Today was magnificent. I made a special trip to the nearby provincial capital for the express purpose of finishing of some paperwork that needed doing. Firstly, a vacaction day request. Secondly, the replacement of a stamp that is needed for my carte de sejour; my working visa equivalent. Really its magical how much time one can use up when one combines French bureaucracy Moroccan style with my own procrastination and the vagrancies of transport and circumstance...
So:
First to the Water and Forest Department. I had called ahead several times last week to attempt to find out when my counterpart would be in his office. Unfortunately, the phone number wouldn't work. Thus, I was flying blind, hoping that he would be there. Predicatably, he wasn't. I found this out by talking to the one person there who I have a language in common with: a secretary who speaks a version of Berber reasonably close the one I know. I have to remember words back from Ouarzazate, but it works. He was in Rabat, and to be back tomorrow. So I wait for the other guy, the Chief, to come back. She said he would come in... he didn't. At least, I gave up waiting for him to come back after three hours sitting there (reading a good book, the Dark Star Safari). I arranged with the secretary to call me tomorrow, and left a photocopy of the vacation days request form with her to make things as easy as possible tomorrow. I left, and went to go check up on my site mate who is beginning her technical training at the hospital here.
Task 1 having failed, I moved on to Task 2.
So, I find the Gendarmerie Royale, and ask them if they have the stamp I need. No, I am told, but they have it at the Provence, the Amanala. ie. the big complex where the government bigwigs work. I go, and the guard at the gate stops me until my Qaid's secretary magically appears and tells me 1) where to go and 2) vouches for me. I go to the security office and wait for the guy to register my name in the books... he then escorts me into the big, huge, fancy building with the shiny marble and the courtyard of desert plants inside and the huge, beautifully tiled stairs. Up we go, but the man he wanted isn't there. So he talks to the guard, who refers him to another guy, who calls over another guy, who says put her in a room to wait for the orginal guy to come back from lunch. So another guard goes to get the key to an empty room where I am stashed for... about 45 minutes. The guy finally comes in, I explain to him in my broken Moroccan Arabic what I want, he seems confused, but nods and leaves. Another guy comes in. He says, we don't have that here. I explain that the Gendarmerie Royale said they do... and then I am lead all over the complex, hither and thither, wondering what on earth is going on... finally to an office, where I finally have an epiphany. I'll just ask Eric... he did this before, he should know where to go. Turns out it's in a little cell phone store in the middle of town... I extricate myself from the Provencial Offices and march over to the store. After much wandering and a bit of asking, I locate it, and ask the storekeeper to change my stamp... only to discover there isn't another stamp. We call my gendarme, the storekeeper searches again, but it doesn't exist. He tells me to go ask the 'Bulis', ie. the police. I decide to go buy toilet paper instead.
Thus, today, I have accomplished... the purchase of four lovely, lightly packaged rolls of toilet paper. We may hope for better things tomorrow. ;)
Monday, June 8, 2009
Monday, June 1, 2009
Mountains and Weather
So often when I go for a walk, I stop and marvel at the land surrounding me. It is harsh, steep, rocky, grand, majestic, naked, depleted, elemental, and beautiful. In the spring the slopes bloom a dusky green as every grass and bush type thing makes a dash at reproduction before the powerful summer sun burns all but the hardiest to a dull or bright gold.
With that summer sun come the storms. As in many mountain ranges, the mountains here provide a daily weather cycle. The sun pours energy into the air, the ground, the plants, and water evaporates, heat rises, air moves. It rises, channeled by the slopes of the ground until it reaches the cold heights where it condenses and “poof!” cumulus clouds are born. Over the course of the day, these little clouds grow into thunderheads. If rain clouds were already there that morning, then these thunderstorms grow big. These storms move across the mountains quickly, and the mountains rake the fingers of their high peaks through the clouds, forcing them up, forcing out rain, snow, and hail as they reclaim the water the sun drew out of them that morning. The rain settles into the ground, setting the stage for the following day when the sun rises into a once more clear sky.
This is so regular and predictable that (as are the usually accompanying power outages) that no one does their laundry in the afternoon. Not even me anymore. J You just have to bring it in half-dried if you do. We all keep candles handy, too.
Today was no different; we got a pretty good storm. Gusty winds, boiling clouds, yellow light, hail, curtains of rain. I had taken a nap, and awoke to a prematurely darkened sky and the constant rumble of thunder from the west. Ominous gusts of wind threw dust, sand, and dirt into the air. I walked to the side of my porch to assess what was coming. Pale grey, but turbulent clouds were mounting up behind Sarat (the peak west of us) and tumbling over. Lightning sparkled across the sky nearly continuously, and the thunder echoed metallically off the mountains. I took my clothes in and parked myself on my porch to watch the storm come. The wind picked up and I watched as curtains of rain dove down between the mountains and me across the way, driven by the wind. It reminded me of large flocks of ducks diving out of the sky to a lake to land in. That lake was soon to be my porch, and I retreated to a window view to watch women and children fight the rain and wind as they hurried to shelter. With no more preambles, it came down hard, and then a sharper tapping sound from my roof announced the change of rain to hail. I remembered the cement downstairs and ran to try to cover it more effectively. The rain was knocking gravel and rocks out of my neighbor’s wall all over my steps, and water was pouring out of the pipe from my roof onto my porch, where an impatient lake of brown water waited to swirl out of the downspout off my porch. Hail smacked my head, as I ran up and down the stairs, trying to manage the water and the cement. A peek inside my house revealed that only the normal problem spots were leaking, and not too badly at that either. L-hamdullah! In a few short minutes the storm had passed, leaving trails of bright brown water wending their way down the mountains.
Sometimes when I’m out walking, I imagine the mountain peaks are reaching up to slap hands—High five! —with the clouds as they drift over. As if they say, “Way to go on that last gullywasher, man! Did you see those little human-people scurry??! Righteous, dude.”
With that summer sun come the storms. As in many mountain ranges, the mountains here provide a daily weather cycle. The sun pours energy into the air, the ground, the plants, and water evaporates, heat rises, air moves. It rises, channeled by the slopes of the ground until it reaches the cold heights where it condenses and “poof!” cumulus clouds are born. Over the course of the day, these little clouds grow into thunderheads. If rain clouds were already there that morning, then these thunderstorms grow big. These storms move across the mountains quickly, and the mountains rake the fingers of their high peaks through the clouds, forcing them up, forcing out rain, snow, and hail as they reclaim the water the sun drew out of them that morning. The rain settles into the ground, setting the stage for the following day when the sun rises into a once more clear sky.
This is so regular and predictable that (as are the usually accompanying power outages) that no one does their laundry in the afternoon. Not even me anymore. J You just have to bring it in half-dried if you do. We all keep candles handy, too.
Today was no different; we got a pretty good storm. Gusty winds, boiling clouds, yellow light, hail, curtains of rain. I had taken a nap, and awoke to a prematurely darkened sky and the constant rumble of thunder from the west. Ominous gusts of wind threw dust, sand, and dirt into the air. I walked to the side of my porch to assess what was coming. Pale grey, but turbulent clouds were mounting up behind Sarat (the peak west of us) and tumbling over. Lightning sparkled across the sky nearly continuously, and the thunder echoed metallically off the mountains. I took my clothes in and parked myself on my porch to watch the storm come. The wind picked up and I watched as curtains of rain dove down between the mountains and me across the way, driven by the wind. It reminded me of large flocks of ducks diving out of the sky to a lake to land in. That lake was soon to be my porch, and I retreated to a window view to watch women and children fight the rain and wind as they hurried to shelter. With no more preambles, it came down hard, and then a sharper tapping sound from my roof announced the change of rain to hail. I remembered the cement downstairs and ran to try to cover it more effectively. The rain was knocking gravel and rocks out of my neighbor’s wall all over my steps, and water was pouring out of the pipe from my roof onto my porch, where an impatient lake of brown water waited to swirl out of the downspout off my porch. Hail smacked my head, as I ran up and down the stairs, trying to manage the water and the cement. A peek inside my house revealed that only the normal problem spots were leaking, and not too badly at that either. L-hamdullah! In a few short minutes the storm had passed, leaving trails of bright brown water wending their way down the mountains.
Sometimes when I’m out walking, I imagine the mountain peaks are reaching up to slap hands—High five! —with the clouds as they drift over. As if they say, “Way to go on that last gullywasher, man! Did you see those little human-people scurry??! Righteous, dude.”
Disillusion: verb
we pretended to have a happy marriage because we didn't want to disillusion the children disabuse, enlighten, set straight, open someone's eyes; disenchant, shatter someone's illusions, disappoint, make sadder and wiser. antonym deceive
A synonymous phrase might be ‘to take off the rose-tinted glasses,’ or ‘to break the news’ or ‘to tell him/her how it really is.’ As you can see, this word is very much negative in both definition and connotation. Yet, it is necessary to see the truth (be what it may) before one can choose the most logical, effective course of action. Otherwise one can only make decisions based on what one thinks one knows. So, in some ways, it might not be such a negative thing after all… once one gets over the accompanying disappointment and avoids sliding into a “shlump” of discouragement… for after all, “un-shlumping oneself is not easily done.” (thanks Dr. Seuss!)
Recently I’ve been confronted with some realities, both here in my village and in the whole of Africa. In my own village, there have been some nasty accusations of money-pocketing (embezzlement, essentially) by some officials in connection with this first project I am involved with. I have followed up the reports with other officials, who I trust, and have been told that the accusations are nothing but lies. Lies meant to throw me off, discourage me… but still I am unsure. Which means that these “trusted” officials may, in fact, be complicit in whatever may or may not be going on. I keep asking around, we shall see what comes to light. On a much, much larger scale, I was reminded how important sustainability is for successful development. A newspaper article and a book both elucidated the debilitating nature of un-sustainable development work very clearly. The scale and import of this I had not known before… I had no real idea. I had an idea, and intellectual understanding, but I didn’t really “get it.” I didn’t put the pieces together, how the huge infusion of money from government to government can actually fuel corruption. Or, on a smaller scale, how a nice organization can provide negative reinforcement for entrepreneurship.
Sustainability is a current buzzword of the development world and its related academic world. Basically, it is the quality of a certain activity/project/development scheme a to be able to continue over the long-term. More important is sustainability on the level of the local. If a Peace Corps Volunteer runs a project that creates a niche for itself that cannot be carried on in the absence of that PCV once they leave, that project is not sustainable. Thus, I find myself in the unique position to be able to do something about all this. I can do my darnedest to make sure that all I do here is, in fact, sustainable. Without me or another properly idealistic American living in my little village. And that goal right there makes all kinds of difference in how you plan and implement. It requires a lot more effort in the way of planning, and education. It’s so good to be reminded of these things, though! I welcome the challenge these realizations provide, for they represent an opportunity to make a long-term difference as opposed to a giving out temporary bandaids.
we pretended to have a happy marriage because we didn't want to disillusion the children disabuse, enlighten, set straight, open someone's eyes; disenchant, shatter someone's illusions, disappoint, make sadder and wiser. antonym deceive
A synonymous phrase might be ‘to take off the rose-tinted glasses,’ or ‘to break the news’ or ‘to tell him/her how it really is.’ As you can see, this word is very much negative in both definition and connotation. Yet, it is necessary to see the truth (be what it may) before one can choose the most logical, effective course of action. Otherwise one can only make decisions based on what one thinks one knows. So, in some ways, it might not be such a negative thing after all… once one gets over the accompanying disappointment and avoids sliding into a “shlump” of discouragement… for after all, “un-shlumping oneself is not easily done.” (thanks Dr. Seuss!)
Recently I’ve been confronted with some realities, both here in my village and in the whole of Africa. In my own village, there have been some nasty accusations of money-pocketing (embezzlement, essentially) by some officials in connection with this first project I am involved with. I have followed up the reports with other officials, who I trust, and have been told that the accusations are nothing but lies. Lies meant to throw me off, discourage me… but still I am unsure. Which means that these “trusted” officials may, in fact, be complicit in whatever may or may not be going on. I keep asking around, we shall see what comes to light. On a much, much larger scale, I was reminded how important sustainability is for successful development. A newspaper article and a book both elucidated the debilitating nature of un-sustainable development work very clearly. The scale and import of this I had not known before… I had no real idea. I had an idea, and intellectual understanding, but I didn’t really “get it.” I didn’t put the pieces together, how the huge infusion of money from government to government can actually fuel corruption. Or, on a smaller scale, how a nice organization can provide negative reinforcement for entrepreneurship.
Sustainability is a current buzzword of the development world and its related academic world. Basically, it is the quality of a certain activity/project/development scheme a to be able to continue over the long-term. More important is sustainability on the level of the local. If a Peace Corps Volunteer runs a project that creates a niche for itself that cannot be carried on in the absence of that PCV once they leave, that project is not sustainable. Thus, I find myself in the unique position to be able to do something about all this. I can do my darnedest to make sure that all I do here is, in fact, sustainable. Without me or another properly idealistic American living in my little village. And that goal right there makes all kinds of difference in how you plan and implement. It requires a lot more effort in the way of planning, and education. It’s so good to be reminded of these things, though! I welcome the challenge these realizations provide, for they represent an opportunity to make a long-term difference as opposed to a giving out temporary bandaids.
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