Our camel train made it to the top of the dunes about 20 minutes before the sunset-- the first of several groups-- and we sat at the top to enjoy the show. After the sun set, we headed on to our camp about 20 minutes down from the summit, among the dunes. The tents had walls and floors of Berber rugs, several camp beds in each, and a bunch of blankets on each bed. It gets really cold once the sun goes down!!! There was also a dining tent, where we had a tajine that was heavy on the veggies, and sliced oranges with cinnamon for dessert. A Spanish family brought bottles of wine with them. Forward thinkers! After dinner there was a campfire with many songs. Everyone was prevailed upon to sing a song from his or her country; as we were the only Americans, Alex suggested Happy Birthday, but one of Moroccans announced an American song and sang a Justin Beiber song (which Alex correctly identified as "Canadian" rather than "American". ) The Berbers played and sang many songs, all with more enthusiasm than the guys in the village earlier in the day. After the fire, Alex and I went out into the dunes, with practically zero ambient light and no moon, and we watched the stars. It was just magical. Our guide Mustafa was with us, and he told us all about his life with a nomad family who "came in" when the kids needed to go to school, and they sold their goats and camels and moved into a house. But he kept one camel that he raised from a baby, and it's more like a pet to him now. It was certainly a once-in-a-lifetime experience! Here's another slide show:
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My son Alex came to spend his college spring break with me, and I took advantage of having him here to schedule a multi-day trip out see some of the farther reaches of the country. By the way, above is his photo of the sunrise in the desert, but more about that later. We started by taking a train to Fez, a city that holds the oldest university in the world (we couldn't go in, unfortunately, but we figuratively pressed our noses to the window) and took a tour of with Mucehine, who is going to be a Fulbright teacher of Arabic at an American university next year. (Honestly, the network of Fulbrighters is nothing short of amazing!) So he took us to see the academic sites and also the crafty ones-- a studio where they were weaving on looms, and a leather workshop, where there were incredible vats of dyes for achieving the softness and colors that people like. We stayed in a classically decorated riad hotel in the medina, and the next morning we met our guide/driver Mohammed for our camel trek. We drove first to a town called Ifrane, which is billed as "Morocco's Switzerland." It is up in the Middle Atlas, and the roofs are A-frames and it is very clean. There is a university there, which is taught by mostly American professors on an American liberal arts curriculum. But to me, it looked like Minneapolis. Next, we drove through a forest of cedar trees, from which I can only assume came all the wood for those amazing walls and ceilings in the old palaces and madrassas, and we saw roadside a troupe of Barbary macaques, or sometimes they're called Barbary Apes. They were quite tame, and allowed us to take pictures. Some following cars stopped and people started feeding them kiwis and oranges, which they seemed to enjoy. It felt a bit like Yellowstone in the 1960s, to be honest. We drove through orchards of blooming cherry trees that were spectacularly beautiful, and then into the Middle Atlas mountains. Apparently the weather system that provided the rain that caused the flooding here in Rabat about two weeks ago delivered fresh snow to the mountains. There was some rain for our mountain travel, some though the high desert and Ziz valley, and when we made it down to the town of Merzuga, gateway to the Sahara in the southeast of the country, we even were treated to a rainbow over the sand dunes. This photo does not do it justice at all, but I haven't mastered photoshop yet! We checked in to our desert hotel, where we we greeted with a glass of mint tea. The hotel was desert-rustic but quite comfy, and we settled in for an evening of off-and-on rain showers, a hail storm, and then some fierce wind that kept random things knocking around for the night. So many pictures that I put some in a slide show: The next day was something I called All-Day Desert Day. We started in the 4 x 4 driving out into the dunes and all around Erg Chebbi. There were some hills of volcanic rock alongside some of the dunes, and one of them provided a great vista of the dunes, the desert, and that plateau that forms the border with Algeria, about 30 miles from where we were. Driving further into the desert we saw many camels, and some tents of Berber nomads. At one tent, two young boys waved to us and we stopped. We were invited to come to the tent and have some mint tea. The dad made the tea while the mom was making some couscous in the cooking tent; the boys went to collect some of the camels that had wandered too far, and the baby was working really hard to crawl in the tent. Her name is Fatima. Lunch was in a small village called Ksar Khamlia. This town is populated by the descendants of Malians, and they celebrate their culture heritage by hosting a music festival every August. We were treated to some singing and dancing, and then lunch in their restaurant called Cafe Nora, which specialized in a "Berber pizza" which was really a lot more like a veggie calzone, but it was pretty tasty. At 4 pm, we mounted our camels for our "trek". I am going to included a specific blog entry on the camel trek, So here are just three photos. Oh, our head scarves are courtesy of Cameltrek Tours-- they have our names stenciled on them! The next morning we got up before dawn, got on our camels, and returned to the hotel so that we could clean up and eat breakfast. And then we headed east through the amazing Dadès and Todra Gorges of the High Atlas range. First, we stopped at one of the fossil "shops" near the town of Erfoud and saw some really astonishing samples of trilobites, ammonites, sharks teeth, squid, etc. And we enjoyed some mint tea with the Fossil Guy! Next stop, the town where Mohammed's family lives. We actually saw his younger brother walking home from school as we passed through the town, and so we picked him up and took him home. I, of course, thought this was a great opportunity to have a "spontaneous natural conversation" in French, but he was a little too shy to play with me. (If you're a careful reader, you will remember that the title of my Inquiry Project is "Spontaneous Natural Conversation in a Second Language...") Then Mohammed's mother invited us in, and served us mint tea! (anyone counting yet???) We had a hilarious conversation in Darija, wherein I struggled to remember words that I knew I had been taught, and she was having a "spontaneous natural conversation." Eventually I agreed (I do know that this occurred in the conversation) to having her paint my hands with henna in the fashion of the area. So here are my hands, in process: Interesting roadside sites: a shepherd had brought camels and goats down to a well alongside the highway, so we visited a bit with him; camel-crossing sign; mass of bikes parked at the middle-school-- it's how a lot of kids get to school, though there are also some school busses; Alex and I in colorful Berber attire (we were dressed by the ladies of a shop in hopes that we'd buy the ensembles. We didn't, though. We drove through spectacular high desert scenery on our way to the Todras and Dadès Gorges. It felt a lot like we were driving right through a Geology 101 textbook! A slide show: And when we checked in to the Panorama Hotel-- mint tea and almonds on the terrace!! The next day, we headed to Ouarzazate, the movie capital of Morocco, But that will be another blog entry. It's been a month and a half since I arrived in Rabat, and things have settled into something I can call "normal". So for those of you wondering just what it is exactly that I'm doing here, this is a "typical" week looks like. On Sunday night, usually late because she is one very busy woman, I will get a "programme" of classes to visit or other activities connected to the university from my advisor. There are no classes being offered this semester that are about the pedagogy of teaching a second language (as I had hoped when I developed the project), but Hafida has done a superior job of making sure that I am getting to see a variety of situations in which students are learning French for the first time at the university level, getting support for French language mastery that didn't occur for one reason or another in their high schools, or using French to pursue masters and doctoral degrees because that is the language of instruction in their field even though not a first language for them. Sometimes, I'm in a French literature class, along with all the spring semester students studying to become French teachers. So in a typical week, I will attend about 4-6 hours of classes at Université Mohammed V. Here is a shot of my advisor doing something called a Soutence d'Habilitation à Diriger des Recherches. In essence, it's a doctoral defense for a person who already holds a doctorate, but must publicly display evidence of her work and accomplishments over a period of years to show continued professional growth. (The jury gave her highest honors after their deliberation. She is an impressive individual.) I take 6 hours or so weekly of French tutoring. I am working with a woman from Strasbourg, France who lives here now, and we just talk. This helps me with my accent and (most especially) improving the way that I use French locutions rather than simply expressing an idea in the way an American would, but using French words. Here's an example: you can say "je voudrais vous demander une question" ("I would like to ask you a question, ") and it makes sense in French, but a native speaker would not word it like that. More probably he would use the verb "proposer" instead of "demander". So my French gets better the more of those French-ish constructions that I work into my conversation. There's also stuff like inserting the right kinds of fillers and emotion words-- expressions like "well," "like," '''wow!" and "sooo..." in English ---and I'm attempting to learn better French body language. I spend about 10 hours weekly in Moroccan Arabic classes. At first, I was just learning some functional vocabulary for getting around in a city where Standard Arabic is the one official language, some people speak French, some speak English (and these at various rates of fluency), some speak a Berber language like Amarigh, and EVERYONE speaks the unwritten form of Moroccan Arabic called Darija. So I've been working on my Darija, and then we slid into the Standard Arabic alphabet so that I can read things here. Now I've learned the verb tenses and I'm working on actual conversation. This is hard for me because there are so many sounds that are just ridiculously hard for me to make (and even hear), so my tutor Adil is a saint. He also teaches me a whole lot about Moroccan culture. We meet in a restaurant or cafe for our sessions. I try to get to at least one school visit per week, observing the way that education is happening in middle and high schools. This past week, instead of visiting a school, I attended a conference of the Moroccan Association of Teachers of English (MATE). The conference was really interesting because the attendees (except for me, the language officer from the American Embassy and the language officer from the British Embassy) were supervisors of English teachers throughout the country, and it was informative to get their perspectives on what is happening in education. The conference was entitled "Reforming Teacher Education and Training in Times of Change". The presentations were about providing education to 21st Century learners, and highlighting (just like in the US) that skills, methods, benchmarks, and goals are in a period of fast and vast change. It was really helpful to me to see how our challenges are really so similar in the US and in Morocco, and I made a lot of contacts with people who can arrange for me to visit second-language classrooms in other parts of the country. I really was overwhelmed by how welcoming and helpful the MATE people are. I also typically walk or tram-ride quite a bit around Rabat, which allows for some high-quality people-watching and is constantly fascinating. I check in every week or so at the MACECE office (Fulbright administrators) to chat with Ahlam (my liaison) and Dr Miller (the director) who are always full of great advice, information, and suggestions. There is a wonderful library there of books about Morocco that is a great resource. In the evenings sometimes I do something social with friends I've met here, or return home to study (sometimes, haha!), watch the sun set over the ocean, deal with on-going issues with my hot water supply, immerse in French language TV (now that I have the proper satellite dish), and write blog entries or check what's happening in the US via Facebook. And the weekends are for going on "toots!" When I met Cindy Reedy, a DAT Fulbrighter last year in Morocco, she gave me some great advice: Every weekend, go on a toot somewhere." So when my Saturday plans fell through at the last minute, I decided that my "toot" this weekend would be to the city of Meknès. I bought a train ticket, and off I went into the mountains, through some incredibly green fields. You are going to have to take my word on this, because I can't figure out how to take a decent picture through a moving train window. Then a petit taxi took me to the Place el Hedim which is bordered by the old Medina, and the enormous Bab Mansour which led to the palace complex of the sultan. I sat at cafe on the place, drank a "panaché"-- which is a punch with various fruits and avocado-- and took in the scene, which has some kind of normal things, and also some kind of tourist attraction not so normal things: Painted tajines massed for sale- normal. Boys driving small cars. Definitely normal. Big and mini horses: Not so normal Look carefully. Those are monkeys that will sit on your shoulder. Who knows? Maybe they drive the scooter, too. Not so normal Guy with oboe-ish sounding horn, (in blue) and his buddy, with the snake (in white). Just like the movies, huh? Then I did some more serious stuff. I went into the medina and visited a museum called Dar Jamai, which was the palace of a wealthy, well-placed family. I was also able to visit a medersa, which is a Koranic school from the 1300s with amazing architecture. And finally, I decided, "Hey, this is a toot-- why not?" And took a calèche ride to see the parts of town that were beyond the former palace complex and beyond the current king's palace complex. I'll post additional pictures on a page called Meknès you can access from the drop-down menu. looking through the palace main floor out to the garden Carpeted and cushioned sitting room upstairs. Detail of carved plaster wall Also a detail of the wall deco. TELL ME THESE ARE NOT CATS!
Eating, shopping, laughing, taking lots of pictures of ourselves: it was a "girlfriend weekend"! This is my friend Hanane. We met in DC last summer when we both took part in the orientation for this Fulbright award. She spent this past fall semester in Bloomington Indiana researching and visiting schools. This weekend, we got together in Casablanca where she lives. It's a very easy train ride from Rabat, just about an hour. She took such great care of me and really welcomed me to her hometown! We started with a Moroccan brunch. Inside that tajine, there are eggs scrambled with a salty dried meat. It was delish! Fresh squeezed juice, fruits, and 4 different breads. In the small bowls under the bread there are some oils and spreads. In one yellow dish is olive oil; in the other is-- Argan oil!! Not just for skin care here in Morocco, it's often eaten with bread. Next stop: Hassan II Mosque. It is a giant complex, really reminding me of the size of St Peters Square at the Vatican. It was built recently, in the last 30 years, and the building materials came from all over Morocco. As you can tell from my hair, it was a windy day, and it was really misty too. The Mosque sits directly on the coast-- in fact, there is part of the floor inside where you can look down at the sea below you. Hassan II is unbelievably big, and is the only mosque in Morocco where non-Muslims can enter. There are several guided tours every day. We missed the morning tours, and decided that we would spend the afternoon inside Morocco Mall instead. (Also a large, new, and impressive building sitting directly on the beach.) Inside the Morocco Mall were several American brand stores, including American Eagle Outfitters and Ralph Lauren, as well as the eateries and drinkeries that you might imagine. There are fancy stores, too, like this and Louis Vuitton, and Fendi, and an indoor souk that felt just a little bit like Epcot Center's Morocco. And there was this: an indoor aquarium. Hanane says there is a mermaid show every once in a while in the aquarium, and I may have to go back for that. There is a cafe area for relaxing and it overlooks a lake with a "dancing waters" fountain, which is directly on the beach. As you can see, it was not a pleasant day for dancing waters or beach strolling, but it was a great day to be indoors! The store where I actually bought stuff was Marjane, Morocco's Target. "They have everything at Marjane," I was told when I arrived, and indeed, that's where I've gotten sheets and towels, cleaning products, and socks, and on this Saturday, the cutting board and knife I need to make my own tajine at home! They also have a grocery store, and this was the seafood section. Those of you paying close attention will note that there was a shark in the aquarium shot, and a shark in this shot. Coincidence?? Sunday was a much sunnier day! Clear skies, and a great day for photographing some of the architecture of the city. (Check out more of the shots of architecture if you want on the soon-to-be-created Casablanca page in the drop-down menu.) Notice that on this day, I am wearing a cool new leather jacket. That is because after the Morocco Mall on Saturday, Hanane took me to the for-real souk in Casa, and we visited some of the leather shops. And here is a great thing about shopping with a local girlfriend: she helped me find a super quality jacket at a very fair price. Whoo-hoo! Here are some sunnier shots of the Hassan II Mosque; There was couscous, too! We stopped by Hanane's brother-in-law's business. Besides being a high school English teacher, Saad runs a private language center. We stopped in Saturday for mint tea and were invited to come back for lunch on Sunday. Here are some of the center staff with tea and with couscous, which is usually accompanied by buttermilk. Everyone at the center was very friendly, even though they were apparently amused by my (not-yet-fully-comprehensible) Darjia. Finally, with Hanane's help, I was finally able to conquer the challenge of finding the right spices in the souk to buy for tajine at home. She took me to the right part of the market for quality spices, and we talked to this man (who looks like a doctor or lab researcher more than a spice guy, doesn't he?) and he prepared little sacks of spices from the jars on the shelves. I bought black pepper, red pepper, ginger, cinnamon, cumin, and cucurmin (which may be turmeric) and my total charge was $1.00. I think this is the basic combo that makes Moroccan cooking "moroccan". I'll let you know how it turns out!
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Marcie StutzmanTeacher, Researcher, Adventurer, Explorer; Maybe crazy; Possibly too old for this Archives
October 2018
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