Special summer festival themed crossing lightsView above Munzashir MonasteryMonastery in Terelj National Park

Terelj

Last weekend I took the opportunity to go hiking and camping with some friends and fellow interns in the national park that begins just south of UB. Using some somewhat incomplete internet information about where to find the minibuses to take us to the town where we would take taxis to the monastery where we would begin our hike, we got to the base of our hike in the afternoon on Saturday.We poked around the monastery a bit. There was a delightful taxidermy/nature-art-made-out-of-nature museum. There were a lot of families who had brought their tents and were picnicking outside (picnicking in Mongolia is a complex affair that frequently appears to involve cooking entire sheep). We admired the view of the valley, and then began our ascent.

The plan was to do a longer, somewhat more challenging hike up the mountain, camping somewhere near the top, and a shorter, easier jaunt back into UB the next morning. The hike up was lovely. We followed a stream most of the way up the mountain through the woods. I’m not sure exactly what the phenomenon was that led to the way the water flowed, but for much of the walk it flowed under us. We were on a layer of mossy, piney ground over a gap and then flowing water. There were frequent calls of “HOLE” to warn those behind of the potential to fall through the first layer of ground. We climbed some rocks at the top and had a much better view of the valley and the mountains all around.

Our process of arriving to this point all involved some vague lonelyplant dot com description someone had posted about getting to where we thought we wanted to be. We then set about looking for some good ground to camp on. Luckily for us, we did not stop at the first decent looking place, but continued along and found the actual peak of the mountain. Peaks in Mongolia are usually easy to identify because of the presence of ovoos, or a pile of stones which generally have a stick with lots of blue scarves tied around it which are used as shamanistic or Buddhist worship sites.

At our new, and much more impressive, peak, we found a great camp site, protected from the wind and already equipped with a nice, flat rock that we deemed the kitchen. Just after we set up camp we watched our peak get enveloped by fast moving clouds. The clouds passed by in time for us to see a great sky full of stars.

Back at kitchen rock, dinner consisted of: dehydrated borscht vegetables with the spices meant to go in spaghetti sauce but instead in water (both packets clearly with salt added) mixed with some jarred hot dogs and noodles. Dessert was a miniature bottle of vodka shared amongst us and chased with oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.

The next morning we packed up camp and got to looking for our path home. The biggest consideration was avoiding the presidential palace compound in order to avoid trespassing and machine guns. So we began hiking across our mountain in the hopes of taking the next valley down. It was not easy going because we weren’t on a path. It involved both climbing over (and up and down) boulder fields and going straight through some pretty thick, yet only knee deep, bush. As it turns out, the path we were hoping to find back to UB was over a couple more of these peaks. Our easy hike back, for which we had limited supplies, ended up lasting just a little bit past delirium approximately 10 hours later. Thank goodness the first commercial enterprise after you get down the mountain is Irish Castle Restaurant. I chugged a liter of water and then got to work on my cheeseburger, fries, coke and liter of beer.

It was a mentally and physically exhausting day, but worth the views, the subsequent feast, and the rock-like sleep that night. I will definitely miss being able to walk straight out of the city into the mountains!

Me and a giant stainless steel statue of Chinggis Khan Volleyball at the staff retreatView from the left of side-of-the-road fermented mare's milk stand

View from the right of side-of-the-road fermented mare's milk stand



Side-of-the-road fermented mare's milk stand

Tourist ger camp in Kharkhorin, near the ancient Mongol Capital of Karkorum

At the Buddhist Temple in Kharkhorin

Buddhist Temple in Kharkhorin

Well, well, well

I am currently interning for the Millennium Challenge Account/Mongolia Peri-Urban Rangelands Project, Project Implementation Unit. So now you will know what MCAM PURP PIU means. The aim of the PURP [condensed version] is to improve the livelihoods and environmental management practices of herders in peri-urban areas through land-leasing contracts and infrastructure investments for herder groups. Land degradation and over-grazing are serious problems that are tricky to solve because the traditional Mongolian practice of open access to pastureland is actually enshrined in the constitution.

One element of the project is well construction and rehabilitation. I had the chance to go to six well-opening “ceremonies” in the peri-urban area west of Ulaanbaatar. This involved driving across fields to each well where we met the leader of the herder group, the well-construction contractor, and representatives from the local government. Those three parties and MCAM PURP signed contracts handing responsibility of the well to the herder group and ownership to the local authority for a period of 15 years, until the herder group has repaid a portion of the investment in the well to a local development fund.

At each well they turned on the pumps and we made sure the water came out. It did in all 6 cases. They checked to ensure everything worked, gave the herder group leaders instructional books about the well operation, discussed land issues and disputes, signed all the documents and the transfer was official. They also got signs to put on their new wells that let it be known this was an MCC/MCA project with funding from the US. I later got thanked for paying my taxes. It nearly brought tears to my eyes.

From my perspective, it appeared to be a successful day of well openings.

We finished the evening with one of the herder group families. This was my first time in a family’s ger and my first chance to experience a lot of the things I had heard about.

I drank some milk tea, made with a bit of tea, milk, water, salt and perhaps a touch of butter. I also tried airag, the fermented mare’s milk which is just coming into season. A bit fizzy, a bit sour; I did not overindulge. They had killed a sheep so I got to try some boiled blood and other innard-y delights. They then made khorkhok (see the picture from the previous post). This involves heating up rocks in the fire, placing the pieces of meat and some potatoes and carrots in a large milk jug with the hot rocks, and sealing it to steam the meat. Except for a bit of stray wool, not bad at all. Frequently people will eat this with pickles. This family actually had a sort of pickled cole slaw which I tried when someone was instructed to “give the foreigner some vegetables.”

After the meat we moved on to toasting with the vodka cup that gets passed around. One of the herder group leaders, who I appeared to be the mother of the extended family, filled up a cup with some vodka and proceeded to pass it around to each person in the ger, one by one. In most cases it is acceptable to just take a sip, or put it to your lips, or dip your ring finger in it and flick it around the room as a blessing, and then hand it back, at which point whoever is passing will add some more vodka and pass it on to the next person. People made toasts to all of those involved in the project and the cup went around until the bottle was empty. Lucky for me (envisioning the road back to UB, which has made me finally understand why we have SUVs) this was not one of the occasions where I was told “bottom’s up.” In those cases, you can’t just sip and pass back.

I had intended to write about a couple of those occasions, but apparently I can talk about wells for longer than I thought, so I will save those for another time.

Zaisan Memorial to Mongolian and Soviet soldiers who died in WWII

Buddha

Me and my horse

"The first customer"The well opening and ownership transfer for one of the herder groups

A herder group leader at his well opening

Baby friend

Khorkhok in the ger--they put all of the meat in the milk jug with hot rocks and sealed it shut, steaming it

Saturday is a great day to represent why I find the town so bizarre.

In the morning, I got up and walked to a place called Grand Khan Irish Pub. Myself and a number of other foreigners living in UB got picked up by van to go about 40 minutes outside of town to ride horses through the hills.  They saddled up 12 horses for us and they went through a selection process that was not particularly transparent to choose which rider would ride which horse. One by one they pointed at one human, then one horse and helped us mount. Sometimes then telling us to get off because the horse wasn’t quite right. It was a bit Harry Potter sorting hat and a bit Goldilocks. But I certainly had no idea what was going on. Finally everyone was on horses of varying degrees of spirit and stubbornness and we made our way into the steppe.

My horse could be described as a homebody. I was trailing behind the entire ride out as he had no desire to go in that direction. My kicks and calls of “CHOO” (which is what we were told to yell to make them go) did nothing. When we would move a few feet, he would start veering off a little bit and then when I pulled on the reins to try to correct him, he would attempt to do a 180 and head in the direction of home. We rode through some hills and past a couple ger camps before turning around. On the turn-around, I suddenly pulled into the lead. The kicking and choo-ing and yanking a meandering horse back onto the path turned into pulling on the reins to try to slow his gallop and prevent him from running too fast downhill.

We all eventually made it back safely and ate some tasty vegetable hushuur (fried dumplings, somewhat like hot pockets) before heading back into town.

The next activity for the day was getting cleaned up and heading to see the Barber of Seville at the Mongolian Opera House. I mistakenly forgot to look up the plot to the opera, so for the first act we were terribly confused and not gleaning much from the Italian songs and Mongolian dialogue. Luckily, at the first intermission, we came across programs in English for sale with plot summaries. I’ll admit, even with the summaries it took me until the second -to-last song to actually figure out who the characters were and what they were doing, but I got there. It wasn’t quite La Scala, but it was worth the experience.

Post-opera dinner brought me back to the Mexican/Indian restaurant, this time to try the Indian food and a margarita. Only in UB.

After a much longer journey than expected, and help from many wonderful people,* I have made it to Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. I’ve been here a little over a week, and I’m starting to settle in a bit.

My first impression of UB was how different it is from anywhere I’ve ever been. The city is laid out in large square blocks, so it’s easy to know what direction I’m going, but the streets names are all written in Cyrillic, if there are street signs, and no one really knows the street names anyways, so I don’t know much more than what direction I’m going. It absolutely sprawls from east to west, and a bit less so from north to south because the hills begin to get in the way. The architecture is an interesting mix of modern, Soviet, post-Soviet (all of which I’m sure are loaded architectural terms, the meanings of which I don’t actually know). The outskirts of the city are full of ger districts (ger being the Mongolian word for yurt).

UB is bustling right now with construction and public works projects, I’m told because it is too cold most months out of the year to do such work so they cram it all into the summer. There are different roads closed off every day and occasional, scheduled power outages to deal with power lines and such. All of the digging makes the city really dusty.

Crossing the street is similar to Cairo in that the one thing you know is that the car will not stop for you. So at least the drivers here are more predictable than those in Boston.

There are little Mongolian fast food restaurants everywhere which serve tasty things like buuz (steamed meat dumplings) and hushuur (fried meat dumplings). There is also an enormous selection of restaurants serving food from all over the world; my favorites being the ones with the weirdest ethnic food combos. The Mexican at the Mexican and Indian restaurant was not bad and I haven’t yet had the chance to try the Mongolian and European restaurant. I have had good Korean, decent Ukrainian and am looking forward to trying the Uzbek place. There are about 5 or 6 different places that have “Irish” in the title and a chain of vegan restaurants called “Loving Hut.” I don’t think I will run out of new things to try.

Grocery shopping is still a bit tricky. I think in the last week I’ve probably spent about 25 minutes standing in front of the dairy sections of various grocery stores and still have little idea what I’m looking at. Spices aren’t too common and I haven’t found any fresh herbs yet. The chocolate selection is AWESOME.

This evening I’m off to try some pub trivia with my roommate. I promise more updates as I figure some more things out!

*Many thanks to all of the extended Baloch family, Heidi, mi lovely madre, and all who kept me sane during my 3-day, surprise layover.

As of May 27th, 2011 I will be residing in Ulaan Bataar (also: Ulan Bator, Ulan Batar, Ulaanbataar) , Mongolia for the summer! I will try to update at least every couple weeks about my adventures in the mostly sparsely populated country in the world.

And, for those of you who read about my time in Morocco, I would like you to recall a post from September 2008 in which I described working at summer camp: For one camp session the campers were divided into teams to celebrate the Summer Olympics. My team was, coincidentally, Mongolia and this is the incredible song that my girls wrote:

Mongolia! Mongolia!

We are the beautiful girls

Mongolia! Mongolia!

We are the serious girls

Mongolia! Mongolia!

We are the united girls

Mongolia! Mongolia!

We are the best

Mongolia! Mongolia!

Fantastic! Fantastic! We are

Words to live by.

I recently not only had the chance to cook rabbit for the first time, but was blessed with fabulous company to eat it with. A Dutch friend of ours who lives in town wanted to get rid of some rabbits she had. I do not want pets. However, always wanting to try new things in the kitchen, I said that I would love to cook rabbit. A few days later I was invited to come cook three of them for her and her Moroccan husband, another volunteer and her host mother. I was a little nervous that there would be people waiting hungrily for the results of my first attempt at rabbit. I ended up cooking them in a tajine, Moroccan style, then serving them with tagliatelle (which I found in town!). I will say for myself that they were pretty tasty.

The best part of the meal, however, was the amazing mix of language and culture at the dinner table. Among the 5 of us we had 5 different first languages (Dutch, English, Japanese, Arabic, Tashelhit). Conversation among myself, the volunteer and our Dutch friend happen in English; between the volunteer and her host mother in Tashelhit; between our Dutch friend and her husband in French; between myself and her husband in Arabic; between myself and the volunteer’s host mother in mixed Tashelhit and Arabic; between her host mother and our friend’s husband in Arabic. It’s a bit complicated keeping track of who can understand what others are saying in what language, but in the end everyone was understood.

We also made ice tea, which was a hilarious first for my friend’s host mother. We were brought small tea glasses, and then we put ice in the glasses and poured the tea. She just laughed and laughed. Tea is critical to Moroccan culture but to put it on ice is unheard of. (It seems a bit surprising in a place that has probably been over 100 degrees for the last 5 weeks). It wasn’t sweet like Moroccan tea, but I think she liked it nevertheless.

I got invited back have a go at a duck too.

This summer is fantastic compared to the last one. The town got some real rain this winter for the first time in about 11 years and it has helped make the summer tolerable. Even if it eventually becomes as hot as last year, the unbearable part of the summer will still be 2 months shorter. And the water doesn't appear to be turning off, either.

Although activities in the Dar Chebab tend to wind down as summer approaches, we tried to liven up the last couple months. On my birthday in May, the women in my English class threw me a birthday party! It was wonderful. There was cake, soda and dancing. And of course, because it wouldn't be a party otherwise, dressing me up like a Berber bride. The women were so sweet and it was a great way to spend a birthday away from home.

Then as an end of the year activity I put together the First Annual Dar Chebab Olympics. There were 5 events: bean bag toss (I sewed bean bags!), three-legged race, bowling, world map labeling (mild disaster--one map was labeled unside-down, Russia labeled as the European Union, etc.) and a ping-pong tournament. I think the kids really enjoyed it and it was a chance for some kids who wouldn't normally come to the Dar Chebab to come. We do definitely have some geography to work on though.

Bean bag toss and bowling

Three-legged race

Awards Ceremony

The rest of the summer will consist of a host-family wedding, a soccer leadership camp for girls, English Immersion camp, climbing Toubkal, and some travel if I have time left. Time is flying by. The end of August is our close-of-service meeting and then there will only be a couple months before I get on a boat and head back to the states.

I had a fantastic conversation with the mother of one of the women who attends my women's English class. Her mother does not speak Arabic, but she really wanted me to understand her Tashelhit. She was wearing cartoonishly thick glasses and an unexplained sock on one hand and she cared for me like I was her own child. She sat right down next to me, turned toward me and didn't take her hand off my back the whole time we were talking. When I didn't understand her, she would repeat, and mime, and finally ask her daughter to translate into Arabic if we couldn't work it out.

There are a lot of God-phrases in Tashelhit after which one is supposed to say in response "Amen," but it sounds like "ah-meen." Unfortunately I am rarely able to pick these out of a sentence so I never say Amen. She was insistent, and whenever she said a phrase that had a requisite Amen, she would then say: "Say Amen." So I would say Amen. With her help, even if I didn't understand what she was saying, I was able to respond as I was supposed to. When I did understand something and responded appropriately, she pointed it out and encouraged me.

At one point, with some translation from her daughter, I understood that she had said: "May God bring you a handsome husband with a nice car." It's a wonderful compliment. Especially considering that when I told her I was still young and not planning on getting married yet, she didn't insist that I get hitched now. Whenever I am looking for a husband, may he be handsome and have a nice car. She asked me how long my mother had stayed in Morocco, and then proudly counted to 10 on her fingers in Arabic. I said 10 days. She seemed so happy to meet me and to learn about me and my family, even if my Tashelhit conversation skills leave something to be desired.

Additionally, my host family's neighbors have named their black and white sheep Obama.

I got to my host family’s house at about 9:30 in the morning on Thanksgiving. I had told my host mom a couple weeks before that I wanted to make Thanksgiving dinner for the entire extended host family. I really wanted to have them over to my house, because none of them had been there before, but was actually quite relieved when she suggested that I do it at her house. I have 4 plates, one large pot, and a small oven, so feeding around 20 people at my house would have been logistically complicated. In the two weeks before Thanksgiving I discussed with my host family what to do about turkey. Sometimes the chicken guys in town have turkey, but since I wanted a largish one Saadia suggested I go pick it up in the nearest city, 2 hours away. She also suggested that when I go to this city, 2 hours away, I buy a live turkey, put it in a box with holes and then in the back of a taxi to bring back to town. I think my face adequately displayed my concerns with this plan, so she modified it, saying that her husband would get someone to bring a live turkey for me. So with the procuring of the turkey taken care of, I focused on shopping for everything else. Mom sent me some creamed corn to make her corn muffins, my friend brought some brown sugar, and just about everything else I wanted, except sage, was relatively easy to acquire. I arrived laden with groceries to my host family’s house. I saw my host mother in front of her mother’s on my way up and she said to me something along the lines of “You’re gonna be scared.” “Of what?” I asked. “The animal,” she replied. I thought this was perhaps in reference to a wild boar incident (they come out at night in around town and occasionally do damage), or a goat being attacked by a dog (the week before on of their goats was attacked) or something of the like. However, when I reached her house and went in the kitchen, it became evident she was referring to the turkey. It was enormous. Comically large. I liken it to about three of my heads. It weighed 21.5 kilos, 47 pounds. Fortunately, we had asked the butcher to take care of the killing and de-feathering, otherwise I think we probably would have had to postpone Thanksgiving. I was still a bit nervous about how I could possibly cook the bird. It would never fit in the oven whole, and even if it could, it would never cook all the way, so we had to take it apart. We broke one knife attempting just that and then moved onto the hatchet. We chopped it in half and then in half again, deciding that 2 quarters would be enough to feed everyone. I set them in a laundry bucket to brine, broke down the other half of the turkey for freezing, and started on the rest of the meal. I made two kinds of corn bread, stuffing, mashed potatoes, baked sweet potatoes and apples, gravy and apple cider. A few Americans helped me out and also took care of the green beans and apple crisp for dessert. In the end most of the host family came, along with a group of kids that my host mother tutors in the evenings and a few others. There were about 25 people in all. I made everyone go around and say what they were thankful for and then made everyone eat off of their own plate. My host mother scared all her sisters-in-law by telling them that they would get no food unless they ate with a knife and fork, but there were not nearly enough forks to go around, so we stuck with individual plates and whatever utensil you could get your hands on. It was a long and tiring day, but everyone seemed to enjoy it. It was a wonderful chance to share part of America with my Moroccan family and it tasted like real Thanksgiving. Adding my Moroccan family to my American family just about quadruples the size of my family, and despite awkward moments and language barriers, I really do feel a part of the family. And now I have a freezer full of turkey to last me the next year.

I recently had two more occasions to dress up in an amelhaf and to try to blend in to my surroundings. Despite the fact that the full-body garment, if held properly, reveals almost nothing, I still seem to be conspicuous in a crowd. When sitting with my usual gang (my host mother, her sisters-in-law and some friends) and we are approached by someone else, they will scan the group, greet us, and then ask about the taromit. If said person speaks to me, the conversation will generally go as follows: Stranger: You’re wearing an amelhaf!

Me: Yeah.

Stranger: You’re becoming Tashelhit!

Me: Ha ha, yeah.

Stranger: Now you have to get married!

Me: Ha ha. Not yet.

Stranger: You wouldn’t marry an Ashelhi man?

Me: It’s not that, I’m just still young.

Stranger: How old are you?

Me: 23

Stranger: You’re not young! You have to get married now! The first occasion was a local festival. In Morocco there is a tradition of moussems. They honor local saints and usually take place at their tombs. This moussem was at Sidi Abdljabar, a part of the valley just outside of my town. First stop was the tomb. Since the tomb is part of a mosque, I didn’t go in. Moroccan law says that only Muslims can go into mosques. The rest of the festival wasn’t too different from a town fair in the States. Shopping and eating. We walked along the side of the road to see what was for sale, then stopped to eat, then shopped some more, then ate some more. At the Moroccan festival in the place of fried dough, cotton candy and French fries there is fried fish, tagine and tea. Most festivals in the area, but in particular Sidi Abdljabar, are known as an opportunity for boys and girls to talk. Other than school, there are not too many occasions when it’s normal for boys and girls to mix. (‘Boys’ and ‘girls’ do not necessarily mean young, they just mean unmarried). If a girl isn’t in school or has finished and isn’t working, the two most likely options to meet someone are through her family or walking down the street, like at the moussem. By late afternoon at Sidi Abdljabar, the coupling had begun. There were girls and boys walking around on the outskirts of the festival, up on the hill, away from the main street. I stuck with the married women for this one. My next big cultural event in town was the engagement party of my host mom’s brother. This time, I got to wear the white amelhaf, reserved for engagements and weddings. All of us with the groom’s family got ready and gathered together plates of cookies, dates and almonds, milk, fabric, dresses, jewelry and a sheep to bring to the bride’s house. We piled in cars and put all the stuff in a truck and drove to their house. We were greeted by a large group of girls welcoming us with songs in Tashelhit and copious amounts of perfume poured on us. Our crew sang the only song I know, the one always sung at joyous occasions, and then we all paraded into the house and sat down. All of the women, in their white amelhafs, sat in one room and the men went somewhere else. Between the four bridal costume changes and pictures of the bride and groom with every guest in each outfit, the women danced and sang traditional Tashelhit songs. About four hours later was dinner. Dinner at weddings and for important occasions usually consists of four courses. The first is called burqooqs, a dish made from couscous with butter and honey poured on top. Then comes chicken with olives and preserved lemons. Then beef with prunes and hard boiled eggs. Lastly, comes the fruit. Shortly after dinner and the last picture taking session, around 2 a.m., the groom’s family headed back to our caravan of cars and trucks and back home. It was a long day, but it was great to be considered part of the family.

Another loooooong time without a post. I added the extra o’s for emphasis. So it is time for a concise wrap-up of the summer.

It was hot. But, fortunately for me, I am a Youth Development volunteer, which means I get to work at summer camp. Summer camp happens at the beach. The beach also happened to be a good 25 degrees cooler than my site. English Immersion Camp is a project with Peace Corps and the Moroccan Ministry of Youth and Sport, with scholarships funded by the U.S. Embassy. In addition to the families who send their kids to the camp, each volunteer gets to send 5 scholarship students. They spend about 2 weeks at camp learning English and doing camp-y things. I got to spend 4 weeks at camp teaching English, leading journalism club and doing all the camp-y things that I grew to love after attending and working at camp myself for 7 summers of my youth.

We sang songs, we went to the beach, we played sports, we had talent shows and fashion shows, we celebrated Halloween in August. I had a wonderful time, and by the tears shed, it was clear the kids did too. Along the way, I learned a few things about myself. Apparently, when it comes to the “Banana Song,” I “go bananas” with the best of them. Or worst. Either way, my banana dance turns heads. Additionally, it appears I have completed my transition from JV athlete to sports superstar. My early years of embarrassment being the worst player on all-boys basketball and soccer teams have been overshadowed by the amount of praise and acclaim I get from teenage boys and middle-aged men alike when I play these sports now; praise which is seemingly disproportionate to the quality of my actual ball skills. On Halloween I also learned that if my other career options don’t work out, I could probably make a decent living as a fortune teller.

The campers were awesome. The kids learned a lot and made new friends and in a totally new context, for many of them. A couple of them taught me and some other volunteers how to “Tektonik” dance. Apparently it’s a dance craze that’s sweeping France and Morocco. There are also now a couple young Moroccan boys wandering the streets who know “Beans, beans, they’re good for the heart…” I can’t wait for next year to teach more impressionable youth fart jokes, compliments of the American people. Speaking of which, thank you to any Americans reading this blog for the pens, backpacks and Frisbees provided for the campers. They read “Compliments of the American People.” During the second session of camp I attended, we introduced an Olympic theme to camp. The campers were divided into countries and competed in various activities throughout camp. My team was Mongolia. My girls came in dead last by a hefty 50 points, but we had a fantastic time. And they wrote perhaps the best cheer ever written:

Mongolia! Mongolia!

We are the beautiful girls

Mongolia! Mongolia!

We are the serious girls

Mongolia! Mongolia!

We are the united girls

Mongolia! Mongolia!

We are the best

Mongolia! Mongolia!

Fantastic! Fantastic! We are!

After camp I traveled around a bit with my lovely friend Emily, who came to visit from London. Despite some adverse conditions, we had a great time. She arrived in Morocco and got straight down to it, ordering sheep’s head at a food stall in Marrakech. We saw a waterfall and monkeys. We came down to my site, where the heat was still something to reckon with. We rode camels on the beach. We broke fast on one of the first nights of Ramadan. We got eaten alive by mysterious bugs. All in all, a successful trip. It was a good chance to see things through someone else’s eyes. In two days I will have been in Morocco for 1 year. It is crazy how fast the time has flown by. Things are going to get going again after Ramadan and I have no doubt the next 15 months will fly by just as quickly.

ihma lhal - it's hot

sahd - oppressive heat

ilheef - hot wind

99 degrees in my bedroom at night and 125 in the sun. Last week the breeze was still a relief, but this week the ilheef has arrived so the breeze makes it feel like you're getting blasted from an oven. So far I have about 3 inches of water in my rooftop baby pool, but even that heats up so is really only tolerable in the morning. That's also probably as much water as it is going to get because my water now only runs sometime between midnight and 6am. Summer is here.

Classes are mostly finished. The Dar Chebab has been getting some work done on it for the last couple months so I was holding classes at the women's center, but schools are letting out so the klids have mostly stopped coming. The Dar Chebab is looking really nice though! So I am hoping to have a big old opening party when everyone comes back. Soccer practices are still happening, but we tend to tire out quickly in the heat.

Many of the families in town will be travelling in the summer. They go visit family nearby or up north in Casablanca. At the same time they are replaced by what sounds like A LOT of people whose roots are here, but who now live up North or in Europe and come for a little bit of time during the summer. I've been told that in August if you want anything basic from the hanut (store) like milk, bread or eggs, you have to go in the morning because with the influx of people the hanuts run out in the afternoon. Luckily, I get a reprieve from much of the supposed mad house because youth development volunteers work at an English immersion summer camp on the coast.

Quick update on thelast 2 months: I ran in a 10k in Casablanca called the "Course Feminine," a race for women and girls. My mama and brother came to visit and were there to support me and some of my fellow volunteers and then they took me on a fabulous trip around the country. I went to IST (In service training) for Peace Corps where I heard lots of great ideas from my fellow volunteers and got a lot of inspiration for the next school year.

The first time the girls were supposed to have their first soccer game was some 5 or 6 weeks ago. We tried again another 2 times and failed. But on Sunday the girls finally had the chance to trounce their counterparts from Tasrirt. Final score: 3-0. There was a lot of hoopla for just 1 hour of playing time, but I think that’s how these things work. We played 8 on 8 with goal keepers, a referee, and vague references to the rules of soccer. The field was a bit rocky compared the pebbly field where we practice, so I’d say it was approximately like playing a game on grass after playing your whole life on turf. Only a little more hurty. The other girls were a little smaller, on average, but clearly knew what they were doing. All in all a good game, and everyone came away happy.

We went back to the school where they made lunch for the girls and let the two teams mingle. Despite all my girls’ tough talk, they got along famously, and the girls of Tasrirt were sad to see them go. While the girls were eating, the 10 adults present were making themselves certificates to congratulate themselves on a job well done. One such adult, in fact, refused the first certificate made for him because it got water on it. Serious business.

But honestly, it was a great day, we made some connections and I think there was a lot of excitement created over about the possibilities of girls’ soccer. The plan is for the girls from Tasrirt to come play here in two weeks. Which means I have to go wash the jerseys.

Here are a few photos:

The girls!Both teams after lunch. We sang Aboomchicaboom.Not a bad view. And my sweeper kicking butt and taking names.

I just got back from my first long absence from site. I was gone for about 2 weeks, traveling to and from and working at spring camp. One of the things that Youth Development volunteers do for the Ministry of Youth and Sport (for whom I work) is attend English language immersion camps. In the spring, the volunteers are spread out around the country at various locations, but we are all at the same camp for the summer. I was sent to a town about an hour outside of Casablanca. I think it might have been my first experience with culture shock in Morocco.

I have been getting used to the culture of my site for the last 4 months. My town is reasonably conservative; parties are always separated by gender, the other volunteers and I have gotten used to always being the only women at the café, most women wear a large, black, full-body wrap when they go outside, and even men wearing shorts is considered by many to be inappropriate. So I was a bit surprised to be confronted with campers at the camp wearing tank tops, dancing in mixed company, and the most shockingest of all, kissing cheeks of the opposite sex (including us!) to say goodbye on the last day. I was like a fish out of water among them. I didn’t know how to act. My Moroccan side was feeling scandalized by it all, my American side was thinking how much worse it must have been to watch me and my friends at that age (I think I would faint if I had to chaperone a Maret go-go), and I just sort of sat there with wide eyes wondering what people from my town would think if they could see me.

And now a major success story: Yesterday I went to have couscous at my host family’s house, like I do every Friday. I was standing in the kitchen with my host mom and her sister, talking, making couscous, etc. Then my host mom told me a fabulous tale about Ayman, the 7 year-old son of her brother, who lives in the house next door. He’s a great kid. He always runs up and greets me with a big, sloppy kiss. He speaks really quickly so I rarely understand anything he says, but he’s wonderful nevertheless. He told me once about how you can go knocking on the doors of the RVs that tourists from Europe drive down here and camp out in town and say “Bonjour, je voudrais bon-bon” and they give you candy. He suggested we go do it, but I thought it unlikely that they would give me any candy, so we just stayed at home. Anyway, while I was at camp apparently a neighbor was asking Ayman about the taromit (foreigner) staying at the house. Asking where she was, or something like that. Ayman said “What taromit?” The neighbor again asked about the foreigner, specifically alluding to me and Ayman said “Oh, Brooke? She’s not taromit.” So it’s official, in the eyes of one 7 year-old boy, I am no longer a foreigner.

Reminded me very much of when my dear brother, Evan, was about 12 and ran around the house with a plastic bag on his head screaming "I'm an oxymoron."

My host family did a party where Youssef goes to pre-schoolish day care.

Birthdays are only observed by some people. Many don't know their birthdays, but increasingly I think families with young kids celebrate them. It's been determined that sad-looking kids in party hats make me smile.

I’m dirtier. But it really doesn’t bother me that much. Now, rather than throwing clothes in the laundry bin and then fishing through it later, I just fold them back up again because I know I am going to wear them again. Until they smell. Pretty bad. I’m calmer. But that is attributable to not having many stressful things on my plate, not to any change or new guiding principle I’ve developed. I can speak a new language, perhaps better than any foreign language I’ve spoken before. And it’s wonderful to be able to communicate with people, but sad whenever the conversation ends with my inability to speak another language. I think a lot and I think it’s keeping me up at night. Without a large circle of friends close at hand and constant daily conversation in a language I fully understand and through which I can accurately express myself, I find myself thinking more. I look back on all kinds of relationships with people with an intensity and scrutiny they don’t get when I’m around them. I think about choices I’ve made. I think about all the potential outcomes after two years in Morocco. I read with much more interest than I ever could in college. I’m hoping to give myself another education. With a little work, I think I might be able to learn as much here in two years as I did in college. First subject that I’d like to look into: linguistics. Currently, I find the subject fascination. I have a friend. She’s married, has a child, prays five times a day and I had to inform her that Jews don’t smell different from the rest of us, but she cares about me and my well-being and we can make each other laugh. We can talk to each other honestly because we know what we say won’t reach the whole town. I miss fancy meals. My mouth generally waters when reading about restaurants or recipes for steak, lamb, bacon, mushrooms, parmesan, and the list goes on. I will try to create what I can, but I don’t think I yet possess the culinary creativity demanded when faced with limited ingredients. An unfortunate side note: the meat selection really does not lend itself to the idea of the first international Steak Off. I’ve gotten taller. Maybe that’s a stretch. But I have realized that I’m no longer short in Morocco. For the first time in about 7 years when I told someone I played basketball in high school, I didn’t get a laugh. I might blush less. I stood up in front of a room of about 80 boys between the ages of 14 and 22 and spoke to them off the top of my head in Arabic and I am pretty sure I maintained my normal complexion. Time has never gone by so quickly and I’m not sure how I feel about it. It’s good because I’m not dwelling on getting home, but also worrisome because what if I don’t get anything done? I keep on telling myself that I still have two years, but I won’t have two years forever.

It recently occurred to me that the readership of this blog, numbering in the thousands, no doubt, might not even know what kind of actual work I’m doing here. So I’ll try to fill you in. As a Youth Development Volunteer Peace Corps volunteer I have two sets of goals to work with: the Peace Corps goals, and my program’s project plan. The larger goal for the Peace Corps, which I absolutely intend to fulfill in a mere 27 months, is world peace. Just one step beneath that are the three aims that Peace Corps seeks to reach in each country: help people in the country better understand America, help Americans better understand the country, and to help the country meet it’s need for skilled workers. I do believe it is within this last aim that each program’s project plan lies.

Each YD volunteer is invited by the Ministry of Youth and Sport to work in a community’s youth center and develop youth. Although teaching English tends to be what many volunteers focus on, it is not our only role, but is meant as a way to integrate into the community and meet people. Right now I teach beginning, intermediate and advanced level English classes to students and one beginning level class for women. They come to the Dar Chebab after school and, for the most part, are self-motivated to be there. Students in Morocco generally start English in their last year of middle school and continue for the three years of high school. Most of my students have started English in school. I also hang out with some of the students one Fridays and Saturdays for free time/music club. And they have taken a liking to the ping-pong set Evan sent me for Christmas.

Other than that, my only other activity is going to/coaching girls’ soccer practice. There are usually about 12 girls who come to play, but probably about 18-20 who are considered to be on the team. They started playing just for fun when the last volunteer was here, and turned it into a more regular practice, but as of right now they really don’t have anyone else to play against. I would really like to expand their program, find some other girls to play soccer, and have a real 11 v 11 game, but it may be difficult to do. Soccer is not really considered a sport that girls play, so I think these girls might be the only ones in town. I would like to look around in the surrounding villages, but since they are smaller and generally a little more conservative, it might be even harder to round up players. So my goal for the next few months is to meet some girls who might want to play. This might also require me to meet a lot of parents, as girls may not always be allowed out of the house.

So in addition to learning Tashelhit and getting my house together, that is what I have been working on. My next project will hopefully be to start some activities at the Dar Talib/Dar Taliba, a sort of boarding house for students at the middle and high schools who live in far villages, because the students there have a curfew at the time when my classes usually start. That's life, for the most part. I'm getting a routine together, making some friends, figuring out how to cook here, and trying to keep a distance between myself and Moroccan high school drama. Here are some pictures:

A view on a walk/hike just a few kilometers outside of town.Some of the soccer girls watching the Morocco-Ghana African Cup Match, we thought they had scored, unfortunately they did not.God, Country, King. Lit up where the old city of Agadir was, which was destroyed by an earthquake.Me sporting the Melhaf, the traditional garment worn by most women in town. More on that later.

If it works, what I say in the video in Arabic is "Kiss your muscles."

I decided to switch the language that I will be tutored in from Arabic to Tashelhit because almost everyone around here speaks Tash. Although most people in town also know Arabic, they simply don't speak it among themselves. I have enough Moroccan Arabic to communicate with the people who do not operate in Tash (i.e. those who are not originally from here) like the directors of the youth centers and the schools, and the Minister of Youth and Sport in Tiznit.

Now that I have begun, I have decided I have to pick up the pace. Unlike before, I now know when people are talking about me, I just have no idea what they are saying. One of two words tips me off: "tafrukht" and "taromit."

"Tafrukht" means girl. Unlike in the States, the definition of a girl is someone who is unmarried, and that of a woman, someone who is. A 40 year-old unmarried female is a girl and a 16 year-old married female is a woman. When my host family or some of the women in town are talking about me, it is generally as "tafrukht." My ears perk up when I hear it, but I am still unable to decifer what they are saying about me. Frequently when there are children around I think it is "get away from the girl" or "the girl is going to hit you." Sidenote: one cultural difference I do not think I will ever get used to is that it is apparently perfectly acceptable, if not encouraged to physically discipline someone else's child. Despite threats from their parents, I haven't hit them, yet.

When people who don't know me as well talk about me, they refer to me as what is clearly my only other defining characteristic: "taromit." It's a Berberization of the Arabic word literally meaning Roman. In practice, however, its meaning is varied. It can mean modern, Christian, European, or generally foreign. The Arabic word in Morocco for foreigner is "Nasrani," which means Christian (literally, from Nazareth) but has been adopted to refer to everyone foreign. Taromit serves a similar purpose, but can also be used to describe vegetable oil as compared to olive oil, or homemade butter versus packaged butter, or family raised chickens versus farm raised. It's opposite is "bladi" (of the country) so we have romi butter and bladi butter, romi oil and bladi oil, romi chicken and bladi chicken. And apparently it is not hard to tell that I am not bladi.

I went to a party to celebrate the homecoming of a woman's husband from the Hajj in Saudi. There were probably 60-70 women there at one point or another (these occasions are sex segregated). I sat next to a woman (a girl, in Moroccan terms) who was continually referring to me, although most of the time I have no idea what about. I just heard my repeated call of "taromit." At one point I could guess that she was saying something along the lines of "Poor foreign girl, doesn't know how to eat" as she was ripping chicken off the bone and placing it in front of me, because by her standards, I was not eating enough, which must mean either that I don't know how to eat with my hands, or I am shy, when really it was because half a chicken was quite enough, thank you.

So I'm off to go work on my language, in the hopes of developing a biting Tashelhit wit to counter, or at least include myself in, the discussions of the roman girl.

Me and Zhour, my first host mother, at swearing-in in Fes.Women singing and dancing at a party my host mother had.

My Eid caftan.

Santa Claus cookies I made for Christmas. I promise they look prettier in America.

Sunset on the mountains.

Only 23 more to go.

After the Eid holiday I ate sheep twice a day for only about 6 days straight. Christmas Day I ate sheep head, just the way mama does it. It left something to be desired, as did the tongue and balls, but true to the Smith/Kerrigan family maxim, nothing was left untasted. For Christmas I did indeed bake oodles of sugar cookies, which have nothing in comparisn to the perfect cookies my host mother bakes, but helped spread Christmas cheer nonetheless. I filled ziploc bags with green and red icing and took them to the Dar Chebab to decorate with the kids. I played some christmas music and rather ineffectively explained the art of the paper snowflake. All in all, I would say it satisfied my desire for a real Christmas.

I New Yeared (Mick Huckabee's distate for candidates who use summer as a verb has inspired me to turn all of my vacations into verbs) in a surfing town called Taghazout, just outside of Agadir. I swam in the ocean on December 31st, but was not as brave as some of my friends who did so at midnight. Although there is an official holiday on the 31st and 1st in Morocco, there are no goings-on relating to the New Year.

Now I'm back in site, trying out a new schedule at the Dar Chebab, and beginning tutoring in Tashelhit. So with any luck I'll be speaking three languages rather poorly when I'm through here. In addition to the English teaching I'm hoping that we will have a music performance sometime soon, and perhaps an expanded girls soccer team.

Promise some more pictures soon.

I survived my first Eid L'Kbir. This is a good thing. Since one of the families living on my compound is fighting with the other ones, I also only had to watch 4 sheep get slaughtered, rather than 5. I am currently finishing up reading The Omnivores Dilemma, so it was a very appropriate time for me to witness the killing of animals that I will eat. Just a couple hours after the event, we ate liver kebabs. Later on, some assorted other innards, not really sure what, exactly. I think I identified stomach. Unfortunately, I informed my family that the rule in my house growing up was that you were not allowed to say you didn't like something before trying it, thereby signing myself up for eating sheep head.

Apart from the sheep part, it was really not too diffferent from an American family holiday. We all ate breakfast together in the morning. Then the men got together to take care of the animals, comparable to a father carving the turkey, perhaps; the mothers brought the water up to the roof and brought the edible parts down to the kitchen. Family and friends stopped by to wish everyone a happy Eid. Everyone was dressed up at some point in the day, depending on whether or not they were dealing with sheep. I sported a delightful, mermaid-esque number, an Eid gift from my host mother. Here are a few pictures from yesterday, sparing you the bloody part.

Me with my host brother and cousin. Other relatives with one of the 4.Kids playing on the roof. They are not nearly as cute when you get to know them.Banjos (or banjoes?) are big in Tashelhit music, but I was a little surprised to see one adorned with eagles, stars and stripes. Our first meal being cooked.

For my first two months in-site, I will be living with a host family. My immediate family consists of my host parents and a 2 year old host brother. However the family certainly does not stop there. My house is right next door to a sort of compund of houses of various relatives. My host mother's parents live in one house below with 1 more daughter and two more sons. Additionally there are 3 married sons who each have their own attached house. In addition to my 2 year old there are 3 other children under the age of three and one who is about 7. When more than one of them gets together, chaos ensues. It is quite a scene to behold.

My host family is very nice. They speak mostly Arabic in the home, which is unusual around here, but wonderful for me. Everyone is very eager that I start speaking Tashelheet, the Berber dialect spoken in the region, so I will definitely have to start that soon, but would like to continue working on the Moroccan Arabic for the time being. The Arabic will help me when I leave town and when talking to officials, most of whom do not come from the region. Most importantly, the mudir (director) of my Dar Chebab is from Casablanca and operates entirely in Arabic. But for community integration, Tashelheet is definitely the way to go.

In total, there are 5 family units on the compound. For better or worse, this means that we will be slaughtering 5 sheep for the Eid L'Kbir, the holiday that takes place two months after Ramadan. I will probably have a lot more to say about that in about a week.

If anyone has the best sugar cookie recipe ever, please let me know. I am planning on making oodles of christmas cookies.

That is the view from my host family's kitchen. I am convinced they have the most beautiful view in Morocco. So come visit.

I am now back in my site, getting settled, and promise some updating soon.

Training went from being just another study abroad experience into real life after we all got our site assignments. I just got back to Fes after two weeks at my site and visiting another volunteer. But for the first time, coming back to Fes doesn’t feel like coming home; it is more like I am just biding my time before getting settled.

Although I only had four days there, so far, I love my town. I left Vermont, but I get two more years in the mountains. They don’t look anything like the Greens or the Adirondacks, but they are breathtaking. The view from the kitchen of my homestay family is glorious. GLORIOUS. Apparently in January there is snow up in the mountains, but it only rains in my town.

I will be returning to my site from Fes after swearing-in on November 26th. Although I am not looking forward to the actual traveling part, I am thrilled to be going back to my town. In order to get there from Fes I have to take a 7 hour train, which can last up to 9 hours depending on whether or not the track has actually been laid yet, to Marrakech. Because as volunteers we are not allowed to travel at night, I stay the night in Marrakech and then continue the next morning on a 4 hour bus South to the Agadir region. From there I take a series of two grand taxis totaling about 3.5 hours of travel, in addition to any combination of ½ to many hours of waiting, to my site. It is exhausting, but beautiful, especially on the second day traveling through the anti-Atlas.

I will be taking over for a current volunteer who will be leaving right before I arrive and will be able to take over her language classes, youth and women’s club, and even a girls’ soccer team she is involved with! Needless to say, I am pumped to relive the glory days of Maret Soccer. No big deal. I played Varsity.

I would love to post a few more photos, but I am afraid the image uploading technology is not performing to the best of its ability today. Ttyl.

I have just been informed that I will be in the Tiznit region of Morocco for the next two years. It is in the Anti-Atlas, it is far away from a lot of things, within a few hours of Agadir, and I lucked out because goats climb trees where I will be. So you can expect photos. And of course, more to come. Here are a couple pictures from CBT: The Boushram Family. Me, Hannan, Fadwa, Auntie Fatima, Mama Zhour, and Baba Mohammed at one of our Ramadan Ftoors.

My CBT group on our last morning in town, wearing clothes that Ian's host family dressed us up in unfortunately early in the morning.

Sorry about the long time-no blog. Training has been really busy but really wonderful. The last two weeks with my host family in my training site were great. Two days in particular stick out.

The first of these days was Eid Al-Fitr, the celebration ending the fast after Ramadan. I woke up and got to eat during the day with my family for the first time. We had sweets, bread, melwi (doughy bready pancakesque deliciousness) and tea. I began with probably two or three cups of tea. And that was my first mistake. My family then proceeded to our neighbor's house, which also happens to be where another trainee was living, for more of the same. And two more glasses of incredibly sweet tea. Then our two families moved on down the neighborhood for more of the same. 4 more cups of tea. In the afternoon, the 6 trainees and our language instructor went to visit all of our respective families to wish them an Eid Mabruk. That is when the tea drinking competition began resulting in another 8 or so cups of tea and 2 cups of coffee. I was happy to escape sans diabetes.

The whole day was really wonderful. I felt like I was having new language breakthroughs with my family; I held entire conversations. Also, my host father, who I initially thought didn't really care for me much and didn't spend much time with the family, suddenly began talking to me, he showed me his coin collection and gave me an incredible Amazigh (Berber) necklace made out of old Moroccan coins. As it turns out, it is just his Ramadan schedule that involves never being home at night. On most nights he stays at home, helps my host sister with her work and perhaps even likes me.

Our big success as a group was our big event with our Dar Chebab. The initial plan was to have three groups write three plays about issues affecting children that we would perform in classrooms. What we ended up with was a 2.5 hour spectacle with 6 plays, clowns, songs and about 200 spectators. The kids started showing up an hour early and sat patiently until nearly the end. Unfortunately, I also made my own big stage debut in Darija. I played the part of a mother who gets beaten by her husband after yelling at him for coming home drunk. Apparently my lines were comprehensible. 'Twas joyful. The plan all came together at the last minute, but it ended up being terrific. Smokey the Bear would not have approved of the enormous piles of leaves we burned under trees to make room for the chairs, but no harm, no foul. I am having difficult loading my pictures onto my computer but I will try to get some up as soon as I can.

We are now all back in Fes. I am definitely going to miss Imouzzer a lot. I got to see the moon rise over the mountains just like over the Green Mountains in Middlebury, I got to eat apples and grapes from out of my backyard, and the people were wonderful. We will find out on Wednesday where each of us will be for the next two years and then will be travelling on our own for the first time to those sites for a week. Anticipation is running high. Happy Halloween to everyone. I don't think I will be able to dress up like a tin of Skoal this year, which is a shame, but my roommate did bring some candy corn, so I think I will make it.

One love.

I have now begun the third stage of my training, my first CBT (community based training) stay. I was assigned with 5 other volunteers and one of our language instructors to the town of Imouzzer, between Fes and Ifrane. Imouzzer is in the mountains and serves as a summer town for residents of Fes. We are estimating that there are around 12,000 inhabitants normally, and the population probably more than doubles in the summer months.

The seven of us took two Grand Taxis from Fes. As we started climbing the mountain we entered a thick fog. For almost our entire first day in Imouzzer we couldn't see anything. We walked to the Gendarmes (police station) in the fog, to the Dar Chabab (youth center), to our homestays, to our languages instructor's house, all in the fog. It was a little bit creepy walking to my house for the first time with my host sister through the woods, seeing people emerge from among the trees and appear from the fog. It was also much colder than expected. Yesterday and today, however, are beautiful, the town is very nice and not a bit creepy.

My family consists of a farmer and his wife and three daughters, 7, 20, and 24. After some intitial miscommunication I now understand that the 24 year old does not usually live at home, she is pregnant and married to a man living in Tangiers and will be going there soon. I now also understand that the 20 year old teaches a Kung Fu class at a local gym and has invited me to participate in her class. Because the 7 year old does not fast for Ramadan, the family has been very kind and offers me food all day long.

We have had one day of language instruction so far from our LCF (Language and Culture Facilitator), Hoda, at the hosue that Peace Corps has rented her for our training. We will continue to have language every day, except Sunday. Last night we also presented ourselves to some members of the community at the Dar Chabab and talked to them a little bit about what sorts of activities they might be interested in having us work on while we are here. It is unlikely that we can really do anything until after Ramadan, but we got some good ideas last night.

So for the most part we are still just figuring everything out, working on our Darija (Moroccan Arabic), and meeting people. It is a bit frustrating to not be able to express myself in any sort of sensical sentences, but I think that slowly people are beginning to understand some of the simpler things I have to say. Luckily I am not too complicated.

Love to all my homies.

I have arrived in Morocco. After a few days of staging in Philadelphia which led to more questions than it answered, three days in a hotel in Rabat packed with introductory sessions to our service, I have made it to Fes which will be my home base for the next 10 weeks.

My Peace Corps group consists of 67 people, 38 in the small business development program and 29 with me in the youth development program. We were all together for the pre service training in Rabat where we had our introductions to the Peace Corps, to Morocco, to policies, to health, to the ambassador and to our programs.

We did not get too much time to look around the city while we were there because we had so many other things to do, but I did get a chance to walk briefly around the medina and have a look at the water. It is hard for me to look at Morocco in any way other than through comparison to Egypt, and I think I need to break myself of the habit. But for now, Rabat is not like Cairo. The dress is much less conservative. The streets and cafes seem more French than anything else. The driving appears to have a little more order than in Cairo, meaning that most stoplights appear to be there for stopping, rather than decoration.

We were in Rabat for the first night of Ramadan. I was lucky to be up on the roof of our hotel for a long series of beautiful prayers from a nearby mosque. The youth development group left for Fes the next morning, right after the small business group, which will do the rest of their training in and around a city called Ouarzazate. The only news I have heard from them so far is that they have made it (they had an 8 hour bus ride over and through the mountains compared to our easy 2.5 hour trip).

We started language classes yesterday. It is really nice to actually be learning again. For now I am in a group with people who have done some Arabic before, but at times I think our Egyptian, Jordanian, and Classical minds get in the way with learning the Moroccan Darija. We are also beginning our cross culture training, and we have chances to ask the PC staff all sorts of questions about life in Morocco. Our first lesson was how to properly use a turkish toilet.

Friday will be our first homestay. For the next 10 weeks we will be moving back and forth between our center in Fes and 6 community based training sites where 5 or 6 volunteers live in a neighborhood, each in a different family. I will definitely have to work a lot on the language before I am going to feel comfortable doing that, but I suppose that it is also necessary to feel a bit uncomfortable to learn a new language.

I must go so I can have my first experience in the medina in Fes, supposed to be one of the most incredible places in Morocco.

I have a cell phone now, if anyone ever wants to get in touch with me: (011)(212) 42561928

I hope everyone is well!

That I have been having dreams about everyone I know makes some sense to me, given the circumstances. The presence of show tunes in these dreams, however, is inexplicable.

In 10 days I am to report to Philadelphia for 2 days of general orientation, form signage, shot receivage, and preparation for my next 27 months in Morocco. My assignment is to the Peace Corps Youth Development Program.

I arrive in Rabat for my initial training, which lasts 11 weeks. Then I will be assigned to my community for the next two years. When I begin in my community I will be living with a family, teaching English, getting to know people, making connections, and being as charming as I can be in order to make it easier for me to move into the next stage of my assignment, developing programs for youths and for those who affect youths, specifically girls. These projects seem to range from English teaching to sports teams and women's health programs.

For the most part, I know very little right now about my life for the next two years. I could be in an Arabic-speaking site, or I could be in an area where the people speak one of the three Moroccan Berber dialects. What French I have left could be useful, or its possible I remember only the things that will be prove entirely useless. My Arabic is not great right now, but even if it was, Egyptian is so far removed from Moroccan that I will necessarily have a lot to learn.

I think that mostly sums up my attitude going into the whole thing at this point, I have a lot to learn. It will certainly be challenging, hopefully rewarding, and undoubtedly interesting.

I look forward to sharing my experiences and hearing from everyone. Please do not hesitate to email me or leave comments.

For those of you who are teaching back at home, there is a Peace Corps program that helps keep US classrooms in contact with Peace Corps Volunteers, so if that makes sense for your classes and you are interested, please let me know!