Quick Work Update

Today marks the first day in 18 months I actually called out of work due to sickness. (And by call I obviously mean awkwardly text my Mudir in Arabic with English characters and numbers.) In sum - I'm a baby. I rarely get sick, so when I do I totally succumb to my snotty nose and hacking cough. Which is way attractive, I'm aware. Also, I blame the entire thing upon fellow volunteer, Nina. The girl is usually quite lovely company, except it appears her phlegm seems to have gotten me sick in the first place. Though, I suppose,that's neither here, nor there. Since I'll be spending the next few hours cuddled up in bed with a cup of newly sent Chai Tea (thanks mom!) and my purring, portable heater, I figured I'd shoot you all an update from good old Sedona-miz.

Work here is pretty standard. English Classes have been reduced to Tuesday through Thursday from 4-8 in the Dar Chebab here in town. I used to work there everyday last year with multiple clubs and classes, but as I am now on my third Mudir, things are... ahem, different. Thus, myself and programming staff have decided that my commitment there is fulfilled with three days of solid teaching and I tend to look outside this particular location and find more successful and stimulating work elsewhere. Though, we still conduct the occasional themed day events and week-long projects on a regular basis. Examples of the former being a Road Safety Day, Theatre and Music Events, and a celebration of International Women's Day this past month. An example of the latter being a Free Health Clinic being set-up at the Dar Chebab that will run for five days starting this Sunday.

Dar Chebab

Youth in Dar Chebab during Theatre event

Road Safety Day

In addition to Dar Chebab commitments, I now go to a nearby village on Saturdays in order to work with my close friend & volunteer, Felicie, at her Women's Association. We work together tutoring girls in English for a few hours in the afternoon, and she also recently began tutoring young girls in French for the hour prior (which I'm also sneakily getting something out of...). Funnily enough, since her village doesn't have a high school, the girls we tutor travel daily to my town in order to finish their Baccalaureate education. So, technically, I'm still helping 'my community' by commuting to hers every Saturday. It's a particularly win-win situation as we get to spend our Saturday mornings hiking around the lake in her site, so it's a pleasant way to start the day and the weekend.

In the midst of a hike with the lake in the background

Felicie and Hadoc at the start of our lake-side jaunt.

In theory, I spend the next day, Sundays, with Sedona-miz's youth soccer league. However, the last couple of weeks have been an issue due to poor Moroccan bureaucracy. Essentially, we have been waiting on a piece of paper to be authorized in order to give us permission to use the school grounds for practice and tournaments without the school staff or director being present. This wasn't an issue last year, and wasn't an issue at the beginning of this season, but - as things go in Morocco - it became an issue when someone up the ranks was momentarily inconvenienced over a door-locking issue. Insha'allah, things will be remedied again by next Sunday and the season will continue according to plan.

Stretching before game time on primary school grounds

Practice and drills

Group of girls that participated in last year's 7 month season

In a few weeks time, all Youth Development volunteers here in Morocco will be conducting Spring Camps across the country. The Ministry of Youth and Sports are holding double the amount of camps this year than they did last year, to which your natural reaction should be something along the lines of: 'Wow! Looks like things are really progressing! They must be reaching so many more children!' Yeah, totally, right? Until you realize that they have doubled the amount of camps, but not the man-power. Since these camps are 'English-Immersion' style camps, they require a certain amount of volunteers to both conduct classes and coordinate the camps for the week in question. Only, the ratio went from around 1:10 last year to about 1:40 this year quicker than you can say 'Holy chaos, Batman!' There's no possible way these camps are going to run as efficiently as they may (or may not have) run last year. Also, the camp I signed-up to coordinate, may or may not be cancelled. Due to... drum roll please... Moroccan bureaucracy! And the truth of it is, I probably won't find out for certain until the week before the start date. Yay!

All in all, though, I'm content with the work I'm doing and with the momentum I have going. At this point in the game, with just about eight months left (holy crap!), the point isn't to be beginning new projects. It's a matter of successfully maintaining and completing those that you have already set up. This rings especially true within my particular sector, as the Youth Centre starts closing-up shop in June and won't re-open until late September, leaving me with... three to four more months of a solid, routine work schedule. My extra time is honestly being filled with GRE vocab-cards, re-working my CV, and contemplating job options for when I get back. 'Tis the season for beginning to think post-Peace Corps! Crazy.