So
over the past week, there has been a ridiculous amount of stuff that has
happened. So, I apologize again for a really extended blog. I'd also like to give photo credit to Kelly Kern, a lot of the pictures are hers because my camera memory card was not working for a majority of the trip. :)
First off, I had the adventure of going to the Hammam. A
Hammam is a public bath house and is really common to do in the Medina. It’s
quite the process actually to get ready; it’s a weekly event for a lot of
people. We went with my friends host sister, and she brought us to by the soap,
henna, and our scrubbies. The first soap is mixed with henna and used to soften
the skin when you first get there. We spent what felt like forever just
scrubbing with that soap. You let it sit
and rinse off with buckets the give you. (You’re also sitting the entire time
you’re there; they give you a stool if you don’t bring one. Because you’re
there for at least an hour...) Then comes the epic scrubby. This thing is worn
like mitten, kept wet, and used (rather harshly) to get all the dead skin off.
It’s almost kind of painful actually. The women next to you scrubs your back.
(In my case it was my friends host sister.) They REALLY scrub. Hardcore. You
can visibly see the skin coming off. It’s kind of gross. After you are sufficiently
scrubbed, you wash your hair, shave, and do whatever you have to do. The final
step was putting on another soap and letting it sit for about five minutes..
Ours was a bright pink, rose scented soap. My friends host sister was really
amused since we were all so light skinned compared to her, so needless to say,
the soap came out WAY brighter on us then it did on her skin. Finally, after
all this, we rinse off and leave (very dehydrated.) Fun fact: sitting in a
sauna like area for over an hour makes a person verryyyy thirsty and very dehydrated.
However, my skin was incredibly soft and I’ve never felt so clean in my
life. J
Okay, with that out of the way, it’s time to look at my
village home stay. I’m going to split up this reflection into sections, because
there is so much to look at.The program I’m studying focuses on Migration, and
this village is part of something known as “the triangle of death” because so
many men from the villages die trying to cross to Europe. Let’s start here. First off, I was expecting
this place to be dilapidated and depressed because, “triangle of death” doesn’t
exactly create a good image. After a four and a half hour bus ride (with very
little air conditioning), we arrived. Now, every person in this village has a
family member who is abroad, or went abroad to Europe. So, although from the
outside things may look poor, the insides of the houses tend to be extravagantly
tiled, or have a lot of things sent in from Europe. The main house we started
at was the house of the President of a local association that offers classes
for women (like sewing) and preschool classes for the young kids. (This is
great in theory, but I did discover later on that organization is something
that is lacking in the organization.)
After a huge lunch and a very warm welcome in an overly tiled, tasseled
and sparkly living room, the men from our host families came to pick us up.
My family consisted of a host uncle, who wasn’t around
very much. My host mom, Haddoma, who was a sweet heart on so many levels, her
son (excuse my spelling) Alahdeen who
was 13, her daughter Houwla who was four and Haddoma’s mother (who was just a
bit out there…) There welcome into the community was so overwhelming and
touching. (We were only the second group of Americans to stay in the village.)
There was an overwhelming amount of food ready for us for breakfast, lunch, tea
time and dinner. The general environment of living with this family was so
different then living with my family in Rabat. Although I love both, I do think
I enjoyed the village stay on a different level. It was a bit overwhelming to
constantly have someone looking over me and making sure everything was okay,
but at the same time it made it feel homey. I was sick for a good chunk of the
trip, so my ability to eat heavy meals like the tagine was very limited. After
finally overcoming the language barrier, my host mom started making me special
foods to help settle my stomach. She watched me very closely to make sure I was
as comfortable as possible. This made feeling crappy, so much easier.
Friends over the house, there was a feast!
We got our hands, wrists, feet and ankles henna'd :)
Host siblings!
Adorable child that was visiting
Haddoma and her nephew who stayed to translate
Another plus? A lot of people there spoke Spanish! Our
host mom only spoke Arabic, but she brought over a friend who speaks Spanish for
me to talk to, and a friend for my roommate Kelly to speak French too. (Another sign over overwhelming hospitality.)
This was refreshing for me, as I have gotten used to not being able to
communicate. My Arabic is not strong enough to do much else then say Hello, I’m
a student studying Arabic. Oh, and I can order coffee and croissants. Then my
French (which is the second most spoken language in Morocco) is just as basic.
Haddoma ended up having her nephew stay with us to speak French and translate with
Kelly. (By the way, our Arabic names that we went by are Couta and Shaima) I’m
Couta. Haddoma has two brothers abroad, one in Spain and one in Italy. She is
divorced, so there is no husband to provide income for the family. Her brothers
and family support her from Europe. Although their house was fairly empty, they
had a room full of things that her brothers had sent her from abroad. Suitcases
filled with shoes, dresses, hair clips, make up, etc. These were her pride and
joy. She showed us the dish soap her brother got her from France. For them, Europe is the ideal and anything
that comes from there must be better.
The next day we went to the Souk. This is basically a
giant market that has anything you could think of. Meet, beans, fruit, vegetables clothes, shoes, barber shops, school supplies and so many other
things. It’s also a social event. The place was packed and it was huge. Our
means of transportation was an ambulance owned by the association (it was a
bumpy ride) and driving in Morocco can certainly raise a person’s blood
pressure…however here we were also avoiding not only cars, but the abundance of
chickens, cows, donkeys, horse drawn carts, motorcycles and bikes. Haddoma
bought Kelly and I scarfs while we were there (Which are fabulous by the way.)
We had our big bag of goodies brought back to the house via horse and carriage.
The Souk was an overwhelming experience, similar to the Medina, and I’m glad I
got to do it. However, I’m not sure I could do it every week for my grocery shopping.
Our chariot:
That's probably half a cow...on a mans back...
Me and Haddoma <3
The headscarfs Haddoma bought us:
A strange sticky candy thing that a fabulous Spanish speaking boy bought us a piece of:
The Souk:
Okay, so things are also very different in the village
then in Rabat. Although I see some gender segregation in Rabat, it was
definitely more pronounced in the village. We had discussions with the men and
women separately, and it had to be that way. The women stay in the house unless
they have to leave. Haddoma is an exception, she can move a bit more freely
since she is divorced. She is also past marrying age, (Which, by the way,
starts as young as 14 or 15.) So since I’m 20 and no married, the women were
shocked. I think I’m well on my way to being an old hag in that village…
The other big thing was this fact that education is not
viewed as important. Jobs are hard to find here, and no matter what level of
education you have, people feel you won’t find a job anyways. I walk by these
protests all the time in Rabat, people with master’s degrees that can’t find
jobs anywhere. Girls are pulled out of
school usually during what we would consider elementary school. They learn just
enough to write and read basically, some basic math and then they’re pulled out
to work at home. The women we all talked to wanted to migrate to Europe to
improve their situation. Or they wanted to be able to be independent and
support themselves through a small business. The village has a milk co-op and
rug co-op to help support the families. It’s very community oriented and family based.
We were greeted and welcomed by everyone and people were over the house
constantly. We had our friends over to see our house, and Haddoma immediately brought
out (all handmade) cake, bread, Moroccan pancakes, olive oil, olives, honey,
jam, coffee, tea and many other delicious treats.
The milk co-op
Oh, we also played dress up...they put us in Jalabas...
...then satin-ish night gowns and robes...they insisted we wear them at the house and when we went to a friends for tea time... She never gets to wear them since she's not married, so I guess she was living vicariously through us?
One last side note? They refused to accept money for
hosting us. SIT eventually convinced them to accept the payment in form of a
donations to the association.
