A lesson

Sometimes I think of my nearly two years here as nothing but one big lesson.

The lesson is this: Make plans, but recognize that planning is just something to keep you busy, a hobby of sorts. Don't take your plans seriously. (As my housekeeper Hafida would say, "My God has a plan for you." Perhaps this is true, but if so, "her" God isn't letting me in on that plan at all.) Don't get attached (to plans, to friends, to the past or future, or to anything else). The idea that one can have control is an illusion, and attachment to that illusion brings nothing but unhappiness. (Funny that I should come to a Muslim country to learn a seemingly Buddhist lesson.)

This lesson has been driven home in a variety of ways, some of them quite painful, over the last couple of weeks, as if Morocco is afraid I might not "get it" before I head out on June 9--regardless of whether or not I'm coming back.

This morning, for example, T and I are sitting on our couch when we thought we'd be (scratch that--planned to be) halfway to Al Hoceima for a four-day vacation in honor of our June 1 tenth wedding anniversary (and because we have just a few more days together before I leave for at least two months).

Planning this trip has been fairly typical; for example, even yesterday, we were still trying to confirm our car rental. We asked the guy to bring the car to us this morning at 8:30, hoping that meant we'd have it by 10. He called at 8:30 to say the car hadn't yet been returned to him, and we haven't heard from him since. Our residence manager and security officer are trying to help get us a car, but I have accepted that it just might not happen. We'll probably get one by tomorrow, so we might just have to cut our trip short by one day. But it's likely this isn't the last thing that will happen to remind us of The Lesson.

Morocco and me

Lately, the absence of my friend LW, my chronic "unwellness," the difficulty of completing a U.S.-centered graduate program while living overseas, and the uncertainty about where I'll be in five months have all gotten me thinking again, rather intensely and frequently, about the idea of loving a country. The cold weather and my health have prevented me from spending much time outdoors, and I find that, without interesting trips and time spent sitting at cafés in the sun drinking mint tea with friends, I like Morocco a lot less.

I've been wondering, too, how many people love or like or are even content with the place where they live. It may not be apparent from my blog, but in my adult life, I have tried to approach each place I've lived with a general attitude of openness and appreciation. I have tried to make each place my home, even when I knew I wouldn't be spending much time there. But if I am completely honest, I must say: I have utterly failed to make Morocco my home.

I haven't explored enough of the country. I haven't taken advantage of its proximity to Europe. I haven't learned the language, and as much as I like to declare that this is evidence of my general dimwitted-ness, it's really evidence of my failure to integrate, to settle down. I haven't made Moroccan friends. I haven't learned enough about Islam. I haven't even asked the University imam to give me a tour of the mosque on campus, and it's the only mosque in the country that I, as a non-Muslim, can visit.

Where do I go from here? I'm not sure. I know that lots of people live in places where they don't feel at home. What do they do? I want to turn from bitterness and get up each morning with the intention of trying to live here. I will renew that intention every day, to the extent possible. That's all I can think of to do.

Rough start

Last Monday was a "little" eid, and T had the day off from teaching. Weeks before, we had decided that we wanted to go to Melilla or Ceuta for the long weekend. We asked our friends Sarah and Terry if they wanted to rent a car and go with us. We decided we would go to Ceuta since none of us had spent much time there before.

For a full week, I could think of almost nothing else. I was desperate to get out of Morocco at the same time that I had a very fuzzy sense of why or of what I wanted to do in Ceuta.

And so, as is too often the case when we want something very badly, it seemed that the forces of the universe were conspiring against our planned European getaway.

First, Sarah and Terry spent the entire week leading up to our trip making phone calls to a car rental agency, and each time, the exchange went something like this:

Terry: "We want to rent a car for Friday."
Car rental representative: "Okay, we'll call you back in 10 minutes."
(Sarah and Terry wait a few hours, then call the agency back.)

Terry: "We want to rent a car for Friday."
Car rental representative: "Okay, we'll call you back in 10 minutes."

This went on over and over again until Thursday night (the night before we were scheduled to leave) when our friends enlisted the help of a Moroccan friend, who finally lined up a car for us – at twice the price it should've been. At about 7:00 that night, then, we were desperately calling other car rental agencies to try to get ourselves a better deal.

We found a car at a better price, but the company required a 20,000 dirham deposit (that's "only" about $2500, an obscene amount of money here in Morocco that none of us would be able to get our hands on with such short notice).

About an hour later, we got in touch with a car rental company in Azrou (about 20 km away) that was willing to rent us a Kia Picanto for a good price. They even said they would deliver it to us here in Ifrane for a reasonable delivery fee.

It was a little stressful not knowing less than 24 hours before we were leaving how we would get to Ceuta, but I thought things were okay.

Saalburg and Frankfurt

On our final full day in Germany last week, AC and IC took us to Saalburg, a museum built on the grounds of an old Roman fort. Close to 2000 years ago, the Romans built these forts every few kilometers along the wall that they built to keep the "barbarian" Germans out of their civilized empire. This museum is just a few kilometers from AC's home in Rosbach.

The buildings of the museum were built to re-create the structure of the Fort, which looked like this:

Most of the buildings were packed with various ancient artifacts, which aren't very photogenic, so the only good pictures I have are of some of the structures outside of the buildings.

Entrance to the fort

Ruins of Roman bath found on the site

 

The Romans baked their bread in these ovens by first heating them with firewood. After the fire went out, the thick clay walls of the ovens held enough heat for baking bread. AC told me the museum has special events for children which include giving them an opportunity to bake bread in these ovens.

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.

What the heck am I doing here?

I ask myself this several times each week. I never ask it when I am, for example, sitting outside a café in the sun drinking coffee with friends (the weather is still nice enough, even now in December, that we can still do this on warm days). I ask it when I am trying to solve a problem, such as a broken tooth. I ask it when I am trying to figure out how to get my textbooks here in time for next semester. I ask it when I realize that there is only one online Master's program in speech-language pathology that will even consider admitting me while I live in Africa. I ask it when I have to pay a ridiculous amount of money to send a few small packages to family and friends back in the United States. I ask it when I realize that the novelty of my living in Africa has worn off for both me and all of those people back home, and when I go days without hearing from any of those people. I ask it when I discover that the downstairs bathroom in my new apartment, which is supposed to be much nicer than the apartment I moved out of, smells strongly like sewage and I am told, "the faculty member who lived there before you never complained about any smell."

I need a vacation from my life. But even planning a vacation sounds like too much to me right now.