This week I got to get into the routine of living life in the desert. In the morning, you get up to work but since midday is the hottest part of the day most people cease working for a couple of hours. Some nap while others simply find a cool place to hang out until the heat subsides. Most evenings the clouds roll through and it becomes so overcast that it looks like it could start storming at any moment, though it never does. In the evenings I like to go to the park where you can find the lake and a (dried up) river. I always seem to find something fun on my walks through the park. This week I saw a tortoise, two chameleons, wild lavender, and a jackrabbit!
It’s been nice getting to know the whole family during my time here. Though Marit (the other IFYE from Iowa) and I stay with the mom and the dad throughout the week, two of their grown children come back on the weekends. The sister brings her three children along with 4-5 of the cousins. We pass the weekends going to the pool and playing Uno and Jenga. Per their request, we also give English lessons twice a day. It’s helpful because the older children that are a little more familiar with the language can help us explain to the younger ones in ways that are better suited for them. Though I do enjoy living here, there have been adjustments that I have had to make. For one there are no showers. Whenever we want to wash we have to heat the water heater with a gas tank and fill up the buckets. They also have a traditional squat toilet in their home. Along with this, they do not have wifi and we are in such a rural area that the reception is inconsistent depending on which part of the house you’re calling from. It’s been much harder to communicate with family and friends from home while being here. I think Marit and I being together during this visit has been beneficial. Since no one speaks English I imagine it would be easy to feel isolated and lonely here if it was just me. While I’ve been here it’s helped me to notice many un-obvious luxuries that I have when in America. They can be as simple as having lamps scattered around the house because we can find outlets throughout our homes. Or having weekends and days off. In rural Morocco, many people work six out of seven days of the week. It’s not uncommon to find someone who works all seven because their livelihood depends on it. I loved that I have been able to have this experience because it’s helped me to identify some of these un-obvious privileges which will change my perspective when returning home.
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This week I moved to my next host family in Midelt, which is a small town located in the southeastern part of the country. It is a desert town with a population of around 55,000 but I am staying in a home about 30 minutes from town. The weather here is much nicer than I’ve experienced in Morocco so far! It gets to be in the mid-’90s during the day and gets down to the 70s with a chilled breeze at night. I think the town is considered to be in the desert not because of the heat but because of the small amounts of yearly rain it receives. My host family is of Berber descent, which are the native peoples of Morocco. The Berber have their own language, culture, and cuisine. It’s honestly a whole new experience living with them compared to the city folk who I had been accustomed to up until this point. I stay in a house with the grandparents but on the weekends the house comes alive. Many of the adult siblings come home to visit and bring along with them their kids. Along with this the neighbors are constantly coming by. The women cook together and share the meal with their families and whoever else happens to stop by. The family system here is strong and important and it often extends out to the local community.
My host family owns an apple orchard of around 15 hectares. The farm has been in their family since the 90s. Along with the orchard they also own and operate a huge refrigerator used to store their apples after harvest. The fridge is comprised of five rooms that can hold approximately 75,000 apples each. Each room is stacked full with palettes of empty crates waiting to be filled. The family uses the fridge for their apples, but they also rent out space to local producers in the area. Once their apples are harvested they ship them to wholesalers in different cities around the country including Casablanca and Tangier. Since harvest isn’t until September the family uses this time to prep the crates so they are ready to hold apples after harvest. The preparation isn’t much. Three workers go through every day and manually wash crates and then re-stack them onto the palettes and load them back into the fridge. They’ll do this until all the crates have been cleaned. The washers get through about 20 palettes a day which adds up to 1,080 crates. Every day after breakfast I walk to the fridge for work. After the washers are finished cleaning, I stack the crates to be loaded back into storage. Out of all the places I have lived/visited so far in Morocco, Midelt has been one of my favorites. It is so beautiful here. We are surrounded by mountains and wildlife. The house is within walking distance of a park that has a lake and river and is encased in fruit trees. The weather is so nice and the people are even more. My host brother works in Meknés during the week but relishes coming home to the ‘simple life’ at the end of every work week and I understand what he means. Here, the clock does not rule your day nor do Zoom meetings or emails. There is significance to returning to the land and focusing on relationships. The appeal is magnificent. This week I got to experience the more rural side of Morocco. My host dad and I spent most mornings and evenings working on the farm. The chores changed depending on the day. They varied from irrigating the fruit trees, to rounding hay, making sure all the cattle had water, or harvesting the fruit. This also included routine trips to the slaughterhouse. I worked alongside seven Moroccan farmhands who are responsible for completing the chores on the daily. These workers spoke no English, no French, and no Spanish so communicating with them was a struggle, to say the least. Usually, I wouldn’t have much to say but often my host dad would have me explain things using whatever forms of communication were available. This was an important exercise because it emphasized how I will have to interact with most rural Moroccans.
While learning how to communicate my host father thought it would also be helpful to visit an average Moroccan farm family. Though working on the farm was a great experience, my host dad made it clear that his farm is not what you will find in a generational rural family. At the farm that we visited the family owned one milking cow, three sheep, and about five hectares of land. Compared to my host family’s operation this was exponentially smaller. The family lived in old ruins outside the city and although they had access to running water they didn’t have many of the other luxuries compared to the American farm life. It is a privilege getting to see both sides of local agriculture because they both play a vital role in the country’s economy. Morocco is so diverse when it comes to agriculture. They produce a plethora of fruits and vegetables, a variety of livestock, argon, and many different nuts and beans. They are successful in this because of how the several types the geography and climate in the country. Morocco exports to many different countries within Africa but their leading exporting nations are to Spain and France since they are so close to Europe. Though climate change has affected the way the locals farm they have done everything they can to adapt, for agriculture makes up more than 35% of the country’s economy. The producers continue to evolve and modify with the recurring challenge of higher temperatures and less rain every year. This week was very busy. We traveled to Ksar El Kébir to spend the holiday with Mohammed’s whole family. The holiday is a three-day event marked on the Islamic Lunar calendar. Families return to their origin and celebrate by traditionally slaughtering a lamb in an act of obedience to God. Mohammed’s family fully welcomed me as I was able to learn more about Moroccan customs and traditions and music. Over 25 of his family members meet every year at a 5 story home dedicated to their quality time. The whole family only resides there only once or twice a year for the holidays (depending on everyone's schedule).
The weekend started with a greeting from the entire family which consisted of lots of la bise’s and laughing. Because of Covid, the family wasn’t able to get together the last couple of years so they all had a lot to catch up on. The next day we dressed in traditional clothes for breakfast and had a literal feast that the older women and moms prepared. The men then prepared the sheep and each family slaughtered their own. Even though this is done every year some members prefer not to witness the slaughter because it is tough for them. After the slaughter, we spent the day preparing the meat to consume. They respect the sheep’s sacrifice by eating all parts of it and not wasting any of their meat. Throughout the next day, we spent eating the liver, heart, kidneys, and lungs. After that, we moved on to the more traditional cuts of meat. And after the third day, the holiday was officially over. I tried mostly all cuts of the meat but I didn’t prefer the less traditional cuts of meat. They had a really specific taste and texture that I was not used to. After the holiday was over we took a trip to Assilah for the beach! All of the cousins and a couple of the parents joined. The water was so cold but once you got used to it you were able to have fun. The day after we all loaded up to visit the blue city, Chefchaouen. All the buildings and walls are painted in different shades of blue. It’s unknown why everything is blue but there are many theories surrounding the origin of the paint. Though the city is located in the mountains the weather was still similar to the rest of Morocco. HOT. After exploring a good amount of the city we finished our night with dinner in Tangier. It was so great getting to experience this holiday with a traditional Moroccan family. The most fascinating part to me was the amount of culture that can be found in one family. When I first arrived I was greeted with ‘Salam’, ‘Bonjour’, ‘Hola’, and of course, ‘Hello’. Their families traveled from Spain and France to be able to spend the holiday with one another. Though I was surrounded by people originally from Morocco they also represented different cultures that they immigrated to. My favorite part was getting to see how these cultures not only interacted with one another but how they so freely flowed among their family. It seemed so effortless but I’m sure that’s from years of learning and compromising. Though this was my second full week in Morocco, I feel like it was my first actual week. Last week was orientation to the country, the culture, and the people. Now the real trial begins. When arriving at my host family they all welcomed me with open arms and kind smiles. The family consists of 6 people including three brothers and one sister. The El Boahdidi's live in an apartment in the city with a house at the farm that they retire to during the idle summer months. On their farm, they have cattle, goats, sheep, and ducks along with a variety of fruit and olive trees. They will move after the daughter is finished with her semester at university, but sadly I think I will have moved on to my next family by then. This week I have been learning how to communicate using only a few words. The Moroccan dialect is very specific and is quite different from classic Arabic that is taught in schools. I could not prepare for the language before I left which provides me with an adequate challenge now that I am surrounded by the language. Every day I try to learn a few new words to add to my vocabulary, which the children enjoy teaching. Although Arabic is their official language the majority of young students learn French, English, Spanish, and sometimes Italian in school. I never realized how intimidating it is to speak to native speakers when it is not your first language. I am always worried that I’ll make a mistake or that they straight up won’t know what I am trying to say. But speaking is the best way to learn and all have been very gracious with my inaccuracies. Last week I worked hard to understand the environmental challenges that faced Morocco and how this affected their agricultural sector. This week I focused more on the people and their culture. How they interact with one another, how their culture is present in everything they do, and the vast similarities that this family has to my own. To help with my cultural understanding of the kingdom we took a trip to Rabat. This is the country’s capital and where the royal family resides. We got to explore the ancient mausoleum, the royal mosque, and the family’s quarters. I enjoyed learning the history of the empire and the effect that colonization had on its people. Although they were fortunate enough to preserve many different traditions and customs, the influence of colonization is still present and affecting the inhabitants of Morocco. My main takeaway from the week: talking comes in many different forms. P.s. Big thank you to my friend, Trinity, for coining the term “‘Racco” My first week in Morocco was spent touring various different resources related to Moroccan agriculture. We went to a feedlot in Casablanca, a fruit tree farm right outside the city, and the Regional Agricultural Research Center. I also began getting acquainted with the country by visiting the Old Medina, partaking in a couple of the traditional dishes, and beginning to learn the local dialect of Arabic!
When arriving they informed us that we will be spending the first week in a hotel and will move to our first host families after that. I think this has been helpful to ease our way into the culture so we don’t experience the initial shock that many face when visiting a new country. Tomorrow we will be moving to our first family and I couldn’t be more excited! I feel that having the routine of the family will help me to feel more settled than that of a hotel. They kept us very busy on our first week. Everyday our country coordinator would tell us what time he is picking us up and we would be hurled into the day, not knowing any plans or expectations. Our first day was spent at a feedlot where we got to observe the daily chores along with the loading of cattle for slaughter. The next day we got to tour a fruit tree farm that experimented on different species’ resilience to heat and water stress. Climate change is very important to Morocco because they are feeling the rapid and immediate effects of this challenge. The fruit tree farm cultivated olives, apples, plums, peaches, argon, figs, almonds, walnuts, cherries, and much more! Later in the week we visited the Regional Agricultural Research Center where they analyzed the findings from the fruit tree farm. The week however was not all work. We were able to make friends with some of the researchers’ daughters who took us to the mall and around the city. We also had the opportunity to visit the Old Medina. The first king of Morocco hand built the palace where him and his whole family are now laid to rest in the center. The artistry was beautiful. It is said that who ever visits will be brought many blessings for the weeks to follow. My main takeaway from the week: Moroccans do not plan. The day before orientation ended our group got to tour Washington D.C. for the day. We spent the whole day exploring the city, observing memorials, and experiencing the various food trucks and events happening in the city. We got to explore for about 7 hours and walked a total of around 8 miles. Though we were there all day I still feel like we didn't even scratch the surface of what the Capital had to offer! I look forward to my visit to Washington, D.C.
The whole class of IFYE's met in Washington D.C. for a a four day orientation. This group includes individuals from all over the world including Austria, Switzerland, Germany, and South Korea. The orientation was necessary to help provide us all with helpful tools before leaving for our summer adventures. We worked on communication skills, coping mechanisms, and languages and customs. We had many guess speakers that visited to describe their IFYE experiences while connecting with people from all over the world. This international training helped to equip each of us with the tools needed to ensure we all have a exciting and enriching summer trip.
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