Tea Please!

So I don’t have internet for 10 days, so I’m improvising and just writing as the days go. Which means I’ll most likely have a couple blogs going up around the same time.

Today was filled with a lot of interesting and fun things. Actually, before I get into that, I have to say- Moroccans eat, A LOT. I start off with breakfast, which these days tends to be a thick, yellow soup (which I actually found chunks of chicken in this morning); followed by bread with marmalade and olive oil for dipping. A few hours after this, during our first “break” of class, we have more coffee (in shot glasses), and more bread/cookies/chips. Then, not even two hours later, it’s lunch. And today we actually had some pasta, with a pepper concoction of a sauce, a bowl of beans, and oh yeah- more bread. And if you know me, I have never complained of a solid piece of bread, and all this homemade bread is absolutely fantastic, but I’m not able to handle it at every meal. And at every meal there’s someone watching you, making sure you eat that bread.

Any-who, I could rant a bit about how much food is eaten and while I rant, I secretly love it all. Okay, so back to my day. It started off with class (on a Saturday, yeah I know), but we did convince our LCF (language and culture facilitator) to have our second half outside. Which, at the time seemed like a good plan, but we were all sweating by lunch time. After class, myself and three other of the trainees, Basu, Fatima, and Jawad (for their own privacy I’m just gonna use their Berber names) decided to go on a walk and check out our community.

The walk was absolutely beautiful. Not just the sights, but I don’t think we passed one person you did not say hello; and this is tricky because after the 20 different ways of saying hello, they go off and we have no idea what they’re saying, but they love it none the less. The children of the community were especially curious about the 3 white and 1 black kids walking through, as they followed us (asking for money of course, but that’s beside the point) and watched our every move. We managed to find a hill right on the outskirts of town that gave us a spectacular view of the valley and community. At this point I do not have any pictures, being I grabbed my case of DVDs instead of my camera case, but I will be here for a few more months so I’m sure I’ll be able to get some sweet pictures for you all.

So after hanging there for a bit, we decided to go on a quest to have a moment of America and try to watch a movie. This ended abruptly as everyone we passed invited us in for tea. We finally gave in and went to have tea with a local businessman who runs a hotel and a Rose Water business. We all felt very proud of ourselves for interacting and socializing on our own without our advisor, so even though we couldn’t convey much, it worked out very well. Plus this guy has a shower and a toilet, so we were sucking up to him in every way possible.

After that we headed back to Bassu’s house, where his host father insisted that we sit down for tea, discussed more vocabulary- was corrected a lot in our attempts. I think for a good 5 minutes I spoke with the trainee’s Grandma going back and forth on the same phrase until I got it just right. lHamdullah (thanks God). After more tea, we headed out yet again, to another household, where more tea was offered. Man, do these Moroccans love their tea!!

Finally, I gave up and figured my host mom would be worrying about me, so I headed home, escorted by a fellow trainee, who was, of course, invited in for tea. So he came in, and we taught my brother a game (a variation of ms. mary mac with numbers), which he loved. After Bassu (fellow trainee) left, I helped with dinner and got to know my Aunt and Mom a bit better, and then was questioned if I liked Bassu, which I had to explain that I liked him, but didn’t like him like him. Try doing that in a foreign language that you don’t really know. I’m really hoping they understood me, or I feel a wedding may be in the making. I guess I’ll find out.

Side note, dinner tonight was pretty damn good. I’d say it was a very creamy rice a roni thing. And it was delightful! And I’m definitely getting more comfortable with my family. Though I still haven’t met my sisters and only shared one meal with my host dad. But I do have three months...

(my village)

Some things I’ve discovered: I have a cow, some sheep and I know there’s a donkey somewhere (Mom- I have yet to find this thing!). Kids are insanely helpful and patient when learning new things, especially language. I don’t care anymore about making a fool of myself (as Mohammed and I were dancing and jumping around the courtyard dying in laughter). I know more of this language right now than I give myself credit for. And trying to watch what I can only describe a Moroccan American Idol, while a seven year old boy is shaking his booty and dancing in front of you, is INCREDIBLY hard, especially when you cannot stop laughing and then that makes him break down laughing.

Imik s imik, little by little. This has been and will continue to be our motto. And now everyday when that moment comes when I think, “what the hell am I doing here?” pops into my head- I’m just gonna think of Mohammed breaking it down in the living room, and I think that’ll set me straight.