not the only American in town

After the weather reverted to winter for a few days it's getting to be spring again. Mom (my visitor for two weeks) is happy about that! After meeting in Marrakech last weekend, we've been hanging out in my town: eating with my host family, going to the dar chebab, walking around town, and saying hi to everyone.

This is the week after a vacation for students here and they are also in the process of preparing theater for a 'culture week' so classes have been sporadic. However, students like introducing themselves, shaking hands, and saying mrHba (welcome) repeatedly.

This photo is from my roof. In spite of the rain I'm glad that I'm here instead of the desert - there's so much green and flowers (especially poppies). As it's getting less muddy it will be nice to walk around the beautiful countryside!

back from camp

I'm now back from the Errachidia English Spring Camp. It was a lot of fun and a lot of work. We were very serious from the beginning.

Welcome to Spring Camp!



We taught English classes in the mornings. We also led clubs - mine was the Journalism Club. We made an awesome English camp newsletter. Here is my English class - the intermediate intermediates!



We had a field trip day when we went to Meski to swim and hang out. This was the last day of some pretty intense afternoon sandstorms (I'm not used to being the desert). It did clear up so we got to swim. The ride there had some messy weather with a combination of the sandstorm and rain. We sang lots of songs.



There were lots of different activities in the afternoons and evenings - sports, lectures, games, music, and cultural activities. On Moroccan culture day there was a wedding ceremony. The music and fashions were very cool. You couldn't see the faces of the bride and groom for the whole time.



Of course we also had American culture day! We realized that our group was rather perfectly geographically diverse (New York, South Carolina, Iowa, Texas, and Washington/California). So we put on a music and dance tour of the USA. We all did an intro and together demonstrated two dances from our area. Some examples: hip-hop, punk, the Charleston, the time warp, chicken dance, two-step, salsa, and grunge. Pretty embarrassing in front of 150 people but still fun!

bus, taxi, foot: on my part of the N8

These all happen to be photos taken from the main road in my area - the N8 - which goes from Fes to Marrakech and continues to Agadir. It's the only paved road in my town. All of the following are less than 20km from my house.

I was lucky enough to be on a rather empty bus with pretty clean windows on a trip to Khenifra the other day. The wildflowers have really started to come out since the last time I had ventured out of town.




This is Khenifra, the provincial capital of about 75,000 people (and not that far from me). It's nickname is Hefra which means pit/hole and it's easy to see why.




Taking a grand taxi is a cramped experience. An important goal is to fit as many people as possible into it. I have tried to avoid them on long trips. Their definite advantage is that once they get going they are the fastest way to get somewhere.




Walking along the road to the south of town there is a lot of nice farmland (some poppies have made their way to the farm too).




There aren't really that many towns around - but there is the occasional farmhouse. I'm glad to know that I have lots of transportation options, I haven't even tried a donkey yet....

some local theater

A creative outlet that seems to be quite popular here among youth is putting on plays. They are fun and tend to use a lot of comedy. There have been two small productions in town lately - one with students at the dar chebab and another with students (girls) at the Development Association.

The first had its public performance at the dar chebab last week. It was a bit of a morality play with a target audience of younger kids. I was also able to understand most of it since it was in Darija (Moroccan Arabic) instead of Standard Arabic as most presentations are. The story is about some guys who are up to no good - drinking, doing drugs, and stealing. The humor comes from the dialogue and action being really exaggerated (as well as the way the bad guys dress). Here is the scheme beginning




But of course they end up getting caught and arrested by the police.




They go on trial to explain themselves in an over-the-top kind of way. It turns out that just one of the guys was responsible for the crime while the other was quite innocent. Justice is served!




Over at the Development Association (where girls from the surrounding countryside come to live while going to school here in town) I was asked to help with a simple English play for some of the motivated girls. We did a fun adaptation of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. It's more of a narration with acting if that makes sense....




"Go home Goldie! Hear our call: run like the wind and don't come back at all!"




So our Moroccan Goldie (in the middle) may not have blond hair.... It's a good time working on plays. I even got invited for dinner a couple times after our rehearsals. I look forward to more theater!