Progress Report for the parentals

Although I'm sure I'll be winning a Pulitzer any day now for my accounts of a stinky, sub-par bus ride, most of you readers (read: my parents and/or extended family members) are probably looking for more of what I'm actually doing lately, a progress report if you will. (Man, I hated those things... every time they arrived I had to give an oh-shit off-the-cuff middle school speech of 'but that was before I turned in my report and got an A on that test, it'll be at least a B by the time the quarter ends!'' And it was... usually an A actually.)

And I give you, what my google calendar looks like:

The kid's club - a project I was working on with some of the local ex-pats - finished up last week and was a really successful pilot project that will hopefully continue during the next school year. Each week we held two three-hour sessions that consisted of two activities and one talk/lecture/discussion. The day would start with something like games, arts & crafts, or songs, we'd have a 20 minute talk on something like 'how to admit when you're wrong' or some other lesson/moral, and then finish with an activity on the environment, language (tash, tam, or english), or chess. We invited the sixth year students from each of the three primary schools in Sedona-miz and with each school on a four week rota, the project lasted a total of three months. It was a great way to meet a lot of the younger kids throughout town and brought me closer to some of the other development workers in town, friendships I am currently very thankful for.

English classes at the Dar Chebab are also slowly coming to an end. As I leave for IST (inter service training) in Rabat next week, today is actually my last class with the Baccalaureate students in preparation for the big exam in June. When I get back to site about half way through June, temperatures will be well into the 100s and people will be starting to vacate my village, making it relatively pointless to hold classes on a daily basis. I'll be continuing my adult classes, as they are super keen, but won't be resuming regular DC duties until September. And though part of me is sad to lose routine, the other half is screaming 'ALHAMDULILAH!' as I really am burnt out from the redundancy of the DC at the moment. A change of pace is welcome, and I'm looking forward to what the summer brings.

So what is going to be brought by this delightful season? Firstly, IST as I mentioned. A week long PC extravaganza in which we meet up with some NGOs, get some grant writing education, and most people will be meeting with their Mudirs in an organized group-like fashion. My site has had like a kajillion volunteers (five YD I believe... so in PC terms... a kajillion), so my Mudir pretty much knows what's up and was not exactly invited... one of 5 Mudirs not invited. He's a little butt hurt, but mashi mushkil. Anyway, IST is going to be awesome as it's the first time we'll be in a fabulous hotel with both with YD and SBD. Sweet deal. Actually, if you recall from an earlier post (yes, about 7 months ago), that gorgeous hotel we all stayed at after swearing in... the one where staff effed up and we had 8-9 people in a 1 bedroom room?? Mmm hmm, yeah we are back there, and insha'allah, we will actually have a bed, if at least a pillow, to ourselves. Not that I didn't enjoy spooning with half of my female stage on the floor... Love you girls.

I'll return from IST for about two weeks before heading off to Gnaoua, that epic music festival I had mentioned previously in Essaouira. SO STOKED. I'm taking a couple vacation days for it even. Yay for relaxing beach side and dancing my tuchas off for a weekend. Much needed. Especially as it will be roasting in my site by then, the salty off shore breeze will be more than welcome.

July will be mostly in site, doing a couple classes a week at DC and... balls if I know. This is my call to you people: find me a new hobby. Crocheting? Nah. Reading? Do that already. Sports? Not in 120 degree heat folks. Underwater basket weaving? If I can find a water source deep enough. I plan on attempting to paint more... and better (read: I suck), start running (read: jogging... it may be pronounced yogging... apparently you just run, for an extended period of time...) with my host sister at like 6am a) so it's not too freaking hot out yet and b) so the creepers in Sedona-miz don't stare. Also mid-month we'll be having a soccer team from America heading into site for a bit. We'll be setting up a day camp for the girls we did the kitty league with in which they rotate between booths, manned by both Moroccan and American players, focusing on various football skills and techniques. Should be awesome. I've also recently completed a grant application to pay for uniforms and equipment for next year's season, so let's hope that comes through as well!

August will be... dun dun dunnnnnnn... Ramadan. I'll be fasting folks, so prepare for a lot of bitchy rants on this here blog about how hungry I am. Or, well, I'll be fasting until I go to Portugal at the end of the month! Or at least that's the plan. A fellow PCV has family there who are ducking out back to America for a bit and have thus bestowed crashing rights to us during the super skhoon (hot) month of August. Lisbon is going to be AWESOME.

Also at some point late July/early August I'll be doing summer camp for a few weeks. We'll find out at IST when exactly our region's dates are, but should be wonderful. Back up in El Jadida, along the beach, and we get to bring three kids from our sites for free, so super happy about that :). Looking forward to it as I really loved Spring Camp and can only imagine this being even better as the Atlantic Ocean is involved.

That about sums up my to-do list this summer, along with cuddling with the kitten, hanging out with the sitemate as much as possible before he leaves (wahhhhh), and (oh yeah!) meeting up with the new region mate 30 min down the road from us in a beautiful site containing a lake (yippeeeee). Felicie is the new (read: only) environment volunteer in the region and (alhamdulilah) is seriously awesome. French born, Ohio raised, PC Benin, Miami, now here. Chick wrote a book too. She is definitely a more than welcome addition to the Marrakech region.

Ttttthat's all folks.

Birthday Dinner at the Sushi-Thai place in Marrakech

Felicie and I at the Almazar shopping mall

Relaxing at our Riad during Alex's, Juan's, Cynthia's, and my birthday weekend

Anecdote in need of an Antidote.

So there I am, minding my own business - ipod in, sunglasses on - waiting for take off to commence towards Sedona-miz from Marrakech after a consolidation drill this weekend. An unveiled young lady comes and sits next to me with a welcome smile and in the back of my mind I'm thankful for a female seat mate for the duration of the ride. My mind wanders out the window and for a moment I'm blissfully unaware of the nuclear strike that is about to commence against my nasal passage.

These two, obviously troubled and possibly homeless, young teenagers - tweens if you will - are the last of the stragglers hopping on board before we pull out of the bus stop. No seats are left vacant, so they are forced to park their rears directly in front of myself and my soon to be bff, just beside the exit doors of our fine bus. In that very moment a wave of absolutely, deliriously, bitingly sour nausea passed over me. The little receptors on the interior of my nasal passageway were literally screaming 'WTF?!?!' And pushing through the vomit inducing fumes, I tried to figure out what the hell was creating this plume of epic disgust.

The source of my current dry heaving was obviously a direct result of these two youngsters in front of me, but the act of pinpointing exactly the cause of my imminent fainting proved difficult to say the least. The kids blatantly hadn't showered for... Allah knows how long, but the smell was much more pungent than that alone. Pee? Their own mixed with any other domestic or otherwise wild animal? Skid marks left from an ineffective bitlma run? Souvenirs of vomit-packed mikas? Possibly... But there had to be something else... It did occur to me that it was a hot, damp summer day... could it just be an extreme case of swamp-ass? Or worse, genital sweating in combo with poor hygiene? We were too early in the ride for that to have developed, I was sure, though to some degree there had to be something awry with either their perspiration levels and/or junk. Lil' Johns timeless prose of 'til the sweat drop down my balls' internally programmed on repeat despite the omnipresence of my ipod.

While all these various options were further dizzying my lightheaded brain, I bonded with smiley lady next to me. I gave her some intensely minty gum, two pieces to be factually accurate, in order to relieve some of the stress upon our nasal cavities. She in turn hosed me down with her spray deodorant - focusing mainly upon my fingers and palms so as to suffocate myself with the fumes in order to best override the road to unconsciousness lying before me. Our strategies were mediocre at best. The thirty minute travel time with Stinky and the Pain exhausted any power the aerosol can may have once had.

It was upon their exit, however, that we discovered the mystery of the Moroccan stink bomb - glue huffing mixed with hash out of some sort of pipe device they each had up their sleeve (literally). Gag worthy to say the least.

There's no place like London

Though Stephen Sondheim once argued that it's a hole in the world like a great black pit, and it's filled with people who are filled with shit, and the vermin of the world inhabit it... I still vote London pretty much rules. After eight long, albeit rewarding, months I managed to vacate Sedona-miz for greener, er colder, pastures. In a matter of three airborne hours, I went from 38 degree weather to 9. Though this happened to be the least of my problems that day.

I'll spare you all the details but the twelve hours prior to take-off consisted of: ipod headphones breaking, at least 40 seriously rambunctious school boys destroying public property - aka dismantling the bus i was on - en route to Marrakech, making a new friend on the aforementioned bus due to much needed distraction, sleeping in the cafe of the Marrakech airport, getting kicked out from 2am -4am and sleeping on a bench, wanting to kill myself during takeoff/descent due to the congestion I had accumulated during my stay in the airport, and haiving my ears plugged for the first 12 hours in country and perpetually sounding like I was a prisoner on the inside of a muffler. Joys.

Once in good old Angleterre I couldn't have been happier. Though I had pretty much lost my voice for most of the weekend and wasn't exactly prime partying material, it didn't stop me from eating my body weight in pork and taking at least two showers a day. It was a dream. All of you know the foodie inside me wants to take you through a far too descriptive play by play of my grazing habits during the calorific four day stay, but I'll just mention the highlights: Bodean's BBQ, Hummingbird Bakery, HK Diner, Snog, The Hoxton Pony, Nude Espresso, Insert nondescript Curry delivery here, Zizzi's, and Itsu, in chronological consumption order. It truly was a culinary tour de force for someone who has pretty much been eating tagine as a religion for the past eight months. Not to mention the fact that my friends paid a micro-country's GDP for our marathon feasting extravaganza. No regrets. Let's just hope my souq has celery, and nothing but, next Tuesday. And the Tuesday after that.

On a more 'blog-worthy' note I suppose, I was happy to find out I was still me there, as I am still me here. Part of me was legitimately concerned I would all of a sudden find myself wanting to stay in London and having some sort of out-of-body freak-out while some officially dressed officials dragged me by my heels through customs to make sure I got on a plane back to Morocco. Part of me was equally as worried I wouldn't fully connect with my dearest friends in London over lifestyle changes, priorities, personal hygiene... etc, and that I'd be preaching some pompous save-the-world dogma while we ate our crudités. Thankfully, both worries were not present in the slightest - well maybe slightest, as in my friends didn't fully appreciate my donkey side-swipe anecdotes amongst their 'screw people and their baby buggies in stores' conversations - and I was as happy to be there as I was to return here. It made me realize how much I do love about my life here in Sedona-miz and how much I will love returning to somewhere like London or New York afterward. Time and a place, insha'allah. And just for the record though, I kind of have the best friends in the world by the way. Like, seriously.

On another side note, the broski is officially off to Kuwait in June for a year's tour. And apparently he's thinking of not going home for Christmas... Now this puts me in quite the predicament. Now I can see why he's thinking of not doing so, abroad for the first time, seriously different surroundings, keeping a certain mindset while there, having a chance to travel, etc. The same things I faced to some degree in deciding to return home for the holidays. However, last year's miss of xmas was not by choice but by PC policy. I have been planning on flying home this Christmas as to hopefully get another point in the 'not going to hell in a handbag' column, but with the brother not going... do I go? I seriously cannot be held responsible for my mother ODing on Scotch and Sodas before sticking her head in the oven if both of her kids are in the Middle East during this joyful holiday season. This brings options to the table: home for just a week? Meet in the middle and do a New York celebration? Get thrown out of the will and take advantage of some travel during the time period in question? All things that will be discussed tomorrow during our Skype date I'm sure. Oh, am I posting this on the interwebs before chatting with the mumsie about my ditching her on Christmas? That would be correct. Wish me luck.

Edit: So while talking to the mom tonight did I lead with anything optimistic? No. Did I mention I wasn't thinking of coming? Yes. Did I eventually say I promise to come for at least 5 days around Christmas only after tears? Yes. Did I forget to say happy mother's day even after having her hint at least three times? Yes. Do I seriously fail as daughter of the year today? Yes.

Say what you want, but hotdamn that tasted good.

Heather, Me, and Mckinley. I need to start wearing a new cardigan. Oy.

Giovanni and myself with a pretty fantastic cupcake in the foreground.

God's gift to international pastry culture: the cheesecake brownie.