Life Called...

Painting a Mural

2008-07-23T06:29:00.000-07:00

This is all happening in Mara's (my region mate/best friend) site.

Mara teaching a lesson about "Hlaqm" or as we know it... strep throat.

Me teaching about hypertension and healthy eating habits.

The girls I taught and painted with.

Mara and I were the only veterans, the rest are newly sworn in PCVs. From left to right... Duncan, Jed, Erin, Moyra, Mara, Casey and Bryan (SBD volunteer). Oh, and I'm in the front squatting.

Camel Spider

2008-07-15T18:14:00.001-07:00

It just killed a scorpion... can I come home?

I'm not Happy

2008-07-15T15:07:00.000-07:00

So I figured out what it is... it's a Camel Spider. I thought these were just in the south of Morocco, but apparently I'm not that lucky.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camel_spider

They are arachnids but not spiders so my statement that I left my fear of spiders behind remains accurate. So I ended the last blog with a statement about non-violence... I think I might have to be a hypocrite. Don't tell on me, ok?

Varmints

2008-07-15T08:33:00.000-07:00

On my way back to my site I stopped off at a friend’s house for a get together. I could tell you about the amazing food, it being good to see friends, sleeping under the stars, or any number of other good things, but I’m going to talk about bugs.

My friend Madeleine’s kitchen has strings hanging from wall to wall. If it were a porch and the strings were thicker I would say they would be for hanging clothes, but they aren’t, so I won’t. Their function is irrelevant… what is relevant is that both strings were entirely covered in flies. I don’t know what they were munching on, but they seemed quite content. I’d completely forgotten that last summer the stagnant heat brought out all of the creepy crawlies.

We’ve all had plenty of stories relating to varmints. Josh has his mouse who has chewed a hole in every article of clothing he owns. Mara has her cockroach infestation where she was killing around 30 or 40 a night (the situation has improved… she’s down to only a few a night). Big Aaron apparently has a necklace made of legs from his Camel Spider kills. I, sadly, have not been able to contribute much to the conversation. I mean I have some huge ants that come out of a hole in the wall and march in procession across my floor and out the door, but they don’t bother anyone. There’s a beetle the size of my palm that wanders my kitchen floor at night, but the only thing he’s ever done is to secrete some smelly substance onto Barry’s hand when he picked him up. Oh, and there was the jumping spider, but it was too small to make any sort of a splash in a "one-upping" conversation about bugs and I’ve left my fear of spiders behind long ago.

Tonight I think I might have something. I don’t think it’s going to win any prizes, but I could possibly be able to join in the conversation. The thing is I don’t really know what I saw. It has eight legs… I think. The front two legs never really touched the ground and looked as if they were operating more like feelers. I couldn’t see any eyes and it was a yellowish color. The remarkable thing about this creature was the fact that it was about the size of my fist. Now when I say remarkable what I really mean is that it was fast, aggressive and didn’t so much scare me in the moment as it made me afraid to fall asleep. I couldn’t find my camera so I held up my laptop’s webcam and snapped a picture. If any of you have any idea what I’m looking at, give me the heads up, especially if it’s poisonous. I know we have a few of those around here; I’m just not sure if this is one of them.

Oh, and I couldn’t bring myself to kill it. So I got a broom and as it was crawling up the wall I swept it away. For some odd reason though I swept in an upward motion, the end result of which is that it flew up into the air, hung suspended for a moment and then when it hit the floor it scurried away. The moment of suspension was quite comical I have to admit. It had this look almost like Wiley Coyote just before he realizes that he’s walked off a cliff and is about to plummet hundreds of feet.

Why didn’t I kill it you may ask? Well, I know this may sound strange considering it is a threatening looking insect and all, but lately I’ve become loathe to take a life simply because I’m being annoyed. It’s a small thing, but in my mind I link it to a much bigger problem. I’m not the only one trying to live here so I work around it. Now I’m not saying that killing bugs is a morally bankrupt enterprise, so please don’t read that into this. I am just trying to live as intentionally as possible and I believe that there are lessons to be found in the seemingly most insignificant of places. I figure that if I don't just go around killing bugs at random, I won't be as quick to sweep my fellow human beings aside for self-interested pursuits.

And We're Back

2008-07-10T02:46:00.000-07:00

So I have finally arrived back in country. After 26 hours of airports, a lost bag, a Shinerbock exploding in another, 2 hours of trains and lugging 50 lbs worth of books and clothes (mostly books :) ) around... I made it to the capitol city. Not quite the Morocco I know, but when I stepped out of the train station there was a protest going on where people were blocking traffic and chanting about unemployment and I felt a little at home.

There were a few scattered riot police who were trying to disperse the crowd which was mostly just comical. A group of 25 would block a side street coming out of a traffic circle and one lone man in uniform would go chasing after them with a billy club. All the while the crowd keeps moving back and forth along a continuum of either agrieved chanting all the way to laughing hystericaly at the attempts made to disperse them. I had a slight chuckle and proceeded to my hotel.

I have a doctor's appointment later today and then hopefully I'll be headed back to my site tomorrow and so begins the last 10 months of service.

....

Quick recap of the States:

Brother's bachelor party... Hanging out with old friends and family in for the wedding... Brother's wedding... Hanging in Austin with friends... Making beautiful music in Austin once again with an old friend... Getting books from wise friends... Hanging out in the pool with family... Packing... Hopping on a plane

hope and the triumph of imagination

2008-05-25T05:44:00.000-07:00

Once again I have lapsed on blog entries. Seeing a pattern? So I’m not a consistent writer… I’ve never been consistent at much of anything so no big surprise there. Let me get you updated on recent developments

The Commune finally came through and bought the pump and piping to get water into the water tower and they are installing all of it as I’m writing this. Hopefully by the middle of next week there will be water flowing in the center of town. It’s still a long way to walk for a lot of people though so I’ve combined forces with an association here to both bring water into individual homes and to make sure that the water being pumped in is clean. The end result down the road is to hopefully install latrines in people’s homes. If we installed them now, they would most likely not be used because collecting water to flush it would be too much of a strain on the women who collect water hence extending water access is Phase 1. At the moment, I’m working on writing a grant to assist in the acquisition of a water treatment system and the community is coming up with the funds to lay the piping and connect the houses. I’m actually quite impressed at the initiative taken by the president of the association Sliman. Part of what I’m supposed to do here is to help associations instill a mentality for sustainable projects and there was almost no need for that with him. He was neither looking for someone to do the work for him nor waiting for the funds… quite the opposite; he has assumed many of the costs out of his own pocket and has mobilized several members of the community in moving the work along.

Hopefully I’ll have this grant written sometime this week once we nail out the final budget and if you would like to contribute I will provide a link to it when it is posted on the Peace Corps website.

In other news, I’m getting closer to coming home for Lee’s (my brother) wedding. I can’t express just how excited I am about seeing friends and family after over a year. I’ve got a lot planned for the time I’ll be home. The vast majority of which will consist in soaking up as much of those people I love as I possibly can, eating some spectacular food (Mexican of course), and enjoying access to running water… maybe stocking up on new reading for the year I will have left. I’m flying home on the 19th of June and heading back on the 8th of July. Some of that time will be in Austin, some in Waco, some in Dallas, some in Henrietta and possibly some in Florida.

Let’s see what else… oh, my new site mate just arrived for her two months of home stay before she moves off on her own. I now have another American living about 2 km from my house which feels a little weird. Her name is Tory from Michigan and she’ll be working with the Water and Forestry. I’m not entirely sure what she’ll be doing, but my guess is that she doesn’t really know yet either. I don’t envy her next two months. Home stay is difficult on everyone and she has the added complication of the fact that I moved here after becoming well acquainted with the language so people here didn’t have to see me struggle through the beginning. The people here can be unforgiving in their judgments of ability and pull no punches in assessing someone’s ability in anything. The language we learn is also pretty much devoid of nuance so you either know everything or nothing. It can break down your confidence after a while. If she makes it through this though, she should be fine.

It’s strange to think that her arrival marks exactly a year in my site (I yr 3mo in country). A year ago at this time Mara and I were arriving in Khenifra for a week of meetings with the Ministry of Health, hanging out with Matt (who is now finished with his service and on his way home via Egypt… Godspeed). When I post this I’ll be in Khenifra translating for the two new Health volunteers in our province as they start their service. It’s interesting to see their reactions to things and wonder if mine were similar when I arrived. It was only a year ago, but so much has transpired since then… battles won and lost, friends come and gone, and up until now a consistent string of victories over the loss of idealism although it has morphed but I believe matured. I hope…

Hope has a lot to do with why I’m still here… hope that the vision that brought me from across the ocean is one that I won’t lose sight of in spite of the constant struggle of the day to day much less of trying to accomplish what it is we are here to do. Hope that strength will be found at the moment where I feel like I have no more to give. Hope that somehow what I am doing will be of some service to those formerly faceless and abstract people who were the subjects of my ideas about the event of Justice and it’s possibility and necessity in every corner of our globe. Hope…

One of my friends sent me this in the mail a few weeks ago. This person seems to always find those words or gifts that reach into whatever pit I’m wallowing in feeling trapped and pull me out reminding me to keep my eyes on the horizon. Bethany, thank you. I’ll leave you with those words…

“In my dream, the angel shrugged & said, if we fail this time, it will be a failure of imagination… & then she placed the world gently in the palm of my hand.”

Water

2008-04-16T06:28:00.000-07:00

So this is the picture of my new water source at the Chinese construction site and the walk to it from my house. Well at least the road going in the direction. You can't actually see where the water is because it's a LONG way down that road.

Shifting Gears

2008-04-16T05:41:00.001-07:00

Gears have shifted a bit. I was revving up to get a latrine building project going, but due to the water situation everything has been put on hold. I’m going with my nurse and a president of an association here to meet with the president of the Commune to see what we can do to move the process of buying a pump along. That should be interesting. I had a 2 hour conversation with several individuals in the community the other day. Actually I should say I was present for the conversation. I tried to keep up but everyone was speaking faster than I could process the words and by the time I understood the word they had moved on and the meaning escaped me. I caught things here and there; suffice it to say that tensions were high. I got my input in there a bit and actually think I communicated quite well what I wanted to say. The gist is this…

I’m here for public hygiene and am not interested in who gets the credit for building the chateau. Right now there is no water and I’m going to work with whoever can help us get water.

I’m going to attempt something tomorrow which could throw everything off though. I’m not the most resilient multi-tasker on the face of the planet and I’m going to try and start setting up the latrine building project with the assumption that the chateau is going to get finished. It’s a risky move I know but a necessary one if I am going to make some headway before I go back to the States for Lee’s wedding and finish both projects by the time my service is finished next May. I’m going to a friend’s house about 3 km down the road where my new site mate will be hosted in a month. He doesn’t have a latrine and is having to build one, as Peace Corps policy won’t allow for volunteers to be in homes that don’t have latrines. I’m going to get his building schedule and try to track how this thing goes up, how much the materials cost and various other logistical details so that when the time comes to start this project, I won’t be completely taken off guard.

On a random note, I couldn’t think of the English word for “piping” when I was talking to my programming staff earlier today. I could only think of the French and Arabic words. It’s starting to get bad… the languages are all mixed up in there.

All Wet

2008-04-16T05:35:00.000-07:00

Something happened today that has happened to just about everyone else in my training group… I lost my phone.

I remember laughing at all those before me who lost their phones because most of them dropped them in their toilets and then the water messed them up. Why you would drop your phone in the toilet, I don’t know? My situation wasn’t quite as comical, it was closer to tragic. I was enjoying a lovely afternoon reading Plutarch in the warmth of the sun while my legs dangled in the river and I got a call from my program manager Mostafa and then another Peace Corps employee LHacen. We worked some stuff out and talked about future projects, it was a good day. Then I put my phone in the breast pocket of my shirt along with my little notebook, identification card, money and pen that I carry around wherever I go.

I usually keep my phone on vibrate and the breast pocket surprisingly isn’t a great place to feel your phone ringing. I missed two calls which I saw when I checked the time so after calling the person back I decided to put the phone in my lap which was a bad idea because I immediately forgot that it was there. About 20 minutes later I was starting to get uncomfortable on the rock I was sitting so I started to scoot myself further up and in doing so dropped the phone and watched it slide down the rock into the water. I have fairly good reflexes and almost caught it, but in the process of thrusting myself to prevent it from disappearing in to Oum Rbie out flew my pen and notebook from my breast pocket. Now I wasn’t laughing, but the two evil 12 year old boys that had been staring at me and asking for money for the last little bit thought it was hilarious.

I jumped in and recovered all of them, but the damage had been done. My phone no longer works.

Visit from the King

2008-04-10T04:00:00.001-07:00

The king came to Mrirt today. Sadly I don’t have pictures though. When I pulled out my camera I got a stern rebuke from the skinny waif of a gendarme standing on my section of the line. Incidentally he was here to inspect an association with which my souq town volunteer Anna works. Sadly she couldn’t be in the building at the time of inspection for even though she had a pass, the authorities were being jumpy and the presence of some random foreigner doesn’t really calm them down much. So she and I watched the procession from the road.

Now Mrirt has been decked out for four or five days with the anticipation of the coming king. By decked out I mean that Moroccan flags were posted every 30 or so meters along the road, the fountain in the center of town was on for the first time since I’ve been here, and the streets were actually cleaned. This morning people were already crowding the roads at 7 even though he wouldn’t pass until 5 or 6 hours later. I arrived around 1230 from my site and we had to take a sketchy back road… I laugh because all the roads to my site are back roads, so the fact that I’m calling this road a back road should say something… and I got dropped off a ways from town. Since the next day was souq and I usually am out of food at this point in the week, I was hungry and all I wanted to do was to go get something to eat, but all the food was on the other side of the road and although the king wouldn’t pass for another hour or so, the gendarmes would let me cross. The road was packed on all sides with people holding little Moroccan flags, pictures of the king, and little children chanting something I only partially understood. It was quite the festive atmosphere.

It took him about 15 seconds to pass my point in the road and almost immediately the crowd dissipated. Some of the kids went running after the convoy, but most of the people around me went their separate ways to discuss their particular angle of vision and interpretations of the minutest details. Anna and I proceeded to the association building he had just visited where we were scolded for not being present during the inspection. Let’s be honest though, I don’t have any clothes in this country appropriate for meeting any kind of monarch and this association isn’t my work. Anna probably should have been there, but her association has it together and neither she nor I want to steal their thunder. Her association is a group of handicapped artisans who make rugs and various other products for sell. Handicapped people have it quite difficult here… there are no wheelchair ramp laws to say the least… and this is a group of resilient people who deal with some pretty powerful cultural stigmas.

We sat and chatted with everyone for a while and then headed home…

… don’t worry, I got some food. I know you were concerned that I didn’t eat. I did. ; )

Old Crow Medicine Show - I Hear Them All

2008-04-10T03:55:00.001-07:00

What I was listening to while I was drinking the coffee right before the frenzied rush to fill water containers with irrigation water.

Water

2008-04-10T03:27:00.000-07:00

Alright so let’s get you guys caught up on life in Morocco…

I am infinitely grateful for the site change. Things seem to be moving with much more purpose here, people are more to the point where dissatisfaction with one’s situation has been built up to the extent that spurs action. The events of the last week have also served to push that even further to critical mass.

So here is out water situation. As long as people can remember, they have gotten their water from the river Oum Rbie that flows through the village. Then a couple of years ago along came the French, Chinese, and Taiwanese construction companies with their bid to build a series of dams, tunnels, and reservoirs from here to my old site in order to generate hydroelectricity. Now electricity is a good thing, but it is coming at the cost of this village’s drinking water. The company solved this problem for their workers by building wells. The community, however, doesn’t have the resources to get to the water 80m below the surface so for a while the company has been letting them occasionally take water from the well. All of that changed last weekend while I was waiting in line to get water from the well.

Apparently the company decided they were tired of sharing their water so they shut the pump off from general consumption. Now at the time everyone was telling me that they had shut it off for good and I was nervous because that was my only source of relatively clean water. I ended up washing my dishes, clothes, and cooking with “segia” water (muddy water from the irrigation ditch) for a couple of days until the pump magically came back on. Now I’ve gotten used to hyperbole being used in every day conversation, but when it came to something as necessary as water I jumped right in on the fear bandwagon.

When they went back to letting people use the well a few days later I felt like a bit of an idiot for freaking out, but then I thought further on the matter and realized that this is the very real fear and uncertainty in which this community constantly lives. They no longer have a clean source of water that they can control and so their access to the most precious resource is dependent on the whims of a foreign construction company. Imagine this… you’re sitting in your home and are thirsty so you think to yourself that you’ll go get a drink of water. When you turn on the faucet, nothing comes out. No biggie, you’ll check again later. Three days later still nothing. You find out that the company building something in your area was mixing a lot of cement and needed the water and that after all it is their water. They’ll let you use it when they no longer need it. In the mean time you’ve gone three days without a drink. How does that make you feel?

During the time the water was shut off, my neighbor came banging on my door in the morning while I was enjoying a cup of coffee (I decided to have an emergency supply of bottled water in my house) and listening to some Old Crow Medicine Show to get the day started. Frantically she told me to go get my water containers; that the water was flowing in the irrigation ditch. At first I thought to myself that there was no way that I was going to use that nasty water, and then I remembered that I no longer had any idea where else I was going to get it. I found myself crouched down by this little canal with all the women filling bottles with brown water and washing clothes and dishes all the while not knowing how long it would last or when it would be back.

I talked to my landlord later that week about the irrigation. He teaches middle school Arabic in Mrirt, but owns a lot of the olive groves in my area. He informed me that there is an “amghar” about 8 kilometers up the road who controls the water. Now I’ve always understood the word “amghar” to mean an old man, but apparently that’s just common usage today and it used to be a title for a man in a position that is no longer in use throughout most of the country. It is the Arabic equivalent of “lamin” which from his explanation I understood as a sort of adjudicator who mediates disputes and dispenses resources considered public. My Moroccan Arabic dictionary says it’s either a “guild master” or a “hired water carrier”. Much of that role is now taken care of by the government, but I live in an area where the government isn’t quite omnipresent so we are still under the “amghar’s” regime. All of this is to say that the “amghar” assigns the times when various communities/farms will receive their allotment of water and the landowners know their times, but the people in my area are mostly not landowners. The ones who actually own the fields live in France, Spain, Rabat, Casablanca, etc. The people who live here have no idea when the water comes; they just have to be on the lookout and ready to take advantage when it does come.

Now this year… just in January… they finished building a water tower in the middle of town. It has several water taps centrally located so that everyone can partake of the water, the only problem is that there is no water yet. The only thing it is lacking is a pump to bring the water up to the filter and into the tower. I’m still trying to find out how to move that process along and have a meeting on Thursday at the Commune with the president. What I have gathered thus far is that the money they collected for the pump when into paving the road from Mrirt, but that because there are so many large trucks constantly on the road because of the construction they can’t finish until the dam building project is finished. So no pump until there’s a road, and no road until there’s a dam… the dam is 6 months behind schedule and counting. The beautiful, finished water tower is just sitting there in the center mocking everyone… at least that’s how it seems to me, and old ladies sit around telling me they are tired of carrying their 60 year old bodies the long distances to the river or the irrigation ditch to collect water and then haul it back home, and the old men continue to feel the anger of broken promises.

I’m 23 years old with very little to say for myself and almost no health experience. My very presence here, however, brings with it an immediate respect and with that great expectations. I live with a fear that I won’t be able to accomplish anything of note to justify the access I have been granted simply for being a foreigner invited by the King. My constant prayer is that somehow I will be able to help out in a meaningful way.

Partying All Night Long

2008-03-12T07:51:00.000-07:00

So having been in country a year I have quite a deficiency of family functions to my name. My region mate Mara seems to be at weddings, engagement parties, and baby dedications every other day but I’ve only seemed to manage one engagement party which I had to leave early because of a meeting the next morning. This weekend all of that changed. My landlord’s daughter just recently got engaged and myself and the two new volunteers in my souq town (Anna and Ian, you’ll be hearing more about them in the future) were invited.

So in Arabic we call this shin-dig a “khoutouba” (the ‘KH’ is pronounced like you’re trying to dislodge something caught in your throat) and in Tamazight it’s called a “thuthra” and it’s a two day celebration. The basic idea of which is that the heads of the families of the soon-to-be happy couple get together to negotiate the wedding, the dowry and all such important matters while all the extended family parties. The downside of all of this, as far as I can see, is that the soon-to-be happy couple isn’t invited so while everyone in their respective families are having a blast; they get to stay at home.

Ian and I didn’t go the first day because it was reserved for the ladies. Saturday, however I met my landlord’s son Asherraf in the middle of town around 6 in the evening where there was a large crowd gathered around some musicians beating drums, singing and blowing on horns. The horns looked like the ones people in funny outfits blow right before the town crier reads a proclamation of the king or something. Anyway, it was quite the long procession from the center of town all the way to the house. The women were grouped in the front and were dancing and throwing their hair around (you just have to see it) and to be honest it did my heart good to see the women letting loose some.

We made it to the house where the entire procession moved onto the roof where, as the music and dancing continued, we sacrificed a ram. I ended up having a conversation later on with someone later that evening who asked me if we could do that in the States. I don’t know for sure, but my guess is that there is some kind of code, or law, or something that would prevent you from sacrificing a ram on your roof. I don’t know why, I just get that feeling. If there is, it’s a shame. After being here for a year now, I’m quite partial to sacrificing a ram/sheep for major family events. So we sacrificed the ram and three hours later were eating it.

After the sacrifice the whole thing calmed down for a while as the patriarchs went to go do their thing. Ian and I got escorted to the equivalent of the singles table although it wasn’t a table, it was a different house. We were there with about twenty other Moroccan men in their 20s and from about 7 until midnight we sat there being grilled on everything from our opinions of Morocco, the Berber language, student politics at the University of Meknes, American divorce law, the Democratic Primary, secret girlfriends, and on the list goes. For the record, everyone here loves Hillary because apparently a member of her family married a Berber and she’s visited here twice. I don’t know about the accuracy of the visits, but that’s what they tell me. It probably goes without saying that covering such diverse topics and being the center of attention for 5 hours stretches one’s language ability. Anyone who has lived abroad knows that some days your mind just clicks and it all makes sense and then other days it seems like you don’t understand a thing. I was lucky and having a good language day.

The food took quite a while to come out, but when it did we had three courses. The first was a chicken seasoned with, among other things, saffron and olives, the second was the lamb meat cooked with prunes which was excellent, and finally we ended with fruit. Of course all of this was eaten with the hands and bread. Now when we had finished, Ian and I gave each other that look any ex-pat knows that says “alright, now let’s start the process of getting out of here.” I use the word ‘process’ intentionally because it is most definitely that. After about 45 minutes of goodbyes and “no don’t go yet”s we were finally on our way back at around midnight. We hit a snag though and ran into some people who had left and were on their way back for the all night dancing and they were a bit more persuasive (read “physically grabbed us and dragged us back”) and so we ended up right back on the roof. At the time I was a little frustrated, but mostly just exhausted. I am so glad that we stayed though.

Once we got back the “alun” (drums) were pulled out and we started the dancing. Now two things here… one, the dancing is pretty much just standing shoulder to shoulder and bouncing up and down… two, it is now 1230 and they were just then bringing down the food for the women to eat which is why female Volunteers hate going to these things. So we got to dancing, just the guys and were having a blast. They handed me the drum to play along, but I can never seem to keep the rhythm of the music here. They eventually asked me to sing a song from America and the unanimous request was Bryan Adams’ “Everything I do, I do it for you”. It’s OK to let out a chuckle right here. So I sang and they sang right along. These guys couldn’t speak English, but that didn’t stop them from knowing all the words to a Bryan Adams song.

We stuck around for another hour or so, but that was about all we could handle. We walked home and I passed out.

Now I don’t have any pictures because I don’t feel comfortable going to a family function and acting like a tourist, but the son of the landlord was taking pictures so I’m hoping to steal his and pass them on so I’ll do that when I can.

New Site...

2008-03-08T03:26:00.000-08:00

Well the deed is done. Friday night was my first night in the new site.

Let me catch you all up on the craziness of the last couple of months. The story goes something like this… The area I was working in was so spread out that effective work was extremely difficult. I was hiking around the hills talking with random farmers and shepherds whose paths I would cross and that was about it. There were no associations with which to work and no potential for projects onto which I could stick a “sustainable” label so the Ministry of Health and Peace Corps finally decided to take me up on my proposal to change to an area where I had contacts and potential for work.

So below are pictures of the new house. I’m definitely taking a step down in amenities. I still have electricity and although I didn’t have running water at my last site, there was a source of treated water only 50m from my house. Now I’m about 800m from a source of drinkable water which is actually probably going to be the crux of my work over the course of this next year. I’m also a bit more isolated, but I’m in a gorgeous area. The Middle Atlas Region is one of the most spectacular areas I’ve ever lived in which is saying a lot since some of those places include the Black Forest, East Tennessee, Central Texas Hill Country, and northern Quebec. I went on a hike with some friends a couple of days ago and discovered lush cedar forests, breathtaking waterfalls, and some near extinct wildlife. Those pictures will have to wait for another time. Of the five of us on the hike, no one brought their cameras… go figure.

So here is the vew of the new house...

This is my bed. As you can see it's not actually a bed, it's just a couple of blankets on the floor. It's comfortable enough though.

This is looking the other direction in the room where I do my work very close to the floor.

And this is my kitchen... not much counter space I know...

There was quite a bit of trepidation about starting over this late in the game, but the past couple of days, I’ve actually been quite excited about hopefully getting some work done where I could potentially see some of the fruits of my labor.

So coming up this week is an exciting date. As of March 6, I will have been in country for a year. It is amazing how quickly the time has flown. I don’t have any plans as of yet to celebrate, but I’m sure I’ll figure something out… or not, I don’t know. I’ll probably just go on a long hike and maybe camp out somewhere, the stars have been spectacular as of late.

More Change

2008-02-04T03:23:00.000-08:00

Wow, it’s been a while since I’ve posted. I apologize the last month has been a little crazy. There’s been a lot going on so let me update you…

The most significant development is that I’m changing sites. The Ministry of Health, upon inspection of my site, decided that they wanted me in an area where I would be a bit more centralized and thus have access to more people with which to work. Although I can’t name the new place I can say that it isn’t far from where I am now and I will be working with one of the same macro tribal groups so the language is only slightly different. I’ve spent the last couple of weeks meeting with nurses, associations, and individuals from the area looking for work and housing. Today I have a meeting with the Ministry of Health to determine whether or not I will be permitted to use the nurses’ housing that was constructing with the Centre de Santé. In terms of housing I’ll probably be taking a bit of a step back in that I won’t have either electricity or running water although the electricity situation might be remedied.

The main issue in the area is access to potable water. There are several springs scattered throughout the hills with very good water, but they are inaccessible to most people most notably the town itself. They have recently built a chateau (water tower) to distribute running water, but it is not yet functional due to some conflict with the Commune I don’t quite understand.

One potential plus of this new site is that I might be getting a site mate who will be working with the Water and Forestry on ecotourism projects. That could go either way but it will be interesting having another American in my site. I’m going to hope for the best and will get someone who isn’t going to make me any crazier than I already am insha’allah. I’m hoping to be moved within the month, but you never know. It’s quite intimidating thinking about almost starting over in a new area, familiarizing myself with a new local politics, making new friends, learning a new dialect, and just generally forging myself a new home, but I think I’m up to the task. I fortunately have a spectacular support system of good volunteers around me.

Here are some pictures of the new site…

Other than that things have been going well this month. The weather has finally started to turn and spring is in the air. I have a sneaking suspicion we’ll go through one more cold spell before it stays warm and starts moving towards full on deadly heat but for now I’m typing on my roof with shorts on soaking up the sun. Work has been slow this month in terms of statistics the Ministry of Health would be interested in, but relationships building has been flourishing both with fellow PCVs and Moroccans. I’ve been to a couple of engagement parties and unfortunately don’t have pictures. Both times a friend would come to my house and say we’re going to go eat dinner, we’d hike for a really long time and when we arrived lo and behold there were about 70 people all celebrating an engagement. I need to just start carrying my camera everywhere I go.

Of Ishmael and Isaac

2008-01-03T03:12:00.000-08:00

So the holiday season has passed and here is a photo journal of that trip... we begin with the Muslim holiday commemorating Abraham's test of faith.

This is me and Hicham right after slaughtering the sheep.

Here we're skinning it.

And of course gutting it.

And here's the mother of the house cooking it. The liver wrapped in the stomach lining was particularly delicious.

Shortly after this holiday I left to go celebrate Christmas with some friends... that was a long trip and I'll tell you about it later. For the moment, here are some pictures.

Our host's house.

Me decorating our makeshift tree.

Cooking the meal

Wrapping presents... then we changed a bit of scenery

It was nice and warm for once

And I got to play guitar both on the beach and in the ocean.

The sunsets were spectacular

Some of us surfed...

And others rode camels. Sounds like the Christmas everyone dreams of right?

I just thought I'd throw that one in for good measure... Mara my regionmate

There are better pictures of this part of the holidays, but they are not mine and I don't yet have my hands on them. To be continued...

Then New Years is also pictureless, but it was spectacular to be around people I now consider family. So for all of you worried parents out there who think your children are alone during the holidays... we do a good job of taking care of each other.

Happy New Year

Hiking in my Site

2007-12-16T04:09:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving Pics

2007-12-16T01:52:00.001-08:00

Our Turkey... it was honestly one of the best Thanksgiving turkeys I've ever eaten. We killed and plucked it ourselves.

Chris and I playing guitar.

Enjoying our feast

A hike later that day. This is Barry and Madeleine on top of a mountain we climbed. I just like this picture of them.

Jamming out in the rug store the next day. I bought one so my room would be just that much warmer. From left to right that's Andrea, Madeleine, Josh, and I. I think we were singing Wagon Wheel.

Bathing and the Hammam

2007-12-16T01:47:00.000-08:00

Ok, so let me tell you what happens when you get lazy. You’ve cooked yourself a meal and it took a while to make so after you have enjoyed every last morsel you sprawl out on your couch, loosen your pants, and maybe even let out a satisfied burp. What you are by no means in the mood to do, however, is to clean up after yourself. What awaits you the next day (or if you are like me and don’t have running water so washing dishes means lugging water back to your house) or a couple of days later is pots that are no longer able to be cleaned with a mere sponge. What do you do? Well, you probably fill whatever it is with water and let it soak and then maybe even attack it with some steel wool.

If what I’ve just described isn’t a situation you ever find yourself in then congratulations, you either don’t cook for yourself and you really need to learn, or you don’t ever get lazy. If you’re never in a lethargic mood, then… well… I have nothing to say to you. You’re super-human. Sit there and wait a while, someone is coming with your medal.

I don’t want to tell you about cooking right now, although I did just make myself a spectacular chicken tajine stuffed with almonds and dates. I want you to now turn your mind to personal hygiene and specifically bathing. I live in the bled (countryside), have no running water, and so don’t really get to bathe myself very often and much like the pot I described above when I do get around to bathing myself, there is a lot of… well… collected nastiness that needs an extra effort.

During the summer it wasn’t a major issue because I could bathe on my roof in the sunshine and the sun would dry me before I was even done bathing. Now it is so cold that during the “heat of the day” I’m bundled up in three or four layers and a blanket and I’m still shivering. I end up getting up much later because it takes me a full hour to get up enough courage to brave the cold outside my blankets (all four of them). Yes I know, I’m cold in Africa, go figure. Before I could take a trip into town and visit one of my Peace Corps Volunteer friends who had a hot shower (that would be the Small Business Development and the Youth Development people otherwise known as Posh Corps) and I would be all set. Sadly, however, all of them just COSed (Close of Service… there two years were up) and the new crowd is still with their host families. What is a poor Peace Corps Volunteer to do? Good thing that in Morocco we have public baths that are the personal hygiene equivalent of a long soak and steel wool.

When I lived in Budapest there was a Hammam (public bath) that I went to every other weekend and in Budapest what that meant was heated pools, steam rooms and a massage all for like four dollars. It was spectacular. Granted everyone in there was naked so some of my friends couldn’t really handle that which meant that a lot of times I went solo. The point is, the Hammam in Budapest was a relaxing experience. I would call it luxurious but it was so inexpensive. That is not at all what the Hammam is here. There are a few similarities… there is steam, and there is water, and a bunch of men although they aren’t fully naked. That’s where the similarities end. People come to these places to actually get clean. Who’d a thought?

So let me describe this process with you and I’ll start by letting you in on the tools you bring with you. You of course have your soap and shampoo. What would bathing be without those? Most people, including myself, also bring their razors from some spectacularly close shaving. I have a nice straight edge razor that someone special gave me that I like to use. It’s shwiya dangerous, but it makes me feel cool that I’m using a straight edge which of course makes up for the danger. You also have to bring your “aghlaf” (I’m not sure of the Arabic word for this thing) which is a large container for water about twice the size of a coffee mug. This is what you use to get the water out of the buckets they provide for you and onto your person to rinse away the week long build up of mud, sweat, and, you know… it’s a week without showering, you get the picture. The final piece is what makes this Hammam experience so cleansing; it is the “Kis”. In dishwashing terms, this is the steel wool. Picture a wash cloth that fits on your hand like a mitten but is only a fraction softer than actual steel wool. Sound horrifyingly painful? I thought so too until I charged recklessly into the unknown.

So you pay your fee, usually about seven Dirhams which used to be like 80 something cents, but now is closer to a dollar thanks to the dollar being extremely weak right now.

(To follow a quick rabbit trail, I had the shock of my life while my granddad and uncle were here travelling. I went to go change some money and the teller at the bank told me that I should have brought Canadian Dollars. I’ve lived abroad for half my life, and have never heard anyone say anything remotely similar to that. I almost had a heart attack laughing.)

Then you go into this room where everyone is changing. Now like I said, in Hungary people just walked around naked and no one cared. Here, that is not the case. There is a sense of modesty so as your are putting on your underwear to go into the Hammam area you cover yourself with a towel. You then leave all of your things in a little cubby hole, grab two buckets and head in with only yourself, your underwear, and your “cleaning supplies”.

Now you have two options, you can bathe yourself or you can have someone do it for you. Most of the time I bathe myself, but on the rare occasion that I’m in the mood, whatever that means, I get someone to do it for me. This is an extremely intense experience and I guarantee you that after this guy is done you will be the cleanest you have ever been in your life.

I usually just do it myself so I’ll describe that process. You walk in through three rooms of increasing heat to where the water is dispensed. There’s HOT water and COLD water. Those are capitalized for a reason. You make a mix of the two you deem appropriate and tolerable and then pick out a spot on the floor next to some other guys also dealing with a week’s worth of build-up, wash down that spot on the floor (this part is necessary) and then plop down. I usually just sit there for a bit and pour hot water all over myself while the heat starts to take effect. I then follow that by stretching for a good long while just relaxing and breathing in the steam and letting my pores open.

After I feel sufficiently stretched out, I plop back down and then shave by feel which is extremely satisfying because you are bearing witness to just how close the shave is as you are going. When you have a mirror in front of you, you can be tempted to rely on the visual which can be misleading. You’ll make it to work later and then there’s a whole spot near your Adam’s apple, just below your nose, and under your jawbone that you missed. After the skin on my face is as smooth as I could possibly make it I move on to washing my hair. I don’t think that needs any explanation.

And now we come to my new, favorite part… the steel wool. I put this thing on my hand and then basically scrub my entire body… ENTIRE body… until about three layers of dead skin (and probably some life skin too… I usually come out looking red all over) are scraped away. Is this painful? Not really. It works a lot like a washcloth should, but when you use a washcloth with soap you are basically lubricating the cloth so that it doesn’t work well as a scrubbing agent. The “Kis’s” sole purpose is to scrub and it does a very efficient job at it.

After you are all rubbed down you then rinse off and then pick up your soap. This part, like the shampoo, needs no explanation. Now when I am finished and have rinsed off, I usually do something that most Moroccans do not. Actually, come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve seen any Moroccans do this so I guess it’s a little American twist to the whole thing. I fill up a bucket with the COLD water and dump it all over me. I think it’s a nice cool down from the entire experience. I guess you could say it brings closure to the relationship you just had with the Hammam.

You then exit to where your clothes are, dry off, change and be on your merry way with your skin all over feeling the smoothest it could possibly be because it was basically just sanded down and then varnished. If I ever find myself making the kind of money that would allow me to design my own house, I am definitely building myself a personal Hammam. However if my past is any indicator as to the type of salaried jobs I’m likely to see in the future, I’m probably going to having that dream for a great deal longer before it gets fulfilled.

Now if you had someone else wash you the experience goes about the same except it adds a bit to the price, and the whole time (except the shaving) you have someone else scrubbing you down, rinsing you, stretching you, washing you, and then rinsing you again. All of that is spectacular except for the stretching. I’m pretty sure some of the stuff the guy did to me today is going to permanently damage something inside me.

Let me use this opportunity to comment to all of you who cringe at the thought of another male, especially one who, like you, is only clad in underwear, wash you down. If that makes you uncomfortable, no problem… just do it yourself. In America if we see girls walking down the street with their arms linked we think nothing of it. Here it is the same with men. Men who are walking down the street together will hold hands, link arms, etc. They don’t even have to like each other. Two guys in my town who loathe each other had to attend a meeting and were talking on the way there and held hands. I don’t want to offer a public explanation for this cultural difference although I have had many discussions about it, some serious but others comical. I’ll leave the why up to you.

So there you have it. I’m sitting here writing this, listening to Jerry Garcia, Tony Rice, and David Grisman jam out and feeling extremely clean but disappointingly cold. Next time I might write about what happens when I let the dirty clothes build up for a long time… well, that’s a different story. The only communal solution to that is the weekly party the women have down by the river where they wash the clothes and I am most definitely not invited to that party. They have offered to wash my clothes, but I don’t feel comfortable asking someone else to do that for me. I will say this… vinegar in your rinsing water acts as a fabric softener. You learn all sorts of cool stuff like that living here.

I hope this finds you all warm and content in the direction your lives are taking. If times are rough, know that joy comes in the morning. And for those of you who pray, please remember the victims of the attacks in Algeria this past week.

Peace

Thoughts on Service

2007-12-05T04:23:00.000-08:00

I want to take a moment and write something out of character for this blog. If you are looking for experiences about Morocco, cultural insights, or funny stories you can go ahead and skip this entry. Times have been a bit tough lately in terms of work related to Health, yet I must constantly remind myself that I am not just here for the purpose of development.

I’ve been re-reading an old American history textbook from college that I had my parents send me. You can go ahead and laugh, I’m fully aware that I’m a bit of a nerd… ok, very much so a nerd. I’ve also been re-watching the Band of Brothers miniseries. For those of you who know me well or are mildly acquainted with my story with the military as well as my development in relation to patriotism, the fact that I am in the Peace Corps should offer no surprise. Let me tell you though that as many of you are, I too am not a static individual. I never have had all of the answers and continue to discover my own ignorance and immaturity… I am a twenty something after all. I guess that’s all part of growing up. That being said, I want to try to explain to you how I see this time in Morocco…

There is a part of me that is extremely individualistic and let’s be honest… selfish. I guess that’s a part of having moved around a lot and never having to take anyone else into account for very long. That goes for friends and girlfriends on one level, but on an entirely different plane that also includes my country of birth.
I confess that I have been all over the map when it comes to seeing myself as an American. At a younger age I was more enchanted with the dream that is our nation, but as I began to get beyond the “in 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue” account of our story and then found myself living abroad, I began to be alienated from my birthplace. I viewed myself at various points in my life as either a “kingdom citizen” (those who grew up in the Church will understand that one), a citizen of the world, or as some kind of a being constantly creating its own meaning and divorced from any labels. The journey through these paradigms has left conflicting voices in my head all vying for dominance, but let that lie for the moment.

There were many things that factored into my decision to join Peace Corps, some noble, others less so. I’m not going to talk about them right now. Interestingly enough, though, I am coming to find that it is not necessarily what motivates you to begin something, but what motivates you to stay. I’ve had several opportunities to leave; a job offer to which I had applied before coming, an outside shot at joining the world of musicians here in North Africa and in Europe (that’s an interesting story for another day), as well as simply how easy it is to just leave. Every time something has come up that could switch my direction so far, I have done my soul searching and make the conscious decision to stick. I don't know that that means this will always be the case, I can only speak for the present.

Yes, there are times when the work surrounding Health is slow or really non-existent. My Programming Staff has actually looked into changing my site because of the lack of people with which I have to work here. Let me take a moment to explain why that is. Over the past few decades there have been plenty of examples of failed development projects worldwide and the stories mostly go something like this…
X (where X is a large sum) amount of money was donated to buy Y (where Y is some sort of thing that was supposed to make life better) for Z (where Z is some people we consider desiring of our help) and we come and install it. For a certain number of years Z all feast on the bounty of the land that didn’t exist before we got there until one day Y breaks. Z then comes looking for help only to find that we have moved on to Q (where Q is the next new thing that is supposed to make life better) and are now working with V (where V is some other people we consider desiring of our help). The problem was that we dropped something off and didn’t bother teaching anyone how to fix it, or build it or really do anything other than use it. The end result is that we really didn’t help anyone; we just kept people in a cycle of dependency.

What we are supposed to be doing is what we call “Capacity Building” which means we’re supposed to be teaching people how to do things for themselves. So when I talk about a Medical Waste Incinerator project what I mean is that I’m working with people to assist them in raising the money and building the medical incinerator and then helping them educate others in running and maintaining it. Let me just say that although my tone at the moment may sound sarcastic (or maybe that’s just in my head), it’s not because I don’t believe very strongly that this is what should be done. The sarcastic tone is that this approach means that seeing the fruit of your labour is neither frequent nor guaranteed which leaves for a frustrating day to day experience. The difficulty in my site is that there are no active associations with which to work, only farmers who are scattered throughout the hills and aren’t given to working together on any particular anything.

This brings us back to the question of what motivates me to stay. My answer is quite round about, but I promise we’ll get there. Stephen Colbert in his comic genius once said of the Peace Corps that he loves it because it takes all of the people who hate America out of the country and puts a shovel in their hand. Extremely overstated, but at the time it hit close to home. I’m not supposed to make political statements on here (which for me comes close to being impossible), so I’ll tread lightly. Let’s just say that it had gotten to the point where all I could see was who we as a people screwed over in the past, who was getting screwed over in the present, and who we were setting ourselves up to screw over in the future. If I sound like the joker at every party who has to bring up the topics that utterly ruin the mood, the comparison is a valid one. If this makes you feel any better, my pessimism wasn’t simply related to my country, it was also my faith (but I’m going nowhere near that one now).

An unintended consequence of being here in Morocco is that it allowed me to step outside of the bubble of academia and the day to day of my petty political, historical and theological grievances and into the unknown where none of that mattered, and has caused me to reexamine my identification. When one is constantly surrounded by various “end of the world” problems (at least in your own head) and you tend to be of a sort who dives into them with both feet like I am, stepping out can make you really examine what you really cared about in the first place. Let me say really quickly that I’m not bashing academia, I love that world and am probably headed back at some point, nor am I saying the things I cared about were petty. What I am saying is that I lacked perspective; perspective I am still gaining. That being said, being in Morocco has allowed me to drop the pessimism related to my origins.

I’m going to write a sentence that not too long ago would have been impossible for me to write without pages of explanation and obfuscation. I AM AN AMERICAN.

Now back to why I mentioned my true geekiness with the textbook and miniseries. For the textbook, I believe that there is merit in returning again to the stories of your past. Since I’ve been here I’ve been continually coming back to man’s story be it Herodotus and Plutarch, or the Qur’an, Al-Ghazali, and Ibn Khaldun, or texts on European and Economic History, or Theology and its development. I started broad but have recently been delving into my own national identity. I don’t know that I ever allowed for balance in my recounting, but for some reason it took Morocco to make me see that not only do we have our Nathan Bedford Forrests and George Wallaces in our history, but we also have Harriet Tubmans and Martin Luther King Jrs. The point is that we have been forging our history ever since nomadic tribes stumbled on the land while hunting large mammals across the frozen wastelands of the north. And although that forging has not always been honorable, it is our story none the less. I think it was highly naïve of me to assume that we should get it right all the time.

Now on to the “Band of Brothers” miniseries. I got this as a Father’s Day gift for my dad a couple of years ago. It is about the 101st Airborne Division during WWII which happened to be my grandfather’s unit (who I never met). I have always been drawn to service in various areas of my life, and what now seems like three lifetimes ago it drew me to seek an ROTC scholarship in college. I’m not going to go into that episode of my life, but I find myself once again unwittingly serving my country abroad. Some of you reading this may scoff at that idea when coupled with thoughts of the sacrifice made 60 years ago. I understand your skepticism, but let me explain…

The world has changed. What happens in your backyard does affect me and national sovereignty is slowly losing its significance. The United States of America is a world power with its economic and military might stretching across the globe with both positive and negative outcomes and whether we like it or not those negative consequences, unintended as they may be, come back to haunt us. I’m not talking solely of military actions, but also of cultures who one day have no electricity and the next have a satellite signal beamed into their homes with the wonder that is American cinema, TV, and music. We have battles in our own country, as “modern” as it is, over the value of certain types of images. Now imagine a culture that hasn’t based its social contract on the separation of church and state grappling with Chuck Norris, Penthouse, and MTV.

We are here not only to do development work, but also to be who we are… energetic, idealistic, and caring Americans. We are here to bring a little bit more understanding into this constantly objectifying world. We are here to be the counterbalance to blind hatred. We are here to head those negative consequences off at the pass. We are here for ourselves, our country, our world, and all of our futures. It doesn’t come with Purple Hearts, parades, or holidays and no one will ever ask us to stand up during church on a specified day to honor our service, but we are here none the less… I am here none the less.

So now finally to answer the question of why I am still here… Even when work goes slowly, I’m still a part of something greater, and although my part in the play may be small for the moment, I’m still on stage.

PCV Dictionary

2007-11-21T04:49:00.000-08:00

So, for all of those out there reading this blog who are family members of my fellow volunteers here… this one’s for you. I’m going to give you all a little dictionary for words and phrases that might be trickling in to the conversations you are having. These are all either Arabic or Tamazight/Tashelheit words that we use ALL THE TIME! Here is how this is going to work… I’m going to put a word in italics and then give you the definition. After the definition, in parentheses, I’m going to tell what we probably mean when we’re using it or what the context is. The spelling on all of these is arbitrary transliteration so don’t judge me.

Insha’allah- “God willing” (this is probably used in every sentence and is the most used phrase. We use this whenever we say something about the present or future. For example, “I’m going to town today, insha’allah” or “I think I’ll eat nachos today, insha’allah.” Occasionally you’ll hear someone use it for the past tense which still doesn’t make sense to me, eg “I went to Mrirt yesterday, insha’allah.” If you have any insight on that one let me know. Now when talking to someone you have to pay attention to the inflection because it quite possibly could mean, “you are absolutely smoking something if you think that’s ever happening.”

Hmdullah- “thanks be to God” (this is probably our second most used phrase and pretty self-explanatory)

Shwiya- a little bit, marginal (if used as a noun, we’re probably saying it’s not that great)

Bzzef- A lot (On this word people can make some really funny inflections)

Zwina, iHla, izil, iغ uda, ifulki… - good, cool, awesome, amazing, fantastic, etc. (all of these are various regional Berber dialects, except the first is Arabic. There are more, but these are the main ones that I’ve run into)

Imkin- maybe

Souq- this is the weekly market that almost all of us go to in order to get vegetables and random other stuff. (It’s quite the event and depending on your mood could be really stressful or invigorating. It’s also a great place to get crazy used clothes)

Miskin- poor thing (so this is the nickname practically all of us go by. So whenever we answer questions about whether or not we are married, or how long we’re here for, or if we have to cook for ourselves, etc, the invariable response is “oh you poor thing.” We also use this to describe pathetic looking vegetables, animals, or really anything… eg. “Those are miskin looking carrots.”)

So these are some of the words that have become almost second nature to most of us and it pops in and out of our English conversations. There are quite a bit more, but this will get you started. I just thought I’d give you a reference so you can understand your loved ones. Enjoy!

Family Visit

2007-11-18T04:54:00.000-08:00

Ok, so this has been a long absence and I’m sad to say that so much has happened between the last time I posted and now, that I don’t know if most of it is going to be told. The good news in all of this is that I have a computer now which means that I’ll be able to write when I feel like it instead of hoping that my desire to write and my presence at an internet café coincided.

So here is the general timeline. My granddad and my Uncle Sam came for a visit which was spectacular. Interestingly enough all three of our first names are Samuel, a fact that was repeated quite often in our travels. We hit Fes the first two nights and crammed the three of us into one room which was alright. I must say though that it was quite the orchestra of snorers. Good thing I’m a hard sleeper. :) The hotel used to be the English consulate way back when and Churchill used to smoke his cigars in the bar. The only site in Fes that we really saw was the old Qur’anic school built in the 11th century if my memory serves. The rest of the time we spent wandering through the maze of souqs.

From there we moved on towards Marrakesh. On the way we stopped for lunch in my souq town, Khenifra, and ate with my region mate Mara. I then got to show them my house. We didn’t stay there long though because we had to head on. We stopped that night in Beni Mellal where we once again crowded into one room.

Beni Mellal isn’t all that impressive; it was just a stopping point on our way down. The next day instead of heading directly south we took the road up the mountain towards Azilal. It’s a gorgeous mountain road that took us winding through the entrance to the High Atlas Mountains. I think Uncle Sam particularly enjoyed driving the switchbacks although I was in the back trying not to lose my lunch. We stopped at the Cascades Ouzoud to eat lunch and were fortunate enough not only to see the magnificent waterfall, but we also got to see some Barbary Apes jumping around in the trees.

When we got to Marrakesh things got a little crazy for a bit. The traffic was bad and we couldn’t find parking near the center of town. After a hard fought battle we finally did and there was a guy there (one of thousands) who offered to show us to a place to stay. Although the place we ended up at was not the one he showed us, he did point us in the right direction.

The Riad we did end up staying at was called Riad Zakaria and was an oasis in the middle of the chaos that is Marrakesh. I really didn’t know what to do with myself on this entire trip. I was taking a hot shower and eating three meals every day, it was quite the change of pace from my regular life here. The guy who owns the place, Zakaria, was quite the find. The man helped us out and hooked us up with anything we could have possibly wanted.

We wandered around in the Jemaa el Fna with all of the snake handlers, wandered through a lot of artisan shops, ate amazing food, visited the royal gardens, and basically just had a good time in Marrakesh. The owner of our riad was also kind enough to throw Papa a little birthday feast. Once again, the food was spectacular and there was a lot of it.

We spent three nights in Marrakesh and then headed off for the coast to Essouaira. Now is Essouaira we met a bunch of my fellow Peace Corps Volunteers who were on their way to our In Service Training in Agadir the next day.

For the record, Essouaira is now my favorite city in Morocco. Not only is it a beautiful little coastal town with a laid back, artsy feel, but we also had some pretty spectacular seafood there as well. There’s also a well entrenched little ex-pat community that vacationed there and never left. I don’t blame them. It was here that we parted ways and they headed back north while I continued south with my fellow Peace Corps Volunteers to Agadir for our training.

Thoughts of Departed Friends

2007-10-18T07:19:00.000-07:00

Ok, so that sounded dramatic. She just went back to the States, but we miss her none the less...

So here's to Kaylene.

Mara and I

2007-10-18T07:10:00.000-07:00

Well here are some pictures of us working. Not actually teaching people becuase let's be honest, I think it's kind of tacky to take a digital camera in a room full of people who can barely afford food and snap pictures for my own benefit.

So these are poses of us working hard preparing our lesson. We actually did work hard, but by the time we got the camera out we were done working, so this is us acting. Mara's a better actor than I. :)

My Friend Alex

2007-10-18T07:03:00.001-07:00

I went to go visit my roommate from our training... My brother from a different mother. His site is considerably different from mine as you will soon see.

So he always makes this face for pictures. He's not crazy... well maybe a little, but only as crazy as the rest of us here.

The rainy season has started, and we got caught in a strom on a hike. This is the rain coming down from the mountains.

So his site is actually in the mountains... barren, imposing, threatening mountains. I loved every second of it.

Site Pictures

2007-10-18T06:54:00.001-07:00

Ok, these are long awaited pictures of my site. These are shots from the roof of my house.

This is the mosque where I get my water. Someone blew the speakers on the minaret so the call to prayer is a little distorted, but it's become a fixture in my life.

This is the view from the opposite direction. The houses you see on the hills are populated by shepherds. There isn't any water up there so they all have to come down and get water from the same place I do.

This is the line of "hanuts" (shops)... and by plural, I really mean a chicken butcher and a general store.

An Amazing Day

2007-10-17T07:55:00.000-07:00

So I am kicking myself that I forgot my connecting chord for my camera because I have some good pictures for you. I'll get back online soon, because I need to type out a site report for our In Service Training (IST) coming up next month.

So let me outline the events of the past couple of days. I took an out-of-site weekend to go visit the site of my roommate from training, Alex. He works in an extremely isolated site in the Errachidia province up in the High Atlas. There was a rugged beauty there that had me absolutely breathless. Part of that might have had to do with the higher consistency of smokers, but I'm going to go with the landscape as the cause. It just sounds better. We were in this relatively lush valley, but surrounded on all sides by vast tracks of sun-scorched plains and rocky mountain peaks. I've got pictures, don't worry, you'll just have to be patient. We spent the weekend doing the things we did in training... talking history and politics, playing chess, making fun of each other, and watching Sopranos. Now this is his favorite show, but I had never seen it. I'm shiwa (a little bit) hooked now. I don't have a computer, so I only get to watch movies when I visit other people, and it was a nice change of pace.

The visit was also an interesting insight into my own existence here. My site is extremely different from his, and I couldn't help but ponder how things would have changed if those would have been the circumstances of my experience. I'm not dwelling on that too much, simply because I love my life at the moment. I also stocked up on books. My friend Alex is quite the connoisseur of literature... a good friend to have.

From Alex's site, I proceeded on to Mara's site for another health lesson, and here is where the amazing day begins. So I'm skipping a lot of the trip, but I won't bore you with details...

So we had to get up at five in the morning for various reasons. Two hours later we would be saying that we just had the most productive morning of our lives. If the same set of events had happened in the States and we had described it in that manner, you would probably laugh. All we did was shower and eat breakfast. What you don't understand is that those few actions involve gathering water from the well, heating up the water (normally I don't do that, but it is REALLY cold in Mara's site right now), taking turns bucket bathing, and then cooking breakfast. First of all it was a miracle that we were both clean at the same time, that never happens.

So our clean, well-fed bodies were off to make the 15 km trek to the Health Center where we would be teaching people how to make Oral Re hydration Drink. We spent the morning teaching, which was good. Both of our language skills are beginning to be honed to the point where people understand what we're saying half the time. We got people to demonstrate successfully what we taught, so we know we were getting our message across.

We left the Health Center around noon and on the way out were offered a tea invitation which we accepted. We had tea and talked with some more people and then headed back to Mara's house. We then ate some amazing vegetarian chili we had prepared the night before and took a much needed nap. The nap lasted a bit longer than we expected, but we were up at 3 and went running for the next hour.

What then transpired, I still think was a dream. WE GOT ANOTHER SHOWER!! If you don't recognize the sound you're hearing, it's angels singing. Taking two showers in a day... well it's just unheard of. I usually take one a week.

We then proceeded to make some banana bread to bring to her host family's house where we were having dinner. We stayed there and ate where they made fun of the fact that the last time I was there, I fell asleep waiting for the meal and was snoring... apparently really loud. Now I think they are exaggerating a bit, but none the less it was not one of my finer moments in life.

In order to understand what happened next I need to give you some background. Mara's site is full of apple orchards and over the last week and a half, people have been coming from all over the country to pick the apples. Now Mara has been trying ever since the gathering season began to figure out how to get apples out of someone, but to no avail.

So as we were leaving her host family's house, the brother runs outside with a big cardboard box and fills it up with apples for me to take back to my house. So now I am in the possession of about 60 or 70 Dh worth of apples. Amazing. This would have been a full and amazing day, but it was not yet over.

We got back to her house planning on maybe baking some cookies, doing back rubs, and then turning in for another early morning, but the night before I had asked the family that lives in the same compound as Mara some questions about the Qur'an and they had told me that their brother who is studying to be an Imam was going to be back the next day. So we returned to find that the brother was not only waiting to talk to us (2 1/2 hours) but that he had bought what I assume was about $50 worth of books... an Arabic/English Qur'an with commentary and another book explaining Muslim theology. Mara and I were and still are taken aback by just how amazing the gift was.

After that was over, we headed back to her house, drank some coffee, ate the banana bread, read some poetry and then turned in.

Welcome to a picture of an amazing life.

Random Pictures

2007-09-19T08:59:00.000-07:00

Ok, so this is me playing the guitar back at the end of May right before I went to my site permanantly. Mara, my region mate, and I were in Khenifra to talk with our delegue staff.

This is my region mate Mara and I at our delegue's house that same week at the end of May. Notice that we are both extremely clean. We were looking at these pictures this week and were lamenting the fact that those days are long behind us.

This is another picture of my region mate Mara. I don't know when this was taken.

This is me at souq staring at some spices back in May

This is Me, Mara, Ann, and Sean in Beni Millal back in June. The other guy in the photo is a Moroccan guy named Cal who now lives in the US and used to play for the Moroccan national soccer team. He invited us to a welcome home party he was having that night.

Project

2007-09-19T08:58:00.000-07:00

So this has been quite the exciting week. Not only has Ramadan begun, but I just completed my first “project”. Ok so let’s not get too excited, I haven’t built any wells or cured any strange diseases, basically no one is prepared to build a statue in my honor yet, but give it time. That really is the goal of Peace Corps you know…

So my region mate Mara and I spent a few hours at the Health Center in Ait Oumghar… don’t bother trying to look for it on a map, you won’t find it… teaching dental hygiene lessons: How to brush your teeth, if you can’t afford toothpaste or a toothbrush how to make them, why you need to brush your teeth, you know, dental hygiene. The basic idea is that on this particular day every week, the women from the surrounding area come in with their newborns in order to get vaccinations and since it takes forever they’re waiting around for hours with their babies. We basically have them cornered. So we ended up talking to somewhere around 45 women and their children. Many of them had confused looks on their faces most likely because there were two foreigners speaking their Berber dialect, but there were also a few who wrote down instructions or went and got friends so they could learn too.

There was this really cute girl named Amina who, although was a little shy at first quickly jumped out of her shell and became our little emissary to the rest of the people in the sbitar. She even left and brought friends of hers back on their way to school.

Now you have to realize that we were surrounded entirely by women, so I was a little shy. I’m used to interacting with all men here and the high level of estrogen was a tad intimidating, not only for me but for the women as well. When I talked with them one-on-one they mostly wanted to know if Mara and I were married. Mara, however, is a powerhouse when it comes to engaging people and drawing them in, and where I tend to be silent when I can’t create a grammatically correct sentence, she charges ahead with whatever word she can recall and brings her listeners into an active dialogue where they participate in forming the sentence. The unintended consequence (or maybe intended, I don’t know) is that because the people with whom she speaks end up helping her complete her sentences, they tend to understand and absorb the information far better than when confronted with my timidly formed “correct” sentences.

So I return tomorrow to my site and finally have a plan for work. So you have an idea of what I’ll be working on in the coming months, my nurse and I are working on a plan to get a medical waste incinerator for our sbitar so we don’t have used needles lying around all over the place. I’m also working on designing a system for our community to deal with trash as a community as opposed to just dumping everything in the river. I have In-Service Training (IST) in November and after that I can begin writing grants. I still haven’t started learning Arabic, which I thought I was going to begin last month, but my tutor up and left for a job, so I’m waiting until I get a little bit more comfortable with Tamazight.

I hope this blog entry finds you all well. Sadly I don’t have pictures of this event because both Mara and I felt awkward taking pictures during the lessons. I apologize for the disappointment, but we’ve been trying to keep our work low-tech and low-key.

Ramadan

2007-09-19T08:53:00.000-07:00

Let me trouble you once more with yet another failed attempt to give you the slightest glimpse into my world here…

Ramadan has begun and I, along with several of my friends, have chosen to join our communities in fasting throughout the month. For those of you who don’t know how this works, nothing is allowed to pass your lips from sunrise to sunset (which translates to about 4 in the morning to 645 in the evening). It’s a tad more involved than that, but that’s the basic gist of it.

My schedule now looks something like this… I’ll start at the end of the day. Right around 5 my stomach starts to revolt and my lips are parched from a lack of liquids in the heat of Morocco. I’m dehydrated and a little weak. It’s not as bad as all that, but I’m definitely ready for nourishment. I’ve had invitations to break fast at others’ houses every night so far so I have not yet cooked the traditional meal yet. We gather in the salon awaiting that haunting call of “allahu akbar” signaling that we can finally nourish our deprived bodies. We then gorge ourselves on Harira (a Moroccan soup), Shebekia (a Moroccan pastry), dates, hard-boiled eggs, milk and Bousheyergh (I’m not sure of the transliteration on that one, but this is a sweet bread). Oh, and did I mention water? LOTS of water… or as we say here, BZZEF! The food is absolutely amazing, and although one might be tempted to draw the conclusion that it might have something to do with the fact that I’ve spent the entire day dreaming about food… mostly enchiladas and maybe a steak… the Moroccan/Berber cuisine is rather delicious. Remember this happens around 645.

Now we sit around watching religious programming, the Moroccan TBN (or whichever one has the evangelists in the extremely gaudy, golden chairs). Muslim religious programming, however, is far classier than our Evangelical counterpart. I usually go out for a work, sit down with a book, chat with people who are now roaming the streets; basically we just pass the time before we eat again.

Around 1230 or 1 we have another meal... That’s 1230 at night just in case you forgot. This isn’t the race to see just how quickly you can fill your stomach that the breaking of the fast was, but enough to call it a meal. Then we sleep only to wake up around 330 for the sole purpose of getting dinner in before the sun begins to rise. After we’re done we go back to sleep and stay that way just a little bit longer than I normally would. Then I wake up.

The days are a bit lazier as no one wants to exert himself or herself as much as they normally would, although in my region mate Mara’s site it is the apple harvesting season and the workers have to work through the day in the fields without water or food. My day, fortunately does not necessarily involve extended periods of physical exertion otherwise I just might get as crazy as the taxi drivers…

… I guess I need to explain that a running joke here in Morocco is the taxi drivers during Ramadan. They have to drive all day long under the same conditions as the rest of us, and by the end of the day they’re going a little crazy and are a bit on edge. Fights break out occasionally over really little things. It’s actually quite funny to watch two men go to blows and have to be separated by a crowd because one of them leaned on the other’s car. Although I must say that I’ve never actually seen anyone land a good punch. It’s normally been this close-fisted slap that doesn’t actually reach its target. For those of you who know me, you know I am no fighter so I’m not exactly an expert observer, but I’m pretty sure that punch isn’t going to win any fight. I think I’ve reached the conclusion that the two combatants are counting on the crowd to separate them before it gets anywhere near serious…

… anyway, back to my life. I’ll do some work at the little health center in town, maybe hang out on the road with the guys there sitting in the shade…

… another quick diversion. I can tell what time it is simply by seeing where the group of men is loitering. They follow both the shade and whichever hanut/butcher/cigarette seller is open. So if I look out my roof to the road and although the shade is on the east side of the road meaning it’s morning, but people aren’t there, I know that the main hanut owner is about to make his run into town to get everyone’s vegetables, bread or whatever else people need. It’s somewhere between 9 and 930. If I wake up from a nap, walk out my front door and see that the shade is in the west and yet there are people on the east side, I know that it’s around 330 or 4 because people are about to head back to their houses to drink tea, eat a small snack and they want one last cigarette from the seller across the street. You get the idea…

… and then I’ll probably sit on my roof or in my living room and read trying desperately to stay out of the kitchen and away from the sight of food or water. Then around 530 I’ll head off to a friend’s house to prepare to break fast.

It’s interesting. I thought Ramadan would make life difficult, and granted I’m only 3 or so days in so this opinion could very well change over the course of the month,. What I am finding though, is that a life here that up to this point was very erratic now has some kind of strange and new rhythm to which I am learning rather quickly to dance. I work to keep my mind off of the hunger, and yet there is something every day to look forward to, to work towards. Reaching that final call to prayer always brings a sense of accomplishment.

Now some of you may be asking yourselves why I am choosing to fast. It’s an excellent question that has many answers. I had been going back and forth for literally months on this decision. Should I be intentionally different in order to force two different cultures to interact on their own terms or do what I am normally inclined to do and adapt as much as possible? I’m not Muslim so fasting for Ramadan isn’t a revealed and thereby required part of my religious life,, however adopting others’ traditions to one’s own has been a time honored tradition of the Church (that’s big C not little c) I’ve grown up in… December 25 for Christmas being a case in point, but I digress. There is of course the possibility of a cynical, work related answer that it makes integration easier,; a depressing, loner answer that it gives me an opportunity to eat at other peoples’ houses and not be alone in mine,; a career-oriented answer that says that it imposes a routine and enables more efficient work,; a religious answer that it allows me to focus my thoughts on higher things employing the time-honored tradition of fasting,; or a “twentysomething” answer that I’m doing it just for the sheer sake of doing it. All of them have a little bit of weight and are some part of the thought process. It most definitely does not simplify the religious question that is asked every day of me… “is tzallat?”… “do you pray?”. Once people find out I’m fasting, it just leads them back to the same question. So we return to the original question of why… and excellent question. I don’t have an answer for you; suffice it to say that I made the choice to fast. Independence forces one to make decisions even when you aren’t ready to make one or fully decided on a course of action. This was the choice in the “Create Your Own Story” that I picked and now I’m flipping through the book to some new, designated page to discover what’s going to happen to the protagonist next in this particular novel.
_______________________________________________

For those of you who are interested in what I’ve been reading lately, over the past week I’ve read “Reading Lolita in Tehran” by Azer Nafisi which was yet another soul-affirming recommendation from one of my friends who seems to be able to always bring me back from the edge of cynicism and remind me, as she so eloquently put it, that although this world groans, it also hopes. I’m almost done re-reading “The Brothers Karamazov” by Fyodor Dostoevsky, which always re-kindles the sometimes-dying flames of my spiritual journey. I’m also reading “Lolita” by Vladimir Nabokov which is not exactly the most uplifting book I’ve ever read… more along the lines of the most disturbing. It is beautifully written though. I’m also reading an economics textbook, but that’s because I’m a bit of a dork. I’ve just borrowed “The Prophet” by Kahlil Gibran and “Into The Wild” by Jon Krakauer and am excited about diving into their pages. Oh, and occasionally I pick up “Arabian Nights” and read a story or two. I’ve been reading politics and history incessantly for a couple of months now so I’m on a little bit of a fiction kick right now.

The Hair is Gone

2007-09-03T07:08:00.000-07:00

So the ponytail finally came off... and there was much mourning in the land. One of the volunteers I'm here with commented that it changes my personality so much because they've only known me with it. That strikes me as rather hilarious seeming as I've only had the ponytail for about, I don't know, 5/46 of my life. Pretty exact fraction you say? Yes it is.

Just in case you didn't know, the hair will be donated to "Locks of Love"

www.locksoflove.org

So here is the process...

This is how I usually go around wearing my hair... in a bun. Although, I try not to pull the karate kid move on too many unsuspecting moroccans

This is of course my tiger face. We all need these. So that's about how long my hair got.

And this is just a wonderfully telling look. Please forgive the monstrosity that is the soul patch. I came into that weekend with a full beard and a body tat hadn't showered in a week so I wanted to get cleaned up and shave and that's the mood I was in. It will be gone soon.

Here is the first cut... and the horror on my face. We bought the scissors that day at market and they were extremely dull. Cuttin anything took us forever.

Here is one of the two ponytails we cut off. Once again... dull scissors. We had to do it in waves.

This is my trusty region mate, Mara, who did the honors of cutting my hair. She's awesome, and if she reads this... thanks again.

I know that this isn't the greatest picture of my new haircut, but it's the best I could do right now... the other's we took are just embarassing. I look like my youngest brother and now that he's taller than me, I look like I'm the youngest. There will be more pictures of me and you'll get better looks at the hair, although let's be honest... it's really not that important.

Home Pics

2007-08-23T09:43:00.000-07:00

So this is what so many people have been asking for. Before you actually look at the pictures though, I must warn you that I got VERY lucky with my house and I have a lot of things that some PCVs don't... like a fridge. I'm very proud of that fridge and so that will be the first picture. :) I also want to warn you that I decided not to clean my house before taking these pictures, so this is about how it normally looks.

What you see on top are all the spices and stuff that I have. There is no cabinet space in the kitchen, so everything I have I put either on top of my fridge or on the counter by the sink.

Now remember that there is no running water so I have to go collect that which can really be a pain. I have the conversation almost every day about why I don't have a wife to do that for me. The Peace Corps of course didn't put "Wife to carry water" on the packing list so I didn't bring one. I'm very upset about that and am lodging a complaint through the proper channels. I'd get one in country, but my budget doesn't allow for that.

This is a desk that my landlord left in the house for me. I don't sit at it though because I think the chair would break if I put any weight on it. It's nice to put things on and look at though. It's all about appearances anyway right?

This is the room I spend most of my time in. I sleep here if it's cool, I read here, I eat here, I... well... sit and stare at the wall here. I was going to get carpet and just use that ponj as a bed, but I sleep on the floor and bringing carpet takes, you know, planning ahead and stuff. I'll think about it.

These of course are my beloved books. I do a LOT of reading and if you ever are thinking about me and want to send me something, "BOOKS" is always a good answer. History, Biography, Theology, Politics... I can get novels over here. Anyway... there are my books. Maybe some of you can recognize the ones you've sent me already... I've read them all.

This is my bathroom. It's hidden under the stairs and there is no door. If you look closely you will find no toilet paper... you do what you gotta do.

Last but not least, this is the outside of my house. Looks pretty cool don't it? Yeah, I didn't show pictures of my roof where i do laundry, sleep and read, mostly because it's just a roof. Stay tuned and you'll be getting pictures of the community as well. Ciao

Clarification and Apology

2007-08-17T04:45:00.000-07:00

I just got a comment on a post from a while ago entitled "Stupid Sheep". I don't know who posted it, but he/she raised an excellent point and I want to respond.

Morocco is a large and VERY diverse country, not only linguistically but culturally. The poster mentioned that even though he/she is Moroccan that he/she sometimes feels like a stranger in his/her own country when travelling.

If I sometimes use the phrase "in Morocco" I am not trying to make a sweeping comment about the entire country. I can only speak for the very small section of Morocco in which I work. The problem is, however, that I am not allowed to tell you where that is for security reasons, so I end up sounding like I'm making sweeping generalizations. I apologize if it seems that way. If anything it is because I'm a lazy writer and I'll try to be more discerning in my words.

Where Can I Go?

2007-08-14T06:58:00.001-07:00

Just listen to the words...

An Eventful Weekend

2007-08-14T06:30:00.000-07:00

It all started with the earthquake then the next night there was a spectacular meteor shower around 1 in the morning. I know this because I sleep on my roof where it is cool. The shower was happening literally above us. One landed on the other side of the mountain from my house. Some of them were streaking all the way across the sky from horizon to horizon. I wish you could have been there because I am not one for poetic description.

Those two awesome displays of nature, and the wonder in which it had entranced me was broken yesterday.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6945504.stm

There was yet another bombing in Morocco. This time it wasn't in the far off coastal city of Casablanca, it was in Meknes, one of the Imperial Cities. To set your mind at ease... Meknes, although considerably closer to me than Casablanca, is still about 140km away from me. So don't worry about me, worry about Morocco and worry about our world, and if you pray, pray for us all.

We, all of us, are in the fight of our lives. You and I are warring against indifference in our own lives, and the objectifying influence hatred and ignorance have on all of our hearts. As long as we live in a world with and "us and a them" we will be at war. Until we finally discover that there is nothing but "we" we will always be fighting. Those of us here attempt to stand in that gap and are struggling against both ourselves and other forces to bring two wayward families together, or at least to remind all of us that we are family.

There are always times of doubt here because sometimes because the immediacy doesn't always seem that evident.

It is.

From an imperfect and humbled minister of reconciliation...

Earthquake

2007-08-12T04:39:00.000-07:00

So last night I was sitting on my bed reading my History of Europe... that's right, I'm a geek, get over it... and my bed started to shake for about 4 or 5 seconds. I started to chuckle because for those of us who have gone to college and lived in dorms, that usually indicates something. I'll let you figure it out.

Once I realized however that that wasn't possible cause I was the only one in my house, my next thought was that it was an earthquake. Now we have an earthquake region here in the Rif Valley up in the north near the Mediterranean which is one of the reasons we don't have volunteers in that area so I figured it was a relatively powerful one from up there, but I got no call from Peace Corps and my friend who lives further north and closer to the region didn't feel it. I called my region mate, Mara, and she felt it.

So today I was looking online to see what I could find. There was no news of devastation so that was a good thing, so then I looked the earthquake up.

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsww/Quakes/us2007fxb3.php

It was a 4.8 and the epicenter was about 25 miles from where I live. So congratulations to me, I just lived through my first earthquake.

On an unrelated note, I finally got my camera working so hopefully I'll get you pictures of my new house next time. I would have gotten them today, but my house needs to be cleaned a little first :)

REVOLUTION!!

2007-08-09T08:54:00.000-07:00

There is a revolution going on in Morocco right now. This particular revolution "will not be televised" but that of course is because most of the people I work with don't have electricity... hence no televisions. So maybe that means the revolution will be televised? I don't know. Regardless there is a revolution going on and I am bringing it back to the States with me.

Citizens of the United States of America... throw away your mops and prepare yourselves for the miracle that is THE SQUEEGIE.

That's right, no more mopping the floor then squeezing the water out then mopping again and continuously repeating the process until you resign in frustration and leave up a "Wet Floor" sign, praying no one slips. Now you can treat your floors the same way we treat our windshields... scrub them and then just squeegie that water right off. No more need for endless squeezing of the mop.

Now I know that the revolution is not going to be easy. We all know that "Big Mop" has billions of dollars of profits at their disposal to perpetrate their smear campaign against the truth, but you can't keep the truth hidden! They have you caught in the lie that you need both a mop and the thing that squeezes the mop. SQUEEGIES OF THE WORLD UNITE!

New House

2007-07-23T06:30:00.001-07:00

So I'm finally moving off on my own. I spent today shopping for all those wonderful things you need in a new house like, well, you know... stuff. Pots, pans, stove, blah blah blah...

... I hate shopping. However, shopping here means that I'm finally getting my own space which I am REALLY excited about. The other thing it means though is lots of bartering... the horror. It's ok. I've got most of what I need for my kitchen except for the fridge. I'm lucky enough to have electricity so I can get one of those. I don't have running water, but the source of water is only like 20 meters away from my house.

I would upload pictures but I don't have any yet because my batteries have died and I keep forgetting to get new ones. Lame excuse I know, but true none the less. Getting anything here takes so much time and I sometimes forget what I came into town for.

So here's a little description of the house. I've got three rooms which means it's huge. I have a little turkish toilet hidden under the stairs to the roof. I have my own roof which is awesome. I have a kitchen and a little room for bathing. It's right on the main road and I'm not that far from my souq (market) town.

Because I have three rooms this means that you should all come and visit me because I have room to house you. Seriously... come visit me

Change of address

2007-07-23T06:21:00.000-07:00

Ok, so now that I'm moving I have a new souq town and am going to have to get a new Post Office Box. So for those of you who know my address, put a hold on whatever wonderful surprises you were about to send my way and wait until I've gotten the new PO Box. I can still receive at the other one, I just won't be in that town often anymore. I'll get the new address out as soon I get it.

Thanks for all those who have sent letters and books. I miss you guys.

Stupid Sheep

2007-07-23T05:51:00.000-07:00

So let me ask you a question, and then I'm going to answer it for you since of course this isn't really a conversation. Would you say sheep are hopelessly stupid or insanely intelligent?

Your answer of course is that they are one of the dumbest creatures on the face of the planet. In fact they are practically a synonym for stupid.

Why would you say they are dumb?

Because they follow each other around and would follow each other off of a cliff it that's where they were led. I've seen them repeatedly walk into a fence to try to get to the other side when the door is 3 feet away. Not the brightest animal in God's creation.

Now I live with a bunch of farmers and shepherds here in Morroco and I've had the same conversation and answered much the same way that you did... that sheep were dumb... and you would have thought that I had just spit on their mother. They insisted that sheep were incredibly intelligent and when I asked why enough times for them to give me an actual explanation they gave me the same exact reasons you gave for them being dumb. They follow the leader and don't deviate from the group. All you have to do is lead one and the rest follow.

The sheep here are the same sheep in the rest of the world, the only difference is what the people deem praiseworthy. I'm going to let you draw your own conclusions about what that says about our cultural differences.

All Wet

2007-07-17T04:49:00.000-07:00

I went camping last weekend with a bunch of environment volunteers. It was quite an amazing weekend actually. we had two guitar players, a mandolin player and some great singers all around a campfire. So pretty much paradise for me.

Before leaving for this weekend of camping however I took a look at what I was bringing and saw my rain jacket but thought to myself... it hasn't rained here in months, why on earth would I bring that?

Several hours later there were nine of us huddled in a tent built for 3 shivering, and trying to eat the food we had that had been soaked through with the rain. It was actually quite a spectacular storm. The wind almost blew our tents away and the lightning and thunder lasted all night.

The moral of the story is that it only rains in Morroco when you plan on sleeping outside.

Building a Well

2007-07-07T05:14:00.000-07:00

The landscape...

My friend going down to dig...

Stayin out of the sun...

Work site...

Water Systems

2007-07-01T04:24:00.000-07:00

There are some of you who have a reference for the pictures I'm about to show you. For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, contact the right people and you'll figure it out.

This is the source of water provided for a town by the local mine. The water here is pumped from 800m below ground where the water table is.

It is then pumped up the hill about a half a kilometer or more to this Chateau where it probably should be treated. From here it goes in two directions. Some of the water is pumped in the direction of a far away village, and the rest is pumped back underground where it flows down the other side of the hill.

And this is the well where it comes out and where more than 200 people get their drinking water.

Project Framework

2007-06-26T06:04:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I think that some of you are starting to think that this is all "Pizza and Pepsi" over here as an old teacher of mine, Mr. Lines, used to say. First of all, there isn't any pizza and we all know the Cocacola company rules the world. So in order to counteract that growing opinion and to give you an idea of what I'm supposed to be doing here, I thought I would let you in on our project framework.

Goal 1:

Community members (men, women, and children) will actively pareticipate in activities that promote personal and environmental health and reinforce appropriate health behaviors.

This is the health lesson portion where we are focusing on everything from health care issues such as the extremely successful Moroccan vaccination program, AIDS/HIV awareness and reproductive health (by far the most incindiary of our tasks, nutrition, and general personal hygiene and preventative health. The other big chunk of this program is dedicated to water purification and solid waste disposal. This one is particularly huge in my area since there is no applicable infastructure.

Goal 2:

Targeted professional and non-professional health workers will have enhanced capacity to deliver effective preventive health education throughout rural communities.

Here we're trying to focus on training basically anyone involved in the birthing process outside of a health care facility whether it is a medically trained midwife or Traditional Birth Attendants (TBA).

Goal 3:

Community-based organizations and institutions will have increased capacity to reinforce healthy lifestyles through environmental and social change.

In my humble opinion this is where everything is going to happen. The first two goals are great but I as an outsider learning the language is not the person best suited to try and change longstanding practices. I believe most of my work is going to be helping get associations formed or assisting current associations in their work. Advising them on better data collection techniques and connecting them across regional boundaries. I've spent the last couple of days meeting with the various leaders of several associations in my area trying to get a sense of what they are doing. I would love to talk specifics, but I don't believe I'm allowed to.

So right now I'm laying the groundwork for the more project oriented existence that is sure to come later on in my service. At the moment though, it is all meeting people and talking as well as trying to learn the language.

Time for a Story

2007-06-20T05:32:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I thought it was time for a funny story, but first I need to introduce you all to my life. Wherever I go I usually meet someone I know or who knows someone I know, etc. So I took my first weekend off and met some friends in Beni Millal. There really isn't anything extremely interesting there, but it was just a central point where we could meet up. It was a much needed break. So we are wandering around the city and meet this Moroccan who lives in the States and is back visiting. Now when you meet someone who shares some sort of connection the only course of action available is to invite them to a party, which he did. It was a blast. He had hired Moroccan musicians and dancers, we ate and had a grand old time. Later in the evening we are outside at his ranch getting some fresh air and I'm talking with his brother and he is telling me about his travels and mentions in passing that "when he was in Romania...", well of course my ears shot up and I probed further. He went to university in Constanta and spoke Romanian, so we ended up having this extremely excited conversation in Romanian for about an hour, neither one believing that the other had also lived in the country. We'd also been there about the same time span from '94 - '00... and apparently there is a whole community of Moroccans in Beni Millal who studied in Romania. CRAZY!!

Now onto the funny story. I will warn you in advance though, if your are especially worried about my safety don't read on it will only make you more nervous. :)

So I got chased by a pack of wolves. For those of you who don't know, there are roaming packs of wolves in the hills around my valley who come out at night. Needless to say, no one goes out at night. Well this particular night I had too because I don't have cell phone reception in my house, I have to go up on a hill near my house. One of my friends in Morocco was having a bit of a rough time so I wanted to talk with her, so I left my house with my flashlight and climbed my little hill. After about ten minutes of talking though I heard this growl from behind me and immediately knew that whatever I was going to find when I turned around, it wasn't going to be good. Sure enough a pack of about six wolves had just crested the hill and was eyeing me hungrily.

So I calmly excused myself on the phone, hung up and in a completly composed manner took of running for my life down the hill tripping over rocks I couldn't see as I went. The rabid dogs on my farm started barking at them though which gave me enough of a diversion to make it back with all limbs in tact. Well they were really barking at all of us because they're rabid... what else are they going to do?

So there's my funny little story. I'm alive, I'm safe and learned an important lesson... well, no I didn't, I'll probably go up to the hill again at night when I want to talk on the phone. What can I say? I need people. :) I'll take a stick or something next time, although with all the Chuck Norris videos they watch here... I could probably just roundhouse kick the wolves and I'd be ok.

By the way everyone here knows that Arnold Schwarzenager or however you spell his name... the star of countless crappy action movies as well as classics such as Kidergarten Cop and Twins... is the governor of an American state. That's right... be embarassed. When they ask me how that happened, I just shake my head and with a look of resignation on my face say we don't understand it either.

Daily Substance III

2007-06-15T07:09:00.001-07:00

Ok, so this is an artist some of my fellow PCVs introduced me to. This particular song makes me think of home... whatever that means. It's strange, it makes me miss someplace I don't even know. I don't know... it just makes me feel like there is a home out there that no matter how far I wander, I can always come back to. I think it has little to do with the actualy lyrics and more with the feel of the song, but there you have it.

Daily Substance II

2007-06-15T07:02:00.001-07:00

Ok, so Colm Wilkerson is the standard when it comes to Jean Valjean, but this was just spectacular. I could listen to him sing all day.

Daly Substance

2007-06-15T06:59:00.001-07:00

So I wanted to share some of the things that have been getting me through rough times. www.youtube.com is absolutely spectacular. If you want to hear music, you just type in what you want and invariably someone has uploaded a video of it so here are some of the videos that I have listened to over and over again when I come to my internet town and need some encouragement...

I'll Tell You What I was Thinking

2007-06-15T06:20:00.000-07:00

I was thinking that there was more to life than what I was living. I was thinking that I had fallen into a bit of a rut that was making me forget that we don't live in a perfect world and that there are things that I can do. I was thinking that I knew well in advance that I was going to have a rough time and I decided as well well in advance that I was going to meet that head on... ADAPT AND OVERCOME!

So now that we know what I was thinking let's look at the problems presenting themselves at the moment and of course I'm fielding suggestions on overcoming them. Now I may have no earthly idea what I'm doing right now, but let's be honest... when you all started out on whatever you started out on, you didn't either and if you say you did... well, you're lying and we all know that's a bad thing right? To quote Pope Julius III "Do you not know, my son, with what little understanding the world is ruled?" Scary and encouraging at the same time. :)

Problem 1...

... I'm in a farming community that is very dispersed. There are groups of houses that are scattered all over the hills. It takes me about a 30 to 45 min walk to get to the next grouping of houses. There is no central place in town except for the school and only some of the children go there. My job is community health education and it's hard to do that when you have to go door to door... especially when you don't exactly have a "door to door" personality. This I think is going to be my biggest challenge over the next two years to doing meaningful work here. Unlike a lot of other volunteers, I don't have any associations to work with, whatever I do, I'm going to have to figure it out.

Problem 2...

... Finding housing. Inshallah this will only be a problem for another month. It's all farms so it's not like I can just rent an apartment. I'm going to have to either keep living with my host family which presents obvious difficulties or rent a part of someone's house. The other option available is to move in to the house they built for the teacher by the school. That has two other problems though... well three. The first two are minor compared to the third. One is that the house is trashed. There are no windows, the door is broken and there are holes in the walls, not to mention there is trash everywhere. I could clean it up though... if one of my friends here can build a house, I can clean one up. Two is that I would have to get permission from the Ministry of Education. That's just paperwork and all that fun stuff though... doable. The biggest problem with that I forsee is that it is on the school property which means I would be dealing with kids ALL THE TIME! I don't know if I can handle that on a day to day basis.

Problem 3...

... Language. That's going to come. I'm figuring that one out as we go.

Now let's talk about the Awesome parts of my valley... I'm going to go ahead and say that the night sky is themost spectacular thing I've seen in my life. No one has electricity so there are no lights anywhere at night except the onces shining down from lightyears away. I went out last night with my guitar after having a particularly rough day and sang for hours until of course a pack of wolves started howling at me from the field across the way and I didn't wait around to see if my music would tame them.

I had my first health talk yesterday in the Berber language and of all the major health problems affecting this area... typhoid, malaria, and so on... I spent a half hour explaining to my host brother that what was on his face was not chicken pox, but acne and that he needed to start washing his face/hair, blah blah blah. Comical right? The funny part was trying to explain the hormones of a teenage kid in a language that calls the entire arm, wrist, hand, etc. by one word, "afus".

Officially a PCV... what was i thinking?

2007-06-06T05:33:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I can't write all that long today because the way transportation works, if I miss it, then I'm stuck and let's be honest... getting stuck is never fun for anyone involved.

So I've been at my site now for... well, a while... and this is going to be a lot harder than I thought it was going to be. The language score, well, it was decieving. My valley speaks a whole new language and don't really understand what they're saying when they do isolate words. It's a farming community so meeting people isn't a guarantee which means I have to get out and make a concernted effort to be visible and by conerted effort I mean at least a 2 k hike to the next house. I can see most of them, but they are up on hills, across fields and such. Oh, and did I mention that I'm in Africa and it's hot? It's hot. Not "I'm in the desert dying of thirst" hot, but still "hard to sleep at night because I'm sweating" hot.

Now don't get me wrong, thoughts of quitting have crossed my mind as they have almost all of our minds. Don't read despair into that last paragraph though, it's more of a dark amusment at my "plight". I had a great conversation with another new volunteer last night and we both, althogh struggling, left the conversation smiling because let's face it. We're in Morroco working. We could be going to class or even worse working 9-5 in an office so let's keep things in perspective people.

I'll be back sometime. I never know when I'm hitting an internet town, but since i don't have electricity and have to come in to charge my phone every couple of days, I'll definitely be back because I think I would go crazy if I didn't have any communication.

I hope this entry finds all of you well.

Oh, and I really need a shower, it's been a week... yes, i know I smell. Deal with it!

Swear-In

2007-05-22T08:09:00.000-07:00

I am officaly now a Peace Corps Volunteer. Sixty of us swore in yesterday in Fez and then scattered to the wind early the next morning. I am currently in my Region Capitol with my region mate Mara preparing for a meeting we have with the Regional Ministry of Health Delegue tomorrow morning.

Goodbyes were somewhat emotional as all of us came to the realization this morning that we are no longer in the "summer camp" that is our Pre Service Training. We now have to go out and make this work. I don't have a schedule anymore, from here on out I do the work I find to do... a daunting task.

I want to share a little it about the swearing in ceremony with you. So I found out several days ago that I scored the highest of all of our language groups on our language test and so I was bestowed the honor/stress of giving a speech in my language (Tamazight)at the swear-in ceremony. Needless to say I was excited about scoring so high, but the downside was that the last couple of days were spent preparing a speech in a language that I had only started learning two months ago instead of cherishing those last few days with newly made friends before we were separated for God knows how long. I was so nervous the day of swear-in leading all the way up to the speech and even after. It went really well though. I had a couple of people come up to me and complement me on my language ability, which was encouraging.

After the ceremony, the stress didn't end. Moroccan television wanted to interview me both in French and in Tamazight. I did the interview in French, but I wasn't about to go on television speaking Tamazight, so I passed that one off to my roommate Alex. We were both on TV that night which is always a little morale boost.

Here are some pictures of swear in...

I think I was talking about my reasons for coming to Peace Corps at this point in the speech... "If my brother is sick, I too am sick..."

This was me telling a funny story from my host family. I had quite a few goofy faces during this speech, but cross cultural communication is always a little goofy.

This is me giving a TV interview in French.

This is me and Ann right before the festivities began. Ann was tied for the person to give the speech in Tashelheit, but passed it off to one of our friends named Aaron.

This is me and Anna Wadsworth after the Swear-In ceremony being good little representatives of the United States. ;)

This is Sean, Mara, Ann, Lacy, and myself after Swear-In. This is a quality group of people if I do say so myself.

And this is me with my LCF Fatoume who was an amazing language teacher

Cascades D'Ouzoude

2007-05-16T08:12:00.000-07:00

So this is our last day in our training city before we head out for swear-in and we took a day trip to some amazing falls down the road... here are some pictures.

This is me, my roommate Alex, and Sean.

This is the falls.

Coming Fast

2007-05-15T06:35:00.000-07:00

We leave day after tomorrow.

We're heading out to meet up with the Environment Volunteer Training Group further north (and not too far from my site) and then we swear in on the 21st after that...

So I took my final/official language test today. I don't have the results yet, but I feel pretty confident. I wasn't all that worried because I know I'm above passing. There is a little bit of that competative thing in there though that I would like to do better than everyone else, but that's merely fleeting. Mostly I'm still just having this random isolated freak outs about the intensity of my job for the next two years and not so much worrying about the lack of amenities, but more so whether or not I have the force of personality and self-initiation to do the work well.

Ok so let me describe a little bit of the last couple of weeks. We just got back the other day from our final CBT session. It was emotional, as all of our host families were crying and most of the volunteers were as well. It wasn't emotional for my family though. I think I was the only one who didn't cry, and I think that is because I was already mentally at my next site and was ready to move on. It was kind of weird though that I wasn't as affected as everyone else. Moments like that make me wonder whether constantly leaving places for other places has built up a resistance to settling. I don't know... thoughts for another day.

We've been in the hotel now for a couple of days getting ready for the test and finishing up all of the last minute packing and stuff that we have left to do. The atmosphere is a little tense simply because all of us are stressed out and really want to vent in some way, but there is no way to get alone and there is no outlet for utter craziness that we would have in the States. The lamentable result of all of this is that some people have been taking that stress out on others. It's a natural human response and we should all be at the point where we would understand that and react accordingly, but we are all human. None of this is extreme, we just are all ready to begin the work we've been prepping for mentally, for some of us, up to 2 years.

The blog so far has been scattered thoughts put through the filter of a frustratingly sanitized training environment. I have the distinct feeling that when the isolation comes (ever so quickly) that these observations will become much more profound, potentially borne out of desperation. I don't know if I'm really communicating what I want to say, but I feel like I'm seeing things and feeling things with a certain immaturity that is going to be violently stripped away... potentially to quick for my comfort, but I guess it never is comfortable.

Several of the trainiees that I'm with and I have all remarked that the volunteers we meet that have been in country for a while all look so much older, but it's more than that. They look as if they've aged in ways that I don't understand. I haven't quite yet identified what I think that is so i don't really know how to explain it. It is strange to think that whatever it was that brought them to where they are will soon be a part of my experience as well. That's all future stuff though, it's just coming really fast.

Just so I'm not confusing you all... I think I need to end this by saying that I love being here. This has already been pushing me in ways that I need to be pushed. I've met some amazing people, I'm having some amazing experiences, and I'm growing... oh and I get to do all of that in Morocco, so honestly... what's better?

Out Again

2007-05-08T06:48:00.000-07:00

So I just wanted to let you know that tomorrow morning I'm going out of touch again for a couple of days. We have our last Community Based Training session. Today is a busy day, but I needed to come type something out for a presentation here at the Internet Cafe so I thought I would drop you all a line and say that things are going well and let you know I'll be away from communication again.

I feel like there is a lot to say, but my mind seems so full I don't really know where to start. I need to go finish working on my presentation, I just wanted to say that for some reason today a lot of you are on my mind and I don't really know how to express that... hence babbling blog entry.

Inshallah I'll talk to you in a couple of days.

I Don't Have Words

2007-05-06T04:28:00.000-07:00

So I just spent a week out isolated from the world with the knowledge that this will be my home for two years. There are so many thoughts to process and so many emotions to try and understand I don't think I will full understand the significance of this week for quite some time. I'm lucky to have some good friends here with whom I can sit down and vent/process out loud.

This is Mara my region mate. I was really excited when I found out she was going to be near me. Ihave someone near me with whom I click well and we'll keep each other sane and working when this gets really rough.

This was a much needed impromptu dance party just to relieve all of the built up stress and nervousness about our sites.

And this was the inevitable pillow fight that ensued.

I'll try and tell you what I know...

Challenge #1... A WHOLE NEW LANGUAGE!!! I thought I was doing so well and then when I got there realized that simple words like the numbers "1, 2, and 3" were not the same, "good" is not the same, neither are "yes" and "no". "G" changes to "J", "M" changes to "SH", and most of the "K"s change to "SH" as well. Not to mention I'm in a farming community where no one really annunciates. It was so deflating to go there relatively confident in my language ability and to just be shot down by a nine year old telling me I really didn't speak any of his language. It was really tempting to retort "well how many languages do you speak!?" but of course that would have fallen on deaf ears because I can't say that to him yet in a language he understands.

Ok, so now I have that out of the way, my sight is GORGEOUS! I'm in a farming town in the valley surrounded on all sides by mountains. My work site is a two hour hike away across some mountains which is beautiful and would be perfect save the hundreds of evil dogs who want to bite your head off. For some stupid reason I didn't take pictures of that hike mostly because I'm an idiot, but what are you going to do... I was enjoying the moment.

My host family is really nice although it is kind of frustrating that the only time I see the women is when they bring me food. I told my host mom though that when I came back she was going to teach me to cook. Hopefully that will break the awkwardness. Although I think we might have awkwardness for a while... she walked in on me changing the other day and got a full frontal. She knocked but of course the words for "wait", "one" and "minute" are all different so she just came on in. I didn't see her the rest of the day... I love awkwardness.

I don't have any pictures of people because I didn't want to flash my camera, or any electronics for that matter. There is no running water or electricity in my site. Some of the homes have solar panels, but it is not, for example, enough power to charge my cell phone. It's alright, I don't really have reception in the valley anyway except for in pockets. This is a poor farming community and I don't want to be the guy that comes in with all the fancy stuff and, I don't even know. I have some good landscape shots for you though.

I set up a PO Box so you can start actually sending me things:

BP 9
Mrirt 54450
MAROC

Yeah, that's it. Amazing how simple that was. I made good friends with the guy at the post office and hopefully that will mean that my packages will actually reach me intact but you never know. Oh and if you are ever thinking of something to send me and don't know... BOOKS BOOKS BOOKS!! I've read so much already and am going to be going a whole lot more over the next couple of years.

So I'm scared. The reality of this as a job really hit me and a couple of other people really hard yesterday. All of us are trying to process the small glimpse we got of our life for the next to years, all of us are doing that unsuccessfully as everything will change once we're in it, but all the facades of self-assuredness have started to break down and you are really beginning to see the hint of fear that all of us have had all along. You start to question yourself... do I have to strength of personality to do this? Is this really what I want my life to be for two years? Am I going to psyche myself into not doing any work? and the questions just go on. Interestingly enough none of them has to do with missing home and not wanting to be here. I love my site, I love Morocco, I love living and working abroad... I'm just nervous about the work I'm supposed to be doing. It'll be alright though. Last night was a time for freaking out, and today is for putting that behind and trying to figure out the way forward.

FINAL SITE!!

2007-04-28T10:01:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I am on a major high right now. Last night we had our language test and found out where we are going to be for the next two years. Let me warn you in advance however... this entry will be frustrating for you because I'm actually not allowed to post on here the geographical location of my site. For that you will have to contact my parents. They are informed. Just know you won't be able to find it on a map...

... so let's start with the language. AWESOME!! I was really worried about it, not so much about passing because I knew that that was going to happen. I really want to do well in this language and maybe break some of the mediocre tendencies I've displayed in the past. It was a smashing success. I don't know exactly where I'm at on their scoring because it was just a mid term evaluation and not the actual test, but I'm definitely in the Intermediate level and all you need is Novice High. (the levels are Novice Low, Mid, High, Intermediate Low, Mid, High, Advanced Low, Mid, High, and Superior)That from only about 2 or 3 combined weeks of language training. It's amazing how quickly you can learn a language.

Now on to the site... all I can tell you is that I am extremely excited. I have a new site and in an area where there were no previous volunteers which means I'll be starting from scratch. It's in the mountains and cold apparently which I'm excited about as well. I don't have running water, but I do have electricity. The thing I think is awesome though is that my house is about 10 km from the hospital I'll be working at which means either hiking or biking when I go. My site covers a very large area and the nearest post office/internet connection/bank is about a 45 minute or an hour drive away. I think the nearest volunteer from my group is about 2 or 3 hours away, but I really won't know that till i've traveled the road. (distances really mean nothing as 17kms could take you 20 min in some places or an hour in others)

I leave tomorrow on my own for a week of exploring and getting the lay of the land and then it's back to our training site for, well, I really don't know what. This is really starting to get real. Up until now it has still only been imagination. I'm so excited.

The bad part about all of this for you is that I really should have just taken the time to write funny stories 2 days ago because now it all seems distant past as the whole landscape is about to change...

... oh, and I'll get an address in a week so be looking for that as well.

Freaking Out

2007-04-25T06:19:00.000-07:00

Ok, so we're back from our long CBT phase which in the end wasn't really all that long. I have some great stories I'll try and post tomorrow or the day after. For the moment, however we are all focused on two things... our language proficiency test, otherwise known as the LPI, and finding out what our final sites are going to be.

All of that happens on Friday and so I need to get off of the internet and get to language studying among ten million other little errands that pop up where you least expect them. The crazy thing is that by the end of next week, I'll know and have visited the place where I will spend the next two years of my life working and struggling. It's an intimidating thought and it doesn't help that our trainers know where we're going but just enjoy torturing us by not telling us.

I also wanted to include a quick picture of me with my host family... so there you go...

Hopefully I'll get some time to write some of the utterly hilarious stories from this last CBT phase.

There and Back Again

2007-04-15T08:58:00.000-07:00

So we've been in our group training town for 2 days now and we're headed back to our Community Based Training tomorrow morning for our 10 day long stint. I'll be out of touch for a good long while. As the training progresses it is getting more and more difficult to find time to make it to an Internet cafe. Life has kind of sped up just a bit. Language has started to really click although I am in serious need of a larger vocabulary.

In general things have started to settle down mentally. I've hit a groove, which for me usually brings on frustration, but here it has brought the opposite... I'm a bit comfortable. I'm where I'm supposed to be and I can feel that very intensely.

So that's just a general "how I'm doing"... let me now share some rather funny little stories...

My host family is pretty cool. My host Dad doesn't really speak or do anything for that matter. My host Mom is the only one I communicate with and it can be a little frustrating at times because the whole cross cultural communication just doesn't happen sometimes. She only understands when I use the correct conjugation and really doesn't pick up on hand signals making communication surprisingly difficult. I prided myself on getting a message across when I didn't speak the language, but this has been rather humbling. So for this last CBT phase it was short and so I only broug one pair of pants which broke my own rule for myself about always bringing a backup of whatever I'm bringing with me. As we say "s Tamazight... mushkil bizzef!" (big problem). I forgot the key to my room at our school house so I had to leave in the rain in the night to go get it. Now you have to understand that the "town" we live in is like 7 houses on the side of a mountain. There are no lights, stores, roads or really any sign that there is a town there at all. This meant that I had to navigate a thin and muddy trail in pitch black on hilly terrain to go get my key in the tattered and worn flipflops that my mom begged me not to bring ;). I would have brought my flashlight but it was locked in my room. I made it there alright and was doing ok getting back. My hands were muddy from catching myself a couple of times. As I reached the house I thought I was home free and then true to form I slipped and fell in the last possible place I could have fallen in the mud. Well as I said before... I only brought one pair of pants. Not a positive situation. My host Dad let me use his Jelaba which is a long hooded robe you wear over your clothes, so I wore it with no pants. Awkward

The other story was the day before. I was talking on the phone out on the roof of my house. I had told my host family that I was going upstairs to study. They must have forgot because they saw the door to the roof was open and they shut it. The door locks from the inside and the only way to open it from the outside is with a key. I yelled for a while but the didn't hear me. Finally I called her on her cell phone... yes no running water, sparce electricity and a cell phone... but as I told you before the cross cultural communication just wasn't happening in person and it most assuredly wasn't going to happen over the phone. All she understood me saying was "door". I had to climb down the side of the house. They saw me doing that and freaked out until they figured out what had happend. Needless to say my family laughs at me a lot.

We have the next ten days there isolated from communication and I'm sure there will be more stories and finally some pictures of my host family.

Community Based Training (CBT)

2007-04-05T06:32:00.000-07:00

So in spite of yet another taxi strike we have returned to our training site here in the city. I am showered so you can all be assured that I don't smell like a (insert your despised smell here)like I did this time yesterday.

So we (a group of five of us) spent the last week living with host families and doing language training in the village. I must say we got the most beautiful site possible. The village was just a collection of houses on the side of a mountain overlooking a lake.

There was nothing in the town so any shopping or health care was done in another village 2 or 3 kms away. I was actually quite thankful for the isolation. We would get up in the mornings and have a language class with our teacher for the morning, have lunch and then do cross cultural stuff for the afternoon. After school was over we would individually return to our host families and spend the rest of the evening trying to communicate very simple sentances that most often were not understood.

My host family consisted of an elderly mother and father. The father was immobilised due to some sort or heart condition so he watched TV all day. I had two host brothers who were 34 and 39 respectively. One was a cab driver and the other, well, I don't know what he did. There was also a grandchild that was there who was around 10. He doesn't normally live there, but was the Prophet's birthday this weekend so he was spending it with his grandparents. Incidently he was the only one that was in the mindset that he would have to use simple sentances to communicate with me. Everyone else would just talk and assume that if they repeated it enough that I would understand... not unlike we tend to do in the States with people who don't speak English.

The weather was great, my group handled each other pretty well and the food was excellent and bountiful. I think I'm gaining weight with all the bread they eat here, and you all know I have a hard time refusing food. ;)

So let me explain my house a little bit. It is a surprisingly large house with a beautiful terrace that overlooks the lake. I had my own room that I could lock with a key when I left which was quite the blessing. I also, surprisingly had a western toilet, a bedet (I don't know how to spell that), a sink, a shower and a washing machine... and wait for it...

... no running water in the house. So obviously none of them worked, although the host brother still used the toilet so there was a constant sludge in there because it wouldn't flush. I used the regular "turkish" toilet.

Now a note on that. I don't think there was a trash can in the entire house because I don't think we ever used anything that we would throw away. That includes toilet paper... think about it a second. We didn't use utensils when we ate and so I have been using my hands for EVERYTHING. Interstingly enough, if you have soap I think the whole process is cleaner anyway. I mention the trash thing mostly because we throw so much away in the US... wrappers, containers, napkins, food, etc. They're excess food, if they had any went to the animals (I lived on a farm), and I don't think they really had wrappers for anything. They killed their meat and didn't use napkins and obviously we don't have to worry about fast food wrappers.

Now I said the house was large. It was, but there was relatively no furniture inside. There was an echo throughout the house and individually in all the rooms. I had a bed in my room and a little night stand and that was it. It was simple and in a strange way beautiful, although I think I could have lived in a whole in the ground with that view.

On Beauty

2007-03-24T13:32:00.000-07:00

This was the sense of the scenery on our training site's side of the Atlas mountains. It was green, fertile, and stunning.

On Transportation

2007-03-24T13:18:00.000-07:00

I'm going to try and describe for you what transportation is like momentarily. For those of you reading who were my aunts and uncles in CEE/IMB/and whatever other acronym you want to throw out there, it's like Romania. The little Renaults here look like Dacias and I think Renault actually bought out Dacia because I've seen that name on cars here. Two lanes become six, using the horn is not an option and all the cars seem to start simply based on the will power of the particular driver. I have to be honest, I feel like I'm at home.

So we have several options available to us in this part of the country. Trains don't run down here so drop that. We have Petite and Grande Taxis. The Petite are for within the city, and Grande Taxis go to other cities. Now all of the Grande Taxis are old Mercedes with five seats... HA! So you get to the taxi stand and say you want to go to Ouarzazate from Marakesh. You tell the guy at the stand and you buy a seat, then you wait. You wait for the taxi to fill up. You could buy out the taxi if you have the money, but I'm a Peace Corps volunteer so lets rule that option out as well.

You wait for how many people you say? I'm glad you asked. Besides the driver, there are considered to be six seats available. Needless to say... we're cramped. It is, however an inexpensive way to get around although you never know how long it's going to take because you don't know how long you have to wait.

For places of the beaten path... we have Transites which are vans that don't have a limit on people. If you can fit someone on top or inside... they're getting in. An excellent way to make friends by the way. If you have to sit on someone's lap for an hour or more, you get acquainted.

We also have CTM which are private buses. I don't have any info on them because I haven't taken them yet. When I do, I'll let you know.

That's all I've got to say about that

On Boys Being Boys and Girls Being Girls

2007-03-24T12:37:00.000-07:00

I wasn't sure whether or not I was going to share this story, but decided to go ahead since the names and dates will be changed to protect this innocent.

So all of us trainees had some interesting homestay experiences. When my volunteer dropped me off at my host family to fend for myself there really was no apprehension on my part. I've been in the situation many times throughout my life where all you can do is say "Hello, how are you?" and then just nod and smile for a couple of hours. Maybe if you are motivated enough you can point and ask what things are, but that never gets a response of just one word, rather a sentance which is of no help you. No big deal right? Plus they had a kid and a TV that was on all the time so there were distractions from the stupid American in the room.

Dinner went well. It was meager, which was to be expected, and the women and children didn't eat with the host father and I, which I also expected. I just made sure to leave food for the rest of the family who would eat later. So we sat and tried to communicate but gave up after a while.

Many of you reading this blog have ideas of what it means to live within a Muslim society. Without sounding too much like a prick, I'm going to go ahead and lay it out there that most of those ideas are probably wrong. I'm not an expert, so the observations I make over the next two years are from my short time in Islamic Studies and my even shorter time living in Morocco. Among those ideas you have, I think most of you have an sense that there are very defined gender roles in Islam and that things such as sex before marriage are off the table. (Interestingly enough it makes our job as a health educator very difficult on the AIDS front) Now we "technically" have the same stigma amongst our Christian communities in the States, but we all know how that works out in reality.

Ok, now that I've laid that groundwork I'm going to tell two stories. The first is not mine, but one of our other female trainee's. The second is mine and is a story of one of the most awkward nights of my life.

So this female volunteer was talking with the women in her host family and after much hand waving and cross-cultraly communication attempts... ie more hand waving... she understood these women as trying to tell her just how big of a clearing you need to make in a field so you and your paramour can duck down and do what young boys and girls do. I got a kick out of that personally.

Now on to the most awkward night of my life. So after we ate and my host mom, the grandma and the little kid had gone to bed the host dad came back into the room I was supposed to sleep in, which also contained the TV. He proceeded to ask me if I wanted to watch a movie and being that it was still relatively early and you don't refuse things when you are a guest I said yes. Well, I shrugged my shoulders which apparently communicated yes. He then went to get a DVD out from a hole in the wall where it was hiding, put it on, and lo and behold I found myself watching a British porn (subtitled in French mind you... think about that a second and see if you can keep from laughing) with a 65 year old man who was mostly blind. Now since he was blind, he sat about 2 feet from the TV with his mouth wide open. Like I said awkward... but you have to admit simultaneously HILARIOUS!! So we sat there, me trying to write in my journal or draw (I've started drawing my experiences by the way... that's a new thing for me) while he watches his movie. Now when I say movie, I mean just that... it was AN HOUR AND A HALF LONG! When he decided he was done watching, he got up, hid the DVD again and told me not to tell his wife.

So yeah, awkward situation and amazingly funny situation. Now the moral of both of these stories, if you want to call it that... I do... is this...

... Whatever kind of society we live in with whatever kind of rules or restrictions, boys will still be boys and girls will still be girls.

DISCLAIMER: If you've never stolen away with your significant other in your life for some romantic tryst or have never had the more "carnal" (not a fan of that word) aspects of Co-Ed relationships on your mind, then I apologize... you are a rock. For the rest of us, it is somewhat of a comfort that through the cultural/ethnic/religious facade, we're still just people.

The Field Trip

2007-03-24T12:14:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I'm finally back... well, finally... I got back early because we were trying to travel around a taxi strike that never ended up happening. You gotta love it. Let me first say that I was completely humbled, embarassed and encouraged this week due to the varying encounters I had. This will be a quick overview of the experience and I'll make some observations in the above posts.

So we left as a group early on Sunday for the other side of the Atlas mountains. It really wasn't all that far but because there was no direct road we had to go around them. We spent the night in a town in the central part of Morocco (for safety's sake I'm leaving out names, but if you want to know them... get in touch with my parents) where we met up with our host volunteers. My training partner was Katie Rosenbaum and our volunteer was April or قاوتار as the people in her village call her.

Right of the bat I was impressed because it was quite obvious that my volunteer dove much deeper into the culture than the others present, for better or for worse. For those of you that know me, you know that would be something I would get excited about.

The three of us broke of from the rest of the group to start getting to know each other and start talking about our week. We left the next day for the town where she does her shopping to get groceries for the week and then it was on to her site another 100 or so kilometers away in the Draa Valley. The landscape changed drastically from our training town to there. We went from a stunningly green, mountainous landscape to Mars as the training staff put it. The ground was dry and very rocky and it was hot and windy. Mind you it is spring so "hot" is not HOT. It gets up in the 130s during the summer and no one wants to do anything and who can blame them.

Our volunteer had decided instead of renting a place in the village, that she would build her own house. It was a spectacular mud house added on to her host family's house including her own courtyard, sitting room, bedroom, kitchen and bathroom. Needless to say I was rather impressed.

While we were there we visited the local health center and observed a day of vaccinations, negotiated the market, toured the town's water facilities and just tried to glean as much information as we possibly could from our volunteer.

We also spent a night with a host family. It should have been two, but there was supposed to be a strike so we had to leave early. That was a wonderfully awkward evening filled with hand gestures and a lot of surrendering to "I have no idea what you are trying to tell me"'s. The kid, ابدال علي was a whole lot of fun, but he was loosing his teeth due to some major cavities at the age of four... one of the many reasons we're here as health educators.

The next day we left to make our way back to our training town which was a two day journey through Marakesh. We arrived safe and sound with no nastiness along the way. I was among a group of all girls that made it into Marakesh, it was an intersting group.

There's the quick version...

I Got Married!!!

2007-03-16T07:16:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I didn't really elope and am now in a relationship for the rest of my life or anything. We were on our way to the دار الشباب (the youth center) on Wednesday to challenge the kids to a soccer game and low and behold there was a cub scout (co-ed) meeting going on. They invited us in and we had a blast playing games with them. One of the games involved a leader "randomly" choosing a girl and a boy and then the girl would get to choose if she wanted to marry the boy or not. My girl kind of facilitated our particular meeting and gave a rather enthusiastic yes when the question was asked. I don't know her name, but she seemed like she was the rebel in the group. What can I say... I guess I'm the "bad boy" with my ponytail and all.

On a completely different note...

...This Sunday we are all leaving to spend a week shadowing a volunteer. Katie Rosenbaum and I are being placed with a volunteer in the Zagora region in the desert. To quote رلشيد (Rachid), our guy in charge of training, it will be just us and Allah. I don't think there's running water or electricity and I'm excited. We've been really pampered over the past week and a half (has it only been that long?) and I'm ready to start roughing it. This will probably be the last entry for about nine or ten days, but expect pictures when I get back.

OH!!! and I almost forgot. We started language training in the Berber dialect today. I got put in the Tamazight group and it looks like my particular class is a motivated one so I'm excited about that. Pretty soon I'll be leaving little messages for all of you in Tamazight.

Peace,

صامويل كنتر

Finally Some Pictures

2007-03-13T06:38:00.000-07:00

So the process of uploading is quite a lengthy one so don't expect pictures often. The ones I'm posting here are from the drive to the site where we are at now and the view from the roof of the hotel where we are doing training. For security purposes I can't tell you where we're at, but I'm sure if you are resourceful... (cough, cough... ask my parents) you'll be able to find out.

This is a lake on the ride to our training site.

This is the most spectacular view from the roof of our hotel.

And this is us doing out laundry

A Word on Terrorism...

2007-03-12T11:59:00.000-07:00

This is a difficult subject to sift through especially through this medium, but for those of you who watched the news today it is a necessary one. For those who haven't heard the news from Morocco today check the link below...

http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/africa/03/12/morocco.blast.reut/index.html

... I want to give you the same word that our in country director gave to us. If you are worried about acts of terrorism being committed against us humble Peace Corps volunteers, don't be! Terrorism by its very nature is an hyper-public act and, as we are going to be stationed out in the middle of nowhere there is very little risk that we will be caught in any cross-fire. I have encountered no hatred, no resentment, and certainly no danger as of yet and although I am not naive in the thinking that the entire country is representative of the few people I have come across thus far, I do know that those who would do harm to a stranger out of sheer frustration at a country's foreign policies are few and far between. The vast majority of the people I have encountered have been horrified that something like this would happen in their country. We are safe, the Peace Corps makes sure of that, and in the unlikely event that we are put in danger they will not hesitate to remove us from that danger.

On a personal note, even if every person I had come across thus far had screamed from the top of their lungs at me and threatened me with bodily harm simply for the eagle on my passport, I would still be here because it is my job superficially as a Peace Corps volunteer and far more profoundly as a "minster of reconciliation" to stand in the face of blind hatred, not with a gun or with hatred, but with love... even though it may cost me greatly. In times such as these, we cannot afford to hide in our corners and objectify each other. We need these interactions to remind us that we are all brothers and sisters who share the same fate on this earth. This is the only way to fight terrorism...

... and it takes great sacrifice.

To creating a world better than the one left us,

Samuel

Language Has Started

2007-03-10T05:53:00.000-08:00

Ok, so we FINALLY started language today and already we've split into ability groups. There were a couple of us who came already able to read and write (maybe without knowing what it was we were reading and writing) So we didn't have to go throught the learning the alphabet process with the rest of the group. I think the few people we have who know the script are all very dedicated to learning the language and I'm excited about that.

I went out today to get some change and I was quite sure that I wouldn't have any difficulty communicating since I'm pretty proficient in French, but the lady I was talking to had little to now French at all and it was a challange. I forgot what it was like living in Germany and Hungary and not speaking the language. In addition to that our hotel has hot water showers, but not in the rooms and some of us are going ahead and using just the cold water to get used to it since we are going to have to anyway. I forgot what that was like too. I have been in the States for far to long to remember experientially what our life was like in Eastern Europe. It saddens me, but it also invigorates me. I'm pumped up about the next two years.

I'm on our lunch break right now and I just got done playing some soccer with the local kids which was a blast. They weren't running circles around me like the little kids did in Romania and Moldova, but the altitude was definitely getting to me. We are about 2000 ft. up here in this town and combining that with the fact that I am inexcusibly out of shape, it wasn't a pretty sight. Well, I don't think there was much of a sight, but it didn't sit well with me. Some of us are going running later tonight. A couple of us are thinking about starting to train for the Marakesh marathon a little less than a year from now.

I need to get back to my room to study for our afternoon classes but a quick blog administrative note...

... For a while I was thinking about password protecting my blog so that I could be a little more liberal with my stories and words, but I quickly abandoned that idea realizing that it just wasn't practical for the vast majority of people who would be reading my blog. So if you got some sort of email invitation from either Kristy or my mom then just disregard it. Everyone can access. I'm not sure what it takes to comment, but all of you should be able to do that to.

Talk to you soon.

صاموىل كنتر

A pure heart

2007-03-09T14:31:00.000-08:00

I am so excited to have this avenue to you. I am also looking forward to taking this journey with you even if only in text. My heart is full of respect and admiration for you. Your life is such a source of joy to all who know you. Life is a better place with you in it. Your family is very proud of you. We will continue to hold you up in prayer............Love, Aunt Sherri

Training

2007-03-09T11:20:00.000-08:00

We have arrived at our training site in the Atlas mountains and it is absolutely breathtaking. Strangely enough it reminds me very much of the Carpathian Alps in Romania. A lot of the countryside has reminded me of Romania and it makes me somewhat nostalgic to a certain degree. The drive was very windy though and I was starting to get car sick. I really wish I had my bike though because the climb was amazing both in grade and length, not to mention the view.

We begin language training tomorrow and i cannot wait to get started.

I hope all is well with you.

Finally Here

2007-03-08T11:47:00.000-08:00

OK, so this can't be a long post because the internet is expensive and I don't really make that much money as a volunteer...

... We finally arrived in country and made it to the capitol city. We've been in and out of more meetings since we've been here and mostly they have been more general stuff from what we got at staging in Philadelphia. Today, though we had a talk about why we came here.

We all wrote whatever various reasons we had for joining the Peace Corps down and then at the end of that the man leading the session asked if anyone wrote down that they were here for training and of course none of us stood up because that was not our interpretation of the question posed us.

His advice... the moral of the story... we are to set aside whatever idealistic tendancies brought us to morocco and whatever ideas we have about helping people because we start training tomorrow and that should be our only focus.

i have a feeling that out of my time here that the time I will have the least amount of access to communication will be the next 11 weeks of training. Bear with me because I will be intensely focused on something else.

You are all in my thoughts though, and email me when you get a chance. Whenever I get to check email it will be a welcome escape.

Day 1

2007-03-03T18:29:00.000-08:00

Well, my first day as a trainee is done. I'm here in Philadelphia with 62 other volunteers headed to Morocco split amongst the Health and Environmental fields. It's strange to think once again that this particular group of people is going to be with me for quite some time, and that I'm not headed home in a short while. It's a lot like the feeling I got getting to know some of the Texas 4000 people for the first time. You have it in the back of your head that you are going to form some profound relationships with these people, but for now they are just an array of trivial facts and possibly names if my memory is working really well.

I'm excited about flying out of here on Monday for Morocco, and the orientation sessions today did little to quiet that restless excitement. I had lunch and dinner with different groups of people and so far it seems that there are a good mix of personalities. It is going to be interesting seeing how everyone does when we take them out of their comfort zones... including me.

I"M READY TO FLY!!!

The Finalized Library

2007-02-24T14:27:00.000-08:00

Ok, so I know many people were curious as to what books I would finally land on. This was a long and painful process and the books I ended up with are not the books I started with. All of them hold their own reasoning and each are a microcosm of my own personality. So here it is...

The Bible
by... well, various authors?

... well, I don't really think this one needs an explanation.

Greek New Testament... a gift from Bethany Baer
by... most of the same various authors?

... I bring this so as not to completely forget my Greek, but even more so for sentimental reasons. There are some objects that just seem to make you feel at ease when you hold them and this is one of those books. It was published in 1907 and has obviously been rebound a couple of times.

"The Impossible Will Take a Little While: A Citizen's Guide to Hope in a Time of Fear"
by... very different various authors

... I assume things will get hard and the contributers to this book have all spent their lives challenging systems and holding steadfast even though it may have seemed the fight had been lost. I will have much need of their words.

"Beyond Good and Evil : Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future"
by Friedrich Nietzsche

... this book is my alter ego and keeps me balanced in a strange way so as not to become a child of "late cultures and of refracted light."

"Biography as Theology: How Life Stories can Remake Today's Theology"
by James Wm McClendon Jr.

... the McClendon is the one theology book I bring with me. I have come to greatly appreciate McClendon's theology over the last year and I thank Suzii Paynter for pointing me in his and Stanley Hauwerwas' direction. Much like Plutarch this book looks at the lives of great men, but unlike Plutarch, through the lens of theology.

"Cu Dumnezeu in Subterana"
by Richard Wurmbrand

...the Wurmbrand is also a last minute addition and is mostly there to keep me connected to Romania in some way. I was going to bring a Romanian translation of the Bible, but it was starting to look like I was going to have the Bible in four or five different languages so I switched it up.

"To a God Unknown"
by John Steinbeck

... the Steinbeck isn't my favorite of his, but my favorite is "East of Eden" and my copy is HUGE. Steinbeck is by far my favorite novelist and so I take him with me.

"The War Prayer"
by Mark Twain

... this small yet profound piece of literature was instrumental in my journey out of ROTC and Carson Newman and into the life that is now leading me to service with the Peace Corps. I don't actually have it in a bound copy. I'm just printing it out on paper, folding it up and sticking it in one of my other books. I have to have it with me though.

"The Rise and Fall of Athens: Nine Greek Lives"
by Plutarch
"The History"
by Herodotus

... the Plutarch and Herodotus were last minute additions. I was a Classics major for a while and enjoy the stories of the city states and great men of Greece. I also translated part of Herodotus from Greek into English so it holds a little bit of sentimental value.

"Morocco since 1830: a History"
by C.R. Pennell
"Islam"
by Fazlur Rahman
"Where There is No Doctor: a Village Health Care Handbook"
by David Werner

... so the last three are reference books. One for health, and the other two were books from my "Islamic Studies" courses.

THE END

Mailing Address

2007-02-13T11:18:00.000-08:00

Ok... so sadly I was informed that posting my mailing address is not the wisest of decision. If I had taken a moment to think through it I probably should have come to that conclusion too. The Peace Corps office doesn't want to be inundated with the packages that I know all of you would send me so for the training portion of my service I will keep my address to myself only to divulge it to those of you ask for it. My email address is...

wayfarer1635@gmail.com

... so shoot me an email, KEEP IN CONTACT, and if you want to mail something just let me know.

What to take?

2006-12-21T09:40:00.000-08:00

Ok, so I need a little feedback.

For those of you who know me and have seen my room in whatever apartment I have lived, you know that the main thing I own are books. I love to read, but it is a bit more than that. When people move someplace new they try and create a small space wherein they fell at home. For some people that involves family heirlooms, or a shotglass collection, or maybe some posters that display their identity in some way. For me it is my library that satisfies that nesting instinct. The problem with this is that books are not a very practical thing to carry when you are travelling light, but there is no way that I am going to leave for two years emptyhanded.

So here is where I need your help. I am trying to decide what books I should take with me. My question to you is this... "If you were going to be gone for two years and could only take two books with you, what would they be?"

Are you scared? ...part 1

2006-12-05T17:51:00.000-08:00

So I'm almost overwhelmingly excited about this opportunity to life and work abroad for two years, but there are a few apprehensions I have about the whole thing and I'll go ahead and air some of those...

I'm worried about making decisions completely on my own. From what I understand, we will be serving in a town with no other Peace Corps volunteers. I'm a little worried about the loneliness of the whole thing, but what troubles me more is the idea that when difficult decisions arise, that those I trust the most won't be there to offer guidance and exhortation.

On the flip side this is one of the things I am looking forward to most. I'll be forced to grow whether I like it or not and won't have the ability to pass off the decision to a friend or family member. Maybe, just maybe I'll be able to stand my ground and face the adversity that is sure to meet me...

... and hopefully I'll make it out on the other side a better person for it.

Invitation and Acceptance

2006-11-28T23:40:00.000-08:00

So it's now official... I'm off to Morocco on March 2 of 2007 as a health extension volunteer.

I'm so excited that I read both the 150 page plus manuals they sent me and another book about the Peace Corps all in one afternoon. Now begins more paper work and more waiting. I have to say I've almost forgotten that I'm graduating from college in 10 days.

The excitement highs, however, are inevitably accompanied by lows. I came to the rather stark realization about a week and a half ago that I am going to miss Austin, FBC, and UT rather intensely. This place has become home in ways that no other city has before. This realization isn't going to hinder my ability and willingess to go and adapt, but it does give me a sense of geography. I think I have an answer to the "where are you from?" question... Austin. I know I've only been here for just over two and a half years, but I guess that's all you need sometimes.

Enough of the lows... I'm graduating, I have a job that is going to allow me to live abroad and learn a new language, and I have a place to think of as home... Life is good.