A lot has occurred since my last post. I am now settled in my new homestay at my permanent site. I am 18K from a cyber so can only to get to email and blog about once a week. There is a youth development volunteer in that town who is a 35 year old lawyer from Chicago. I am very lucky to have her nearby and look forward to spending some time on weekends with her.
My new town is very conservative. Some women, including my homestay "daughter" cannot go anywhere by themselves, including the weekly market (souq) which is like a farmer's market. So that is a bit different. Here's a photo of Latifa in the kitchen making bread, a daily activity.
One thing I continue to learn on a daily basis is that one simply cannot generalize about what Morocco is like. It can vary so much from region to region, and even within a town. For example, on my morning walks I see a regular type of tractor harrowing the land, and on the other side of town a man is plowing the field using a mule and old-fashioned plow. Same goes with housing. My house is above the mechanic's garage, and with the exception of one room, is unpainted cement, with about 10' high walls. My room is about 8' square with no windows.
There is no heat and the inside room temperature is very cold...I'm guessing around 50 or so. On the other hand, my new Arabic teacher (who is a new English teacher at the high school) has a place that is light and airy and has ceramic tile walls and floors. But, her place is cold at night as well. Warm, lovely days...probably around 70 or so. I guess February is the coldest month. I will be in my own place then.
I arranged to store the furniture I received from a departing PCV in my Arabic teacher's place, as she has little furniture. I have nearly everything I need to set up house, looks like. I believe I indicated that my new town has running water all day; not sure if I indicated that it is generally cold. Some places have hot water heaters; they are square boxes that are attached to the wall.
I am enjoying my morning walks...go out for at least an hour about 7:45 when the sun is starting to come up over the mountains. It is beautiful country in this area, with many hills and mountains, so I get a good workout.
A bit more on transportation and I'll add more about my work etc next time. I indicated that taxi drivers are a bit crazy. The roads are generally very narrow with not much shoulder, so drivers tend to go right down the middle. Horns are honked a lot to alert pedestrians, motorbikes, bicyclists, etc that they better move over. Lots of tour busses and vans in this area as well, as it is the primary road between two larger towns. In larger towns, there are petit taxis that can legally, and realistically, only carry three people, and the fare is the same no matter how many people are in the taxi. To go from town to town, there are grand taxis, which are old Mercedes (and I mean OLD!) and they require 6 people in the taxi, 2 in front with the driver and 4 in the back. You can buy and extra seat if you want more space for yourself, but I generally just squeeze in with everyone else. It costs 7 DH to go from my town to my cyber town 18K away, which is about $.80. If anyone were to come to Morocco, I would definitely advise against renting a car and driving yourself around. Traffic accident rates here are pretty phenomenal, I understand. The Peace Corps has a policy against travelling at night, with good reason. It is funny, though, to see "scarved" women wearing jellabas on motorbikes in the bigger cities. I've been wanting to see a man on a donkey talking on the cell phone and get a picture, but haven't happened upon that yet!!
My new town is very conservative. Some women, including my homestay "daughter" cannot go anywhere by themselves, including the weekly market (souq) which is like a farmer's market. So that is a bit different. Here's a photo of Latifa in the kitchen making bread, a daily activity.
One thing I continue to learn on a daily basis is that one simply cannot generalize about what Morocco is like. It can vary so much from region to region, and even within a town. For example, on my morning walks I see a regular type of tractor harrowing the land, and on the other side of town a man is plowing the field using a mule and old-fashioned plow. Same goes with housing. My house is above the mechanic's garage, and with the exception of one room, is unpainted cement, with about 10' high walls. My room is about 8' square with no windows.
There is no heat and the inside room temperature is very cold...I'm guessing around 50 or so. On the other hand, my new Arabic teacher (who is a new English teacher at the high school) has a place that is light and airy and has ceramic tile walls and floors. But, her place is cold at night as well. Warm, lovely days...probably around 70 or so. I guess February is the coldest month. I will be in my own place then.
I arranged to store the furniture I received from a departing PCV in my Arabic teacher's place, as she has little furniture. I have nearly everything I need to set up house, looks like. I believe I indicated that my new town has running water all day; not sure if I indicated that it is generally cold. Some places have hot water heaters; they are square boxes that are attached to the wall.
I am enjoying my morning walks...go out for at least an hour about 7:45 when the sun is starting to come up over the mountains. It is beautiful country in this area, with many hills and mountains, so I get a good workout.
A bit more on transportation and I'll add more about my work etc next time. I indicated that taxi drivers are a bit crazy. The roads are generally very narrow with not much shoulder, so drivers tend to go right down the middle. Horns are honked a lot to alert pedestrians, motorbikes, bicyclists, etc that they better move over. Lots of tour busses and vans in this area as well, as it is the primary road between two larger towns. In larger towns, there are petit taxis that can legally, and realistically, only carry three people, and the fare is the same no matter how many people are in the taxi. To go from town to town, there are grand taxis, which are old Mercedes (and I mean OLD!) and they require 6 people in the taxi, 2 in front with the driver and 4 in the back. You can buy and extra seat if you want more space for yourself, but I generally just squeeze in with everyone else. It costs 7 DH to go from my town to my cyber town 18K away, which is about $.80. If anyone were to come to Morocco, I would definitely advise against renting a car and driving yourself around. Traffic accident rates here are pretty phenomenal, I understand. The Peace Corps has a policy against travelling at night, with good reason. It is funny, though, to see "scarved" women wearing jellabas on motorbikes in the bigger cities. I've been wanting to see a man on a donkey talking on the cell phone and get a picture, but haven't happened upon that yet!!
posted by Connie Genger | 7:10 AM
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