a new baby and global warming

A new baby and global warming
I woke up to a brisk morning and found only the youngest sister moving about. Quickly I was brought up to date. My other sister who lives nearby went into labor early this morning. We ate breakfast quickly and hustled to the clinic on the top of the hill. Once there we waited patiently and my host sister drenched me in a strong perfume. We waged whether it would be a girl or a boy. The family was pretty sure it would be a boy. I had a strong feeling that it would be a girl but we all decided either way the baby will be loved and we were all excited.
I brought my Where There Is No Doctor book to the clinic in case something went wrong. Let me first tell you about this book. This is a village health care handbook that covers everything from diarrhea to tuberculosis. It explains procedure in simple words with aid of very detailed drawings, some of which I wish I had not seen. I could learn how to build an outdoor latrine, making sure it is well ventilated, how to put in a catheter and even scarier how to perform circumcisions; if the occasion just happened to present itself. I have no medical background but with this book I should be able to handle any of those procedures. Or so it claims. The only thing far scarier than the Where There Is No Doctor book just might be Where There Is No Dentist which does actually exist. Another important lesson that the book states in bold that I wanted to share is, DO NOT GET YOUR CHILDREN USED TO DRINKING CARBONATED BEVERAGES.
The thought of using the book made me sick. I’m not a fan of blood or pus so I’d rather not partake in medical procedures but if someone has to I suppose I would. Luckily the mid wife was perfectly capable and my fears were subsided.
I found myself picking the place apart. The one bathroom was filthy, there was blood on the floors, they were un-swept, and it was cold. The baby would be cold. The fire was started and the rooms were smoke filled. To start the fire my sister suggested throwing in a large plastic bottle. I looked at the clinic person for comfort seeing if she thought it was a bad idea to be burning plastic in an enclosed space where a child was just born. I received a blank stare as she sat at her desk, her head resting lazily on her hand. She saw no problem with it or why it might be a problem and just said, it’s going to go up the pipe anyways.
The baby was born into a world of melting plastic and cheap perfume.
I know burning plastic isn’t a direct influence on global warming but what about pollution, cancer, resperatory problems? I actually was a little aggravated and said in English in an overwhelmed mixture of concern and frustration with the problems of pollution and the diminishing quality of our environments health, “What about Global Warming!?” Then I laughed at myself for being irrational. In this moment a truth manifested itself to me. Teaching the concept of global warming and climate change and pollution to a majority of the world is extremely difficult and calls for a basis of understanding of some basic principles in science and environment. Teaching global warming to people who have never had the opportunity for education would, as I imagine, be mind boggling and appear foolish. We are expected the world to make a change and take on more environmental choices. The ones who have the opportunity and I believe the responsibility to do so is the wealthy, educated countries. Those who have the ability to make some sacrifices and chances, those countries that significantly influence others. The underdeveloped and developing worlds are consuming our products, our plastic products, our un-biodegradable, polluting products. This is being done at such an alarming rate and without any education of its harmful effects or proper disposal methods. Burning of plastic is very much a part of daily life.
There was however a valuable lesson learned about fire safety, the danger of carbon dioxide poisoning. My host mother wasn’t aware that it’s important to have a room well ventilated. How fire eats oxygen, a vital component to our survival. She just thought because you are cold you start a fire and close the doors and that’s fine. We sit in smoke filled rooms often.
While the father patiently waited outside, the baby was born around 3 pm. It was a girl and she would forever be called Maysam. She is truly beautiful, as babies are. She came with a full set of black hair.
After the baby was born I went over the mid wife’s house to hang out for a bit. We made friends. She is my age and is studying Economics in Meknes. She speaks English pretty well and we agreed to meet up often.

Aid-el-Kbir

December 9, 2008


*Reader discretion is advised. Once again the thoughts in this blog are mine and not that of Peace Corps. I am responsible for the words I write and take full responsibility. It is also important to keep in mind that I am a bordering vegetarian and my views are as I know rather subjective in this entry.


Setting of the stage:


Today the Islamic world celebrated its yearly sacrificial feast. It is known in Morocco as the “Great Feast” similar to our Thanksgiving in that regard. It was derived from the feast of atonement in which Abraham sacrificed a ram. As the story goes, Abraham was about to sacrifice his only son to demonstrate his faith and submission to God when fortunately a ram appeared in a nearby thicket. God spoke to Abraham, that he needs not to sacrifice his son, instead a ram would do. This is the same story as Abraham and Isaac in Christian and Jewish traditions. If you are still unfamiliar with the story and prefer a lyrical interpretation of the event I suggest listening to the song Abraham by Sufjan Stevens on their Seven Swans album. It is short and to the point. The whole album is worth listening to, yet questionably not as good as the album, Illinois: Sufjan Steven’s Invites You To Come On And Feel The Illinois. Okay, on with it…
The animal according to principle must be mature and without blemish. Each family must have its own sheep for the sacrifice or if one cannot afford a sheep a goat or a less expensive animal will suffice.


Prior to sacrifice, the people must purify and sanctify themselves. Personal cleanliness is practiced and men typically get a haircut and occasionally women apply henna. Henna serves the purpose of not only cosmetic purposes but also is believed to protect against evil influences. Some even paint henna on the sheep before the sacrifice. Following the feast, almsgiving and prayer ensue. The chief praying ceremony takes place in the morning at the mosque.
The Quran instructs that animals which are sacrificed should not suffer. Prayers and respect are offered to the animal. Other animals should be witness the sacrifice and the neck is to be cut with a sharp knife in one clean stroke. The animal is bled at sacrifice since blood is a cultural medium. The single stroke across the jugulars and carotids sufficiently reduces blood flow to the brain so that the animal is rendered senseless. Humane sacrifice and exsanguinations are similar qualities of ‘halal’ and ‘kosha’ meat. It is a time of humility in which practicing Muslims are expected to provide for the poor and reconcile differences within families and communities.
On the first day the liver, heart stomach and lungs are eaten within hours of sacrifice. At night the head and feet are eaten and the rest of the meat is spread out over the remaining week, sometimes even preserved through sun drying for a whole year.

The First and Final Act:



The night before our sacrifice, someone from town delivered a sheep to our house as part of almsgiving. We already had purchased a sheep however and it was decided the gift sheep would be kept as a pet for a year and be sacrificed the following year. It was far too skinny to provide sufficient protein anyways.

We woke up around 7:30 and had a breakfast of sweets. There was a lot of movement in town and there was a heightened frequency of animal sounds. My sisters and I quickly visited some relatives and around 10 the slaughter was to begin. In Morocco one cannot begin their slaughter until the king has performed his. On television we watched as the king dressed all in white slaughtered two massive rams which put the size of our sheep to shame. His rams were decorated in henna and had on a garter of orange flowers around its neck. With a white sheet protecting the king from the rams, and four men holding it down the task was handled quickly.
In most cases the man of the household would perform the ritual but as my father is blind that would not work out. Instead, the husband of one of my sisters and our cousin came to the house to help out.

I was not sure how I would react and was not sure if I was ready for what I was about to see.
The sheep was carried out of the barn with some resistance and laid on its side outside in the open courtyard near the drain and bathroom. I probably shouldn’t have but I looked into her eyes. I don’t know if I am giving sheep more credit in terms of awareness of preceding events but I swear she knew what was about to happen and she had an almost passive 'I give up look in her eyes'. Maybe it was my sadness reflecting in her eyes but I felt for her. This was going to be harder than I thought.



My family wanted me to take pictures of the event. I was excited at the chance of capturing such a cultural celebration but it was difficult.
Before I knew it the knife was slashed across the sheep’s neck, a lot smoother than I thought it would be. Immediately blood started streaming from the sheep’s neck, and convulsions soon followed. For minutes following, the animal with its neck slashed kicked its legs with such intensity as if it was caught in a nightmare and trying to escape with full force across an open field from an antagonizing predator.

The blood was drained from the animal and quickly washed away into the drain by my host mother and sister. They tried to keep the mess down to a minimum. Some of the blood was saved in a large red cap but I am not sure where that went afterwards. I pulled away from the scene, as far from the event as I could be in the limited space provided. Leaning up against the wall my family looked at me to see how I was doing. I tried to appear okay but I was horrified, sad and felt bad for my fellow member of the animal kingdom.

The animal continued to convulse so rapidly that it was spinning itself around in circles on its side, blood spurting about. After most of the commotion was completed, the head was completely severed from the body and immediate my host mother took it into the kitchen and placed it on the fire, searing off the hair and preparing it for future consumption. Following, my brother in-law broke off a branch from the nearby tree and sharpened one end of it. A slit was cut in one of the hind legs and the stick was then placed in the hole and moved around to provide a passage way for air to be blown through. He put his lips to the slit and blew in air and the sheep expanded just like a puffer fish or a balloon would. This is done so that the skin can easily be separated from the meat. With the aid of the knife and downward thrust of his fist, the skin was easily separated in one clean piece from the animal. The hind legs were than broken and tied together to be used to hang the animal upside down on a hook to continue the dissection. At this point our cousin had arrived with his set of knives and the stomach was opened.



The insides were extracted carefully. Intestines pulled out away from the body as not to contaminate the rest of the animal. The intestines are removed from a distance as to reduce the transmission of brucella (an inhaled pathogen). The heart, liver, lungs and such were placed in a plastic bucket nearby.
It was then discovered that the sheep was pregnant. I had a feeling prior to sacrifice this might be the case as the utters seemed swollen. Maybe that is why it was fighting so hard. It was suffering the loss of not only its life but that of its unborn child. The sack in which the baby was in was taken out and placed on the ground and then opened up. The baby was small and did not yet mature to the stage of having any hair but was in the form of a sheep none the less. The neck was slit and it laid there. Everyone felt bad but all were interested in seeing it. It was a good opportunity for an impromptu science lesson. With the chilly air, steam from the freshly opened body churned in the air.

The whole operation was fast. This I was thankful for. The smell which filled the rest of the day however was a constant reminder of the events which occurred prior. All day long the head was placed over a pot of water to steam on the wood stove in the main sitting room. Smells of burning flesh, hair and internal organs filled the air everywhere I went. In the kitchen the internals were placed on a grill plate and cooked over the fire. Intestines placed on the handle of a wooden spoon, turned inside out to clean and then placed on the fire. Liver was chopped into small pieces, wrapped in fat and thrown on a skewer.

I was handed a piece of intestine and a piece of bread. With the intentions to not offend I took the smallest piece of intestine, largest piece of bread and ate it as quickly as possible. It must be a delicacy. The only parts not eaten it seems are the brain. This the cats ate.


That was about all I could handle for the day and ate mostly bread. I could not get the image out of my head. I missed the distant connection between me and my meat. I don’t really eat a lot of meat as it is but seeing the action made me feel that much worse about my meat eating habits. It is not something that I need to survive. It seems unnecessary. I am more of the berry and nut eating variety I suppose.
It was nice to find out that not everyone enjoys eating the insides. My host mother wouldn’t eat them as well as another friend of mine in the village. I suppose having to prepare it all morning might turn one off. I am grateful that I did not witness any excessive pressure about eating the meat. That whole day and the following two nights I experienced reoccurring flashbacks of the event and I am still literally digesting it all.


I must say that in this entry I do not wish to offend or demote the ritual. I understand its significance and I know that everyday millions of animals are slaughtered for consumption all around the world, even excessively in my own country which actually uses less humane methods, but I am sympathetic towards my meat. If anyone has any information about veganism please send it my way. This might be my best option for personal food consumption happiness.

“Day of the first big snow”

December 2
I wake up in the morning to a foot and a half of snow layered out over my village like a fresh coat of vanilla frosting. School was cancelled because the roads were covered and the two plows in the region didn’t make it this way.
After a round of snow ball fights with the children outside I piled on the clothes and begun my trek to Ifrane. I had plans the day before to go with my site mate and another PCV nearby. We were determined to make it. We began our 4-5 mile hike around 12:30. The scenery around us was pristine and unscathed. Everything took on the appearance of a black and white photograph. All that was visible was white snow, and the wet, saturated tree trunks. The sky, having dropped off all it had to offer on the ground was now beaming sunlight.

We had begun walking through the forest towards the waterfall and stream nearby which had nearly doubled in size due to the past months of heavy rain.

On the way to Ifrane we saw two donkeys basking in the winter sun, trying to keep each other warm. Both had their front legs tied together which is common here so that they do not run away, however the technique provides them with the freedom to roam around larger spaces of land.

Up on a hill away from the road we spotted a group of boys skiing down a small slope. The younger children all stood up on the top of the snow mound watching the older kids ski down. One of the boys skied down to us and asked if we wanted to go for a run and we couldn’t pass up the offer. We climbed up the hill and traded in our snow soaked boots for a pair of ski shoes a few sizes too big. I was a little worried about the steep terrain and oversized boots but I made it down successfully none the less. After one run we thanked the young boys and were on our way, continuing our journey to Ifrane.

There were very few people whom we encountered on the unplowed street but we did come across a man and women walking from Ifrane back into their village. I was shocked a little when I saw that the women was carrying a large bag in each hand and one on her back as the man held nothing. He appeared to be in good shape and able. This is a common scenario I witness. Women do most of the heavy work.
Finally, our journey ended around 4:30 when we arrived to our destination in Ifrane. By this point the post office had closed and most of the tasks which we needed to accomplish had to be postponed as the sun was going down and most businesses had shut down for the day. Fatigued, cold and rather hungry we decided to stay with a friend’s family in Ifrane and carry on with what we needed to do the next day.

“Sheep”

December 1
We bought a sheep today but soon it will be dead. More on that later…

“Adjusting to the shower experience”

November 30

When I was a tot I remember taking baths with my mom in the room to supervise me. She made sure I did not drown myself in the tub and protected me from the burning sensation of shampoo in my eyes. As I grew up I enjoyed taking baths alone without any supervision. I would use the time to relax. I can turn on my music, maybe even light a candle and lay in the tub for a good while. Perhaps I might even read a book if I feel I am in need of an extra wind down.
Being here, I am once again reliving my childhood. No longer am I the independent self sufficient woman that I believed I was. With my limited vocabulary and comprehension I have a hard time articulating what I feel, need, want and don’t want. My family believes I am a young child who does not know the ways of the world. So when it came to bathing, I most certainly needed supervision.
It had been 8 days since my last bath. You might be disgusted to read this but let me assure you it is not all that bad. Being in the cold, I do not sweat and the thought of taking off layers of clothing to change sounds torturous. Towards the 7th day however you do begin to feel a little itchy. So on the 7th night, after dinner I mentioned to my host mother how I was going to go to the Hammam (public baths) the next day. Assured that I would catch a cold if I go, she insisted I bathe at home. I agreed and so the next morning I woke up to find that the living room was converted into the bathing room. The carpets were removed and a large metal bucket of water was placed on the wood stove. I was instructed to remove my cloths and sit in the plastic blue bucket near the stove.
I did as I was told, the same procedures as the Hammam. Undress and take everything off except for your underwear. So I did and I sat in the bucket, not yet warm from the water. My host mother wanted to stay in the room with me so as I undressed as she was sitting on the sofa watching me and instructing me how to mix the hot and cold water in the surrounding buckets to make it the right temperature.
So there I was, naked in the bucket. We had the television on and watched French cartoons, a language which we both do not understand. I am becoming less embarrassed about a lot of things and public bathing with my host mother is one of those things I have now come to accept. She does a great job scrubbing my back and I always leave feeling clean. What more can you ask for.

First Hammam:

Bodies of women crowded into a hazed room of steam. Body on top of body being scrubbed down. Women of all sizes, children. There was fighting and loud talking between women who were territorial over the limited sitting spaces on the ground. The floors were wet, walls cold, ceiling dripping condensation onto our heads. The walls and floor all tiled and slippery from soap. Women scrubbed each other with their hand mitts like a piece of meat. Four hours one woman can spend in a Hammam. Two hours for me was enough. I sat outside and waited for at least an hour for my host mom to come out. The time she had in there must have been very valuable to her, it was an escape from the house.
It was not like my experience in the Hammam in Rome except for the fact it was dimly lit, warm and there was water. There were so many bodies around. I was the only one in there who had short hair and was blonde. I was a spectacle, everyone watching me.

You scrub your skin and layers peel off of you. You are left with a fresh coat of flesh like the day you were born. It was dark in there. There was a warm yellow light. Haze. Children screaming and crying due to the heat. Women drinking from the faucet to keep hydrated. Older women with henna in their hair, the color melting away, running down their backs in the steamed room.
You sit in a wet space and soap up while seated in your underwear. Scrub yourself, have others scrub you, you scrub others. Rinse. Sit. Scrub again. Rinse. Sit. It is a repeated process until one feels they have cleansed themselves fully.

I can cook I promise

I’v been insisting that I learn how to kneed bread and that I want to help them but my mother just gently laughs at me and tells me my hands are for writing. I did however convince them that I could cook and I made my first attempt. A simple alfredo. I took a trip into Ifrane and searched high and low for the right type of cheese settling for the only package of grated cheese I could find. My only other option in the entire city was a block of Gouda. When I brought the package home my family was astonished at the package and it took a few moments to convince them that yes it was in fact cheese. Normally cheese is grated at home.
I went to work in the small kitchen and was being surveyed closely by my host sister, brother and mother who found it amusing that yes this young American girl does know how to cook. It was a little difficult trying to cook with them there as the sister refused to let me strain my own pasta or stir the pasta myself, afraid that I would burn myself. Luckily alfredo does not take a long time to prepare and before we knew it we commenced eating. I closed my eyes for just a few seconds with the first bite and briefly envisioned myself sitting in the Piazza of Santa Maria in Trastevere in Rome with a nice glass of vino. Luckily the family enjoyed the pasta and I received a round of applause at the end of the meal by my whole family.

Final Site Placement!

Bliss. I have arrived to my final site in Zaouiat Sidi Abdessalam. Excitement overcame me. Even my blind host father embraced me and expressed his excitement I was to stay there. One of my host sisters will also be staying in Zaouiat from now on. No longer will she travel to Meknes. I am glad; she keeps me company and helps me with the language.
Having arrived in October I was immediately introduced to the consequences of living at high altitudes and in cold weather. When it rains here the temperature drops drastically and the village streets turn into cascades, feeding into the river below. When I first arrived the weather was warming and the river nearly dried out. There have been fears in Morocco of desertification and lack of water but the past few weeks have been nothing but rain. The moisture is seen as a blessing to many farmers as it helps with their crops but in many parts of Morocco the rain is becoming a larger issue and vast parts of Rachidia, a nearby region have been witnessing severe flooding. Every night on the television there are new visions of the destruction the rain has caused.
The moisture is starting to drip from the ceiling leaving its imprint on the cold concrete walls; taking shapes like clouds do in the sky. If it were not for the wood stove I might freeze to death. I can see my breath as I sit in my room. I have been confined to the small wood stove in the communal living room where the family sleeps, eats and spends all their time. All of the walls have one long sofa against them. The father sleeps on a mattress on the floor and there is enough room for a small round table which we eat at and a TV that is on all day and receives three channels. The shows are all soap operas with a few dubbed French and Spanish ones. News plays on occasions in both Arabic and French. On Sunday mornings I was amused to see that the Bernstein Bears cartoon airs here. I grew up on the Bernstein Bears books.
It’s interesting how all the homes in Zaouiat have a television in them and it is the main source of entertainment. During dinner the television is also a guest at the table and like the family story teller it does most of the talking.

I just found out that my brother here is attending school without any heat in the building. He is also without any boots and he was freezing when he came home from school for lunch today. He tried fitting into his mothers black boots with pompoms but they did not fit. It took me 15 minutes of insisting before he put on my boots that fit just right. I can see him there in my mind, sitting in a cold concrete classroom, trying to remain focused in the bitter cold with his arctic hands frozen to his pencil.
Here you heat the person and not the room. It is certainly more difficult to adjust to at first but it actually makes more economical and ecological sense. We have come to depend on the wood stove. Cooking our dinner on the flames of the fire. There is constantly a tea pot on top with water which is used to wash your face and we use the flames to toast our bread in the morning.

On October 18th, twenty-four women participated in a group discussion concerning the history and future of artisan production in Zaouiat. Initially, we began the meeting with our questions in Tamazight. However, the women suggested we conduct the meeting in Darija. Although the change in language proved challenging, we were able to progress through our questions with the assistance of our LCF.
Following our meeting with the artisans, and informal ones with members of the community in Zaouiat, we had two Needs Assessments. The first was a formal one we compiled by asking the weavers directly and the second was our impression of the current attitude and state of mind of the women, obtained through informal discussions and speaking with our families at home. While the first may have been closer in form to the ideal we will strive for in service, the meeting was difficult to control and we felt that the list we ended up with was neither reflective of the artisan’s needs, nor realistic for us to implement. The women did agree that, among other things, they would be interested in workshops on natural dyeing and forming organizations, but the predominant demand was for community amenities.
However, since our informal analysis had shown that attempts at forming a cooperative in the past had simply ground to a halt, and attempts at selling to Al-Akhawayn University or setting up pricing systems based on output had failed and often cost the women money, we were hesitant to approach large projects or make promises. Rather, we felt that the most important thing was to give something concrete and, in some way, helpful, rather than uncertain hopes. We ultimately decided to hold workshops with guest speakers, since it was realistic and more beneficial, given our limited language skills and time frame. Amina Yabis led the first about natural dyeing, as the women would be able to use natural materials around Zaouiat for their own work. We also decided to invite a speaker from the Artisana in Azrou, Hossein Zahri, because we felt that the majority of the women were not aware of either the benefits or pitfalls of Nedis, cooperatives, and associations, nor of the steps necessary to create them.
Preparing for these workshops was relatively simple; we invited Amina for the day of Sunday, October 26th, and Hossein for the afternoon of Monday the 27th. The week before we bought wool for demonstrations from the suq in Azrou, and prepared it for dyeing as well as we could, based on our research of the process. We invited the weavers who had seemed most interested in serious discussion of their work at the meeting, and ones who had particularly impressed us with their skill. We met Amina in Ifrane, and although she was somewhat late so were most of the women, and after a brief scare that we were going to throw a party and no one would come, we finally had our speaker, a medium-sized but interested audience, and all the materials necessary.
Amina, a practiced speaker, did very well transferring knowledge of how to dye with natural products and which materials produce specific colors. As an attempt to leave concrete reminders, we bought a book from her to leave in the community, which explains the whole process and gives more details on the materials. Furthermore, we made bundles of the samples for each household attending, which was simple but pleased the women. Overall, they seemed happy and several at least said that they would use the skills in the future. As they left, we reminded them of the meeting on Monday.
The next morning, we called to confirm with Hossein that he would be attending that afternoon, and then went around the community reminding those we had marked as interested and motivated. At 3 o’clock, a few women showed up exactly on time, and more trickled in until we had a good-sized audience of about ten. At 3:30, we called Hossein to confirm that he was on his way, and learned that he was patiently waiting for us in the Artisana in Azrou. After he explained that he had a meeting in Ifrane, and could not come to Zaouiat that day, we spent a few frantic minutes discussing our options and ultimately decided that since we had the women there, we should discuss their experiences with working together and with weaving as a business.
The discussion was essentially a more rational and focused repeat of the first one, in which we were speaking with women who took their work seriously and wanted to explain it to us. We found that they enjoyed working together and felt more productive in small groups. Furthermore, they sometimes shared the responsibility of purchasing supplies or selling goods when a few could not go to the suq or markets. Concerns about more formal production arrangements seemed to be about lack of productivity in large groups, or misunderstandings such as believing that many women would be required to share one loom. Regarding general business practices, we found that some of the women had difficulty pricing their products and recording the costs of inputs, and would occasionally sell for less than they had paid for materials. The meeting ended with no real conclusion, but at the least the women did seem interested in forming an association or cooperative in the near future.

Technical:

Unlike the other training groups ours was rather unique. Most groups performed the technical aspect of their training in their community which they lived. As most inhabitants of Zaouiat are farmers and our program managers did not know of any artisans here we were assigned to an already organized co-op in a city roughly 30 minutes away. The majority of products created by these women consist of woven carpets, each done on a hand loom. Here is their link if you would like more information. http://www.freewebs.com/azrouartisana/amalweavingcooperative.htm

Our task was to work with these women and develop an action plan to help them in the course of our training which is roughly a month in a half. On our first day at the association we asked a series of questions about what a typical day was like for the women and how things generally work there. The next meeting we had was with the executives of the Co-op in which we had them create a community map. We provided markers and a large piece of blank paper and asked them to draw their city, locating important landmarks and places that they go to frequently.

It is interesting the way in which they decided to complete the map. The women were very timid at first and originally wanted us to draw the map as they claimed to have no drawing skills. After some encouragement one of the women took hold of the marker and with the direction of the other ladies drew a large circle in the middle to mark the co-op. Lines were drawn out of the co-op, marking the distance each women was from the co-op and who was close to who. When asked where certain landmarks were in the city they had difficultly being able to place them in relationship to themselves. Although this map did not provide an actual representation of their city it did provide insight to the lives of the women and their way of thinking. Women in the co-op general go straight from home to work and vice versa, not really being able to walk around their own city. Their life is structured around the co-op and the lines drawn appear to be a representation of their relationship to their community.

When asked where they do not like to go in the city the response from one lady was public parks as she doesn’t like people to watch her.

After our third trip we discovered that continuing our work at the artisana there was going to be more difficult than we imagined. One of our first concerns was that we were learning a different language than the artisans speak. They speak Darija and we were learning Tamazight. We had a difficult time asking questions and conducting interviews and understanding their responses. The travel was also proving to be an issue as it was far away and took away time from our language lessons and, the schedules of the women were not that flexible that they could receive us when we came for our brief hour sessions twice a week.

Fortunately, after talking with the women in Zaouiat we were extremely excited to find that yes there are artisans here but most just do not think of theselves as such. Almost every woman in Zaouiat is a carpet weaver and has a loom in her house. The products range from traditional carpets, pillows, jellabas, buttons, purses, needlepoint, embroidery, knit sweaters, and pants. Weavers use materials from different sources. Sometimes they recycle wool from old sweaters to make their rugs. Women who own sheep will often prepare wool on their own. The women also use commercially processed yarn purchased most often at the s-suq in Azrou.

The artisans of Zaouiat are not uniform. Many use traditional Berber patterns but we also found examples of individual creativity in the textiles of Zaouiat. One woman sells embroidered cloth to a shop in Fez. Another has found a market in France for her carpets. Yet another woman sells knitted garments to friends and family throughout Zaouiat. Several women participate in Ifrane’s craft fair in the spring. Although all are talented, some artisans are more skilled in commerce.

We walked around and saw many carpets made here and were extremely impressed in their quality and design. The women in Zaouiat however are not yet formally organized and only create carpets and blankets for their families. We have heard that there was an attempt a few years ago to form an association and the paperwork was near completion but due to the expenses of traveling to Meknes to process the paperwork and the cost of making photocopies the project was dropped.

The more information we found out about the weavers in Zaouiat the more we decided we had to convince our program manager to let us do our technical in Zaouiat. We had many opportunities to integrate with the people of Zaouiat. We adopted Tamazight names, which were assigned by our friends in the village. I will forever be referred to as Karima in Morocco, which I have heard is a good name meaning generosity.

We have witnessed many situations in Zaouiat, both religious and cultural. During the first week, we were walking around and stumbled into the ceremonial recognition of a new soccer field where we met many local and regional officials. Unfortunately, we also experienced a death in our town. Our cook’s mother passed away and we went to her house to pay our respects. We witnessed the grieving at her house and then saw the ceremony at the cemetery the following day. In addition, we celebrated L-Eid in Zaouiat, which we spent with our families. As a group, we united and went around the village greeting people and enjoying a cup of tea at each house. The women in our group also had traditional henna painted on their hands for the celebration. One of the more entertaining moments was when the group was dressed in traditional clothing and paraded around for our families. We learned that the best way to integrate into the community was to make time for tea and conversation with the families.

Not only were we already integrated into our community but the women showed a willingness to work with us. Thankfully after a meeting with the program manager we were allowed to stay in Zaouiat and perform our technical training in Zaouiat. We only had two weeks left in training and we had to make use of the time as effectively as possible. Our first step was to find a time in which of the women in town could get together and sit down with us for a little question and answering. We walked around house to house inviting women we knew weaved and invited them to attend. The local authorities, the Qaid, Moqadem, and Sheikh, played an integral role in inviting women to attend the meeting.

Task One:

At the onset of our arrival we had to check in with local authorities stationed on higher ground. We followed the path laid out by the frequent trips taken by the donkeys only to find that the Calif (mayor) was out. As we walked back we discovered the reason for his absence at his post. It was the inauguration day of a new soccer field and darshabeb (free school) which was to be built. A mass of men lingered around the new field. Women watched from a far occasionally resonating a reverberating shriek which I was told is a customary way to welcome guests. While most local women stood afar few women, including the ones in my group stood amongst the elite men from outside the village. I later found out that one of the females was an engineer of the project; another is a VP of an office and one a president of an association. Fortune also graced us with the chance to meet the president of the Tamazight communities, who interestingly enough is deaf. (a deaf leader… something to pounder on in the future)

Shortly, the Caid showed up to the event. At that time, an elder of the village approached him vocalizing his objection to the field being built as he believed the land was stolen from him. With a lack of a written documentation of the land being his, there is not much to be done. Distressed, the older man became louder and the confrontation escalated. A group of men formed around the conflicting pair. Attentively the Caid listened to the man and tried his best to resolve the quarrel for the time being. Patience and listening skills I found are an honored characteristic of authorities in Morocco. One is supposed to firstly listen to what someone has to say and be patient before taking any action. Despite efforts however, the older man would not settle and the event became a little physical. At this point the local police took action and had to move the man away from the Caid so that the Caid could continue on with the dedication.

Training: Octoberish

My CBT (Community Based Training) group made up of 4 other PCT’s(Peace Corps Trainees) was assigned to do our training in a small Berber farming village named Zaouiat Sidi Abdessalam located in the Middle Atlas Mountains. It is recorded that there are 240 households here and I am almost sure more animals than people. Inhabitants are believed to be related to the founder of the site, Sidi Abdessalam.

Abdessalam reportedly was a very religious man who decided to move away and live in solitude. He found this scenic landscape in a little valley with a stream running through its heart and decided to set up his abode. In intervals his family followed him to this site and when he died they erected a modest sized mausoleum on site which is still visited. It has been customary for inhabitants of Zaouiat to marry within the family and most people here are either married to first cousins or friends of relatives. Zaouiat in all its forms illustrates a collectivist community in which one looks out for the other.

Zaouiat feels like one large house and people walk around visiting each other unannounced and sit for hours drinking tea and conversing about the weather, how three cows died the night before due to cold and if one’s family is well. Due to the comfort of everyone being comfortable with one another, women here walk around in pajamas unless they go into the nearby cities for shopping in which they outfit themselves in jelabbas. Another characteristic of women’s dress here is a bath towel fastened onto their shoulders cloaked over their front acting as an apron and another defense against the cold. Men here on the other hand appear to be more modernly dressed and enjoy wearing various track suits and the young ones are fitted in the classic white and black converse. Since men have more freedom to travel and are generally the ones who go to the cities it only seems to make sense they would be more contemporarily dressed.

When my community based training group (CBT) and our Language, Cultural Facilitator (LCF) arrived into Zaouiat we were all delivered like babies in a basket to our home stay families. Everyone was very nice to us but with our limited vocabulary it was difficult to explain ourselves. We arrived with a vocabulary bank of 5 or so words which couldn’t get us past “Thank you” and “How are you?”. The first day I walked around with a little notebook and pen recording everything I could point to. At arrival, two of the home stay families pulled out last minute and two of the girls in my CBT group were periodically destitute. Fortunately within fifteen minutes of inquiry two families graciously opened their homes to them and we all were successfully placed within a family. We all were fortunately only a few steps away from one another. My family consists of my mother father and my 15 year old brother. I have three sisters. One is 23 and lives and works in Ifran, another is 20 and lives in Meknes and one is 22 and lives in Zaouiat with her husband. After briefly settling into our housing situation we went straight to our LCF’s house to being language lessons and make lunch.

During the time which we arrived, the whole community of Zaouiat was fasting for Ramadan and we had difficulty finding bread. An endearing woman over heard that we were in need of bread and she brought out a fresh loaf she had just baked to give to us. For a people who are said to live in poverty, the hospitality emanated is rich in quantity and quality. From the beginning our group felt welcomed and protected by the community. Everyone’s host mothers even insisted on accompanying us to class on the first day, afraid and assured that we would get lost despite literally being around the corner from where we all lived.

Arrival in Casablanca: September 9th

Stepping off the plane I was intoxicated by exotic new smells. It was a combination of what I imagined warm red sand to smell like, mixed with that of subdued exotic spices cooked into long grained rice and that familiar scent of someones grandmother. The air was warm and there was some humidity in the air but that was balanced by the feeling of dry earth. The time spent in Casablanca was short and we were quickly whisked off to Rabat for pre-service training. The view from the windows of our large luxury bus was that of newly paved str eets, donkey pulled carts, farm animals such as cows, sheeps and chickens as well as a few stray mangey dogs who rustled threw the scraps of greenery for nutrients.

I was surprised by the litter scattered across the semi barren land. What appeared to be plastic bags and products seems to have been imbeded in the earth just as long as the soil they polluted. Houses and buildings were scattered about and the structures were consistantly painted in shades of white and earth tones.

Rabat: September 9-12th
The hotel in Rabat was both comfortable and foreign. The smells of the food filled the air even though it is Ramadan, the time in which Muslims fast from sunrise to sundown. While in Rabat we recived vast amounts of information regarding safety and security. There seems to be an air of freight of the streets when locked up inside the hotel, hearing stories of how things can go wrong. From a quick view or survey from the balcony of the hotel to down below, the fear subsides. It is like Platos cave. Images and stories of the outside fill our mind but once we are allowed to step out and see things for ourself the reality is not quite as scary as we had imagined.
Satelites seem to adorn every rooftop.
The traffic can be freightening to a foreigner. There appear to be similarities in driving styles in Morocco to that of Italy. There is chaos yet an understanding of that chaos amongst drivers.
The Ambassador also came to speak to us and we found out some interesting tidbits. Apparently the United States and Morocco have long had good relations. Morocco was the first country to recoginze the United States independence. The Ambassador spoke of a copy of a letter he has between George Washngton and the Sultan of Morocco dated 1789 which thanks the Sultan for his support and that he was sorry he did not respond to the Sultans messages earlier as he was just finishing up a revolution and getting used to his recent election as president.
After a few weeks in Rabat we took off for a town in the Middle Atlas mountains. I wish I could tell you where but this is confidential.


Middle Atlas: September 12-21



The town we are staying in is surrounded by mountain peaks and cedar tree forests and there are rumors of monkeys off in the distance. A group of us went hiking on our day off and failed to find them however, the view was breathtaking. Surveying the land I realized this part of Morocco is not how touring books generally depict it to be. Yes, the land is sandy but there is also greenery all about. Morocco also has many plants similar to that of the ones I see at home but only of a slightly different variety. For example, inpatients, grapevines, verbenas, roses and such.
The days are relatively warm and the nights are much cooler. The other night I witnessed the most spectacular storm from the rooftop of our hotel. Surrounded by mountains I watched as a massive thunderstorm went around the circumference of our town. The lightening spectacle was like watching fireworks but due to the distance there was no loud crash. I must have stood there for a good hour just watching, stunned by the beauty.

While in training here we have been doing a lot of language and cultural training. We learned the ceremony of tea preparation, how to use a Turkish toilet, food and water safety and table etiquette. We also received a few shots which didn’t feel too good. The whole group of the Small Business Developers began learning Darija (Moroccan Arabic) for the first week and a half. The past few days however I was assigned with a few other students to begin learning Tamazight instead. Tamazight is the language spoken by the Berber communities in Morocco. It is the language of the indigenous communities and has been spoken for over 3,000 years. I’m extremely excited about this as I greatly desire to work with the Berbers and learn about their culture which has been put on the fringes of society since the westernizing of the country by the French.

The whole lot of us are all breaking up into smaller groups for 5’s and 6’s and sent off to our first session of community based training in which we will all spend two weeks with a host stay family to better learn Moroccan culture and language. I will be living with a mum, dad and two daughters (18 and 21 yrs) as well as a son (12yrs). I will be without internet for those two weeks so I will update you as soon as possible.

Questions, comments or concerns?

No need to be worried.

Morocco? Where is that?

Morocco is like a tree whose roots reach deep into African soil and which breathes the winds of Europe through it's leaves.

Morocco is located in Northwest Africa, separated a few miles from Spain via the Gibraltar Straight. Morocco is composed of the Sahara desert, coastal land in the north and the Middle Atlas Mountains which runs through its midsection.
Arabic is the official language, however French is also widely popular as well as a few Berber dialects. Morocco also houses one of the oldest University in the world, The University of Kaureein, founded in 859 A.D. in Fez, Morocco.
The national drink: mint tea
The national dish: cous cous

The Job: Small Business Development

aiding local artisan communities, mainly groups of women in rural areas

• product quality and service control
• business planning and management
• organizational development, individual empowerment
• community leadership

Training: 11 weeks of Pre-Service Training in Azrou, Morocco (Middle Atlas Mountains), orienting myself with local resources, cultural and social contexts, learning either colloquial Moroccan Arabic of one of the Berber dialects.

Living Adjustments:

-Turkish toilets... look it up

-eating from a communal platter of food with shared eating utensils and glasses

-very different meal times

-deficiency of alone time and personal space

-lack of independent movement for women after dark

-differences in dress (no revealing sun dresses)

-prohibition of alcohol as is customary in a Muslim country

blog, blogging, to blog, blogosphere

I was apprehensive. Well no, present tense, I am apprehensive about blogging more than I am about leaving for Morocco. Communicating virtually is something which I question the sincerity of. I would rather hold your hand and talk to you, looking into your eyes, or the space between your chin and shoulder blade.

Words seem to take on further characteristics once spoken orally. There is an ephemeral nature which places an immediacy and importance to the words. They are gone and you can only grasp on to a few quick phrases if you are attentive, some which you can hold onto long enough if they ingrain themselves.

What happens to things once you put them on the Internet? Is it preserved for cultures to view in generations to come after being filed in wherever things are filed, to better be searched for in the future by newly developed search engines? The soundness of this question is irrelevant for the time being, I am doing this to keep in touch with my loved and to be loves.

With all the above placed in a box to the side, I shall venture into the blogosphere and begin another journey blogging about my jaunt on Moroccan soil with the Peace Corps. For my close and dear, I wish this new tool will aid in experiencing with you that which I wish I could be doing with you by my side. For future, former or ambiguous participants in that which is the Peace Corps, I hope I can do justice in providing an unprocessed voice of a 22 year old female from New England participating in a two year small business project in Morocco, doing what I hope to be assistance to local artisans and craft persons alike.