The subject today is the medina streets. So the streets of the medina are for the most part very narrow, not having been built before the advent of the automobile. This fact does not discourage cars from actually driving through the medina.
For example, on my way to Arabic class in the mornings, I must walk through a street where vendors sell produce. Every morning, men find a way to squish multiple trucks into the space of an American alley: it’s very impressive. Also impressive is the way I don’t get clocked with crates of potatoes and onions as I walk by.
Since they are so narrow, cars can’t pass except on the widest of streets, like Mohammad V and Sidi FataH. If a car encounters a blockage, such as another car, the driver simply stops and commences honking until the other vehicle moves. Delivery trucks are problem in this case, as they squat in one place for a long time.
Motorbikes are a whole other story. Imagine walking down a narrow alley and hearing the growl of the engine. You don’t know from which direction it’s coming, but you know it’s getting closer and closer. Suddenly a screeching motorcycle or motorbike rounds the nearest corner and you must throw yourself up against the wall, only to have the offending motorbike almost snag your sleeve. Scary stuff.
In other news, this evening I bought (with Soukaina doing the actual speaking and me just providing the capital) one of the lovely scrubbly mitts that you use in the hammam to rub your skin off. I also got a ball of the henna soap that goes with it. The rest of the family laughed a little when Soukaina told them about my purchases; I guess previous students weren’t as enamored of the hammam as I am.
This coming weekend we have an excursion to Meknes, Fez, and Volubilis. I’m pretty excited, because it means we get to be tourists, as opposed to awkward residents. I mean, I stick out when I’m walking through the souk (market) on account of my blondness and general aura of Westernity (yes my own word). I do live here, but I am obviously out of place and strange; there aren’t many tourists toodling about on the back streets of the medina. I’ve gotten used to seeing Moroccans everywhere around me. I even stare at the European tourists now when I see them on my street (which also happens to be part of the souk). In conclusion, this weekend I can take pictures openly and feel OK about sticking out, instead of wishing I somehow looked less un-Moroccan.
Valentine’s Day is this coming Sunday, when we’ll be in Fez. Soukaina and I were talking about it, and I said I would be glad to get away from all the hearts and pink and red ridiculous commercialism (but I didn’t know the French word for “commercial”). We both think the mass quantities of chocolate are a good idea, on account of Soukaina being genuinely in love with chocolate and me being a brand new Moroccan and finally admitting to my love affair with sweets and BREAD. (If you were wondering, the Arabic word for bread is “hubs” but the “h” sound is a kind of hacking in the back of your throat and the “u” is very short.)
My brother’s club music is currently battling for supremacy with the radio in the kitchen and the TV in the living room. It’s a good thing I don’t have a lot of homework to do. I just have to squash a third language into my head while speaking a different one and thinking in still another. You know, no problem. But much of it is Jay Sean, so I guess I can’t complain that much.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
on being a pedestrian
Third day of classes. I have Darija vocab coming out my ears. I think I’ve absorbed maybe a third of it…? I’m also getting better about navigating through the medina, although it still requires constant vigilance on my part to spot this sign, or that door.
Traffic here is terrible, for us anyway. Anytime you cross the street you take your life in your hands: you just have to look for a break in the cars streaming by…and GO! They won’t stop for you, but if you get too close they beep. Motorbikes are also very popular; people double up on them, and triple up on normal bikes. Despite the fact that you almost get run over by a car, you can actually stop in between lanes to wait for the cars to go by, as long as there are marked lanes (I think that’s the unspoken rule…). I may get a ticket for jaywalking when I get back home because of this habit of crazy street crossing. I mean, you just walk right out into the middle of an intersection and kind of dance around the cars streaming by.
Traffic here is terrible, for us anyway. Anytime you cross the street you take your life in your hands: you just have to look for a break in the cars streaming by…and GO! They won’t stop for you, but if you get too close they beep. Motorbikes are also very popular; people double up on them, and triple up on normal bikes. Despite the fact that you almost get run over by a car, you can actually stop in between lanes to wait for the cars to go by, as long as there are marked lanes (I think that’s the unspoken rule…). I may get a ticket for jaywalking when I get back home because of this habit of crazy street crossing. I mean, you just walk right out into the middle of an intersection and kind of dance around the cars streaming by.
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
kasbah!
I went for a run and took a shower; it was a good day. Classes were slightly less taxing than the 30-minute run. We have Arabic in the morning for 3 hours. It’s the local dialect of Arabic called Darija, as opposed to the classical Arabic called FusHa, which we start next week. Our teacher, Fatima Zohra, is very nice. The whole class is like playing Charades, but it works.
Our lecture this afternoon was disappointing because the lecturer’s English wasn’t really up to it, but she made a good effort. We were done super early, therefore, a bunch of us went to the Kasbah. It’s right across the street from my house really. It has a beautiful garden that, in theory, is good for studying, but the kittens are distracting. Street cats are everywhere, and not bending down and petting all of them tries my patience daily, especially the kittens.
So the Kasbah. A kasbah is really just a walled town and they’re all over. In fact, most cities have a kasbah at its center. The kasbah here marks the first area of settlement of Rabat, where the river Bouregreg meets the Atlantic Ocean. All the houses inside the kasbah are painted white and blue; it looks almost like Greece.
Our lecture this afternoon was disappointing because the lecturer’s English wasn’t really up to it, but she made a good effort. We were done super early, therefore, a bunch of us went to the Kasbah. It’s right across the street from my house really. It has a beautiful garden that, in theory, is good for studying, but the kittens are distracting. Street cats are everywhere, and not bending down and petting all of them tries my patience daily, especially the kittens.
So the Kasbah. A kasbah is really just a walled town and they’re all over. In fact, most cities have a kasbah at its center. The kasbah here marks the first area of settlement of Rabat, where the river Bouregreg meets the Atlantic Ocean. All the houses inside the kasbah are painted white and blue; it looks almost like Greece.
I got home around 3:30 and tried to study my Darija vocab. I tried. But I ended up taking a nap, so it’s really just like home.
Later in the afternoon I went for a run down by the beach with my friend Becca. The glorified sidewalk is actually under construction. That’s one of the things I like about Morocco, the public works are open to all. Really though, we almost ran between a dump truck and a bulldozer; there aren’t any fences or guards or anything. We were running on half-made sidewalks and curbs and it was fine.
The coast is spectacular, by the way: the waves have been eating away at the sandstones and limestones to create a 30-foot drop to the ocean. The waves were huge today, easily breaking over the tops of the cliffs.
Crazy people surf here actually; there’s an official surf club on the beach. Some members were walking home and ran me off the sidewalk with their boards (in a nice way).
That’s another thing, we girls get yelled at everywhere we go. The main road parallels the sidewalk by the beach, so can you imagine the amount of catcalls and beeping we were subject to? Yeah. A lot. You’ve just got to understand that these guys don’t mean anything hostile when they holler at us in the street. Back in the day, and still, it was a manner of courting: the only place where the sexes could mingle was the street. Guys yell at girls to get their attention, and girls can look back at them, or something, to indicate their interest. It works against however, because when somebody shouts at me I generally look. Some guys are just trying to be polite I think, but others are just trying to get your attention. Broken English is popular, as is French, and sometimes Arabic, but I don’t usually get the Arabic because I am blond, and therefore a European. Some guys will actually follow you, but that hasn’t happened to me yet. I’ve also learned to ignore pretty much everything in the street as I walk.
Later in the afternoon I went for a run down by the beach with my friend Becca. The glorified sidewalk is actually under construction. That’s one of the things I like about Morocco, the public works are open to all. Really though, we almost ran between a dump truck and a bulldozer; there aren’t any fences or guards or anything. We were running on half-made sidewalks and curbs and it was fine.
The coast is spectacular, by the way: the waves have been eating away at the sandstones and limestones to create a 30-foot drop to the ocean. The waves were huge today, easily breaking over the tops of the cliffs.
Crazy people surf here actually; there’s an official surf club on the beach. Some members were walking home and ran me off the sidewalk with their boards (in a nice way).
That’s another thing, we girls get yelled at everywhere we go. The main road parallels the sidewalk by the beach, so can you imagine the amount of catcalls and beeping we were subject to? Yeah. A lot. You’ve just got to understand that these guys don’t mean anything hostile when they holler at us in the street. Back in the day, and still, it was a manner of courting: the only place where the sexes could mingle was the street. Guys yell at girls to get their attention, and girls can look back at them, or something, to indicate their interest. It works against however, because when somebody shouts at me I generally look. Some guys are just trying to be polite I think, but others are just trying to get your attention. Broken English is popular, as is French, and sometimes Arabic, but I don’t usually get the Arabic because I am blond, and therefore a European. Some guys will actually follow you, but that hasn’t happened to me yet. I’ve also learned to ignore pretty much everything in the street as I walk.
Monday, February 8, 2010
to begin with...
So people, this is so you don’t have to email me constantly about my whereabouts in the beautiful Maghreb (Morocco). I will try and post as often as possible, with pictures because I know you are clamoring for them, but internet access, and my willingness to sit around in internet cafes will be limited. That said, welcome to my blog!
I have just finished my first weekend with my host family, who is adorable, by the way. My father is Al-Hajj Mohamed and my mother is Hajja Fatima, the “Hajj” means they’ve done the pilgrimage to Mecca. My sister is Soukaina, she’s a bit younger than me, and my brother is Amine, who is a few years older than me.
Their home is the ground floor of an old building in the Medina (old city) of Rabat. It has a roofed central courtyard and rooms around that: 4 salons, a kitchen, and the toilet. A salon doesn’t have an American equivalent; it’s more like a living room that doubles as a bedroom. There are sofas up against the walls with pillows and a table in the center of the room, with wheels usually. During the day, the family uses it as a living room, and at night the pillows come off and blankets come out. One room is the dedicated living room, with a TV, and that’s where we eat all our meals (yes, with the TV on). At night Soukaina sleeps there. Amine has his own room, but both he and Soukaina use it as a living room; it has the computer. I get my own room, which is nice. It’s the formal sitting room and is usually closed (?). It’s an enormous room and I don’t use all of it.
We have a Turkish toilet. Yes, it is a hole in the floor. Before you cringe in disgust, know this: it’s very hygienic and easy to use. If you can aim. But think about it, how many times have you had to scrub the toilet and really hated it? This is way less to scrub. It’s been better since a roll of toilet paper magically appeared a few days ago. You flush the toilet by pouring sometimes violently depending on the amount of ahem, material.
The shower at home is just a nozzle, added recently I think, in the wall above head level. Moroccans here don’t shower every day, or every other day: they go to the hammam once a week. Soukaina says she goes twice a week in the summer. The hammam is the bathhouse. And I LOVE it. I told Hajja I wanted to build one in the US. The hammam Soukaina and I went to on Saturday is a few blocks from the house in a nondescript building near the main road through the medina. We brought a few buckets, plastic stools, and toiletries. We paid 10 dirhams (8 dirhams = $1) to get in, and 1 dirham to rent a few more buckets. Once inside the hammam proper, you fill up the buckets and stake out your space within the room. Oh yeah, and you’re naked (undies only) with probably a dozen other women. What followed was a confusing and variable series of soaping, scrubbing, shampooing, and rinsing. The best part is the scrubbing. Imagine this: rubber sandpaper. It’s a mitt-type thing, and you just scrub the top layer of your skin until it comes off. Brilliant. To make a long story short, we were in there for about 90 minutes, and I emerged cleaner than I have ever felt. But I was tired for the rest of the day. My family nodded knowingly, saying “Ah, hammam.” The heat takes a lot out of you.
I hung around the house after the hammam and then went out later with Soukaina and Amine and their friends, who we dropped off at a taxi, then strolled about for an hour. I practiced my few words of Arabic. Oh, I forgot to mention, we speak French at home. Well, we speak French when we need to communicate, and then they speak Arabic the rest of the time. Darija is the name of the Arabic dialect spoken here.
We got back around 10pm and then had dinner. Nights are late here, and dinner is past my usual bedtime. “Tea” falls at my dinnertime. Meals involve a lot of bread and the family telling me to “Guli, guli!” which means “Eat, eat!”.
More on classes later, because today has been our first real day of classes.
Pictures later too. Be patient.
I have just finished my first weekend with my host family, who is adorable, by the way. My father is Al-Hajj Mohamed and my mother is Hajja Fatima, the “Hajj” means they’ve done the pilgrimage to Mecca. My sister is Soukaina, she’s a bit younger than me, and my brother is Amine, who is a few years older than me.
Their home is the ground floor of an old building in the Medina (old city) of Rabat. It has a roofed central courtyard and rooms around that: 4 salons, a kitchen, and the toilet. A salon doesn’t have an American equivalent; it’s more like a living room that doubles as a bedroom. There are sofas up against the walls with pillows and a table in the center of the room, with wheels usually. During the day, the family uses it as a living room, and at night the pillows come off and blankets come out. One room is the dedicated living room, with a TV, and that’s where we eat all our meals (yes, with the TV on). At night Soukaina sleeps there. Amine has his own room, but both he and Soukaina use it as a living room; it has the computer. I get my own room, which is nice. It’s the formal sitting room and is usually closed (?). It’s an enormous room and I don’t use all of it.
We have a Turkish toilet. Yes, it is a hole in the floor. Before you cringe in disgust, know this: it’s very hygienic and easy to use. If you can aim. But think about it, how many times have you had to scrub the toilet and really hated it? This is way less to scrub. It’s been better since a roll of toilet paper magically appeared a few days ago. You flush the toilet by pouring sometimes violently depending on the amount of ahem, material.
The shower at home is just a nozzle, added recently I think, in the wall above head level. Moroccans here don’t shower every day, or every other day: they go to the hammam once a week. Soukaina says she goes twice a week in the summer. The hammam is the bathhouse. And I LOVE it. I told Hajja I wanted to build one in the US. The hammam Soukaina and I went to on Saturday is a few blocks from the house in a nondescript building near the main road through the medina. We brought a few buckets, plastic stools, and toiletries. We paid 10 dirhams (8 dirhams = $1) to get in, and 1 dirham to rent a few more buckets. Once inside the hammam proper, you fill up the buckets and stake out your space within the room. Oh yeah, and you’re naked (undies only) with probably a dozen other women. What followed was a confusing and variable series of soaping, scrubbing, shampooing, and rinsing. The best part is the scrubbing. Imagine this: rubber sandpaper. It’s a mitt-type thing, and you just scrub the top layer of your skin until it comes off. Brilliant. To make a long story short, we were in there for about 90 minutes, and I emerged cleaner than I have ever felt. But I was tired for the rest of the day. My family nodded knowingly, saying “Ah, hammam.” The heat takes a lot out of you.
I hung around the house after the hammam and then went out later with Soukaina and Amine and their friends, who we dropped off at a taxi, then strolled about for an hour. I practiced my few words of Arabic. Oh, I forgot to mention, we speak French at home. Well, we speak French when we need to communicate, and then they speak Arabic the rest of the time. Darija is the name of the Arabic dialect spoken here.
We got back around 10pm and then had dinner. Nights are late here, and dinner is past my usual bedtime. “Tea” falls at my dinnertime. Meals involve a lot of bread and the family telling me to “Guli, guli!” which means “Eat, eat!”.
More on classes later, because today has been our first real day of classes.
Pictures later too. Be patient.
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