How on earth did it get to be May 21 already? Well, here we are then, and I am officially a 2nd year volunteer as of Tuesday. Neat, huh? That means I am halfway through with my time as an actual volunteer and over halfway done with the time I have allotted my self to live in Morocco. Or, as my thoughts ran about 2 weeks ago: part II of "Jini’s" Peace Corps experience has officially begun. That thought ran across my mind the evening I went to go and meet my sitemate, Meg, to show her the way to our little village. The new routine has yet to establish itself, probably won’t establish itself until she moves out of home stay and into her house.
I keep finding myself thinking about this year vs. last year. And what it was like getting dropped into this little village, alone, and figuring out how to speak and who I was going to be, here, at the same time. It wasn’t much fun, actually. I didn’t realize it at the time, as I was just putting one foot in front of the other, one word after the next. That in-the-zone dodged mindset that running cross-country with asthma teaches one. Thankfully, all things pass. J Some 2 to 4 months later, I had learned enough to be able to hold actual conversations in our obscure little dialect here, and, more importantly, had found what looked like a workable way for me to be here. I had some ideas for projects, I had helped others complete their projects, I had learned how to cook, was living in my own house, had my own pets, and was slowly establishing myself as myself (instead of that-girl-staying-with-the-sheikh). Mom commented on the phone at that time: "you sound much happier now than you did during the summer." And I realized, I am! And, I am glad to report, I still am! Projects move along… slowly… but they do move all the same. I have good friends here, a sweet (in the both old-fashioned sense, and the sweet-awesome sense) boyfriend, good Moroccan friends, and a slow-born but no less real affection for this land, this place. I figured out a way to not feel spiritually alone, too. That was key. I still don’t know if two years will be "enough" time for me here, or if I’ll extend, or if sometime in the next couple months I will suddenly realize that I am "done" with life here. It happens. We’ve lost 6, I think, volunteers from my stage (including both Health and Environment). Some broke themselves on the mountains or were broken by parasites, some got sick of the …slowly… aspect of things here, some became discouraged by the ministry they work with, some just wanted to go home. I can only hope that if I should find myself feeling "done" that I will find it in me to finish what I have begun. Because, as my brother says, "that’s how I do!" The first volunteer to live in O. Ali was a health volunteer who called it quits after three months. Meg is her replacement. I am doing what I can to help her adjust to life here with more ease than I did. Because there is MUCH for us to do here, though it isn’t always easy to see how one ought to do it. And because—selfishly—I like having another volunteer here. For company. For when I want to cook up a good stir-fry and share it with someone that will eat it from enjoyment and not because they feel bad for my effort. Isolated Moroccans are notorious for not liking food they aren’t used to. J
So, this is phase two, part II, the halfway point. Restlessness resurfaces after months of focused effort on settling myself in this place. Projects move ahead… slowly… and I say good-bye to friends who were here a year before me. In one year, that will be me.
Monday, May 25, 2009
Sunday, May 10, 2009
welcome
Welcome to Ait Ali, home of the most confusing Tamzight/Darija/Tarifit spoken in Morocco! A bit of an exaggeration, but that’s how I felt like welcoming my site mate. It’s great, actually, that the Peace Corps has taken my suggestion and placed a Health Volunteer in my site. She’s great! She’s smart, enthusiastic, and most importantly, game to take on the formidable task of learning how to talk to people here.
She’s been here for about a week now, and people are slowly getting used to the idea that I’m not the only volunteer in town anymore. They keep saying, “oh, she doesn’t know Tashelheit.” I remember how frustrating it was! Oh man, it was so hard. I’m more than happy to try to help her with every single little language trick I have learned here. The cool thing is that, as she methodically goes through the language learning words, I’m learning things too. My goal, last year, was to learn how to be understood. I stopped worrying about grammar, exactness, and worked on mastering the sounds, the basic words, basic phrases, and basically just trying to survive. Now that my site mate is here, she is attacking our version of Tashelheit methodically and aggressively. It’s great. I’m filling in so many holes in my language!
The other fun thing is that she is a dance instructor and longtime yoga student. So I can learn both dance and yoga from her! Hopefully, I mean we’ll see. Also she loves fantasy books and likes hiking. If you know me, you know that I think these are important character traits. :) Hopefully we can also collaborate on projects, working on improving things, educating people about both health and the environment. I’m excited!
She’s been here for about a week now, and people are slowly getting used to the idea that I’m not the only volunteer in town anymore. They keep saying, “oh, she doesn’t know Tashelheit.” I remember how frustrating it was! Oh man, it was so hard. I’m more than happy to try to help her with every single little language trick I have learned here. The cool thing is that, as she methodically goes through the language learning words, I’m learning things too. My goal, last year, was to learn how to be understood. I stopped worrying about grammar, exactness, and worked on mastering the sounds, the basic words, basic phrases, and basically just trying to survive. Now that my site mate is here, she is attacking our version of Tashelheit methodically and aggressively. It’s great. I’m filling in so many holes in my language!
The other fun thing is that she is a dance instructor and longtime yoga student. So I can learn both dance and yoga from her! Hopefully, I mean we’ll see. Also she loves fantasy books and likes hiking. If you know me, you know that I think these are important character traits. :) Hopefully we can also collaborate on projects, working on improving things, educating people about both health and the environment. I’m excited!
bees
Ait Ali is humming again. I remember last year, my head was all fuzzy with changed sleep patterns, new food, and an avalanche of new words. I stepped out onto my host family’s roof/balcony and heard this all encompassing humming. At the time I thought, “Sweet heaven, that canNOT be the flies… but there are a lot of flies… ooog.” It wasn’t flies though. It’s bees. Hundreds of thousands of bees. Hurrying to every flower they can find. The air is abuzz with their activity.
Ait Ali is known for it’s honey. There are a couple kinds made here. There is rosemary honey, or “white honey” as they call it. It is white, too, especially when it crystallizes. Pure, sparkly, creamy white. It’s delicious. There is also “black honey,” which isn’t quite black, but it is very dark. Its flavor is complex and delicious. It is not easy to get your hands on any of this honey, though. Those who have their own hives (most people) eat all the honey themselves. The cooperative sells the honey in big cities. The women’s association sells the honey to the first comers, I guess, and the que fills up fast.
This year is supposed to be really good for the bees. We had a lot of rain in the spring, so there were just bunches of flowers. The bees responded by reproducing. Hive after hive swarmed, and the beekeeper experts would don home-made bee hats, and coax the bees into a big basket with the help of a large metal spoon. A honey bee swarm is when the number of bees gets to big for the physical size of the hive. The queen then lays a new queen egg, and once she matures, she leaves. She takes half the hive with her, and they start a new hive somewhere else. Bees are much more aggressive when they are getting ready to swarm. They just come after you randomly sometimes. At different times, one part of the village would suddenly become dangerous to traverse. People would drape scarves over their heads and run. My host family’s bees swarmed, too.. they swarmed to right outside my front door. One morning I stepped outside my door, and locked it, and as I walked away, I thought “Gee, that sounds like a whole lot of bees really close by…” and I turned my head to see a couple thousand of them clustered on a small log sticking out of my neighbors wall, hanging on each other like the monarchs do in Mexico. A solid mass of humming, buzzing, worried bees. I stood stock still and stared, and then quietly walked away. A short time later the bee-man came with his bee-hat, his basket, his metal spoon and his sting-impervious hands and feet.
I like the bees. I like bees even better when they like me. Maybe someday I will be a beekeeper and grow medicinal plants (rosemary, lavender, sage…) for my bees to drink nectar from and make delicious honey. I think it would be fun!
Ait Ali is known for it’s honey. There are a couple kinds made here. There is rosemary honey, or “white honey” as they call it. It is white, too, especially when it crystallizes. Pure, sparkly, creamy white. It’s delicious. There is also “black honey,” which isn’t quite black, but it is very dark. Its flavor is complex and delicious. It is not easy to get your hands on any of this honey, though. Those who have their own hives (most people) eat all the honey themselves. The cooperative sells the honey in big cities. The women’s association sells the honey to the first comers, I guess, and the que fills up fast.
This year is supposed to be really good for the bees. We had a lot of rain in the spring, so there were just bunches of flowers. The bees responded by reproducing. Hive after hive swarmed, and the beekeeper experts would don home-made bee hats, and coax the bees into a big basket with the help of a large metal spoon. A honey bee swarm is when the number of bees gets to big for the physical size of the hive. The queen then lays a new queen egg, and once she matures, she leaves. She takes half the hive with her, and they start a new hive somewhere else. Bees are much more aggressive when they are getting ready to swarm. They just come after you randomly sometimes. At different times, one part of the village would suddenly become dangerous to traverse. People would drape scarves over their heads and run. My host family’s bees swarmed, too.. they swarmed to right outside my front door. One morning I stepped outside my door, and locked it, and as I walked away, I thought “Gee, that sounds like a whole lot of bees really close by…” and I turned my head to see a couple thousand of them clustered on a small log sticking out of my neighbors wall, hanging on each other like the monarchs do in Mexico. A solid mass of humming, buzzing, worried bees. I stood stock still and stared, and then quietly walked away. A short time later the bee-man came with his bee-hat, his basket, his metal spoon and his sting-impervious hands and feet.
I like the bees. I like bees even better when they like me. Maybe someday I will be a beekeeper and grow medicinal plants (rosemary, lavender, sage…) for my bees to drink nectar from and make delicious honey. I think it would be fun!
Aftermath Part III
There are about 180 bags of cement sitting in my basement. The remaining 20 have been transported up the river to the site of the repair of one of the irrigation ditches. Every morning I am awoken by a dull banging on my door at around 7 am. This is the boy who carries the bags 2 at a time on his mule up to the construction site. I walked up there myself two days ago with my camera, and got some good pictures! Where there used to be a sheer wall of crumbly, dry dirt there is now a carefully constructed rock wall cut into the side of the cliff, and paved on top like a sidewalk in the US. Like some one needed to make a fancy path for some reason. Right now they are working on the sides of the irrigation ditches, having carried several large planks of wood up there to serve as molds for the concrete. It looks good! I’m excited, and relieved, to see the work in progress.
I also went over to look at the other irrigation ditch that they laid with plastic for temporary watering purposes. To be honest I wondered a bit when they told me about the temporary plastic. Couldn’t we find a way to make that permanent? Plastic is much cheaper than the cement I have already purchased. But after seeing it, I am again relieved. The plastic, being uncontinuous, leaks, and where it leaks, the water escapes into the crumbly dirt and it does it’s thing. That is, it crumbles. There are a whole bunch of new rock, tree, dirt and other stuff fallen into the riverbed. So, in the interest of the irrigation ditches lasting any time at all, the cement is in fact necessary. My understanding of the scale of the problem of the irrigation system came slowly. First I walked up one side of the river, then I walked up the river bed, and finally up the other side of the river. It was on this third trip I really understood the engineering problem these ditches represented. Smack in the middle of 100 ft cliffs of crumbly soil was where the ditches had to go for a gravity-powered system to work. But due to the flooding, the riverbed run right up to the base of cliffs, and when the river is at flood, it doesn’t take much time at all for the river to eat away the cliff causing the whole thing to fall into the river. Again. That’s right, this could easily happen again. Thanks to my father, I keep thinking: “We need a better mousetrap.” The problem with better mousetraps is that they require more money and people who are actually engineers, not just engineer’s daughters. I can envision all I want but I don’t know what it takes to make it actually happen… for now, the villagers and I have settled for the original mousetrap. We are all praying God sends rain in more moderation this year.
I also went over to look at the other irrigation ditch that they laid with plastic for temporary watering purposes. To be honest I wondered a bit when they told me about the temporary plastic. Couldn’t we find a way to make that permanent? Plastic is much cheaper than the cement I have already purchased. But after seeing it, I am again relieved. The plastic, being uncontinuous, leaks, and where it leaks, the water escapes into the crumbly dirt and it does it’s thing. That is, it crumbles. There are a whole bunch of new rock, tree, dirt and other stuff fallen into the riverbed. So, in the interest of the irrigation ditches lasting any time at all, the cement is in fact necessary. My understanding of the scale of the problem of the irrigation system came slowly. First I walked up one side of the river, then I walked up the river bed, and finally up the other side of the river. It was on this third trip I really understood the engineering problem these ditches represented. Smack in the middle of 100 ft cliffs of crumbly soil was where the ditches had to go for a gravity-powered system to work. But due to the flooding, the riverbed run right up to the base of cliffs, and when the river is at flood, it doesn’t take much time at all for the river to eat away the cliff causing the whole thing to fall into the river. Again. That’s right, this could easily happen again. Thanks to my father, I keep thinking: “We need a better mousetrap.” The problem with better mousetraps is that they require more money and people who are actually engineers, not just engineer’s daughters. I can envision all I want but I don’t know what it takes to make it actually happen… for now, the villagers and I have settled for the original mousetrap. We are all praying God sends rain in more moderation this year.
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