Friday, April 27, 2012

Random things I've seen

Hi Everyone!!!

I have compiled a few pictures as a representation of what I have been up to recently.  It is hard to explain all of the things that I have been doing and seeing so I just decided to show you!!!  

As an update, I am in this town for another three weeks, then I move to my final site.  There, I will be with a second host family for two weeks and hopefully will be able to find my own apt in that time!!! Exciting!!  I know that once I get there I will have too much time on my hands and promise to give more information about different cultural and linguistic details. 

Right now my days consist of about six hours of language and cultural classes with my Moroccan teacher and my evenings are filled with eating and talking with my host family.  I feel like I am becoming integrated slowly and getting a better sense of how things work here.  I will explain more when I actually have time to type! 

Please feel free to ask any questions you have about what I've seen so far!!

~Kelsey


Last weekend I went to Immouzer to see a presentation put on by a current PCV. The PCV was working with Youth in the Small Business sector and had managed to network with an association in the states that gave loans to youth that wanted to become entrepreneurs.  The loans were distributed to the students in the form of supplies for their projects and goal of the loans was to create businesses that would grow and employ more youth in the future.  The PCTs were invited to the event and about 30 or 40 of us (out of 115) went.  It was great to meet up with people that I haven't seen in the last month!  That is because all of us are split up into three groups and only have biweekly meetings with people in our group.  It was really great to see the goals of a volunteer realized and celebrated.  Most of the loans were given to people with Berber heritage and some traditional drum playing and decor was part of the event!

On the way back from Immouzer we stopped at an area that was near a lake and I just had to take a picture because the scenery was so gorgeous!  Also its a good reminder that the landscapes in Morocco are extremely diverse and not everything looks like the Sahara.  With that being said, I wonder what my final site will look like.  Will I be in the north? or south?  Or somewhere in between?  I am exciting at the idea of traveling throughout the next two years and seeing how diverse Morocco truly is. 
This group of pictures are also scenes in El Hajeb.  The other day a few of us decided  to go for a walk by the big hill near one of our host families and the scenery was amazing!!!  Its great to be high up and see the whole city before you!
The following pictures are also from our walk around the countryside of El Hajeb.  I am lucky to be in such a beautiful town!

Here is a picture of me and two of my CBTmates.  
I also had one of the neighbors come over this week and do henna on me, my host sister and my host mom.  The Henna happened very quickly, then we let it dry for about an hour and a half and then scrapped off the dried dye with a knife.  It was a very interesting process and will supposedly take about a week to come off.  The only bad thing is that when I get my hands wet, it seems to come off a little bit so I unable to wear contacts or cook at the moment!!

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Pictures!!!!!

View from my hotel room in Rabat
Picture of shoes at the market in Rabat.  30 Dirhams is about four dollars 
Me in front of a fountain in Ifrane
Me in front of a waterfall in Ifrane.  Sorry about the brown shirt lol

Driving on the way to Azrou.  This is basically what the road looks like between towns where I am right now


Sheep!!!  You also see many of these between towns with their shephards.










My Town!!

My town!!!!



My town again!

Update on PST

Hi Everyone,

Wow, I can't believe that the last time I updated was from the airport in Philadelphia.  So, I've been in Morocco for about three weeks now and am finally getting a small grasp on what to expect from day to day.  Training in Rabat lasted for 9 days and was great.  I sat through a lot of powerpoint presentations about food, safety, culture, Peace Corps policies, had a few language classes and got a lot of shots.  Luckily I haven't gotten sick yet despite the lack of nutritious food or communal cups, plates, spoons.

Okay, so Morocco is a country of diversity.  One minute you will see a billboard for the new iphone and the next minute you will see a donkey cart pulling today's vegetables to the market.  The language is quite diverse as well.  Most people speak a dialect of Berber in the home, Moroccan Arabic (darija) in the street, learn Modern Standard Arabic and French in school and high schoolers learn English or Spanish as well.  Most people speak to me in French and are surprised when I utter a few mangled darija words back at them.  It's lots of fun trying to mime what I want and understand any of what is being said to me.  With that being said, I am currently able to form very short sentences and questions using my limited vocabulary, but have not idea what is being said back to me in response!  Its a fun process lol

One big change for me is the food.  As a vegetarian, I have been lucky enough to be able to eat around the meat with no issues.  With that being said, I have never eaten so much bread, sugar, mayonnaise or oil in my life.  I am starting to adjust to the carb overload and know that it could be a lot worse in another country.

I have done a little bit of traveling.  I have gone to Azrou, Fez, Meknes and Ifrane so far.  The bigger cities are very modern.  I am currently in a semi-urban one with about 20,000 people and almost anything that you would need is here.  I have had trouble finding a winter coat, but I am sure that I will spot one soon.

One of my favorite parts has been starting to teach English.  We taught for four days, three hours each and it was a wonderful opportunity.  My lesson planning skills still need a lot of attention, but the experience was extremely uplifting to be around teens that voluntarily came to english class and were eager to be around an American.

My typical day includes waking up, eating breakfast and going to language class for four hours.  Then I eat lunch, go back for three hours of cultural discussion/ community integration and come home for second lunch (lol).  Then I usually go with my host sister to the market or other local stores, sometimes we go to aerobics class or the Hammam (public bathhouse.  Basically a big sauna room with faucets around the room.  It was hot. I loved it!) and then we make dinner, eat dinner and watch Turkish or Mexican TV. Then I study darija for as long as I can before falling asleep.  Its and exhausting process but it has been great so far.

Sorry I haven't been updating lately.  I only get the internet twice a week and it usually takes about twenty minutes to check my email.  I will try to post again next week!

Thanks for reading!!!!