A Productive PC Day

I was still recovering from the weekend and a late night last night, so I slept in until 9:45 this morning. Giving me enough time to throw some clothes on and rush out the door to meet Said and Ali at 10am to meet the director of the high school. It was a brief meeting and my role was mainly to lend them credibility. The director and teachers agreed to allow us time this Saturday afternoon for an information session about SIDA. Whew! They didn't seem to need any convincing, but this Saturday will be here before I know it. I made plans to meet Said and Ali later in the day to make a game plan and went home to eat breakfast and do some laundry. The sun was out, so I had to take advantage of it!

In the afternoon I met the women from the weaving cooperative. They did some serious networking over the weekend at the workshop – they learned about several craft fairs and festivals, picked up some great ideas from Fatiha and were talking about creating a shop close to the main road where they could be more visible to tourist traffic. Right now they mainly work out of their homes, if they work at all. They do own a small house but it is tucked behind another house and not easily accessible to the main road, plus its very dark so its not very conducive to weaving. There was some heated discussions going on as they made plans to purchase supplies to start weaving together. I suspect there are some trust issues and I want to talk to Zinb about doing some small seminars or tea talks about business skills and team work activities to try to build up their trust. They made plans to meet on Friday to hand roll couscous to sell at an upcoming fair.

The meeting was great because we hung out on the roof of the house they own. It was a beautiful day and women trickled in in the half hour after the meeting was supposed to start. Some had babies strapped to their backs, while others were had young children in tow. Everyone was very animated and opinionated. Sadia the young woman I mistakenly thought was shy and soft-spoken kept interrupting Zinb as she was talking. Zinb would quickly tell her to be quiet, please and she would pipe down for a few minutes before jumping right back into things. All of the ruffle feathers were smoothed by the end of the meeting and we all left on a good note.

I went over to Zinb's house for tea after the meeting. I had made pumpkin bread, also known as muskoota (cake) in my village. Most women make something like a tea bread in bundt pans and I don't think I've ever had the same cake twice. Since recipes are passed down from mother to daughter and nothing is written down, every woman's cake is a little different. None of them ever put any vegetables like zucchini, carrots, or pumpkin in their muskoota, although sometimes its flavored with yogurt or shredded coconut. I make what Americans know as zucchini/pumpkin/banana bread with chocolate chips and call it muskoota. It usually goes over very well and today was no different. The women loved it and wanted to know why mine had a nice golden brown color. My secret is whole wheat flour I bought in Meknes. It gives everything a heartier texture and that nice golden color. Unless you buy wheat kernels or grow wheat and grind your own flour, the only kind available in stores is bleached white flour.

We had a lovely tea time and I meet Zinb's family. She has twin brothers, who I haven't met, but she keeps trying to set me up with one of them. I always laugh and deflect her overtures by saying I don't know him (this doesn't usually work because arranged marriages are still fairly common) and she always tells me that he looks just like her. What more could I need to know?!

I had to leave tea early to go teach my English class. Zinb tried to give me bread before I left, but I declined with a promise to come to her if I ever wanted bread. Meals and snacks are not complete without bread and the fact that I don't eat bread all the time still miffs people. In English class, we worked on time and I was amazed at how quick they were with picking up the quarter past or quarter to an hour. They recently learned this in their regular English class in school, but I was still surprised at how fast they were telling time.

I went straight from English class to the women's literacy class. These women amaze me too. Most did not know how to write numbers or recognize numbers when we started and they are already counting in the thousands. We are also learning the Arabic alphabet – the main reason I joined the class. We are starting to learn words, but I don't usually follow enough of what is happening to pick up the words. Once I'm comfortable with the alphabet and feel confident enough with my Tamazight, I'll start studying Arabic. For now though, I'm focusing on improving my Tamazight and practicing the Arabic alphabet by writing new Tamazight words with it instead of the English alphabet. Literacy class also gives me face time with a group of women and hopefully, I can plan some tea talks or other events with the women from class.

Just as I was starting to make dinner, Said rang my doorbell to see if I could come to the internet cafe with him to find additional information and pictures to use for the SIDA information session. I needed a few minutes to eat something and gather my things together so I told him I would meet him there. He and Ali were crowded around a computer google-ing to try to find the information they were looking for. I had some pamphlets with a website in Arabic, which proved useful. Another English-speaking young man from the Sisterhood was there helping an older man video chat with someone. He asked me why I didn't invite him to the workshop...I wanted to tell him because I didn't know him, because he always asks me to help him with his English, but never shows up to class and because he strikes me as kind of a jerk - not good qualities for someone I wanted to do peer education about a sensitive subject. Instead, I told him there were only a certain number of slots for each village and I was sorry he didn't get to go. This made me realize how careful I need to be about singling people out for opportunities.

Said and Ali found some good information (I hope – its all in Arabic) and I agreed to buy red ribbon and print out some documents for them while I'm in Khenifra for tutoring on Wednesday. PC had sent me a bunch of pamphlets for World Aids Day, which we'll use at the high school. I was counting them, in English in my head, and I noticed that Said was counting along with me in Arabic. This struck me as rather funny and I told him we should switch – I'll count in Arabic and he can count in English to help us with our language.

They walked me home and I was kind of hoping one of them would invite me over for dinner since it was 9pm and none of us had eaten dinner. No such luck, Said mentioned hoping there was still dinner left for him, so maybe we were past dinner time and they didn't want to invite me over to nothing. I ate popcorn with curry powder (yum! you should try it) instead.