Maricela in Morocco

Friday, June 17, 2017

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Today we had a quiz in class, I'd say everyone did quite well although we have decided to take another quiz Monday similar to it to ensure we've understood the material before moving on. I haven't had a chance to introduce my classmates yet, there's a total of 9 of us and our Professor Noha, makes 10. 4 boy, 5 girls, there's: Louis, John, Richard, Justin, Alexandra, Haley, Andrea, Leah and I. For the most part, none of us knew each other before the trip. My roommates are Alexandra and Justin. We live in the Medina of Tetouan and it's a beautiful walk to school every morning which makes a 20 minute walk feel like a 10 minute walk which explains why we are 10 minutes late to class haha:) We've established a new time to leave for school after today, 09:10 at the latest to be there by 09:30. We have bread/khobz for breakfast, along with a plethora of cheese--one you peel with this cool cutting tool I've never seen in the U.S., one in a bowl that's white which I'm certain it's goat cheese, and the triangle cheese that we DO have back home that peels from the foil (my mom has a ton of those in the fridge, yum)--along with apricot and strawberry jam, organic olive oil--when I say organic it's natural, or as Dris would say:

The people here in Morocco can't afford the pesticides for the food you know so the food is organic, which is good.

and to drink we have water and coffee/cahooua--our house mom has a mini strainer she sits over the little cup used for mint tea, and uses it to strain the fat from our milk when we pour it into our coffee. The coffee is great, although it can't beat the Moroccan mint tea. They grow their mint in the front yard along with many other plants they use to prep food.
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After our quiz in class Leah, Louis, Justin and I left to walk around outside and thought, what better way than walk flights of stairs? I was tired! It was a beautiful view though I certainly enjoyed it, you can see me overlooking the Medina.

Overlooking the Medina

Went up higher for another view of the Medina

Upon our return, Noha had some sweets prepared for John because it's his bday, Happy birthday, John!
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After studying at school Justin and I decided to head back to the house/dar khatib (our house name), and start on our laundry. Upon our arrival I recognized a funny smell upstairs, our house mom and another girl who lives there, (we still haven't figured out if she's family or not) were deep cleaning the room I was previously living in before I realized all the bugs that had annoyed me haha. There's usually mosquitoes and these weird looking flying ants, they won't harm you but they're annoying because there's so many of them. I feel like I'm always smacking one away :( lol. Our house mom came out of the room and gave us new sheets to put on our bed and told us we were getting another roommate, it was more like this: talib, un hombre (student, a man). I was like what? When? She replied, sbado, hmm domingo (saturday, sunday)? I could tell she didn't know when he was coming, and I also wasn't expecting anyone to be joining us since we were the biggest group. The dar khatib is relatively big in size though, it's a 18th century Tetouan Medina house with 3 floors plus the roof so our house mom probably takes lots of students at a time. Alexandra arrived and we told her the news, we were excited and anxious at the same time because we were afraid we wouldn't get the chance to meet him due to our weekend excursion with the class. We decided to finish our homework before dinner.
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Our house mom knocked on my door and said talib, I looked at Justin and was like what? oh the student is here! We went outside and met Roman, our new roommate, I was stoked we got to meet him before our departure for Tangier & Assilah this weekend. I enjoyed getting to know him and his experiences, he's 26 from Birmingham, Alabama, a doctoral student doing his research here specifically for Morocco, going to Dar Loughat (house of languages) school as well. Justin and I showed him to the roof where he told us that he's been to Ghana and received his personal name from the people there, Brazil, 2 different west African countries, Fez (Morocco), Europe and other places I can't remember it was all overwhelming. He's also learning arabic because he needs to know it for his research, and he recently converted to Islam.

Studying abroad has definitely brought me to cross paths with people I would've never before.

At dinner, we had soup, fried eggplant, khobz, lamb with french fries on top, and melon.

Fried eggplant

lamb, fries, and khobz/bread

Homemade fruit juice

Alexandra, Justin and I exchanged conversations with Roman talking about our majors, career plans, and trips in Morocco. He was excited to break his fast because he said he was really hungry and had recently converted. At times I feel like we are fasting too because there isn't any lunch unless we want to go to the nearest restaurant in the Medina called "El Reducto," my favorite place here. If anyone wants to visit the Medina I'd highly recommend staying at El Reducto, they're on trip advisor too.
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After dinner, Alexandra, Justin, and I stayed up until midnight packing our clothes for the weekend trip and finishing homework. My stomach hurt from all the food we ate too so Justin and I went up to the roof again to let our food settle, a daily activity for us because you can see all of the Medina from the roof to the Mediterranean, the wind is consistent around 70-80 degrees fahrenheit which I've also learned how to convert from celsius where you subtract 32 and multiply by 5/9. Later on before bed Alexandra and I washed our bathing suits from the previous weekend to prepare them for the beach in Assilah. I also got to talk to one of my Alpha Gam sisters, Maria, I was so excited to hear from an Alpha Gam and catch up. #GoGreek!
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Goodnight everyone:) I can't wait to tell you all about Tangier + Assilah!
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One of the many cat photos

This is my first post, I will be adding more posts to catch you all up on my experiences day 1-14:)

Day 15:

We're on the bus to the Angra region to visit the sooq. A sooq is a market place where you can buy mostly food along with other things such as stuff for building your house. Dris said it's the more rural region, to not expect luxury. He also says that we will see that it attracts Arabians from 30km around the area. Basically, I should've used the bathroom before we left dar loughat (my school in tetouan Morocco) lol. It's a bus full with my class and 3 other students at the school. I love riding the bus because I get to see the mountain views from the window. The moroccan way of driving also keeps me entertained. Dris (owner of the school) has also said that the animals sold at the sooq are slaughtered the same day they are sold at the sooq. I'm not sure what to expect from rural Morocco, but I can't wait! Dris also has just mentioned to not eat or drink in this area as they aren't experienced with other cultures and if we want to do so we must do it here in the van. I still really have to pee..
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Very rural, the buildings are old, oh I think we are getting off now.

Dris says: This part of the sooq is usually like a "bee hive" usually outside of Ramadan. Very busy. There's a phrase that's known as "Noisy as the sooq" bc it's so loud here.

It was very hot, and I remember telling John, one of the other students, to look at the chicken and go help him he's stuck on his back! He responded, his head is cut off! LOL I looked over and sure enough there was no head, I've never experienced anything like that in my life, even in the states it was hilarious. Noha (my professor) bought 1 kilo of apricots for 8 dirham which is .80 cents in the USA. This man that came along with said he bought his goat for dinner because it's cheaper in the sooq than in tetouan. The cat calls were more consistent here yelling SEÑORA! and Justin (another student) also got told by one of the market people to throw his gum out bc of Ramadan, that goes to show how serious they take their fasting here in the sooq.
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Back on the bus I expressed to Louis that i wanted to play some soccer before I left and the man next to me told me I could rent out a field in Martil for an hour or so, so I may look into that. Outside the window I can see that gas is .90 cents per liter and 1.00 for a liter of supreme I believe... We got dropped off and went to Reducto, I unfortunately wasn't feeling so well and scurried home to take some medicine. Later on Justin and Alexandra arrived with Leah, it was great because we got to show her around our house and she helped us with understanding broken plural conjugations in Arabic.
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15:30, Allah akbar, it is time for dinner! Traditional soup first with Ramadan sweets in the middle, next course was 2 types of pasta/spaghetti dishes, the following course was chicken with boiled eggs and cinnamon on top, ending with a local melon cut up. I'm always left so full at the end of each meal, Dris wasn't kidding when he said that if we wanted to lose weight coming here we chose the wrong place haha. It's delicious though I love sitting down with the family. I timed dinner today and it takes about an hour and 20 minutes. We also watch 2 TV shows through dinner, the same ones although I never know what they're saying lol. One important note, is that when we eat we eat from the same dish in the middle of the table with our right hand using 3 fingers (thumb, pointer, and middle finger).
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Now Alexandra, Justin and I are studying for our test in the morning. I will resume my blogging tomorrow:) along with funny "study abroad memes" ;)
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