October has been a month
of accomplishments. After returning from my month of travels I tired to
make sure to get right back into my community. It wasn't easy and I
realized just how long a month is and how I don't want to leave again for that
long. To help my transition I decided spending a lot of time with my host
family was important so I went there almost every day for a week. They
are always so welcoming and greeted me with open arms and lots of food.
Their response when I walked through the door... "We thought you
died". Well at least they were thinking of me, but they have my number a
simple call to make sure I was still alive would have been nice. I guess they
saw the accident on the Tishka on TV and thought I was on that bus.
Thanks guys!
They always have a way of
helping me remember why I’m here, and always help me feel like part of the
family, including group naps, sibling fighting, and of course my host mom ready
to feed the baby whenever needed (if you catch my drift).
Since we were
back in site and ready to work we met with our mudir, and the head of the
women’s association in town and made some schedules for classes. We got right into work and started
having our exercise class three times a week. Though only one person showed up at the first one, at our
most recent class four people showed up, so we are growing. It’s not easy to get women excited
about exercise and fit our class into their schedule but we are working on
it. Along with that we have had
English classes for women at the association who are interested in
learning. They are very motivated
learners and though it’s very challenging at times, it’s been a great
experience so far. As for work at
our youth center, that’s not going as smoothly. Though we have made countless schedules and told many kids to
come somehow we cannot seem to connect with the kids who are interested. They come when we aren’t there and when
we are there the kids are nowhere to be found. On top of that, though very exciting, our mudir informed us
that they are closing the youth center for a month and a half for
renovations. Though it is deeply
needed and will make the youth center much more appealing, it’s hard to be
excited when work there will probably not really start until the beginning of
next year. Even with this it’s
hard not to be excited at the prospect of students and starting clubs, classes,
and activities with them. It also gives us more time to plan program for the future. Writing letters for donations and grants for education on AIDS, and a 5k race with a health program at the end.
Besides that
I’ve still been able to travel a bit.
I spent a weekend in Marrakesh working with our mudir, and other mudirs
on projects we would like to hold and how we can get them done. The hostel was nice enough to allow us
to spend an extra night and we were able to get to see the city a little. Besides that I was also able to travel
to Casablanca to compete in a half marathon. It was an amazing experience, and though I don’t think I’m
cut out for distance running, now I can say I’ve run a half in Casa.
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| Rock Stars / olympians |
In Casa we spent the few nights we were
there treating ourselves. We went
to Rick’s Café and ate steak and drank martinis.
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| Classy lady |
Though it seems like it would be touristy, Rick’s had
terrific food, great service, and was very classy, though they do have the
movie Casablanca playing on repeat, but at least it’s on mute. We went to the Morocco Mall and did a
little too much shopping. It was
overall a terrific experience. The
Morocco Mall is huge. It is three
floors of stores including some very pricy shops like Prada, Louis Vuitton, and
many more stores we didn’t even try to go in. It also had some of my favorites like Gap, Banana Republic,
and H&M. It was impossible to
not feel homesick sitting there drinking real Starbucks surrounded by
bags. While there we also visited
the mosque. It is absolutely huge
and amazingly beautiful. The
details in the structure are breathtaking, and pretty amazing to see.
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| Rockin Out infront of the mosque |
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| Mosque Hessan Tanny |
Since I’ve been
back from the marathon there hasn’t been much going on in site. The big holiday is coming and many
people are traveling or getting prepared which has made us cancel our classes
for the week. I am currently
preparing myself for Friday, when I will be going to my host family’s house to
celebrate by watching them slaughter a sheep or goat and eating almost the
entire thing. Hopefully my host
sister won’t mind me passing on my portion of brain and stomach to her.
