rêve marocain

In joining Peace Corps, initially I had minimal intent toward bettering the world. A bit embarrassing to admit, but it's the truth. Rather, I needed to escape from a personal rut and the bounds of my comfort zone, and viewed the "world peace" and "international development" aspects as attractive side effects. If I could contribute to those, great-- but I needed to do something for myself first.

I haven't often thought of my service as a job, but more of an opportunity to experience a series of environments and relationships-- an experiment, in a way-- to put myself in an entirely new situation and see how it goes. The relationships formed here-- the potential they have overturned, the good examples that have been shared, and the friendships that have come to be-- are by far the most rewarding aspects of the experience, and are where the most significant successes can be found, in my opinion. Though it feels unwieldy and pretentious to consider myself a facilitator of world peace, I believe that when people from different worlds come to understand and respect one another, it's a step in the right direction-- one that echos out long after the initial parties have gone their separate ways. The effects of our having known one another will carry on after my departure, through them in Morocco, and through me in America.

The friends I've found are some of the wisest people I have ever met, though they don't realize it. They live without concerns for status or reputation, ignoring the expectations of anything or anyone in order to share a connection with others, and for the joy that can be found there. I have looked up to them, learned from them, and am forever humbled by their struggles, hard work, and the spirit they retain despite such hardship and no promise of anything. Their families have taken me in, called me their son and have shown me warmth unlike any I have ever felt.

One constant of my service has been the dream-like quality to it all. Many times I have literally stopped in awe and disbelief that this is the life I get to live. I wake up each morning and look out over snow-capped mountains and a green valley. Forests, a river, olive groves, almond trees, wheat fields and a mountain range are my backyard. I walk down the street and am greeted by people who have accepted me into their place and their lives. I am lucky, grateful and can't help but occasionally feel undeserving of it all.  

I've had the support of the Peace Corps community-- fellow volunteers and sitemates, my family, friends back home, and a partner who fell into my lap four months into my service, who has waited this out with me for nearly two years, helping me through every step. I was able to show this place to my brother, who can indeed report that I haven't just been somewhere in the Bahamas the whole time. 

Looking through my photos, their inadequacy is striking. Reading past blog entries and the journals I've kept since minutes after leaving home, I can tell they don't reflect accurately what this has all been. I wouldn't expect them to, but I've tried, and I'm glad I have them. Only the experience can equal the experience, and it only happens once like this. It will all seem like a dream the moment I step off the plane, and there's nothing I can do to prevent that. Perhaps the truest ways I will see Morocco will be in my own thoughts and actions to come-- those parts of people I've known having become a part of myself, and in the confidence that comes from having done something I once couldn't even fathom.

The path through these last twenty seven months has reinforced my belief in the precept that things are always happening as they should, even if you can't see why or how at the time-- and that whatever you need at the moment is there for you. It has proved itself to me time and again, and shapes the way I try to live.

I think that to better the world, each person has to work to better him or herself. I'm glad I made the decision to join Peace Corps, selfish as it may have been at the time. It's the best thing I've ever done. As it turns out, the desire to be a better person hasn't been as one-sided as one might think. It's a process-- an exchange, nudged along by the help and example of others-- one that requires a lot of giving, and one that can continually be improved upon.

The days here lately are as beautiful as any I have ever seen. I find that trying to appreciate something "more" because you're about to part with it never seems to really work. You just gotta do what you normally do, while you can. Speaking of which, there's a knock at the door... I'll be out for a walk.

Eighteen Days

Eighteen days. In eighteen days I'll be signing my name in a book at the offices in Rabat, then I will have finished Peace Corps... two years, three months and a few tajines later.

At this moment, things are quiet. The boxes have been shipped home, the gifts bought, final reports submitted, and everything is ready to be left behind or packed into suitcases, all of it resting in neat little stacks around my forever emptying house. A few goodbyes have been said. S is in Paris. The days are sunny and bright and chilly. It's somewhat of a limbo phase, where I'm all ready to go, but it's not quite time yet. I'm spending quality time with the sitemate and the guys, and have paid visits to TeaMaster Abdel Ali and the host fam. My surplus books, DVDs and clothes have been distributed, and all but a map of Morocco and some insect guts has been removed from my walls.

I'm awaiting a phone call to inform me of my replacement, who will be here on the 31st for a short site visit. Going on past experience, that should be several days of hurried activity as the new guy gets a crash course on Amizmiz. The day following his departure a friend of S's will be here to visit, staying through till my last day in town, the 10th of November.

As far as what it's like to be this close to finishing, it's a bit of everything, as one might expect: bittersweet, surreal, exciting-- though nothing has hit too hard just yet. It feels like that's all waiting at bay for the time being, ready to rush in as the final goodbyes are said and I'm in the taxi heading out of town. I'm not quite sure what to expect, really. It does sneak in here and there, as I walk around and think to myself that it's one of the last times I'll do so during this experience. There's a lot to be said about what this whole thing has meant to me-- more than I could ever articulate on here, but I'll probably attempt something of the sort in another post soon to come. Get yer tissues ready!

COS Conference/Chefchaouen

Medical? Check.

Dental? Check.

Mostly pointless conference sessions? Check.

Seeing my fantastic staajmates? Double check.

Lasagna at La Mamma and five meals of falafel over the course of a seven-day period? Oh yeah.

Done. Onward...

Chefchaouen: A town of somewhat mythical status, the place up north I'd just never had a good opportunity to visit. In fact, I had already come to acceptance with the likelihood that I probably wasn't going to fit it in during my Peace Corps service, but was invited along for a short trip following COS conference.

Expecting to step off the bus into a teeming throng of European hippies, faux guides (pronounce: geeeeds) and hash peddlers, we were instead greeted with an empty parking lot, not a tourist in sight and no indication whatsoever that we had even arrived in the correct town, aside from the fact that the driver turned off the bus and disappeared into the night. Where were the enchanted blue alleyways? The cobblestone streets? The hanging lanterns? Turns out they were just up the road a bit. The town itself is spread across the long, slow slope of a mountainside, providing a perfect lookout across the valley. It is clean, vibrant, and according to my companions, has a very "European" feel. The majority of the city consists of modern, well-kept buildings and businesses with a backdrop of high rise condos, though the "old medina" section provides a more quaint, traditional feel, and yes, the beautiful blue and white-painted passageways. We woke early the morning after our arrival to explore them, getting lost amid their twists and turns, stairways, archways and canopies of grape vine overhead.

 

Perhaps it was the low season, or my expectations were simply skewed, but there seemed to be hardly any tourists. I suppose I am accustomed to Marrakech where the streets overflow with them, but in Chefchaouen their presence was shockingly minimal. I had also expected to be solicited hash constantly, as reported by other Volunteers and guidebooks-- the city is notorious for it-- but it only happened once, when a guy at the hotel flashed a tiny baggy and promised "good quality". We declined, though the other guests, hotel manager, restaurant waiter and every bleary-eyed shopkeeper we passed seemed otherwise. Also, due to the city's northern location and, therefore, prevalence of Spanish-speaking tourists, we were offered holas as opposed to the usual bonjours.

We took a taxi outside of town to an area called Akchor, at which you can hike to either some cascades or a natural arch called God's Bridge. After fighting off the multitude of faux guides lurking where the taxi dropped us off, all of whom insisted that we needed a "son of the countryside" to lead the way (which was most certainly arduous and fraught with peril), we opted for the clearly marked and worn path toward the Bridge. The day was perfect-- warm, blue-skied and sunny. Along the way were several neglected gardens, with squash growing plump and vines taking over the crumbling bamboo fences. I'm a total sucker for that kind of stuff. The hike was relatively short, and provided great views of the surrounding mountainside-- the forest, sheer gorge walls and the lagoon-blue water of the river below. The bridge itself was impressive, though considerably more so when standing at a distance, as when one is on it, it ceases to be visible. Right. We ate lunch on the rocks in the river below, shoes off and feet in the frigid water, the sun pouring down into the gorge above us. 

Two nights was just enough, I think, as there isn't really a whole lot to DO aside from shopping and simply walking around to take in the sights. It was nice to feel the slower place of a town that seemed content with itself and in no rush (insert hash joke here)-- a welcome change of pace from the weeklong rush of Rabat and familiar chaos of Marrakech, a great place to feel the chill of autumn setting in, and a perfect way to wrap up my Peace Corps travels. Unless you count the 5.5 hour bus ride, taxi, 4.5 hour train ride, taxi and hour bus ride fending off pickpockets on the way back to site the next day. Which I don't.

guess which one...

drawing by Lisa Payne

Headin Up Nawth

In just another day here I'll be making my way up to Rabat for COS Conference. We'll have dental and physical checkups, an exit interview with the Country Director, and a couple days of conferences relating to the transition to life following Peace Corps. Just imagine: as you go about your week, there will be approximately fifty Americans running around the Moroccan capital, home to the King and the 2020 Summer Olympics, each with a small white cup held delicately within an innocuous brown paper bag, on a mission to deliver a sample of his or her own-- well, you know-- to the lab before the time limit expires. 

Been keeping busy here. My sitemate and I realized that, though I will be returning to Amizmiz on Oct. 4th, she will be away until much later this month, giving us precious little time to enjoy each other's company before I head outta here for good, and she gets a newbie to haze. We've been making more effort than usual to cook dinners and watch bad tv together in the past week. Sushi? Chicken nuggets? Green beans and mashed potatoes? American-style hamburgers? Bread pudding? The occasional adult beverage? Mm hm. 

Speaking of the new volunteer-- my replacement-- the only detail we know is that it will be a guy. He is not yet aware, but the plan is for him to take my house as soon as he finishes homestay, thus saving myself and him a huge pain moving all of my crap across town and back. Hopefully he will be in agreement.

I've consolidated things around the house, figuring out what I'll need to ship back, what will go to my sitemate, what will stay for the new volunteer, and what I'll lug to France, Denmark, and eventually Illinois with me. I've ended up needing to take home much less than initially anticipated, which is a relief. I thought I'd be paying a fortune on airline extra baggage fees or shipping to America, but that seems to have mostly been avoided. There is even room for gifts-- any specific requests, by the way? Now is the time!

When I return from Rabat I'll have a few open weeks here, during which I hope to take care of said shopping, wrap things up with the counterpart, and I should probably start saying my goodbyes little by little. I'm anticipating that time to go quickly. The new volunteer arrives on Halloween for site visit-- a period of five days during which we go around and meet the necessary people, register him with the gendarmes, and give him a crash course on Amizmiz. Then he'll head out until to go swear in as a volunteer, and will return on the 25th for good, almost two weeks after my departure.

Also, it seems that over the course of the last few months I have written a little album- a collection of songs, if you will. Thanks to this here geetar and computer, I was able to do so. Not sure how it came to be, but it did! Almost done. Just finishing up the last song, then I'll post a link to the whole thing here if anyone is interested. And no, it does not sound like "Moroccan" music...

Beyond Ramadan

On my way back to site from a day trip into the city on September 9th, I heard whisperings of the next day being l3id sghir, the holiday celebrating the end of Ramadan. Sure enough, the following morning white djellaba'd men filled the streets, calls echoed from the mosques, and I found myself at a neighbor's house, wide-eyed and buzzing as glass after glass of tooth dissolvingly sweet tea coursed through my veins.

I had ended my fast several days prior, due to a weird stomach issue and the Peace Corps doctor's recommendation that I resume eating as normal. Oh well-- close enough, right?

Things have returned to normalcy relatively quickly, it seems. School will be starting before long, and the roundabout at the main entrance to town, a popular between-class hangout, is already filled with loitering youth. Cafés are packed with men half-hidden behind a veil of cigarette smoke, and the streets are a-bustling with the drones of motorbikes and groans of transport vans. People have resumed conversing with one another beneath my windows at great length and maximum volume, often from tens of feet apart. Nice to see some life back into everything.

I'm anticipating my friend Abderrahim's return any day now. As I wrote previously, he's been working near Rabat for most of the summer but will return to continue his studies at university in Marrakech. Also attending will be my good buddy and cousin of Abderrahim, Aziz, who passed the ominous "Baccalaureate" exam this past spring. Aziz has only left Amizmiz a handful of times in his entire life, despite being twenty-two. As a result, he has no stomach for vehicular transportation and tends to spend the duration of his rides heaving into plastic bags, much as he did on the two hour, four bus round-trip fun-time excursion to register for classes last week. Poor guy. It's going to be a rough commute every day, but I hope he will adjust quickly. He does, too.

September 9th also happened to mark the two year anniversary of my stage's arrival in country, which is a strange fact to process. People ask whether the time has passed quickly or slowly, to which I can never articulate an answer. The passing of time has been quite the enigma of my Peace Corps experience, tending to expand and contract, accelerate and slow, and in retrospect, often seeming like all simultaneously. Recalling those first days and months, it feels like so long ago, yet I remember it as crisply and vividly as though it were yesterday (erm, perhaps even more so)-- the grand mystique in everything that has since become the mundane. I still glimpse it often, though these days it comes as a passing appreciation rather than sustained awe. Family and places back home have remained familiar as always, but life before Morocco feels truly like another existence entirely.

September 12th marked two months until COS! I'm officially done November 12th and fly out the 13th. I've started to have dreams about it, even. I must be excited. Beginning later this month and continuing into early October we'll have COS conference in Rabat, which involves prepping for departure, wrapping up this and that, and medical/dental checkups. Fingers crossed for two years of remaining parasite free!

The Ramadan Diaries, Chapter 2

I've remarked to several people, perhaps much to their concern, that I've been feeling as though I'm the subject of an isolation experiment, left to my own devices in a confined space day after day for observation. Look, look, he's at the computer again. Fascinating. Now he's walking to the other side of the room. Yes, write it down. Write it all down...

As the furnace rages on outdoors, I remain a prisoner to my house until the late evening hours when escape is possible, into the still-not-brisk-but-at-least-not-scorching night air. The days are very much the same, filled with nearly identical activities, only in a different order.

We're now a little over halfway through Ramadan. On our nightly walks we've watched the moon grow from its sliver to full; now it wanes its way toward darkness again. The first faint traces of the crescent visible after the new moon will indicate the end of Ramadan, and we'll celebrate l3id sghir, the small feast.

I haven't found the hunger to be particularly any more tolerable. It is an ever-present sensation, continually tugging, reminding. I've noticed that in the hour or so before breaking the fast (about 7:20 PM), I feel lightheaded and a little loopy. When I do finally eat, I've learned that I'm not able to consume my normal portions without some serious discomfort, feeling wayyy too full. Of course when one is so hungry, it's hard to resist not engulfing everything in front of you, or going back for a heaping bowl of seconds. It took me some time to stop doing that. I've observed that the Moroccans don't eat much during lftur (breakfast) either, having a bowl of soup and a nibble or two of this or that, hardly making any noticeable dent in the cornucopia-esque array before them.

I've been making the rounds, having breakfast with the families of my friends and local acquaintances, which has been great. Last year I kept pretty much to myself, but I'm really enjoying getting to know the families better, and the visits are tremendously pleasant. I've adopted the practice of eating a late dinner around eleven or midnight, and dropped the suhoor meal in the pre-dawn hours. My body clock has shifted; I stay up a few hours later and, proportionally, sleep in a few hours later.

I am looking forward to finishing. While I do enjoy the spirit of the time, I am not crazy about the lack of energy and torpor that seems to be self-perpetuating. I fantasize about getting "back on track", physically and mentally. Without the religious obligation, I have to make my own relevant reasons for doing this, otherwise it's just sitting around being hungry until you can eat. My motivations are very much in accordance, at least in my understanding, with those of the Muslim world-- practicing patience, developing a more deliberate intent toward kindness and giving, and reflecting on what you have. It's good stuff.

A friend's succinct words regarding Ramadan:

I watched an interview with a woman on television, and she was talking about the time of Ramadan, "when all the Muslims make themselves suffer", and she thinks we are crazy to do it. But she doesn't know at all. We are happy, and we want to fast. Ramadan is one of the best times in the life for us.