National Lampoon's Wiener Vacation

"I hear the rain a comin',

it's rollin' 'round the bend.

And I ain't seen the sunshine,

Since, I don't know when."

- a take on Johnny Cash's Folsom Prison Blues

I don't even know what to say about the weather these days. We had four months of winter without any rain, and then May happened. Since the start of the month it's been non-stop storming. Which, I would complain about more if they weren't accompanied by some epic thunder and lightening. I know I compare this place to Arizona all the time, but these daily afternoon thunderstorms are straight of my childhood vacations to Flagstaff and Sedona. The temperature - thankfully- drops a few degrees and the village comes to a standstill, watching & waiting, until the storm passes a short twenty or thirty minutes later.

Now, there is a lot I would love to write about these days, but somehow it all comes back to feelings tied to, results of, or reactions to the Marrakech bombing and/or the death of OBL. Both of which the Peace Corps has asked us to temporarily suspend our first amendment right on. Though it's a no-go topic for the moment, we'll see how long I can keep my mouth shut for. Probably not that long.

Happy news, however, I'm seeing my brother next week! No, he still isn't allowed to enter the country (note: in addition to military not being able to enter the country, no other Peace Corps volunteers are allowed to vacation here either. It's a complete shutout - Oh, except for us of course) buuuut, I was granted leave on short notice to go meet him in Vienna! So, in addition to seeing my brother, we'll be staying with two of my very good friends and the vacation also happens to coincide with my birthday. Success!

I must say, it has been well earned though. These last few weeks have been chock-full of primary school activities, Medical Clinic preparation, and grant proposal drafting in addition to regularly scheduled classes at the Dar Chebab. Not to mention the copious amounts of GRE studying I'm having to do these days. The five days in Vienna (well, more like three with two days travel) will be a welcome change of pace.

Sidenote: In attempt to come up with some sort of pun for the title of this entry, instead of coming across a classic sausage joke or Schwarzenegger reference, I stumbled upon a mathematical concept of something called a Wiener Sausage... talk about a mind trip. I was SO confused for least 15 seconds.

I got this:

Instead of this:

Ps. It's worth noting that the caption underneath that first picture was: "A long, thin Wiener sausage in 3 dimensions." Not kidding.

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

No, Clint Eastwood has not randomly come to Sedona-miz. (Though how awesome of a coincidence would that have been? Clint & Sedona. Mmm, yes.) Instead, this is a current summation of this past week's adventures.

The Good:

Weddings. Weddings! Who knew I was such a gosh darn sap? Last Sunday, I had the privilege of witnessing two of my good friends from Uni marry each other, on one of the most beautiful days I have ever seen in London. At the Bingham Hotel, in Richmond Upon Thames, Paige & Harish exchanged vows in front of around 50 of their closest friends and family. I had been excited for the day to come for some time, but I hadn't anticipated quite how touching and wonderful it was going to be. I blubbered all over myself during the ceremony & speeches. Thankfully, I remained composed for the rest of the evening. Champagne may or may not have had something to do with that. Reacquainting with friends I hadn't seen for three years, some even six, was a gift in itself. I felt like I was home again, in a country I adore, with the people I love. Since it's still another six months until I get that feeling back permanently, I look forward to July when two of my very best friends get hitched as well, just this time in St Andrews.

Speaking of St Andrews and weddings and people I went to school with - I'll keep it brief, but my God was the Royal wedding beautiful yesterday. I mentioned blubbering before; it was more of a slow and steady trickle this time... But come on! That dress. And tiara. His 'I'm-quite-pleased-with-myself' smirk. The flower girls. And the choir boys singing. And... all of it. I'm a sucker. So sue me.

The Ugly:

Yes I realize I'm reversing two of the adjectives, but stick with me. The ugly should be quite obvious. There was, as I'm sure you all are aware by now, a remotely-detonated bombing at a cafe in Jma El Fna square in the center of Marrakech yesterday. No, I was not there. No PCVs were injured. No, Peace Corps does not have plans for consolidation or evacuation as it stands. Sadly, 16 people were killed, and around 20 injured they say. Among them French, Canadian, British, Swiss, Israeli, and Moroccan nationals. The cafe is known to be a hot tourist spot, one I've frequented in the past myself, so they believe the aim was at foreigners. Though the ministry of the interior says it has hints of Al-Qaeda, no one has claimed responsibility, so blame has yet to be placed. Here are some articles for more information:

New York Times

Reuters

Al Jazeera

The Bad:

Without making this terrible event at all about me, I'm disappointed in it's timing. There is never a good time for someone to cowardly plant a bomb full of nails in a cafe full of people enjoying their country, for someone to die while on vacation, for people to lose their lives for simply enjoying a cup of coffee. Unfortunately, the ramifications of this incident will extend far beyond those present at the cafe. This will strike hard the tourism industry here in Morocco. An industry the local economy relies so heavily upon.

A direct example of this would be the planned of visit of my best friend, her fiance, and her cousin this past weekend. They were due to fly in on Friday morning, and with the explosion having happened Thursday, this quickly made them question their visit. Well-versed travellers and hardly skiddish, they were forced to cancel their trip under the guidance of 'better safe than sorry'. Which I totally appreciate and understand. Unfortunately, in addition to my best friend, my brother has also been forced to cancel his trip this month. He was due to come for my birthday while on his R&R from the Army in Iraq. Yet, it seems Morocco is now listed as a hot-spot and he no longer has clearance to enter the country.

Lame.

So you see, friends, this week has had its ups and downs.

Yay for weddings. Boo for terrorists.

An anthem we all can stand by, yes?

Shall I make tee-shirts?

Medical Clinic

How about we take a quick ride back in time to March when the Sedona-miz Dar Chebab played host to a week long free medical clinic serving the needs of both Sedona-miz and the mountain villages surrounding.

I admit I sort of dropped the ball in telling you all about this in a timely manner, but the last month has been a whirlwind, so my apologies. Back to the point, however. So back around the second week of March, a team of three doctors, around eight nurses, and five or so general helper-outers from America hopped on board an airplane headed for Sedona-miz. They were invited by a local ex-pat couple who have been working in medical outreach for sometime here in Morocco. Every year they try and bring out either a dentist or doctor to help the sickly & far reaching ends of the village. They coordinated with two associations I work with here on a regular basis and after persuading the Mudir to allow us to use the Dar Chebab grounds exclusively for a week, we were in business.

We saw on average 150 patients a day who were composed of mostly women and children - we assume the men were either at work or too embarrassed to come to American women with their, ahem, hashuma problems. Over the course of five days we saw everything from the common cold and allergies to head tumors, full body rashes, and more nether-region problems than I could keep count of. If there's one thing I know Peace Corps has got to keep working on here in Morocco, it's SIDA (AIDS) and STI education. Half of these women didn't even know what their problems were or how they possibly could have gotten them. Let's just say I got to know a little more information than I needed to know about my neighbours and extended host-family members.

All in all, it was a productive and successful week with only a few setbacks due to the weather conditions (within the week it went from hailing golf balls to sunny and 90 degrees). The team from America were a wonderful array of young nurses and jet-setting development workers. Met some great people I hope to stay in contact with for sometime to come. With over 720 patients seen and treated, it was one of the more gratifying weeks I've had in Morocco lately.

The Moroccan half of the team, including me, who helped translate symptoms and treatment instructions between the doctors and village patients

The waiting tent outside of the Dar Chebab. You'd swear The Beatles were playing Sedona-miz the way these Berber ladies were storming the gates.

Inside the waiting area before being instructed to go to one of the doctors.

(FYI - behind the curtain lies the Gyno room. Forever is that instilled in my memory.)

Doctor checking out a young boy's ear infection. I couldn't exactly take photos of the tumors being removed discretely. You'll have to settle for the excitement of an ear exam.

In addition to exams, the American team brought suitcase upon suitcase of medication to prescribe to those in need. (Most important - Flinstone vitamins I say.) The only people against handing out free meds were the local pharmacies, who apparently had little to no business for almost a month after... whoopsies.

Spring Camp Taroudant

After having slept 13 hours upon my return to Sedona-miz, I now feel up to the task of filling you in on what I've been up to lately. Namely - Spring Camp down in Taroudant.

Last year I worked close to home, spending the week with around 90 kids in Marrakech's Centre D'Accueil, teaching English, holding an Environment club, touring the region's water treatment plant (which pretty much only reeked of methane, never again...). I had originally planned to work this year up in a town called Azzemour (Tash for olive) which is just north of El Jadida along the coast. It had only 18 campers last year, and after having had close to a hundred during Spring 2010, 18 sounded like a nice number for a week of near-sleepless nights. Fast-forward to a week before Camp 2011 is due to start. I was informed that Azzemour's Centre D'Accueil hadbeen closed for refurbishing, and I was now being sent to Taroudant. 'Sweet!', I thought, 'Two of my good staj friends are working that camp & I've never been south of these mountains, done and done.' Little did I know that 175 kids would be attending... my dream of a calm lackadaisical week with 18 campers evaporated the second I arrived.

Don't get me wrong, we had an excellent time and did the best we could with 9 PC volunteers & around the same number of Moroccan staff, but with 175 kids, it was pretty much insanity from start to finish. To give you an idea of our day-to-day, here's our daily schedule board:

Fellow PCV Bjai and I were in charge of Beginner-Low English, which means they basically knew squat upon arrival. With a class of around 45 we tried to keep activities as fun as possible, in order to keep the attention of not only that many people, but the punks that naturally find their way into any camp - in both Morocco & America alike. We did the expected number learning, animal vocab, fruits & veggies, etc. Lots of pictionary was played, men were hung, charades was enjoyed. The highlight, though, was definitely ending each day with about 20 minutes of Hello, Goodbye. A big shout out to the Beatles for creating a song with super simplistic lyrics so that even the most novice of Moroccan English speakers can wrap their heads around it. An a capella performance accompanied by desk drum beats made for an excellent close of each class. Mental high-five to Pringles-Beginner English Class.

Other than English, PCV Anna and I did a sweet Art club in the afternoon, in which we made Origami and friendship bracelets.

We all participated in the rest of the activities, which included a Scavenger hunt, Talent Show(s), a 'Religious Night', Improv Comedy, Taroudant Excursions, and a 'Spectac' to wrap things up the last night. Kids had so much fun, they all signed a petition to keep camp going an extra day. No joke. Moroccan staff were obviously as against this as we were, having not slept the entire week. I think we all averaged 2-4 hours of sleep a night, 5 if you were really lucky. And given the sleeping set up we had, that was impressive in itself:

Other random highlights include, but are not limited to:

- The dance five of us conselours did to Taio Cruz's 'Dynomite' for the talent show. There's a video out there somewhere, probably, (scarily,) (unfortunately,) making it's way to facebook soon. It was kind of awesome.

- The random homeless boy that joined our group on a walking tour of Taroudant one afternoon. Seriously the sweetest, most well-behaved Moroccan kid I've ever met, never mind the homeless part. He ended up showing up to camp every day after & just kind of tagging along. We fed him more than I thought was humanly possible to feed a 10 year old, and adored his company throughout the week. Adorable.

- This group of kids that could have easily beaten any group on America's Best Dance Crew. Like, Out. Of. Control. Good. Comparable to those Jabberwocky guys. So cool. So, so cool.

- Taking the winning team of kid's from the scavenger hunt out to smoothies in town. Most were excellent English speakers and we had a pretty awesome & liberal convo while enjoying our fruity drinks. Basically, it ended with the American PCVs begging the boys in the group to stay wonderful & sweet and not turn into the gross disgusting jerks that ruin a Moroccan male's reputation. They pinky-promised.

- Water balloon fight that lasted a couple days and ended in a one hour battle the last day of camp as the kids were leaving. Anna & Crisi introduced the first balloon in their English class as a disciplinary action against a punk kid that wouldn't shut up in the back of the room. They listened after that.

Anyway, all in all, another successful and enjoyable week of camp. Met some awesome PCVs I hadn't known before & loved a good chunk of the kids that came. Thankfully, after camp ended, we PCVs spent a good two days on the beach in Agadir, sleeping off the exhaustion in the sun. Just what the doctor ordered. And after another week of class here in Sedona-miz, I'm heading to London for a good friend's wedding on Easter Sunday. Can't wait to wear spring dresses & my hair down and have it be culturally appropriate!

Friday Funday

After a whirlwind week at the Medical Clinic, (which I will post about shortly, no doubt) I decided to dedicate this Friday to cleaning house and listening to some sweet tunes of my choosing. Ask any PCV and they'll attest to the amount of cell-phone amplified Moroccan music I was forced to listen to during a 50 hour work week at the Dar Chebab...

Anywho, I thought I'd share with you all my musical obsessions of late. So, stay tuned... HA.

First at bat - 'Stack Shot Billy' by The Black Keys

Okay, so, these dudes kind of rock my world. While I'm fully aware they've put out three (badass) albums since Rubber Factory back in 2004, there's something about the grittiness of this record I can't get over. I can literally feel when my insides sync in with the beat of this track in particular. I remember the first time I saw these guys, back in '03, when the opened for John Mayer... Yeah, you read that right. John... Mayer. I didn't get the connection either, but I totally came away from that concert blown away by the opening act and pretty much forgetting anything having to do with headliner. (Yes, I'm avoiding your questions on why I went to a Mayer concert in the first place... I was 16.) I know I'm not the first nor last to express their adoration of this duo - seeing as they won a freaking GRAMMY this year ya'll - but hotdamn, they move me.

'Goodbye England' - Laura Marling

I. Need. To. Be. Her. She is out of control talented. I've been obsessed with I Speak Because I Can for over almost a year now. It's one of those rare and complete story-telling albums. It's fantastic. The fact it came out of a girl who was, what, 19 at the time? Boggles my mind. She writes with such experience and grace, it's the complete package. For those of you who are into Joni Mitchell, Mumford & Sons, Noah and the Whale, etc, this is for you. I have such a girl-crush on her. Perfection.

Okay, and 'Rambling Man'. Just enjoy.

'Gasoline Alley' - Rod Stewart

I, along with every other woman in history, have had an old-man crush on Rod Stewart for sometime now. There is just something about his voice in combination with this short (and not normally) a capella diddy that pulls at a girl's heartstrings. My crush-age has recently been reignited due to the newest season of American Idol (yes I'm admitting this to the public). I'm sending some serious vibes to that Paul McDonald kid. You hear that, Paul? Mrhaba to Morocco anyyyyyytime.

'Maggie Mae' - Paul McDonald (Rod Stewart tune)

'Not Fade Away' - Jack White (Buddy Holly tune)

Apparently, our friend Jack made a surprise stop at SXSW the other day. I saw this clip and died a little inside. The first musical I ever saw was Buddy - The Buddy Holly Story at the Strand Theatre in London's West End back when I was 14. I loved him. I was obviously born some 50 years too late. However, having one of my favourite musicians of all time covering this classic made me happy. Gah, why I am I in Morocco and not touring around the US attending various music festivals again? The Coachella line up made me tear up, SXSW is making me anxious, Bonnaroo is just going to full on make me bawl.

Fasters of the world... Unite!

This morning I got out of bed this morning thinking... mmm roast chicken sounds divine for lunch today (my brain works like that, sadly). I hadn't had any poultry in site for about a month now. So, after some morning chai tea and strawberries for breakfast, I made my way into town in order to buy a chicken for the day's feasting.

As I was walking along the road, among several sbah-al-khairs (good mornings) from neighbourhood children, I reached my half-way point - the mosque at the end of my road. The Friday prayers had already begun - they last about three hours in my neck of the woods - and I happily enjoyed the melodic chanting as I continued my way down the road towards my chicken guy.

That is, until I stopped dead in my tracks and realized - Hey, dumbass, it's a Friday. During Lent. No chicken for you.

So, I rerouted my trajectory and made my way towards the fish guy instead. The half kilo of fish is now comfortably resting in my fridge for roasted consumption this afternoon.

Ironic that an Islamic prayer call can remind me of a Catholic fast, n'est-ce pas?

So, yeah, about that. We've been over the fact that I don't really subscribe to any particular religion, but I'm a respecter of all, yes? And any probing religious questions I receive here in site are usually answered with the crowd-pleasing line of, 'I know there's something out there, I just don't know if his name is Jesus, Allah, Buddha, etc...' Which, is more or less what I actually think.

Thus, I figure if I went to bat for Islam during Ramadan this past year, I should follow suit and play my cards right this Lent. Doesn't hurt to appease all possible deities, am I right? Plus, I grew up with Lent as a prominent fixture in my household. My Dad even respects the no-eating-meat-on-Fridays thing for the entirety of the year. Living at home at as a kid, I was all about the Fish Fridays, as this usually meant a family dinner at a nice beach-side seafood restaurant was involved. Well, that or the infrequent (and disappointing) Mickey D's fish sandwich... shudder.

Moral of the story is, in addition to the no-meat Fridays for the next 40-odd days, I'll also be putting a hold on all baked goods. This includes cookies, cakes, breads, the works. I figure, in addition to offering up a sacrifice to any of the aforementioned gods, it'll have me looking good for an Easter Sunday wedding in London next month. Win-win!

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.