couple of days, I've been holed up in my house, trying to ease back into the swing of things.  However, it's Ramadan and I don't think I've explained what that is or how that affects T-town. 

Ramadan is an Islamic religious holiday where Muslims abstain from both food and water during the day and then eat at sunset. To know more about the holiday, I shall point you here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/islam/practices/ramadan_1.shtml

Therefore, during Ramadan, this means that T-town is affected economically and socially. Shops are open in the morning and close in the afternoon, only to reopen after lftor (the breakfast meal, held after call to prayer for sunset). Many people sleep during the day and then stroll around town after the breakfast meal. Many children run around the streets in the evening, playing games and socializing. It's a unique part of the year and I'm glad that I get to be in T-town for this experience. 

But why name this post stormy afternoons? It's quite literally storming here, even if it is the edge of the Sahara desert and 99 degrees Fahrenheit, it's raining away. The weather is making me nostalgic for my moody cafe days. Who knew that it rains during the summer here? 

I'm really looking forward to the Autumn months. It'll be nice to get back to work and let the order of a schedule pull me forward. And, thanks to the marvel of cell phones and internet, I'm not that isolated that I can't just call a friend. :) 

And just for kicks and giggles, here's a picture of me, other volunteers, and campers from summer camp!

Home, and back again.

Okay, yes, I have been gone for a month and a half out of T-town, but I have not been just sitting down contemplating life! Let's cover where I've been first. Starting July 3rd, I packed a big suitcase, and went straight up to the capital Rabat, where I worked in an orphanage. Eleven days after that I went to another city named El Jadida, where I became a camp counselor for Summer Camp. And then lastly, I did another 5 days at an orphanage in the same city. So that takes care of all of July, which I had patiently worked through in order to get to August, where I took vacation to go to AMERICA. Oh man, I teared up just walking through JFK. I'm confident people thought I was nuts. I bought my first Starbucks in eleven months and told the barista, "This is the best coffee you have ever made." 

Sweet-sweet America, I can't say enough good things about you and how much I missed you. Your entitled-mid life crises, your barely legal mothers, your mountains of unattainable paperwork, your processes, your legal system and encumbered way of life, etc. The amount of infrastructure that America has is staggering. I mean, it seems as though EVERY road is paved! There are trees and flowers and greenery everywhere. The weather in the Seattle area was a nice cool 68 degrees Fahrenheit the entire time I was home. I was totally unused to it anymore. I got to wear jeans for the first time in two months! Holy cow! This was unbelievable. What a change from the upper 80s of the coast I had been enjoying, and the intense 108 degrees I was getting in T-town. 

Visiting America was an enormous blur. Basically, I went home, ate as much ridiculously good food as I could, shopped, and hung out with friends and family. I even saw a movie in a theater! Egads! Not to say that Morocco doesn't have movie theaters, it's just that they usually have Bollywood, Arabic, or French films. Occasionally there will be English speaking films, but they're usually from a few months back. So, it's a toss-up. But anyways, two weeks in America felt like an ice-cold shock to the system. I think I acted normally but inside I kept thinking that there is American life and there's Moroccan life, and they are two separate worlds. Or rather, one place has my American family and friends and the other has my Moroccan family and friends. I don't even know what to think. On the way back from America, I had a layover in Paris. So I had about 5 hours to kill and I was relaxing in the airport lounge, drinking coffee. While I was trying to put back together my broken heart after leaving America, I heard a mysterious airport voice calling passengers, and there indeed, was a certain 'Williams' called. But I thought that couldn't have been me, my plane wasn't leaving for two hours still. However, I went upstairs after a fair amount of time just looking around and minding my own business. So I looked at my gate and saw that boarding had just closed. So after I about started crying, jumping, and falling on the floor all at the same time, I had to go talk to the airline and switch my tickets, and blah blah blah. Happily though, there was a flight only two hours after my original flight was supposed to take off. I did indeed make it to Morocco only to fall into the arms of my beautiful friend Jolie who let me sleep at her house for the next four days. That's all I'll write for now. More soon. :) 

So, I thought that Charles de Gaul airport had fantastic architecture. 

Here's a picture of Jolie's dog, "Mushkil" (a.k.a. Problem) being adorable as per usual.

And let's end, of course, with some food porn. We made excellent pretzels!

Water is Life

Hey there,

So I know I've taken about a month and a half's worth of hiatus but before I start giving you the lowdown, but before that I'm going to give you some culture time!

As many of you know, T-town is a full on Berber (technically, the dialect Tashlhyt (Tash-l-heet)) town. I sort of forget, now that I'm hanging out with some friends in the North of Morocco that Berber culture is not as prevalent here. I realized that it was time to share with you and everybody else the daily blend of culture I experience. I can't even begin to give you the details on Arab and Berber culture, but click here to get an idea of Berber history and culture: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berber_people

Now that that's covered, I want to show you that the rabbit hole goes deeper. Some friends of mine recently introduced me to a band called Tinariwen. This band is Tuareg (meaning, that they come from the interior of the Sahara desert). Also, to learn more about Tuareg people, click here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuareg_people
I love this band's sound, and it is somewhat similar to the music that's played all the time in T-town. Therefore, I want to share this documentary I watched with you!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOu4fdlPiWI
And in case that that link doesn't work, youtube: Tinariwen, Aman Iman

Also, just for your information, 'Aman Iman' means 'water is life' in their Tashlhyt dialect. Curiously, I found out that you can buy Tinariwen's cd at Target (wow, the world is small/ recording companies leave no stone un-turned). And haha, yes, that is a shameless plug. Enjoy! BssHa! (To your health!)

Also, special thanks to Rachel Rubinski for this photo! :)

A peaceful day.

I'm so thankful to be home! After my long trek home from IST (In-Service Training), all I really want to do is get back to my modicum of normalcy in T-town. I finally broke down and got out the fan I inherited from the last volunteer and I had it blowing the whole night and I slept so well. Thank God. Two nights ago while I was attending a meeting, I slept in a room where it was so hot I kept getting up to splash water on myself.

Today I feel so thankful to be home because I'm just taking a day to be quiet. I sometimes feel that I spend entire days talking, which is wonderful because I am blessed by so many interested people. However, I also feel that it's healthy to have inside health days in my house. I woke at 8am and decided I needed to clean my whole house and do laundry. The only thing I haven't been able to clean yet is my room (so typical) but I think I'll get around to that later. Right now, I'm just enjoying sitting on my balcony, watching my laundry dry in the warm wind (it's near 100 degrees Fahrenheit here) and reading a book. Later, I think a friend will invite me to go for a walk this evening.

I love my life here. Right now I feel so peaceful and that things are good. Haha, I hope this feeling lasts longer than a day. I have noticed though that my crazy emotions that were so uncontrollable at the beginning have sort of evened out. I'm able to rationalize my thoughts and feelings and I've been realizing that I have a lot more patience with myself than I used to.


And now for your viewing pleasure, it's me wearing genie pants in Marrakech! Also, in the background you can see a guy taking a siesta in the cart.

Meetings, meetings, Meetings, Beach, beach, Beach

Wow, I'm at IST (or In-Service Training), which means I've been in country for 9 months or been a volunteer for 6 months. I can't believe that 9 months ago I was in America, drinking iced coffees, wearing tank tops, and eating bacon whenever I pleased.

I'm so so very happy that instead of Marrakech, where IST was supposed to be held, we were moved to MeHdia. Mehdia is a tiny little beach town which is faaaaantastic. I sit in meetings all day and then go to the beach to go body surfing. Oh life, how I adore you right now. Actually, I pretty much always adore life because I'm in Peace Corps which means I'm accomplishing a bunch of life goals. Now I just need to figure out what my next life goals are. (haha, oh life goals. Well this is why I'm in Peace Corps....I know it's only 6 months into service, but it's never to early to start negotiating and navigating the other side...)

Anywho, I had quite the enjoyable time getting here to Mehdia. So I spent the night in Marrakech two nights ago with a bunch of lovely volunteers and then had the pleasure of their company on the train  the next day. Everything was fine on the train. It wasn't even hot! Hamdullah! THEN, tragedy struck and rocks were hit and some cylinder broke on the train. And then we waited for an hour outside of Casa. Then, once in Casa, we waited for another hour. Then once outside of Casa, we waited for ANOTHER hour. WHY?? If we had been on the train for truly 8 hours in any normal time, we could have made it to Fes instead of just Kenitra....*sigh* Ah well, hadi l' hy'att (That's life) or rather, this is the Moroccan life of mashi mushkil (no problem). It's almost dinner time so I gotta run. Ciao! Bslama! 

New job title: Baladeer

So have I told you I bought a guitar? Oh yes, and it has served to make me extremely happy. Since I don't have any guitar books really, I'm using youtube as my teacher and so far it's worked well. In fact, it's worked so well I've started taking the guitar to Dar Chebab and been teaching what little guitar I know. I realized that my students don't know how to read tablature so I figured this might be a nice intro to anyone who wants to learn about the western system of music. 

Yesterday while I was playing my guitar with a bunch of other students, one student wrote down some lyrics and started singing them. So I asked if he would like me to write chords to the song and make up a melody. He said sure and two minutes later we had our own song. Hooray budding songwriters!

Anyhow, that's the latest and greatest but I'd also like to tell you what I've been up to. So I went to the Rose Fest and helped out in a SIDA (the French version of AIDS) tent at the festival. A group of volunteers and I all attempted to talk to many Moroccan festival goers about SIDA. I felt pretty satisfied about it. In fact, it inspired me to have my own AIDS day event in my town. I was able to convince the local doctor to come to the Nadi Naswi (Women's center) and give a speech about STI's, SIDA, and other areas of women's health. 

It's nice to to be busy but I sense things are definitely slowing down. It's beginning to get warm here and school is coming to an end so we'll see what the summer holds in store for us!

Here's a particularly beautiful sunset that I decided to photograph from my balcony. 

This is my friend Marcus and I at the Rose fest.

When Marcus and I went to lunch, this little lady came out of nowhere and decided my olives were tasty. :)

 Of course, roses at the Rose fest.

I worked the morning shift at the Rose fest. You can just barely make out the snow on the mountains in the distance! Barely. Haha.

This is the AIDS tent where we worked for the few days at the Rose Fest.

I was lucky enough to stay at another volunteer's house who just happens to be friends with a French pastry chef. You have NO IDEA how delicious these were.

And then on an unrelated note, there was a party in my town that I was invited to! 3 hour dance-a-thon? Yes please!

That's all for now. Catch you on the flip side. 

Vascillating

Well today was funky. I began today by really thinking about what impact I was having here in T-town and I was sort of beating myself up because I felt stymied by natural ebbs and flows of population to my classes. I was talking to one of my students on the way home and I thought to myself, this person feels like the only person who cares that I’m here. I mean, I generally think I’m a happy person but these thoughts were rough. What impact am I making here? Does anyone care that I’m here? Why do I care so much about trying to please these people when I’m not sure they want me here? Isn’t this my life dream? Shouldn’t I be trying to give my all? Why is apathy becoming a more normal part of life?

Then out of nowhere, a group of teachers were sitting outside my house at a café when I came home from Dar Chebab. They called me over and started talking to me. As it turns out, they would really like to have me teach some English classes for them. Wow! I feel really elated by this.  I also thought it would be nice if I posted something aside from farm animals and me traipsing around the country. I work, I swear!

Now for a picture of me kissing a Triceratops.