Last Day

June 19th, 2014
We took a train to Rabat early in the morning.  We arrived, walked around the city, and went shopping in the market for the last time.  Sam and I stopped at a fruit stand and got peach juice which tasted like heaven.  It was so perfectly good. The store was a little hole in the wall and every shelf was covered in every type of fruit possible.  It looked fake because if we had been in the U.S. it all would have been plastic for presentation.  There were even bunches of grapes hanging everywhere that looked like plastic grapes but were real. We also went to the mausoleum of the kings of Morocco.  There rests the grandfather, uncle, and father of the present king.  It was so beautiful and made with such intricate designs.  I don’t even know how to describe such detailed mosaics on the walls with varying colors and designs.  Outside this mausoleum is a mosque that was being built centuries ago, planned to be the biggest mosque in the world. It never got finished because the man who was building it died.  However, to this day, there are still large cement posts all across the courtyard where the mosque would have been. We climbed on them and took photos. It was cool.  The next day, we took a train to Casablanca, said goodbye to Anass’ mom and brother and got on a plane to France.

More reflections later... but in summary, it was an incredible experience to have, yet again, experienced a culture different than my own.  The amount of learning one can do about the world, about one's own culture and about oneself is limitless. It’s amazing how much the world has in it and how much we have in our own world that we do not think about or that we take for granted.  

And now, France, another country to learn from.

Dress-up and Henna

June 18th, 2014

Today we have been just sitting around the house, enjoying time.  The family is very silly.  They spend all day making jokes toward one another.  It’s like making fun of one person and everyone laughs and laughs, even the person being made fun of.  Their aunt, who has Alzheimer’s, is always the brunt of the jokes but she laughs so often.  They play tricks with her.  For example, my stuffed animal fox...They throw it at her and she jumps and shouts because she is afraid of it.  Then, everyone laughs, she laughs and its really funny.  Then they do it again and she is scared all over again and everyone laughs again.  This continues for hours.

At the end of the day we played dress up.  They put me in Moroccan style clothing and did my make up.  The dress was fancy and stiff with layers of lace and a belt to hold the many layers together.  It was white and beaded as well.  They also called a women who came to the house to do henna on us.  All the girls got henna done. Sam and I got it on our hands and our feet.  Mine was a beautiful flower design that is done most commonly in Morocco.  After that, we sat still for hours, letting the henna dry.  We couldn’t move, especially out of fear of getting it on our luxurious dresses.  They prepared a huge feast to say goodbye, but I could barely eat because the henna was also on the inside of my hands.  At the end of the night they put socks on our hands.
That was our last night in Azrou.

Traveling Around Morocco: Surreal Experiences

June 17th, 2014

The past three days were full of one adventure after another.  The first day, we left Azrou to go to Fes.
The weather is getting hotter as we get deeper into summer.  Fes felt like an oven.  I could feel the soles of my shoes burning on the scorching pavement.  We drank water every few minutes just to make it through the day, also stopping to sit every half hour to catch our breath.
Fes is a huge city.  We walked around everywhere, stopping at various beautiful buildings to take photos and to admire the detailed decor of the massive doors or the colorful tiles lining every wall.  We stopped to eat in a restaurant where we sat on the terrace looking across the markets, after which we descended down into the market.  Fes is a large commercial city, also very touristic at this point, and therefore it the markets are filled with merchants who know exactly how to get you to buy what they are selling.  We had many intense interactions where the merchants tried to force us into paying more than we wanted.  Bargaining for a price can be extremely stressful especially in a place where they know how to make tourists feel overwhelmed and make them buy more.  Yet all of that plays into the true experience of being there.  The market was so vast.  We walked up, down, and around cobblestone streets that turned into hills, lined with fine artisan work.  Clothes, rugs, food, dresses, pottery, metal work...all incredible.  We walked through this for hours.  It was breathtaking and overwhelming.

After a long day of exploring the city, we got on an overnight bus to Merzouga, 10 hours south.  We all tried to sleep, switching positions, Sam and I taking turns sleeping on the floor under the seats.  The next morning at sunrise we arrived in the small and empty town of Merzouga: the desert.  The town was so much different than everything I had seen before in Morocco. All the building structures were made out of mud and straw.  The shapes were different.  Everything around us was gold instead of brown or tan and the entire town was surrounded by desert It was so peaceful and quiet in comparison to having been in Fes the day before. Seemingly just for tourists coming to the desert, the town seemed to run off of the many hostels there.  Ours was called Auberge des Roches.
When we first arrived we napped and then walked around the town for a bit.  There were about 6 or 7 shops to go into in total.  The air was like a heavy blanket, the hottest air I had ever been in. We took another nap.

Later that evening as it began to cool down, Sam and I were guided out into the desert on camel back to watch the sunset.   It was incredible! It was the most surreal moment of my life, almost to the point that you can't even react.  It felt so normal to be me on a camel in the desert, as if I could do this every day.  I dont think anything in my life has been more cool or bizarre.  Just watching their feet sink into the sand and being high up off the ground with sand whipping around us was so cool.  There was a sandstorm that was building, but we continued outward until we arrived at these little huts made out of blankets and wood posts.  We sat inside for a few minutes waiting for the sand to die down.  Then we went back, riding the camels, scarfs over our faces to protect from the sand that was getting in our eyes, ears, and teeth.
That night we hung around the hostel, had a dinner provided by the hostel of Tajine, a stew like meal brought inside a ceramic platter with a triangle like cover on top, eaten with bread.  We also had salad and fruit afterward.  We sat around and talked, enjoying the cooler heat of the desert and the beautiful decor of the hostel.

The next morning we woke up at 6 am to hike out into the desert and climb the highest dune to see the sunrise.  We walked for what seemed like hours, every step exhausting as our feet sunk into the sand, trekking over massive sand dunes.  Our skin drying up by the second, we continued to drink water and walk.  We finally arrived at a huge sand mountain.  We climbed the edge of it to the top.  It took us forever to get there.  It was extremely vertical and about half way up we were crawling on our hands and knees.  It was so high up, I was so nervous, not able to look around me and enjoy the beauty.  But, when we finally arrived, it was incredible to see the view of the desert all around us, dunes rolling into more dunes with the white hot sun in the background.  We sat on top for a while, just marveling at how incredible the sight was.  I still can't believe I was there.  

Although it was so high up that from the bottom the people on top look like little sticks, going down was so easy.  We did not follow the path, we just walked down the vertical mountain, sliding slowly, and it was not dangerous because your feet sink into the sand.  Its like snow, but softer.  By the time we arrived back to the hostel we felt exhausted and delirious.  Like most aspects of traveling, the experience is always more incredible in retrospect.  You feel like death at the end but as you begin to relax, you can't believe you did something so incredible.  

We ate breakfast, and then took a taxi to several towns nearby, working our way back up through Morocco.  We went to Erfoud, a more modernized town where we went to an incredible shop filled with thousands of polished fossils made into different shapes and home decor, for example sinks with fossils ingrained into them. Later we went to an extremely old shop that had been there for at least a hundred years. Everything was covered in dust.  In fact, it is this shop that was used to rent the clothes for the film Gladiator. How cool! I bought a really cool purple, stone ring there. 

That night we took a bus back to Azrou.  I tried to sleep in the back but the bus was swaying back and forth all over the road.  I had to convince myself that I was just being rocked to sleep. Apparently while I slept the bus broke down but the driver decided to keep driving, even with it overheating.  Morocco is crazy and wonderful!!!

We have one final day in Azrou, we leave for Rabat tomorrow, and the next day its on to France!

Arabic Words

Schoon- who

Sehmeli- sorry

Ajii- Come here
Sa fit?- thats enough?

Bp-hsssaa- to your health

reply with

La tiksa- no more tears

(This is something said after every time someone showers or buys something.  Many things are a series of sayings and replies that go with that saying. ) 

Relaxing

June 13th, 2014

Today we spent the day lounging around the house.  Sam and I did laundry on the roof.  We also emptied out the small blow up pool that had now become dirty and as we did this we began to smell a rotten smell.  It turned out to be a chicken head on the roof, just rotting away.

Later that night, we walked around Azrou, shopping a little, stopped to get ice cream, and then we sat in the town-center outdoor amphitheater where there are usually boxing matches.  Sam and I talked about her time in Morocco and how it took many years of visiting for a few months at a time to truly discover the depths of this culture.  There are so many aspects of a culture that can not be understood unless you are truly a part of it.  That’s the incredible thing about culture.  Its all ingrained so deeply and its all so vast yet detailed.

Experience at the Hamam

June 12th, 2014

Today I went to the Hamam with Sarah, Selma, and Sam.  The Hamam is a communal bathing center. It is an elaborate process of cleaning oneself while also being a social activity where women go together to talk and spend time and wash one another.  It was honestly a really fun time.  At first it is a bit weird to be completely naked with so many women that you don’t know, but with time you realize it is just the way it is.  First you are in a room where you undress.  From there, every room that you go into is more hot than the first.  It is like being in a sauna.  You choose a room and fill your buckets with water and begin to rinse yourself.  Next you take a mix of henna and olive soap and rub your entire body with it.  It is a blackish green color.  Then you rinse yourself again.  Following the soap, they take a hand cloth which is made out of very scratchy black material.  They scrub your skin for you.  I stood in front of Sarah as she scrubbed my entire body.  It is so rough that your skin turns completely red and layers of grey skin peel off of you.  After, you rinse your body again and go into the cooler room to wash your hair.  We sat in this room for at least a half hour just rinsing and re-rinsing.  It was honestly so fun.  It was like a huge bath time.  Just playing with water and washing yourself with your friends.  It’s a really friendly activity.  Honestly, my skin has never been so soft and clean! You then go back into the first room and dry off and redress in warm clothes so as not to shock your system going from the heat to a cooler temperature.  You also wrap your hair.

In Moroccan culture there is a lot of superstition about the cold.  If you sit on the floor, they will come give you a blanket or a mat to sit on because they believe that the cold of the floor will come up to your ovaries and make it so that you cant have babies.  Cold makes people sick and even kills them.  If you went outside with wet hair, even though it is so warm here, and then later you have a stomach ache, they will say it is because you were in the cold.

Later that night, it was Anass' birthday. We stayed up until 3 am because his sister Hooda was making cake for him.  Everyone fell asleep on the couch.  But at 3 we woke everyone up and we celebrated his birthday, singing happy birthday in Arabic, French, and English.  We took tons of family photos and ate tons of cake.

Perspective and the Value of Life

June 11th, 2014

This morning we woke up to go to the farm of Anass’ family.  They have recently inherited a portion of land and are therefore building a house on the land, to live on and cultivate the farm.  They are each going to have a room and even each have a bathroom.  It will be a very big home.  This is a big thing.

As Sam and I went up to the roof to take pictures of the surrounding farm, we had a very interesting conversation about social class and how it exists in America versus in Morocco.  Here every person has their place in society and that place is very important.  Every person contributes to making life work for everyone else.  Every job is significant.  Not everyone here sees each other this way.  But some do.  In the religion of Islam it is important to see others this way.  If you have some, give to those who have none.
In the U.S. we often don’t think about people that are poor as an important part of our society.  Someone who does manual labor is thought of as someone who didn’t try hard enough, didn’t have enough advantages, or didn’t educate themselves to be successful.  If you are not a success, you are a failure.  Here, doing the work you do is respected because they see each work as necessary.  If they did not respect the work done by farm hands, if this was not equally as important, how would the work get done?  Because of this, Anass, who has taken responsibility over the farm, has made sure that those working for his mother on her portion of the farm are taken care of, given a portion of the food grown, as well as that they have social security.  This is a noble thing to do, in my mind.  Some people here do not treat others with such respect.
When I talk to people about these things back home it is like those who are poorer are beneath us and not as good as us because they didn’t reach a successful level.  Even those who do not look at others as beneath them, still do not look at these jobs and say wow this is truly necessary and incredible that someone is doing this for us.  It just bothers me to think that we think of others this way.  Everyone is necessary.  Everyone has their place.  If my dad had not been a construction worker, how would those houses be built? How would those people have had someone to fix their bathrooms, install electricity into their home, build them porches…If we all thought we were better than that, we would be without those that we need in our society to keep our lives continuing.  We must respect every type of work for this reason.

Additionally, I have been thinking a lot about standards of living and how much we value things and a lifestyle that can give us more and more.  Yet, as I grow more in my life I increasingly realize the value of pure happiness and joy.  I see the value of people and how this is what life is about.  As I travel the world, or live far from my family I see that those people in my life are what makes me feel happy to wake up every morning, not the amount of Tvs that I own or the size of my bedroom.  My life was simple growing up, and I was happy.  When I got older I thought I would want more.  But really all I want more of is love, contentment, and food.  If you can have these things, if you can work to just provide these things for yourself, you will live a good life.  You will be satisfied.  Beyond that is of no importance other than to further pamper yourself.  Fun, yet not necessary.   We stress about climbing the social ladder to be successful, to work more and more, to make more money, to then be more happy.  When in reality, even below the poverty line with 7 children, my family never lacked joy or love.  My father worked hard, but when there was food on the table he stopped working to enjoy his life.  We need to stop, and just enjoy this right here.  The real beauty of living.

Later, we walked around the farm, through the apple, plum, olive, cherry, almond, and many other types of trees.  The farm is in the middle of a valley surrounded by mountains.  It began to rain as we walked and we got completely soaked, even got hit with hail.  It was fun to be muddy and soaked.   Its really cool to have seen a farm in both countries that I have traveled to.  This farm was much more structured and had been producing food for a long time.  In Ghana, the farm was just starting up.  However, the cool part about it was seeing the more rural aspects of Moroccan culture.  The owners of the farm had beautiful homes, both Moroccan and western in style.  However, the workers, and the village outside of it were small and simple.  It made me think that if I had done ProWorld Morocco, I would have been located somewhere like this, really working with the people.  We stopped at the house of the workers who tend the farm and had tea and hacha with them.  Hacha is a fried cornmeal-like bread that you eat with butter, and jam or cheese, olives, and boiled eggs (with cumin and salt on top).  C’est delicieux!  Everywhere you go it is expected that you will let them feed you.  They did not eat with us but sat and watched us eat.  Even if you have had enough and are full, it is polite, almost necessary to continue to eat to show your gratitude in return.  

Greeting people is also a large part of the culture.  When you see people you know, you stop and kiss them on each cheek, sometimes twice on the same cheek.  Even as a stranger, I kiss every person that they kiss. They do not treat me as a stranger.  Every time we come back to Anass’ family’s house, we go around the house and kiss each person to greet them as though we had not seem them for a long time.  Its really wonderful.  When we left the house of the workers, we said goodbye to them with kisses and then they followed us down the road  a ways to talk more.  We kissed goodbye again.  We turned and went the other way, they kissed us again.  Many kisses.

On the ride home from the farm, we took a taxi, always squished full with people.  Driving through the countryside on a dusty road with Moroccan music playing on the radio…I might as well have been in a movie.  Life is beautiful.

A final thing that I realized today is the concept of all cultures.  In our world today all cultures resemble one another in the same way.  This way is that each culture has its own specific way of thinking that applies to them.  However,  as the world becomes more and more globalized, people living in more largely populated areas of the country have different thoughts than those in small rural towns.  In Morocco it is traditional to marry a man and then move in with him and his family and take on his life.  This is true, however, with more money, a couple can have their own house and create their own space.  Additionally, in cities, women think more independently and there will be more options and choices because the mentality expands.  We think about countries far from our own and we think that thoughts do not vary or that their whole culture is the same in action and way.  This is why we stereotype their world.  However, just like in the United States, we have variance.  In some places we think it is necessary to take our husbands name.  That is just how it is.  It is not oppressive, just how we do things.  However, some people don’t like that idea, they want independence, they decide to keep their own name for different reasons.  There is no textbook concept of how a body of people will think.  Culture is not an imprint, but an ever changing landscape affected by various variables.   There are so many paradigms that its impossible to know one thing about any culture because the second you think you know it, something will change, especially now in this modern age where people have more influence on one another, even from across great distances.

Arabic Words

zweenah- beautiful, pretty

Mooshky mooski- its not a problem, that’s okay

Lahbess- how are you, (like ca va you reply with ca va, lahbess you reply with lahbess)

La- no

Waugh- yes

Spirituality and Beauty

June 10th, 2014

Today we drove into the city of Meknes to walk around, see sights, and go to an incredible market.  Driving into the city was an hour long taxi ride through fields and countryside. The most incredible sights to see:
Land that looks dried out, yet is speckled with yellow and purple flowers. Sheep and donkeys scattering the landscape.

I spent time enthralled in conversation with Anass about the history of Morocco and Islam on the way there and on the way back we talked about the relation between all religions and about belief and finding your own path.  It was beautiful. It was like talking to an older wise brother who knew life and could help me with life. He explained his beliefs, and why he believes.  He explained that the three main religions- Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are all linked and that in Islam they believe in all of the prophets from these other religions.  He talked to me about taking time to find your own beliefs in life, but that it all comes back to the incredulousness of this world, that nothing is simple enough.  Everything was created perfectly in our ecosystem because only a God could have come up with something so complex.  He let me explain how there are two ways of thought for me: either the world in which life is incredible because God created it or a world in which life is incredible because everything has evolved in the most incredible magic way called science. It's hard to know which path to take because through Anthropology I have learned that both are merely a belief system, a decision made to put your faith in something that people are discovering and experiencing and looking into.  Something that evolves with the culture and becomes a part of our communication and metaphors and ways of seeing the world.  Both hold something to be passionately inspired by.
 Both Sam and Anass are great people.  It was beautiful to talk with people who are open to the world, not closed off on one side. They love life, yet they believe and they are open to people not believing. It brought me to tears to realize how I understand why people believe in God and I understand why people don’t and that I feel stuck in the middle, able to be on both sides if I choose.

In Meknes, they took me to ancient ruins and structures, a grain and horse stable, the castle of the king, etc. Something really incredible is the detail with which everything is built and created.  Every building and room is made with hand made tiles with small intricate patterns and designs and many colors.  Every wall and door has carvings, and many things are inscribed with Arabic calligraphy.  Its seriously too gorgeous of a culture.
We walked around the area of the town where Anass was born, saw his dad and cousins and went to the market to buy things.  The market was huge.  There were moments when we could not move because you were packed in shoulder to shoulder all around.  They sell fresh spices in the market, and full corpses of meat hanging down.  I saw a camel head at a meat stand.  They have mountains of olives everywhere.  Beautiful rugs and clothing.  I bought a carpet and a house dress and spices for my new home with Jake.  Im starting to feel like Grandpa Bill, collecting objects from around the world to decorate my home.  I also bartered for a cheaper price on something in French today.  It was pretty cool.

Later Sam and I snuck peaches on to the roof and ate them.  They were so fresh and juicy.  Just like in my home growing up, if anything comes into the house, it is gone in minutes, eaten by the swarm of people.
I also tried figs today for the first time, well more so devoured them.  Prognosis: Amazing! Why don’t we have them in the U.S.? We import everything other fruit.  I don’t know how else to describe these fruits other than juicy.