My Time in Tetouan: Day 1--

So Michael got us a pretty sweet deal on a Grande Taxi ride to Tetouan and we got the driver to take us to Hercules Cave, too!  I totally dig caves and other cool natural landmarks like this one, so I was totally pumped to check it out.  The scene was picture-perfect and the sound of the waves in the cave was mesmerizing, but the guys and I decided not to wait for the sunset, rather we continued on so that we could see a bit of Tetouan in the day.  This proved to be a good call, because we had a bit of trouble finding a hotel—but once we did, we struck it rich!  Ok, the pillows were lumpy and there was only a hole in the ground to serve as the hotel’s community toilet, but for an equivalent of 5 euros per person, we got a 3-person room and then a 2-person room which—get this—had a balcony that looked right over the town’s central round-a-bout!  How rocking is that?!  So we went crazy with pictures before checking out the souks for the evening and hunting down some dinner.

Turns out the owner of the hotel was also the city’s Tourism Minister (or so he claimed…) and he had “the best place in town to take us to”, so we followed along but I knew what was coming.  And, sure enough, we were led through the winding maze of the medina’s souk into the carpet store of a funny old man who promised us a good view, some mint tea, and the best price in town.  Well, the view did turn out to be incredible (check out my pictures!!), and he did serve us tea, but only Josh was interested in purchasing goods from this carpet store man.  After the elaborate and informative “presentation” that the storeowner put on for us (did you know that real camel rugs won’t burn??), the group was hoping that we wouldn’t have to leave with him disappointed in us not purchasing anything, but on the contrary, I think we left him rather happy.  Josh ended up haggling his way into buying FOUR small, beautiful rugs to bring back to the U.S. as souvenirs so once his rugs were packed up and in hand, we found a cheap, quick, and delicious schawarma place for dinner.  We were all exhausted from the long day (especially from Assilah, the boys claimed…haha, very funny…) so we put any thoughts of late-night Tetouan night-life out of our minds as we satisfactorily retired to our hotel rooms for the evening.

My Time in Tangier--

Hey, everyone!  So I’ve returned from a delightful trip this past weekend—it was just me and the guys, and boy was it a good time!  It started off kind of rough because I was supposed to meet them at the Rabat train station bright and early Saturday morning, only the taxi driver took me to the Rabat AGDAL station (closer to my house) which I didn’t even know existed until it was too late and I missed the train they were on.  Ha!  So I had to wait 2 hours to catch the next one, where I met up with them in Assilah and we kept heading straight to Tangier.  I was kind of hoping to explore Assilah too but perhaps sometime in the future I can make it back, especially as this coastal town apparently is the favorite of some of the guys and all they can talk about is how wonderful it is and how it’s too bad I missed it.  I have a feeling I’m never going to hear the end of it…

Assilah aside, there was still a lot to fit into the day—we wanted to stop by the American Legation Museum because, fun fact, Morocco was the first nation to recognize the United States of America as an independent country.  So, the Tangier American Legation became the first American public property outside of the U.S., and Josh and I, being the Americans in the group, were particularly geeked to check out this sight only to find out that the museum is closed on weekends.  Yes, because that makes a lot of sense…

So the guys and I moved on, checking out Tangier’s Kesbah ocean view and museum (I highly recommend, although it’s best if you have the all-knowledgeable Phillip for a tour guide), grabbing lunch, and finally we poked our heads into the Church of Saint Andrew, built upon land donated by King Hassan I of Morocco to Britain in 1880, before we haggled out a good Grande taxi price that would get us into the town of Tetouan, stopping at Hercules Cave on the way.

For some gorgeous pictures and informational subtitles, click on any of the pictures of go to my Pictures and Video page.  Also, stick around for my posts about Tetouan and Chefschaouen next!

TGIF!

Headed to Chefchaoun and Tangiers with the guys!  Have a great weekend, all! :-)

New Students=New Surprises

Q: The odds of an old high school classmate attending Qalam wa Lawh at the same time as me?

A: Apparently, they’re good enough.

It really is a small world after all.

The Amazing Amazigh!

Sorry, folks.  Our school excursion this morning was to the Royal Institute of the Amazigh Culture (basically, the history of the various Berber tribes) but I have nothing to report on.  Given that the percent of the presentation I understood was pretty much zilch, I was relieved to find that most all but two or three of my classmates were in the same boat as me.  And, after all, this is why I’m here—to listen and comprehend!  Or try to, at least.  But really, you should look up the Amazigh if you have a second; I couldn’t tell you, but the way the discussion panel was going on, I’m sure it is a fascinating subject: http://www.ircam.ma/fr/index.php

Rabat’s got “Mawazine”--

Last Thursday, my roommate Zoe and I met up at a Thai place nearby in Agdal that she had tried with some of our classmates the night before.  I enjoyed talking over my first real non-home-cooked dinner since coming to Morocco (even if it was Thai and not Moroccan cuisine!) with my

new roommate and getting to know more about her.  Pursuing a PhD at the moment, she is incredibly smart for her young age and I think I am on the right track to following a similar path of wisdom and success as long as I keep things up!  It was very enjoyable getting to people-watch with her and sit back and relax after an exhausting day (We had originally intended to go shopping in Agdal after school got out but I had finally gotten my checked luggage from the airport…why it spent three nights in Atlanta when no city south of Philadelphia was on my itinerary, I have no idea!!  That aside, I was just happy to at last feel at ease because I didn’t have to bother wondering about what I was going to wear the next morning and worry about if I would ever see my stuff again.).  Just as we were finishing up dinner, my classmate from Australia Maggie called to see about meeting up to go to a concert that evening so after picking up some groceries from the local market with Zoe, we headed back to our apartment and I got ready for the concert.
As a way to boost tourism and promote the culture (or so it is claimed), His Majesty the King of Mohammed VI sponsors a free annual music festival at the end of May called the Mawazine (“Rhythms”).  I head read about this event even before having arrived to Rabat and I was really hoping to listen to Nancy Ajram sing because of all the performers I looked into, she was really the only Arab singer that I was familiar with and really enjoy her music.  However, because she was performing the same day that I flew in, I hadn’t yet met my roommates nor classmates so I had no one to accompany me to the concert and I didn’t dare go alone (plus, I got a pretty sweet tour of the city and made a really great friend of the neighbors by not going out that night).  So even though I unfortunately missed Nancy, whose style I consider the epitome of modern Arab pop music, Maggie was interested just as I was in attending any concert at all before the event was over.  Some of our classmates had gone to one venue a few nights before and did not enjoy the extent of harassment they experienced so Maggie and I were on our own, but we took our chances and actually had a very good time.  We didn’t make it early enough to see the female Egyptian singer Angham, but we did see Melhem Zein from Lebanon and he was outstanding!

To view the entire concert we saw, click here!

Why I’m Here--

It’s a lovely Tuesday morning right now with a perfect blue sky and a warm, light breeze.  If there’s one thing that I can count on every day, it’s that the weather will never fail to be pristine.  If I had to name another thing that I could count on every day, well then it would be that I am guaranteed to hear daily about 500 honks of horns given that the school I go to is located on an intersection and Moroccans like to honk (or, rather, they hate bad drivers)! 

I suppose now it’s more than time to share with you all a little bit about my school.  I’m sitting outside on the school’s patio at a row of tables with my friends who are sipping on Moroccan tea and laughing at jokes they’ve been sharing in English, German, and Italian (it seems that “your mom” jokes are universal, only I’ve yet to hear one in Arabic…).  It’s not a very big school—enrolled are about two or three dozen students, as far as I know, whom I see every day.  They are all different ages, varying from high school students taking a year off to discover themselves to 60-year-old individuals whose children have all grown up and have children of their own.  They are also from all different countries and at different levels of Arabic, which provides a lot of opportunity to meet some great people and learn about different cultures but unfortunately it also means that everyone has a tendency to resort to conversing mostly in English, and as horrible as my Arabic is, I really came here to speak it!  At least the Germans are willing to speak German with me…

Personally, I feel that I got fantastic training of the formal Arabic language with my Grand Valley professor’s help from the Al-Kitaab workbook series (thank you, Professor Maisel!!), so I was pumped to discover that the classes here at Qalam wa Lawh use the same series.  I was even more excited that I had exhausted my Arabic language learning at Grand Valley, so by receiving this scholarship from the Center, I was going to be going above and beyond any possibility I had of advancing my Arabic back at school. This meant buying the second al-Kitaab book and it has got so much vocabulary that it’s fantastically overwhelming—but but by the time I leave Morocco, I will already have gotten through the first four chapters.  Not only are the class lessons beneficial to my furthering my comprehension of the language, but even more so is the fact that from the time I wake up to the time I go to sleep, I am constantly confronted with Arabic Arabic Arabic.  And this my friends, long story short, is why I decided to accept my scholarship, fly to North Africa, and dedicate a month of my summer to learning this beautiful language rather than ride the struggle bus trying to teach myself from the second al-Kitaab book out at the pool in my own backyard.  Sure beats last summer.