Our television debut is on Youtube.  A classmate found it and forwarded the website to me, so I'm regurgitating those instructions here. I figured it out, so hopefully you can, too.

Here's the website: http://www.alaoula.ma/infos.php?lang=fr.

On the main page click on the tab at the top that says "Infos".
In the main video box where it says "journal televise" use the pull down box to select 20-Avril-2012.
You will then click on the top blue box on the right in the video box (actually, for me, the video just popped up on the screen, and I clicked the "play" button. Fast forward to minute 8 and the newscast starts.


I'm the really young, good looking guy!  The guy I'm playing ping-pong with is my hand-holding buddy!

"Roomies" in Azrou

The gang in Azrou

An absolutely gorgeous day, L’Hamdulila!!!!  My bones might even feel the heat if this keeps up.

My birthday was awesome (as far as birthdays go, which isn’t far when you need an abacus to figure out how old you are).  My classmates took, me to the local “fancy” coffee shop and bought me cake and coffee, and then the next day, at Hub, one of the PCT’s interrupted the “goings-on” to say that it was my birthday the day before, and so 50+ people sang me happy birthday (doesn’t anyone else have birthdays around here?).  …and my wonderful daughter sent me the most awesome email ever, that made me cry in the ciber (internet café), which freaked a few people out.

I have to share it and I hope I’m not breaching a confidence, but I think she’s okay with it…

GOOD MORNING.  HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY POPS!!

 youre such a big boy now. haha

 honestly, dad, i admire you so much as a person. youre honest,

 rational, open minded, egalitarian, frugal, down to earth, adventurous,

 very smart!, and very wise, immensely loving empathetic generous

 considerate respectful and caring!! the majority of the qualities i have

 come to appreciate in a person, you have. that might not be such a

 coincidence as i think. but i realized this the other day, (i mean ive

 always respected you and thought of you highly, but) you really have so

 many qualities i admire. NOT TO MENTION YOU ARE IN THE PEACE CORPS! you

 are really going to make a difference in the world. i am so proud of you

 for that.

 YOU ARE JUST SO AWESOME! I AM SO LUCKY THAT THE UNIVERSE GRANTED ME A

 PARENT WITH SUCH AN AMAZING AND LOVING PREROGATIVE!

There was a bit of drama between our teacher and the talamid (that’s we students).  Apparently, the words “silly and “jerk” were considered insulting and offensive to our teacher (of course, not directed at her; just mentioned in conversation).  I mentioned that that seemed silly, which somehow exacerbated the situation.  Then I said I was “crappy” at something-er-rather, and I might as well have called her a pig-eating infidel or something.  Anyway… the students were pissed that we weren’t able to express ourselves to our LCF, (the “F” being “facilitator”) when she is supposed to be the person we can rely on, but it was just one of those cultural things, I guess.  Anyway, she got her panties in wudge and we got our panties in a wudge,  and it ended up leading to all of our class talking to the “powers-that-be” at our hub about our unhappiness with our classroom situation.  We actually sat down with four of the “high-ups” and expressed some of the issues we were having, and they were very receptive to what we had to say, and had a lengthy talk with our LCF.  Things seem a little better now, although she sure is rigid!  What the hell… 4 more weeks.

…a couple of interesting cultural points.  First, of all the weird stuff that I’ve had to get used to (squatty potties, no toilet paper, eating out of a community bowl, etc.), one of the weirdest (why its so weird, I don’t know) is male hand holding between heterosexual men.  And I’m not talking about two other men holding hands.  We’re talking men holding hands with me!

 In Morocco, close friends can be found holding hands walking down the street or standing and talking.  No biggie, right?  I think that’s a great expression of friendship.  And I would say I’m the least homophobic guy I know.  So why, when the mudeer (head) of the Dar Chabab, took a shining to me and held my hand for about 5 minutes while we had a get together with the Moroccan Finance Minister and some other muckity-mucks, did my self-consciousness level rise about 500%?  I was told later that it was a great honor and an unusual situation for him to have “adopted” me as such a close friend in so short a period of time, and its all pretty awesome in retrospect, but just standing there with 10 other people, with the two of us holding hands was just a little weird.

Another custom that no one clued me into and thank Allah (damn, I like saying that) I didn’t trip on my zeb  (just learned that word today, if you can figure it out) is that there is a definite unwritten rule when we are all eating from the community plate.  Typically, there will be perhaps rice all along the bottom with any number of different vegetables stacked up in the middle, and some meat mostly obscured by all the vegetables.  Well, in every situation so far, it seems like everyone pretends there is no meat in the middle until the very end, because everyone eats the rice and vegetables (using bread, of course) but completely ignores the meat.  The plate is pretty much wiped clean of everything except the meat, but it still sits there.  It might be that everyone waits until the head of the family digs in to the meat (I need to be paying more attention to that cue), but all of a sudden, I look up and it’s a feeding frenzy.  Actually, I’m just kidding because everyone is very respectful and pushes meat toward each other and usually one of the women reaches in and breaks it apart and divvies it up by sliding it to “your” side of the plate (major Hshuma to reach beyond your triangle of the plate and eat from “someone else’s triangle).  I raise this custom mostly because I so didn’t know it existed and I’m so glad I didn’t just pull an Uncle Tom and reach in and yank off a drumstick to the shock and horror of all the other guests.

I met my host mother and father (who of course are much younger than me) and 3 daughters last night for the first time.  They’ve been on vacation for the last week or so.  They seem very nice, and the three girls (10, 6 and 9 months) are so f***ing cute!  It was anarchy and chaos all rolled into one last night, as company came and went for hours and hours.  We had supper at 11:30, and I finally went to bed at midnight, but everyone else (plus guests) partied on til Allah knows when. I snuck out this morning so no one had to get up and fix me breakfast,  but I know when I get home, they will all be very obsequious and apologetic (and scolding) for not waking them so they could fix my breakfast.  As an aside (okay… these are all asides), I have all this time to type because our LCF gives us an oral language assessment every Saturday, and they take about ½ hour each, so that means 2 ½ hours of ridiculous down time while we wait for the others to finish (I went first today).

Oh yeah… A super-cute Moroccan girl came into the dar (house) yesterday and it turns out she’s my cousin/niece/granddaughter; hell I don’t know how this host family relationship thing works.  Anyway… I think she’s the niece of my host father.  We really hit it off and she knows enough English (about the same amount as I know Darija) for us to hang out a lot the last two nights.  …but it turns out she’s only 21 (she looked a bit older to me, but whatever) and she’s only here on spring break til Sunday, when she goes back to Rabat  to resume her studies as a gendarme cadat (which is pretty cool).  Oh well…

One last item is that we were on TV yesterday.  I can’t remember whether I mentioned that we were filmed at the sports center a couple of weeks ago, but I guess it was a national crew, because we were on Channel One out of Rabat yesterday afternoon.  A lot of people saw it, but I missed it.  I think 99% of what was filmed was left on the cutting room floor based upon what people told me because the mudeer (yeah… my new boyfriend) had already taken a shine to me back then,  and wanted to be in lots of shots, so he would kick people off the pool table and have me and him play pool, and kick people off the ping pong table and have me and him play ping pool, all while the camera was running.  …but it sounds like that footage didn’t make it.

Okay… finally going to send this.  Another beautiful day.  Not much going on, because I decided to stay in town and get to know my new family a little.  Pretty much everyone else went out of town.  There’s a big “Earth Day” fair in Fez and some PC function in Immouzer (having to do with how to raise money for our community projects, or something).  Still others went to Azrou to see the qrouda (monkeys) in the Gaba (forest).  That sounded the most fun, but I’m being good and staying here (although here I am at the ciber instead of the dar.   ….and the cute 21 yr. old went back to Rabat, so there’s even less reason to be at the dar.

All is good (kulshi mizian) and we’ve been here over a month now, so time does seem to be flying.  …more to come.

The Four Season; Azrou  10 of us in a little one-room hole

The "estate" of my 1st host family

Azrou (Mosque on the left)

More Azrou (and same with the below pics)

Brenna at the Fishery (we took the kids there)

Gang at the Ifrane Sports Center

Gali (Cool LCF) at the Sports Center

Kids singing the Moroccan National Anthem (which I started learning today)

Nikki and Nadia at the Fishery

Ryan "Lebron" Buckley

My ex-host mother making Tajine

Kids at the Fishery

One person has blindfold and other (me) has legs tied, and its a game just like "Marco-Polo"

Feet tied...

...dinner.

Some of the gang from both Ifrane Groups

Hanging out in Azrou

Killer Sports Center

Homemade Hlwa (peanuts ground up in a coffee grinder, chocolate, and some sort of yummy center)!

Two pieces of news:

First, I moved!  I have a new host family!  It was a whirlwind affair with me leaving class at 12:30 yesterday, going to my old homestay family and doing the walk of shame as I had to pack up my shit (one of the PC people had already told them I was moving out), say good-bye, and hump it to my new home.  It was the right move and I think I was just too much of a chicken-shit to pull the plug, but Malika  (the director of the entire hub, which encompasses about 40 PCT’s) got the job done. 

I was out of the old place and into the new place by 1:00.  The crazy thing is that I’ve only met one of the family members, the sister of my “host father.”  Everyone else is on vacation, I understand.  …but she is awesome (Fatiha), and very welcoming and friendly.  So how they made the decision to accept me without meeting me is a mystery, but if they’re anything like Fatiha, its going to be just fine.

The new place is shaping up to be perfectly awesome!  The “man and woman of the house” are in there 40’s (okay… its hard to call them my host dad and mom).  The “dad” also has two siblings living in the house (Fatiha and Abdllah) , also in their 40’s, I think), and…. A 10 year old, a 6 year old, and a 9 month old!!!  Woohoo!  I’m not sure when they get back from vacation, but its pretty comfortable so far.  I have my own huge room with actual lights that turn on and, get ready… a heater! There is also hot water and there may even be a shower.  No western toilet but like everyone here, I to the point where the squatty potty is perhaps preferable.

And all that happened by 1:00, I had lunch at the host family of my classmate Brenna, and was in a taxi with two classmates, heading to Azrou, by 2:00.  That was awesome, meeting friends from 5 different sites (many of whom had to travel much farther than I).  There were 10 of us altogether that spent the night (although we hung out with some of the Azrou group for a bit), and we had a blast.  We basically hung out in this awesome room (dripping with sarcasm) that consisted of 3 double beds and 2 bunk beds, and played games, .  Of course, we played games in the room because the weather sucked, but it didn’t really matter. 

So I’m now back in the house, just met my host “uncle” (I guess) and found out we’re teaching at the Dar Chabab this next week as well (it was only supposed to be last week, and we had our big good-byes, etc.).  So now all I want to do is rest (…got about 4 hours of sleep), but we need to get together and plan our lessons for the kids (or at least plan tomorrow’s lesson).

Well… Spring Camp is over and it was not only fun, but there were a lot of kids that I/we bonded with and will miss.  The camp itself was not much of indicator of what I’ll be doing at my permanent site because the Dar Chabab actually hired a group of professional “cheerleaders” (for lack of a better word), composed of four guys who pretty much ran the camp by having the kids sing songs, dance, etc.  The actual English lessons and activities that we PCT’s engaged in made up about 5% of the time.  Nevertheless, it was a fun experience and I did get a feel for how much the kids enjoy the experience and US!  By the by, their national anthem is beautiful and 40 kids singing it in harmony with gusto and passion is awesome (it lasts several minutes).

We had couscous for lunch at the Dar Chabab, and I sure hope I can get my hands on a picture of me eating it.  Couscous, for those that don’t know, is probably the traditional Moroccan dish, and is a type of rice with assorted vegetables.  The skilled couscous connoisseur  reached their hand into the community plate and grabs a gob of rice and veges., and proceeds to knead it into a beautiful ball, and then basically toss it into their mouth with little fuss or muss.  …then there’s me…  It is truly an art to make the ingredients actually stick together, and I wore about half the plate all over my clothes.  If it wasn’t for begging a spoon from the kitchen, I would have starved to death.

Friday is the religious day of the week in Morocco (fyi, I’m typing this on a Friday evening, but am not sure when I’ll be able to post it, so don’t start thinking the days of the week are different here if I post this next week).  Couscous is the traditional meal on Fridays, and usually lunch, it seems   For some reason, my host family served couscous yesterday (Thursday) and they don’t even attempt to ball it.  They just serve it with bread like the other 142 meals I’ve had so far.

It snowed again this morning, and turned to freezing rain all afternoon.  I am so over this weather.  …no one home when I got home, again.  I don’t think any of my sitemates have had a single occasion where they were ever alone, and yet I’m alone about half the time.  The idea is supposed to be “family” and so if the family goes out, so does the PCT.  Me; not so much.  Again, I think its because I’m a guy, but I’ll learn more tomorrow when I meet my boys in Azrou, meaning whether they have better relationships with their host families.  In Ifrane (where I am), there are two groups of 6, with 9 women and 3 men (about the same ration as PCV’s generally).   But, the other two guys here are married, so I can’t really compare my situation to theirs.

In case you wondered, the second oldest PCT here is 25.  When the PCV’s arrived to help us work at the Dar Chabab, we all sat at the café and the PCV’s guessed all of our ages.  The guessed I was 39, but I didn’t really take it as a compliment because when you’re that young, anyone over 35 is just old, and so 39 is the same as 70 J

I so want to go to the hamman tonight, to get warm and get clean, but it is a ritual that you go with another same-gender person, and so if mention going, I know my host father will feel he has to go with me, and I know he won’t want to go.  I can’t remember how much I talked about the Hamman, but you either love it or you hate it.  It is indeed a public bath, but with different rooms of different temperatures, all steamy and awesome (I fall into the “love it” category).  You can just lie down in an open space and bask in the steam.  The reason you bring a “mate” is because you basically bathe each other.  It is the weirdest thing to sit in there and watch men scrubbing each other!  …and I do mean scrubbing each other, because they use this sandpaper-like cloth and scrub and scrub til your skin is pink/red/gone! Its definitely a scene out of Midnight Express.  But it truly is super-awesome when its this cold out. 

The guys wear shorts/boxers and are quite conservative, but I understand the women’s hamman is a different story entirely.  Not only are they completely naked, but my female sitemates tell me that their host moms scrub them entirely and I mean entirely (one of my sitemates said “I don’t think my vagina has ever been that clean”).  20 “la shukran’s” (no thank-you’s) doesn’t seem to make a bit of difference to the host mothers, and some of my sitemates were a little taken aback by the whole affair.  Hey… I’m comfortable with my masculinity;  if some guy wants to give me a scrubbing, he can just go for it (okay… maybe with the boxers on).

Okay.  My “host brother” just walked in and is preparing my kaskroot, so I better try to help him.  I tried to offer to help, but he has his marching orders from his parents to do it for me (he’s only 16 for crying out loud) and that is the problem.  They think of me and treat me as a guest instead of a family member.  Oh well…   Less than 5 weeks and I’m back in Rabat, and then off to save the planet, one kid at a time.

...ha!  Got to the ciber so posting the same day.  ...more photos to follow (I forgot to download from the camera).

Chick Magnet

Well.. The weather is schizophrenic (whoa... I wondered why my spell check didn't underline that word in red, and then realized I actually spelled it right the first time; that's like winning the lottery).  We've had some pretty warm and beautiful days surrounded by cold, rain, and snow.  It is so f***ing cold going to sleep that the number of blankets I need to keep warm could actually crush me to death.

Buds came up from Azrou last weekend and we had a great time!  Even better, a few of us are going to Azrou on Saturday and actually staying the night in a couple of hotel rooms, and meeting some other buds from Fez and Immouzar.  It should be awesome!!!

I haven't blogged in a bit because of a lack of internet, and now I'm freezing my f***ing butt off in a ciber (internet cafe), and so I'm abbreviating much of what's happened lately.

We filled out our "site placement preference" sheet and turned it in a couple of days ago.  Basically us telling PC where we want to locate for our two-year site.  Morocco has such diverse topography, climate, populations, etc., that its difficult to even decide where I might want to be (not that its guaranteed, but they pay lip service to trying to place you in your preferred setting).  There's the coast, which is, of course, awesome, whether its the Mediterranean or the Atlantic (there are some unbelievable spots, as you can imagine), but everyone and there brother wants those sites, and when you list your site preference, you're supposed to be explaining why the site fits your skills or otherwise benefits the PC, and trying to find a PCPC (Peace Corps politically correct) reason why the coast is going to benefit the PC is pretty difficult.

 Then there's urban vs. rural, and desert vs. mountains.  Rural can be pretty rural (no running water, electricity, etc), and urban can be pretty crazy.  Desert sites get up to 130F in the summer and mountains get down to.... well, shit, pretty much what I'm experiencing right this minute.  Obviously, my thinking right now is to get someplace warm, but if I'm sitting in 130 degrees, I'm going to be begging for this weather!

...so anyway.  I asked for moderate climate and a more rural setting.  I didn't even pretend that those choices would somehow benefit the PC, other than to say at my age, extreme temperatures could kill me :)

The teaching has been interesting because it gives a little insight into what I'll be doing in a few short weeks.  Really, though, its quasi-teaching at best because there are a bunch of us "co-teaching" and its spring camp, so mostly pretty informal lessons.  But, we have three PCV's (Peace Corps Volunteers; we're just lowly PCT's or Peace Corps Trainees) come up from various sites to help us (one guy came from near the Algerian border, which is a 20+ hour bus ride).  But it does help to talk to these guys who've been in-country for 19 months.  They have very different sites and different ways of teaching at their Dar Chabab, but I'm glad to have had a chance to talk to them.  ...and the kids are great and really like us.

The particular Dar Chabab in Ifrane, is super-nice, as you can imagine, with a soccer field (with artificial turf), pool, ping pong, aerobics, tai kwan do, etc., so it totally spoils us for our ultimate site, which will most likely be a sh... well... not nearly as nice.

My language is getting better, but the thought that I will be "language-ready" in 5 weeks to go out and run my own Dar Chabab is pretty funny.  If they want to know my name, where I'm from, how to by candy at the Hanoot, and how to say mom and dad, I'm set!  One of the PCV's who's been in-country 19 months seems to have even less Darija as me, if that's possible, and he says he just relies on the stronger english-speaking kids in his language lessons to pretty much keep things flowing, so I guess it all works.

I'll post a picture of me so you can see how awesomely young and cool I look.  Gonna sign off....  I came in here to Skype Lex, Ry, and Mia, but Skype (or my computer) is having a definite problem).

Needless to say, I miss everyone and wish many times that I was there, but it really is pretty amazing here, and I'm so glad I'm doing this!!!  I'll be in touch!

Bslama!

...went to Azrou today with my class (Azrou is a larger town about 15 km away).  I got a chance to hang with Ryan, Bre, and a few other buds).  Azrou is our "hub" which means our sub-groups all meet there every so often to cover various cultural and other matters.  We had our "sex talk" which dealt with safe-sex issues, including a pretty sobering video of five former PCV's (Peace Corps Volunteers) who contracted AIDS while in service.  ...glad I don't do that anymore!

There was also an interesting talk from current volunteers on various harassment issues, including race, gender, sexual preference, etc.  For some reason, I guess Americans of Asian descent get the greatest amount of comments/harassment.  The gal who spoke on that was pretty funny.  She said she traveled something like 16 hours from her site in the south to come up to Azrou and speak to us (although she probably was happy as hell to get the break).

Ryan (Buckley, not Becker, in case there was any confusion), might come up to Ifrane this weekend, and we might have to Hshuma a little bit. "Hshuma" means "shame" or "shame on you," but is used, by us anyway, to include any number of things we're not supposed to do, which is pretty much everything.  For example, Nikki, one of my site mates, had a small rip on the knee of her pants that might possibly show a little skin if it somehow opened.  Her host mother saw her getting ready to leave the house and she yelled "Hshuma, Hshuma," and made her go up and change her pants.  We're not allowed to drink beer while we are in training so that would be Hshuma also, if you're reading between the lines.

...family just got home, so gotta run!

My bedroom (that's my bed/couch/chair/desk) in my host-family home.  I sleep here with Hussien, the 15 yr. old son (we both sleep on this couch).

The "entry room" (for lack of a better phrase) and kitchen (bathroom to the left).  There are only 3 rooms plus the tiny kitchen and tinier bathroom. 

The living room (with central heating)

That's our dining table.  This room actually gets pretty toasty when the daily log is put on.

The "Sok."  ...huge farmers market

...sok...

more sok, but not sure what this is...

...still more sok...

My site-mates

Famous American University in Ifrane

Awesome ceeber (cyber-cafe) in Ifrane

A nightclub, believe it or not

I bought postcards, but will I do anything with them

Random cool street

Just more Ifrane beauty

...I am in Africa, right?

My awesome site-mates, Nikki, Brenna, Brittany, Martha, and Nick, with the famous "Ifrane Lion

more random...

Amazing isn''t it?  These pictures are of Africa, for crying out loud.  ...and the ones I took today (and will post soon) make these pics. look like the slums!  Ifran is simply incredible! It is a mountain resort that is the absolute antithesis of what most would think of when they conjure up images of Africa.  Clean, litter-free, well-kept, beautifully maintained, solid construction, fancy cars, beautiful homes, cute shops, awesome cafes.  Unbelievable.

There is an American university (where we send our kids for semesters abroad), and I think I mentioned that the King has his summer home here.

It was simply the luck of the draw that we were placed here for our 8 week "CBT" training.  Those of us who are here will be subject to just that much more culture shock when we are sent to our final site (which is pretty likely to be at the opposite end of the spectrum, although there will be a few that end up here or near here).

The downside is that it is frikking freezing and has rained pretty much every day.  The other downside is that my residence does NOT  look like any of the homes I have posted.  I live on the proverbial "other side of the tracks" (I have a few pics I'll post of that, as well). But its all good.

Definitely doing a lot of walking, as everything is a hike, no one has a car, and no one is inclined to take taxis (even though the average taxi ride is about $2).  A coffee is about $.80.  I bought a candy bar for 1 dirham yesterday (which is about 12 cents).

We work hard studying, but I definitely feel like I'm a tourist at a resort rather than supposedly suffering in Africa.

We had company for kas krot today (I think my host mother's sister, and someone else), and so out came the "fancy food."  Fresh bread, tomar (dates), milk with coffee (which is the sh**, by the way; hot milk with instant coffee is my new favorite drink).  I've got a major headache trying to participate in any sort of communication.  Unbelievably, I actually do understand a word or two now and again, and can throw in a couple of comments, which cracks them up, that I can spreak the rangrage.

My host mother and daughter were somewhere and my host father works, so my lunch (I come home every day to eat lunch) looked pretty bleak, but my host father showed up (they get paid to feed me three times a day, so I sensed that he got dragged back from work), and by blind luck, found his kitchen and whipped up lunch (I sat in there and bit my lip as he stumbled around trying to find something to feed me).  We had kfta (ground meat) with beed (eggs) poured over them, a can of Hut (sardines) and.... get ready... bread!  It was actually pretty good.

Ten minutes later, my host father was back out the door, and off to work.  My site-mates continually complain about how they have no free time and sit around with their host families and friends ad nauseum, but I seem to be the odd bird that has an enormous amount of free-time.

...anyway... there was a point to my story.  When my host mother, her shabiat (friends), and I were at kas krot, I quasi-communicated the confusion her husband faced while cooking me lunch, and they thought that was pretty funny.  Then they asked me what he cooked, and I was able to understand what they asked and actually say what we had, so it was kind of cool.

We had to present ourselves to the Kumisarria (police station) today, to formally announce our presence and provide our passport.  Pretty much a formality, but absolutely required.  My ustadda (teacher) said that my host father called her twice to ask her why she hadn't presented us earlier, so he must have been worried.

...so we got to wander around all afternoon and check out the suntur (which is the really cool part of Ifran, pictures of which will follow soon).

...blah, blah, blah... Enough for now!!!

A study in contrasts.  This is happening right along side  the beautiful homes

Park on the way to class

Modern-ish girls in Ifran

Buildings along the way to class

Roller bladers are not uncommon here

Local cafe

Road to Ifran