Sunday, November 26, 2006

Friend or Fowl

Seasonal changes… I’ve already begun sleeping quite regularly in a hat and gloves – not sure that bodes well for the winter to come, although I do concede that my cement house with high ceilings tends to aggravate the situation. Fall here is definitely not what it is at home – as we instead experience a rather sudden shift in temperature (not unlike the loss of Spring that I always lamented when I lived in New York and Boston). Still, I have my occasional reminders of what it ought to feel like. As I passed through Immouzer a few weeks ago to help out with a training, I felt fortunate to be in one of the few places in Morocco (that I’ve seen at least) where I could actually experience a little genuine fall foliage. It was raining rather hard when I arrived, but enjoying the smell of the wet leaves more than made up for the fact that I was slipping all over them! I had actually visited this cute town about the same time last year, but somehow I forgot… and after a year here, I am much more aware of the absence of these little tastes of home in my day-to-day environment.

Thanksgiving has come and gone. Even though I’ve missed my share of family holidays even while living in the States, somehow it’s a little harder here knowing that it is a prologue to an entire holiday season that I simply won’t be experiencing. I try to explain this to some of my Moroccan acquaintances, but Thanksgiving can be a little confusing given that it carries no religious significance. Still, in terms of explaining its cultural and family importance (along with Christmas), I try to draw parallels to Lعid al-Ftir and Lعid al-Kbir. Unfortunately, due to my limited language skills, my explanations are often limited to something like, “We celebrate sharing and blessings, and we eat a big dinner.”

That said, of course most volunteers know how to make the most of things and celebrate however they can. This year, a few folks headed to Assoul the weekend before for a quasi-pot luck meal. My sitemate’s turkey, Pickles, was supposed to be the star attraction. Unfortunately, Pickles didn’t turn out to be such a big eater (or perhaps she was just incredibly clever, although we all know that she is simply delaying the inevitable), so the butcher wouldn’t kill her. We had chicken instead. Now I will be stuck taking care of a turkey throughout the rest of the holiday season while my sitemate is away doing normal person things.

Speaking of chicken, in addition to the occasional cow in the transit, our drivers fairly regularly carry crates full of chickens back from Rich on their roofs. It is actually perversely amusing if you go to one of the areas in Rich where the transits park – you occasionally hear a series of squawks only to realize that each one represents some poor bird being tossed by a guy standing on the ground up to a guy on the roof of one of these vans (I guess it would be too slow – or simply lacking in entertainment value – simply to hand them up). Last week, however, I had cause to wonder if those few airborne moments perhaps give some of the birds ideas. As I was riding back to Assoul, several of us noticed something fall past the window and began yelling at the driver to stop. Sure enough, there was a chicken lying in the road a couple of hundred meters behind us. Apparently, the poor thing had seen its chance at freedom and tried to take it. “Immut" (“It’s dead”), an old man behind me said. Someone ran to grab it, and miraculously, it began flapping its wings and squawking – a real fighter! So back on the roof it went, probably only to have become someone’s lunch (possibly even mine) the next day. How depressing! Somehow, I think the story would have been far more heroic and inspiring had – barring a successful escape attempt – the thing simply died in the road.

Oh, as you may have noticed from my lovely portrait with Pickles, I have finally given up on the idea that simply pulling my hair back for two years would somehow be more practical. In fact, it was getting rather gross. Many thanks to my friend Anne for her help with the chop job (out of sheer frustration, I nearly engaged in a far more brutal one several weeks ago, but instead settled on simply taking a few inches until someone else could do it properly). Surprisingly, very few Moroccans have said anything to me, besides, “You cut your hair.” Thanks for the update. I have to say that, in addition to improved washing and winter hat-wearing conditions, I’ve been happy to feel a little more like myself again. It’s sort of like how I miss my regular wardrobe. It’s not especially diverse, but I never realized how much I felt like my own “sense of style” – and I do use that term loosely in my case! – helps define me. Here, with only one or two exceptions, my wardrobe consists entirely of clothes that I intend to throw/give away (even the stuff I brought from home), so you can imagine that there’s not all that much that I really love wearing here!

Another important aspect of “being oneself” here stems from friendships – more than I expected. I’ve been thinking a lot about that lately. Of course none of my friendships with Moroccans are exactly “normal,” if such a thing even exists. I have my host father, whose fantastic English and relatively open mind (although I do still push a few boundaries), renders him someone I can talk to about nearly anything. Mina – our cooperative president – is perhaps the most genuinely nice and caring friend I have made here, although our language and educational differences make it difficult to get into any complex conversations. Still, when I tried to tell Mina that I was feeling a little homesick about the holidays, she began tearing up as she assured me that my next year here will pass even more quickly than the first one. I so often feel so judged and on display here that it is nice to be reminded that some people do really look at me just like any other human being. And then there is Najat – who speaks sloppy French and refuses to understand my Tamazight, and yet offers my most relaxed Moroccan friendship. We look at fashion magazines (frighteningly outdated ones, I’m afraid), and talk about movies and men. The other day, she read my fortune, and we played cards all afternoon along with her sisters (I love how admittedly hashuma this house full of women is!), with the loser of each round being forced to sing, dance, or perform various acrobatic feats. When I left, she was going to feed the animals and offered to eat some of their feed if her sister and I each paid her 5 dirhams (a little less than 50 cents). Even though Najat is older than I am, I love that we can play like little girls, and that I am not being judged for not being a proper Moroccan woman (well, not being married, officially here I am still a “girl,” although I am trying to convince people to think about women a little differently on this front!).


One last lesson of the past week: If you drop $12 Sony earbuds into a bucket full of dirty dishwater, they'll still work after they dry. So even though their computer batteries suck, at least the company has redeemed itself in my eyes.

Tuesday, November 07, 2006

Broken Record and Bulimic Romans

... Not "record-breaking" (but perhaps that...), but that I sound like a broken record. I had big plans two weekends ago (once Ramadan finally ended) finally to visit the Saharan sand dunes of Merzouga (and undertake my first camel ride) -- one of my last major "must-sees" in this country (although with, in sh'allah, a year left, there's plenty more that I hope to do or revisit). Anyway, yet another rainstorm blew into Assoul for a few days. Our dry land couldn't handle it, and the end result yet again was widespread flooding, roads and bridges washing out in all directions out of town, and my getting stuck in Assoul for several days (which beats getting randomly stuck out on the road somewhere, which has happened to me more than once in the past) without any form of communication (remember, even the teleboutiques don't work when the sun isn't shining!). So my desert plans were literally all washed up.

Still, I couldn't feel too sorry for myself, merely missing out on a little vacation time, as I explored the damage around town. This time, there was basically a wide river of rather rough waters flowing past town in place of what had been everyone's fields. People (women mainly, of course) immediately came out to begin surveying their losses and cleaning up after the water began to subside in the following day or two, which I certainly admired. My life is not so hard.


This past weekend was a three-day weekend culminating in a holiday on Monday in celebration of the Green March, so I finally was able to get up to the city of Meknes long enough to visit the nearby Roman ruins of Volubilis. Some of the mosaiacs were surprisingly well-preserved, although I still struggle to imagine what life must have been like in these ancient buildings when they were fully intact, painted, etc. I have visited other Roman ruins in England and, of course, Rome, but somehow an interesting fact had heretofore managed to escape me (and I can't imagine having learned and subsequently forgotten this, but...!). Our guide, Rachid, led us into the ruins of one affluent home, showing us the latrine (which was set up like a bench so folks could continue socializing while they did their business) and a "vomitorium." "The Romans," he explained, "were bulimic." Apparently, the rich ones had nothing better to do but to eat and to have sex all day (the latter evidenced by a brothel with a large, carved-in-stone male organ marking the entryway). I supposed they had to find some way to reconcile the former activity with the latter and maintain their physiques. The fact that they ate lying down couldn't have helped either.

This week, I am repeating my Gender and Development training for some new Youth Development volunteer trainees before I head back to Assoul. Back at home, my life has been full of political intrigue regarding our new cooperative-in-progress, basically causing it not to progress very much. There is still no electricity, so I am reading a lot again since my two computer batteries can barely get me through one movie (thanks Sony). That said, if anyone can hook me up with the last four episodes of Season One of "24," I'll... well, we can negotiate your reward depending upon your personal requirements! In the meantime, the fuel supplier for the town generator has cut us off, because, in theory, they'll be losing Assoul's business anyhow once the real electricity gets hooked up (never mind that those crews have all gone back up to Imilchil -- our two villages take turns protesting in order to get work done, but apparently there are simply not enough labor resources to work both places at once!). My sitemate has a new creature gracing his garden -- a turkey named "Pickles." We'll be eating Pickles for Thanksgiving with the help of a few of our colleagues, although I have gracefully bowed out of any of the slaughter and cleaning activities, and have offered up my garlic baked mac & cheese instead (so what if I've never had that for Thanksgiving before!).