November 30, 2008

Just because we’re in Morocco doesn’t mean that we cant celebrate Thanksgiving in true American style. Three friends: Alex, Amy, and Emmy and a fourth new friend, Tim cam over Thanksgiving afternoon. Right away we began to cook. By the time that dinner was served, we had turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, peas, green beans, and gravy. About 4 minutes into dinner, the electricity went out, but with candles ready, we didn’t let it ruin the festivities. For desert we had homemade apple pie and homemade pumpkin pie, both of which were delicious. When we looked out across Ait Daoud we though that it was a bit ironic that only our apartment (the only one in which people were celebrating a holiday) was the only one that didn’t have electricity. Our upstairs neighbors had blown the circuit and the circuit box was in the apartment of another neighbor who was out of town. Luckily, however, at about 9 PM, the electrician was able to crawl through a window and turn the power back on…another thing to be thankful for. So, we watched a movie and called it a night.
The next day, Tim had to depart but the rest of us walked out to the overlook for a crystal clear view of snow capped peaks. We had a long game of Frisbee and then settled back down for another movie. We wanted to play a board game but didn’t have any. So, in true Peace Corps fashion, we downloaded a picture of a monopoly board and created one from scratch on some cardboard. Moroccolopoly comes complete with game pieces, dirhams instead of dollars, and our own unique set of chance and community chest cards. Our holiday also consisted of a long hike out to a large hill to look for fossils. We spent several hours poking about and found hundreds of fragments of ammonites, 5 to 10 species of bivalve, crinoids, and as always, some unidentified fossils. All in all, it was a great Thanksgiving.
So, not to give the impression that Peace Corps is all fun and games, we have been completed a proposal for a tree planting project and are scheduled to meet with a women’s cooperative down the road to discuss acquiring plants for a middle school garden as well as have one of the women come in to teach the students about the importance of plants. Carrie has been making health lessons to teach at the hospital and is working with Emmy to conduct a refresher course and knowledge assessment for traditional birth attendants in the area. Furthermore, I have been teaching English to a few of the motivated men in town and am working on an environmentally themed mural design competition and festival display for the student environmental club. Our bathroom project is still in the works but may be expanded to include several households in a nearby rural village. Several more meetings and info gathering sessions are planned.