This is really happening

Happy New Years everyone!! Can you all believe that its already 2015? I arrived to Morocco almost a year ago, oh boy how time flies.

A view of my site taken on a hike. Photo credit: Olivia Dinucci (she has a really nice camera)

Things have been going great for me lately. Before the holidays, work was really taking off, and then during the holidays I got to spend a lot of time with some amazing PCVs. With the stress of the move behind me now, inshallah, I finally feel like my priorities are back on track.

Action shot of the mudir of the youth center (right), the self proclaimed "King of Chess"

As a "youth development" PCV, sometimes my job description/goals can be somewhat, um.... vague. Starting out again in a new site has actually proven to be really good for me because of this. I felt like I kind of knew what to expect and what boundaries to set this time around. Right away I started teaching a few english classes, a creative thinking club and computer classes in site and Ive been having a bit of a bureaucratic argument with the mudir to get women's aerobics set up... which inchallah will start in the next 2 weeks. I will also be starting a music club this week and hopefully start a soccer club with the middle schoolers (basically Im hoping my semi-authoritative presence will help them get some time on the field). My creative thinking class has been really rewarding for me to work with because we are able to have a lot of discussions about more..... interesting topics. We talk about: local politics here and some problems with the government/police corruption, people with physical and mental disabilities, what the kids actually want for themselves and the community, religion, American culture like Thanksgiving and Christmas, etc. My last class with them right before Christmas, I showed them some pictures that my mom had sent me depicting Christmas themes and we talking about the story of Santa Claus. I was worried that there might be some confusion about my intentions of sharing about Christmas, but it was received really well. I showed them the movie "Elf" (fast forwarding through some....7shuma, or culturally inappropriate parts) and I was astounded at how much they loved it. They even stayed after class to finish it. Even the most "tough" of guys were roaring at the fart jokes. I was surprised that they understood the jokes about Buddy pushing all of the buttons in the elevator and running around the revolving door, both of which I am sure most of them have never seen in real life before. Im excited to keep introducing topics to them to discuss. 

High School english textbook on "Women and Power" with the first description reading "A strong woman works out every day to keep her body in shape"  

Here is a picture that I took one day of our daily vegetable souqs. People from the outskirts of town usually take these donkeys into town to load up and take back

Here is the view from my roof. What you see on that concrete parking-lot-looking-place is an olive souq. My area is known for olive oil and this is where they are sold to be press at the local presses around town.. More on this later

One thing I love to do is bake american things for my host family and other people around town. I made these buckeyes for my host family and it was received with mixed reviews. In a recent care package I got some fruit roll ups that I passed out. The store owner couldnt figure out how to unwrap it because of the plastic wrapped around it. After tasting it, his eyes lit up and asked me in arabic "Is this from the countryside" (this comes from the notion that most things like honey and olive oil are more delicious if they come from the countryside and are more fresh). I had a really good laugh at this because fruit roll ups couldnt be more processed

The Sunday before Christmas I got my first visitors to my site. Olivia and Kabir (with whom I spent L3id Kbir) and Blake all of whom have been some of the most important people in my service. It was great to get to show them my site and get to just hang out without all of the stress that had been going on with the site change. One of the cooler things that we did was we went on a hike towards this natural spring, but realized we didnt have enough time (we had a bus to catch to Figuig, where me and Blake were going for Christmas) so we turned back, but went a different route. As we were walking, Olivia noticed that there was an intense olive smell next to this barn/shed along the trek.

(sorry, had to screenshot this because instagram is weird about downloading pictures)

I realized that I recognized the house as somewhere that I had eaten one time, so I went and knocked on the door and pretty soon we were getting a tour of the press. Just for your point of reference, this is pretty far away from the village itself, so it was quite the stumble-upon. The tools that they use to make the olive oil seem straight out of medieval times. Everything is either man- or donkey powered. The girl showing us around told us that we should eat with them, and she proceeded to give us olive oil that was pressed that day, olive oil that was a little bit older, butter, strawberry jelly, local honey from date palm trees, almonds and fresh bread. It could be one of the most rustic, delicious dining experiences yet in Morocco.

hiking in the forest by my house, has an eeiry  gnarled beauty about it 

After that I spent about a week in a town called Figuig with close to 30 volunteers from Christmas Eve until New Years Eve. Figuig is a UNESCO world heritage site because of the ksars which tunnel through the neighborhoods of the city pretty mich made out of clay and hay. It is also an oasis town, which I had never actually seen before even though they are all over the south of Morocco. This basically means that the town is covered with palm tree forests, and through that makes up a winding irrigation network which made exploring through the palmry so fun. Also for some reason the town felt very empty, it was as if the town could potentially hold about 60,000 people but only 10,000 actually lived there. It felt like we were the only ones there.

Just outside of Figuig, those mountains are Algeria

Me taking in the sunset..... or not because Im looking the wrong way

My friends surprised me with this cake, I really wasnt expecting it, nor really wanting to make my birthday anything special, but it was really nice that everyone took the time out to do something for me. I was really touched

cheesin

Some of the crew...... and you can get a feel for the palm trees in this picture

The Xmas day crew

Here are the stragglers after a couple of days. BTW if you are wondering why we are wearing so much clothes and blankets.... its because it is pretty cold all the time. No indoor heat=no salvation from the cold indoors. 

model poses in the palmery

New Years was spent in another friend's site (JD) with Blake and Peter (seen in the picture above in the middle) and it was fantastic. JD made the most excellent pad thai and chocolate chip cookies and let us take a hot shower and he had 6.... yes 6... space heaters set up. It was so cozy and we shared some sparkling wine for NY2015. It was a really good time for some healthy reflection and laughs and just goofing around. I love spending time with other PCVs because we can all get deep with each other or just laugh at stupid things we find funny. The next day we went to Blake's site to spend the night with his host family which was wonderful. I wish I could have spent more time there, but at the same time I was excited to get back to my own site which was a really good feeling to have.

The next few weeks should be nose-to-the-grind for me in site building up my schedule more. As of now, I am really feeling the love for Morocco and my Peace Corps community. Here is to 2015, a year of new news and positivity.