All the same

Are small towns all over the world the same? Here are some similarities I have noticed between Ifrane and small towns in the U.S. with which I am familiar. (Powellites, this is for you!)

-When you fly into the airport (which is in a nearby [or not so nearby] big city), it's probable that you will either be on the plane with someone you know, or you will run across someone you know somewhere along the way. (In the U.S., whichever one of you has a car will offer a ride to the other; in Morocco, you will share a taxi home.)*

-You cannot go out anywhere in your town without seeing at least a few people you know. If you are a teacher, you will see your students, and sometimes they will explain to you why they missed class on Friday; they will ask about the assignment due on Monday; etc.

-When you go to the nearby “big city” to shop (at Wal-Mart, Target, or Marjane), you will, in all likelihood, see some of your coworkers there doing the same thing.

-People you have never met know who you are.

-You don't need the Yellow Pages because any time you need goods or services, you just ask everybody you know who they would recommend.

-When you go to your town's coffee shop, you don't actually have to place an order because they already know what you usually get.

-You evaluate the restaurants in your small town with the highest rating being "[name of small town] good." For example, if someone asks you, "Does this restaurant have good food?" you will respond, "It's Ifrane good."

-You will drive for three or four hours just to get to a place where you can go shopping, eat at a truly good restaurant, go to the dentist, go to the doctor, have a surgical procedure done, etc.

-Any time you try to walk someplace, people driving by will constantly stop to ask if you need a ride.

*Last August, when T and I were flying to Morocco for the first time, on the plane from New York we sat across the aisle from a nice couple and their baby. They asked where we were going, and we told them that T had a job at Al Akhawayn University. The woman said something like, "Oh, my husband's father teaches there." We probably responded with something like, "Oh, that's nice." Fast forward several months. I am in Rabat with my friend LW. She is stopping by the house of her friend Steve to visit his son and son's wife because they are also her friends. Son's Wife opens the door and looks strangely familiar to me. She is much quicker than I am and realizes that she and her husband and baby sat across from us on the plane several months earlier. She even has a picture she took of her baby on the plane in which you can see T and me in the background. This was a weird reminder that the world isn't nearly as big as we sometimes think it is.

Sweeping up

This isn't a great photograph because it was taken covertly, but I want to show you how official city workers clean up the town--using brooms made out of sticks with twigs or brush tied to them. In warmer cities, the workers use fresh palm branches.

The road home

The drive back to Ifrane on Sunday (after a weekend spent in Midelt and Imilchil) was long, hot, and uncomfortably crowded. Nevertheless, I was okay with it. I was accepting of it. And I found that, maybe for the first time since coming back to Morocco after five weeks spent in the United States, I was really, truly accepting another year in Morocco.

I want for the tone and content of this blog to be more positive than negative, more forward-looking than backward looking. I try to do more pretty photographs, and less silly navel-gazing.

But the truth is that it was hard for me to come back here on August 25. It was hard not to dwell on a lot of things that are not (or do not have to be) all that important – the accessibility of a Whole Foods store; the closeness of family and friends (and the ease with which I could communicate with them when I had a U.S. phone number they could call); the convenience of conducting business by telephone and in English; the availability of vegetarian protein products and good microbrew beers; even the presence of a soft, comfortable bed with high-quality pillows.

I lost sight of why I gave these things up, and I was seduced by the ultimately materialistic (and, therefore – at least ideally – unimportant) conveniences and luxuries of living in my home country. I lost sight of what I gained in the previous year here in Morocco, and of what I have to gain in the coming year (or more).

So I am back in Ifrane with greater resolve to live here. T and I are planning on hiring a Darija tutor, in an effort (no matter how pathetic it turns out to be) to be able to communicate with more Moroccans. We will try to go on more trips. We will try to make more friends. We will try to be more kind, giving, and generous to those around us. I will continue working on my constant quest to be less materialistic and less caught up in "the little things."

I think this family was probably ecstatic when they were finally able to get their solar panel (which  is just barely visible on their rooftop). That kind of helps put the Whole Foods thing in perspective, doesn't it?

And even though I know that my ultimate goal is to return to the United States and to find a (permanent) home somewhere within its borders, I will work on being patient and appreciative of the moment.

These are all resolutions that I will have to renew week to week, day to day, and sometimes even moment to moment. That is one reason I am posting them here: a public declaration makes them more real, and harder to forget.

At least for now, I'm home. I'll say it again: I'm home.

A night in Imilchil

See the cow (next to lines for drying laundry) in this backyard?

Imilchil is a small, quiet, dusty village in the High Atlas Mountains. I think it would remain an obscure village, unknown to foreigners (and probably even to many Moroccans) if it weren't for what the Rough Guide to Morocco calls "the world-famous Imilchil Moussem," a giant fair held in September that is attended by "30,000 or more Berbers" from the region. It's also called a "marriage market" because it's a traditional time and place for young people to choose marriage partners.

This festival has become a huge tourist attraction (and the influx of tourists has, sadly but not unpredictably, changed the event).

And it is my understanding that it is happening this Thursday. What that means, though, is that on Saturday and Sunday, when we were in Imilchil, there were virtually no other tourists there. And other than a few worn-out signs pointing to auberges (French "inn"), it was very hard to imagine the village accommodating many tourists.

In any case, we enjoyed our time in this relaxing and beautiful village.

Thea, Sven, and Josiah walking through the bustling city of Imilchil...

Road to Imilchil

In two previous posts, I mentioned a weekend trip to the towns of Midelt and Imilchil. Throughout most of the trip, I was very glad to be doing it at the same time that I thought I will never do this again.

One of the factors behind both of those thoughts was the road, specifically its length and quality. On Friday night, it only took us about three hours to get from Ifrane to Midelt. But on Saturday and Sunday, while we didn't have much distance to cover, our route was very, very scenic…and that means slow driving.

In fact, we were on such scenic routes that Google Maps doesn't even know they exist. The best I could do to show you our route was to place markers on a few of the towns that we drove through.


View Larger Map

Sven, Thea, Rachid, Abdul, and Josiah

In Midelt on Friday night, we stayed at Riad Villa Midelt, which I don't think is really a genuine riad, but it was nice anyway. The manager, Abdul, and his friend Rachid were very friendly and sat talking with us for a long time that evening as we had tea outside in the cool desert air. Later they served us dinner, and I had the best vegetarian couscous I have ever had.

The riad was in a quiet part of town. Rather than exploring Midelt on Saturday morning, we chose to have a leisurely breakfast before setting out for Imilchil.

All of the ceilings in the riad were covered with this intricately handcarved wood.

View of Midelt from our room at the riad

View of Midelt from the rooftop terrace

We set out for Imilchil a little after 10:30, and that's when things got really interesting.

The people of Imilchil

On Friday night, we stayed in the town of Midelt. On Saturday night, we stayed in Imilchil. Here are a few pictures from that village.

The people of Midelt

This past weekend, our friend Josiah had a couple of visitors from Germany. He used their visit as an excuse to rent a car to take a weekend trip, and he invited T and me along.

We had a great time, and my husband took hundreds of pictures. Before I blog about the trip, I need to sort through the photos. In the meantime, I thought you might enjoy some pictures of people in the town of Midelt, where we spent Friday night.

From Nebraska

I haven't yet written about what T and I "did" for five weeks in Nebraska. That's mostly because we didn't do much that would be "blog worthy" or of general interest. But in case you're still wondering...

We "borrowed" our Senegal parrot, Mango, from the Nebraska Parrot Rescue. She remembered us immediately, and we had a great time with her.

 

This little dude, on the other hand, didn't seem to remember us at all. Sigh.

On the lack of privacy (or "JABS goes off on a bit of a rant")

Last night, I was up until almost three because I had to "attend" one of my classes from 12:15 to 2:15 AM Greenwich Mean Time. Because I need a very minimum of seven hours of sleep per night, I got up late this morning (and still didn't get my sleep minimum). When I came out of the bathroom after my shower, I heard female voices coming from downstairs in my apartment.

If this had happened to me in my house in Wyoming, I would have been utterly confused and rather frightened, because there would never be any reason for someone to all of a sudden be inside my locked house without my permission.

Here, however, this seems to be a weekly occurrence (and some weeks it happens more often than once). There are lots of people with access to our apartment – the building staff, the cleaning ladies, and the maintenance men, at the least. And there seems to be an infinite number of reasons for them to come into our apartment.