A delightful trip

The Good and the Bad

2007-11-12T00:44:49Z

Unfortunately, I have been remiss in my column-writing duties over the past few weeks or so. To be quite frank, I have not had the time to collect my thoughts, let alone express them! Since my last column, I have had three weeks of “midterm week,” a northerly trek to Gibraltar, yet more work, and a southerly trek to the charming beach resort of Agadir (Cue foreshadowing). Only now, as I am sitting in a café on the beachfront, have I found the time and inspiration to write.
Perhaps I should begin this Moroccan column on a non-Moroccan topic: the political status of Gibraltar. As I have previously mentioned, Gibraltar – whose name comes from the Arabic “Jebel Tariq” or “Tariq’s mountain” – is a British possession along the coast of southern Spain. The British took control of the 7 km2 (2.7 mi2) peninsula in 1704 during the War of Spanish Succession. This annexation was formalized in the 1715 Treaty of Utrecht, which among other things gave the Spanish the right of first refusal in the event of British departure; in other words, the British were required to offer the Spanish control of the territory if they ceased to administer the Rock.
So, I bet that you’re wondering what bearing an 18th-century treaty has to do with modern-day politics and specifically with Morocco. Well, the short answer is that while the naval base is not as vital in terms of strategic interest as it once was, the Spanish are still extremely upset at what they see as perpetual British imperialism. This British Rock has been a slap in the collective Spanish face for over three centuries. The lowest point in Anglo-Spanish relations with regards to Gibraltar was during the years under the nationalist Franco government, which closed the border for over two decades, thus cutting off many of their own citizens from gainful employment in Gibraltar (ironically enough, the Spanish now use these workers as martyrs in their struggle, from a monument “to the Spanish workers of Gibraltar” at the border to demands that the British pay their pensions!). While the border was reopened after Franco’s death, the territory remains a point of contention between London and Madrid.
The dispute is further complicated by the political situation in Gibraltar. While almost all Gibraltarians are pro-British and do not wish to have any Spanish role on the Rock, they currently do not have any say in negotiations. This is because the UN recognizes Gibraltar as a “non-self-governing territory”: in other words, a colony. Under international law, Gibraltar’s citizens are deemed to be colonists, and the principle of territorial integrity – that is, Spain should control Gibraltar since it is geographically part of Spain – is applied. In order to prevent this, Gibraltar – which has held elections for a local assembly since 1969 – has implemented governmental reforms. Under a constitution enacted earlier this year, the legislature has been renamed as a parliament and the chief minister – akin to a prime minister – has been granted greater executive powers. As this constitution was overwhelmingly approved by the citizens of Gibraltar in a referendum, say the British, the territory is self governing and therefore no longer a colony. By this logic, the theory of self-determination applies. Under this principle, the people of Gibraltar must be consulted before any change from the status quo, which would supersede both Spanish claims of territorial integrity as well as claims based in the Treaty of Utrecht. Because of this important nuance, Gibraltar’s government has mounted a campaign to be removed from the UN’s list of non-self-governing territories, a move vigorously opposed in Spain.
So, what does this have to do with Morocco? As it turns out, quite a lot. Spain has two cities on the Mediterranean coast of Morocco: Ceuta (Moroccan name is “Sebta”) and Melilla. These two cities are autonomous cities under Spanish rule, although Morocco claims both cities. Therefore, Spain is in the awkward position of claiming a historical right to a territory through geography in Gibraltar and through self-determination in Ceuta and Melilla. While the dispute between Morocco and Spain has been mainly peaceful, on occasion there has been military action, such as the Spanish Navy’s retaking on an uninhabited island (Isla Perejil) off the coast following its seizure by the Moroccans in 2002, or even bloodshed, like the deaths of many Moroccans and other Africans who try to illegally enter the cities as a method to enter the EU.
Given these two situations, what are the prospects for Gibraltar and – by extension – the Spanish cities? Given that a full handover of control, like the 1999 British departure from Hong Kong, seems very unlikely, since the majority population of each is overwhelmingly British and Spanish respectively, a proposed compromise has been joint administration of the territories, similar to Andorra’s situation of having both French and Spanish heads of state. However, this sort of arrangement has been rejected outright by those in the cities. Additionally, another option – independence – seems highly unlikely, as the cities are dependent on the finances of their respective mother countries. As a result, probably the best and most likely solution is what has governed these cities for centuries: the status quo.

The Good and the Bad remains copyright of the author golladayp, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Hypermarts and Haggling

2007-10-01T01:02:47Z

At the end of a long week, I have finally found some time to do some non-required writing! As promised, here is what happened to me yesterday:

I went down (altitude-wise, since it's actually north of here) to Fes with five other folks: a VMI keydet (Eddie), another American exchange student (Kelsi), a French exchange student (Camille), and two Moroccan students. We left here around 10ish, and we took a grand taxi to Fes and got there around 11:30. Upon arrival, we decided to head over to Marjane, the Moroccan hypermart chain, located on the outskirts of town.

Now, you might a fairly decent idea of what a hypermart is like. I don't. But the best comparison I can make is halfway between a Wal-Mart Supercenter and a full-fledged shopping mall. After all, how many Wal-Marts do you know of which have Lacoste and Swatch boutiques within their doors? Not many, at least from my experience!

Well, in any case, one of the main reasons why I needed to go to Marjane was to purchase a jacket. Being the genius that I am, I had managed to pack everything except for a cold weather jacket. Since Ifrane's temperature fluctuates around 25 to 30 degrees Celsius over the course of a day, this has become a rather serious problem for me! In any case, my family had briefly investigated the cost of shipping the coat and other items to Morocco, but the cost of shipping (around $150-250, depending on the carrier) was to the point that it would be more economical to purchase a nice coat over here.

So, being a bit foolish, I decided to drop into the boutiques first. I think that I realized how bad this idea was when Eddie and I dropped into Lacoste. Indeed, upon asking for the price (in Moroccan derija, no less), we received the price (in French) in euro: a coat for only 300 euro! I decided to check out what was in Marjane proper. Fortunately, they had very nice, simple Italian black wool jackets on sale for around 400 dirhams, or about $50. Even more fortunately, they had them in my size! After getting some other items (mostly food; shopping while fasting is another very, very bad idea), we went on to check out.

Just to throw the very familiar shopping style of Marjane and the ville nouvelle into relief, we then moved onward to a place I had promised myself I would never return: the market in the medina qadima (old city in Arabic). As Fes receives a large number of tourists year-round, the medina is very much built around the tourist industry, meaning that shopkeepers are usually more aggressive (and prices therefore higher) than in cities on the road less traveled. That being said, I would still say that the Fes souk (market) is less aggressive than its counterpart in Marrakech!

Fortunately for me, I had wrapped up all of my planned purchases, meaning that I was not looking for anything in the medina. Unlike shopping in (most of) the fixed-price shops in the ville, one of the centerpieces of shopping in the medina is the ancient and noble art of haggling. It is a game of sorts played by both seller and buyer, and it certainly has many stages. The start is when the seller gets the potential buyer into his (most shopkeepers are male, so political correctness be damned!) shop. Often sellers of high-dollar items, like rugs, may offer his guest some mint tea, the Moroccan national drink, as the buyer looks at various items for sale. Once the buyer sees something he or she likes (many times the owners are very good at figuring out what the buyer wants the most, even if he or she feigns interest), then the next stage - that of negotiation - begins.

The price first given by the seller is never the price at which he intends to sell; most sellers are in fact insulted if the buyer doesn't negotiate the price down, as it doesn't follow the rules of the game. Frequent tactics by sellers include lowering price "because you're a student/American/whatever I want to get you to buy this," commenting on the quality of the product, the good cop/bad cop approach (the second seller is unwilling to drop the price, while the first and more senior seller "forces" a lower price), and preparing the product as if the sale has been completed. Conversely, tactics for the buyer include praising the seller and his goods, claiming a lack of funds (one good method is hiding funds in other pockets or areas, so as to show a lack of money: the poor student act!), and breaking off negotiations/walking, which (if timed correctly) can get a further drop in price.

However, once there is a handshake on a price, it is obligatory for the buyer to purchase; this is yet another rule of the game. The actions of the seller post-sale are a sign of how the buyer has done in the negotiations; if the seller is extremely angry at the buyer, then he or she has gotten a good price, while kindness from the seller probably means that the buyer has overpaid. Then the process begins with new buyers and sellers!

After going through this for what seemed like an eternity, we finally decided to escape the sweltering labyrinth of the Fes medina in order to prepare for ftour at a most unusual place: McDonald's, transcribed into Arabic as "MaakDounaalds." Incredibly, ol' Mickey D's has done a very good job of localizing in Morocco, as they were serving traditional ftour food in addition to their usual menu. Never before have I seen a McDonald's sell harira, dates, and bread alongside Big Macs and the "Royale Cheese" ("You mean they don't call it a Quarter Pounder with Cheese?")! After not eating or drinking for the day and walking several kilometers in the medina, I had a veritable feast. One "Maxi Best of..." (think like a large-size value menu) Royale Cheese (which they refused to make plain for some strange reason...), a bottle of strawberry-flavored water, and a Kit-Kat McFlurry. Never before (except for possibly one particular McDonald's in Stephen City, VA, where my dad and I stopped while moving my sister to New York) had McDonald's tasted so incredibly amazing.

After leaving the McDonald's crafted by the hands of Allah, we finally made our way back to Ifrane by grand taxi, tired but happy.

As always, I love getting comments or topic requests, so if you've got any for me, please feel free to email me at golladayp@gmail.com, and I'll see what I can do.

(Unfortunately) Back to the salt mines of academia,
Phillip

Hypermarts and Haggling remains copyright of the author golladayp, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Fasting and Ftour

2007-09-23T03:35:02Z

As promised, I am giving you an additional update this weekend. Who knew that I would actually keep my word on this one?

In any case, the month of Ramadan is upon us, so I wish you a “Ramadan mubarak sa'id,” or what amounts to “Happy Ramadan.” For those of you are unfamiliar, Ramadan is a month in the Islamic lunar calendar during which the Prophet Mohammed received the Qur’an (or Koran; the Islamic holy book) from Allah. What this entails for a Muslim is that he or she must abstain from many activities permitted by Allah from the first prayer call of the day (fajr, which is right before sunrise) until the next to last prayer call (maghrib, which is right after sunset). For example, here in Ifrane the current times for beginning and ending is from around 4:30 AM until 6:30 PM, although these times are getting closer together, since the days are shortening. During these hours, people are supposed to abstain from any sort of eating, drinking (even water), smoking, and sexual activity.

Now that I’ve given you the encyclopedic definition of Ramadan, I’d like to let you know what it’s like to be in a Muslim country during Ramadan. Even though Morocco is a fairly liberal country in its interpretation of Islam, Ramadan is a very serious event here; one way of putting it is that their strict adherence to the fast makes up for their lack of adherence to the other four pillars of Islam! Seriously, though, life in Morocco changes completely during Ramadan. Even on our campus, which is home to a large number of non-Muslim students, many campus services close around 3:30 in the afternoon and don’t reopen until after ftour, or the breaking of the fast. This doesn’t apply to places on campus alone; while in Fes last weekend, I was at Marjane (think something resembling a Wal-Mart Supercenter) when we were asked to go and check out, because the store was about to close. At 6 PM! That – combined with the fact that the alcohol section of the store was completely closed off – was one of the more surprising things I saw there.

So, with no food and nothing to drink, what is a person supposed to do? Well, most people rest for as long as possible during Ramadan, in large part because during fasting, one’s blood-sugar level is near zero! Unfortunately for the average college student (or professor), classes are not optional, so frequently sitting through class becomes an exercise in self-torture, especially if a class is right before the end of the fast. Not surprisingly people become a little more high-strung during Ramadan, and sometimes tempers can be on the short side.
However, this is all made up when it comes to the time for ftour. A traditional Moroccan ftour usually resembles something like this: the first food to traditionally break the fast is the date. Usually after eating one or two dates (the first one I ate at the first ftour was possibly the sweetest thing I’ve ever eaten!), the next thing to be consumed is a bowl of harira, which is a tomato-based soup with chickpeas, pasta, cilantro, and (occasionally) meat. Other items include milawi, or a grilled flatbread, shebekia, which are honey-covered pastries, and various juices, milk, and water.

The process of eating continues long into the night, until right before the beginning of the fast. At this point, most people are quite tired, so to no one’s surprise most people sleep as late as possible the next morning. Then the whole fasting process begins once again!

Well, that about sums up a brief explanation of Ramadan here in Morocco. Once again, I love to get feedback on the column, so feel free to send me a message at golladayp@gmail.com, and I’ll try to address it in future columns!

Signing off from Ifrane,
Phillip

Fasting and Ftour remains copyright of the author golladayp, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Of Delays and Travels

2007-09-21T01:17:31Z

You know, one of the problems with writing any sort of blog or column is that whenever you are remiss in your writing duties, the amount of material tends to stack up, becoming rather like a snowball rolling down a hill. As the topics increase, this makes the writer less inclined to write, knowing that it’s extremely difficult to prioritize the pile of information which he or she wants to present to the reader. It truly is a vicious circle, and my circle was certainly not helped by being rather busy, both in terms of classwork and travel.

Fortunately for yours truly, I am turning the proverbial lemons into lemonade, and I shall be covering these two
obstructions for this column (thus wrapping up that sappy little bit of writing about my writing!). After around a month on the ground here in Ifrane, I can now safely report about my academic life on campus. The term had quite a slow start, in great part because of the need to take placement testing as courses were already starting! The Arabic exam two days before classes started, while French was completed only after the first day of classes. I am currently taking 13 credits worth of classes, which is a light but recommended load for us international students. I’m taking beginning Arabic II (where I placed, as well as the place in the book where we stopped in the summer!), Algeria since independence, 20th century international history, and computer programming in C.

But wait, you might be thinking: What about French? Well, I placed into consolidating French (kind of like beginning II/intermediate I French) but I ran into a major scheduling conflict: the French class conflicted with both sections of programming. This gave me three options: drop programming for French (didn’t want to), try to take the next highest level of French (probably not a good idea for someone who hasn’t taken French in a classroom for over four years now), or work in my spare time to improve my French for placement back at W&L. The third choice, needless to say, became the least bad option for me.

Enough about placement, though; let’s talk about the courses. I am in the fortunate position of being in two classes with mainly international students (Arabic and Algerian history) and two classes with mainly Moroccan students (Programming and 20th century). This provides an interesting situation, especially in my programming class, where I am the only non-Moroccan student in both sections. Some funny situations have occurred, such as when I was asked a question by a classmate in Moroccan Arabic! My blank look must have been priceless. However, programming does have one major advantage: we are all on the same playing field when it comes to language, since we are all newcomers to the C language.

Classes in the sciences are certainly interesting outside of the States, particularly when you are not a major in that field. I have been asked countless times by my classmates why I am in programming; they are quite surprised that a liberal-arts major would take any science/math course for (essentially) fun. The other classes, though, are quite different, especially since they are in my major area. The two history courses are great, although one of the biggest surprises I’ve had thus far has been in the area of textbooks, or rather the lack of them. At W&L, it’s not uncommon for a history class to have at least five or six books, if not more! Here I have two texts for both history classes. I was shocked when I picked up my books here.

Of course, studying abroad is not merely about textbooks and lectures; one of the most important parts is taking the opportunities to visit and enjoy your host country and culture. Two weeks ago I was presented with a prime opportunity to do just this: Morocco had parliamentary elections, which meant that the university was closed to allow students to go home and vote (they don’t have absentee voting here). For those who didn’t vote (only about 37% of the electorate voted) and internationals, this meant that we had a three-day weekend. A few friends and I decided to go up to Tangier (also spelled Tanger (French), Tanja (Arabic), and probably other ways too!), which is on the northern tip of Morocco. As we wanted to make the best use of the three-day weekend, we took a train from Meknes – the closest train station – at around 2:45 in the morning on Thursday night/Friday morning. We got to Tangier around 7:30 AM, meaning that we went to our friend Khalil’s apartment overlooking the port to recharge our batteries (travelling in second-class meant that it was impossible for some of us to sleep!). We then went out for a delicious lunch at a Lebanese restaurant along the boulevard running alongside the beach, then went up to Cape Spartel, which is where the Atlantic Ocean becomes the Strait of Gibraltar. On clear days you can actually see where the water changes, even current and color of the water. Needless to say, it wasn’t a clear day. Oh, well.

After a quiet evening (for some of us!) I got up bright and early at 6:00 in order to cross the Straits to Europe with a friend. After getting to the port and buying our ferry tickets, we waited for our 9:30 AM crossing, which would take approximately an hour. We arrived in Algeciras, Spain, around 12:30 PM. Now you’re probably wondering where those two extra hours went. Well, Spain is one hour ahead of Morocco in terms of time zone (though they are at the same longitude), and Morocco, unlike Spain, does not have Daylight Savings Time, causing a two-hour shift. Undaunted, we walked to the local bus station in order to get to the city of La Linea, which is the Spanish side of the Gibraltar border.

Gibraltar’s name comes from the Arabic “Jebel Tariq,” or “Tariq’s mountain,” for the Berber general who landed there and started the Muslim conquest of Spain. When one approaches “The Rock,” it becomes apparent why the names for the area revolve around the big hunk of stone. It’s huge! After arriving at the bus station in La Linea (cost only 2 euro to get there!) we continued on foot in the direction of the mountain. Then we arrived at the border. For a territory which is a constant thorn in the side of Anglo-Spanish relations, the crossing was surprisingly simple: the Spanish authorities gave a glance to the passport, as did the British customs official. After that, we were in the realm of the Crown.

Knowing that our time in Gibraltar was going to be limited (since we needed to return to Morocco), we immediately set out on a walk. After walking across the runway of Gibraltar’s airport, which is the only such road crossing of its kind as far as I know, we continued along Winston Churchill Avenue into the town proper. Union Jacks and the Gibraltarian flag were flying everywhere: it turns out that the next Monday was Gibraltar’s national day, and patriotism in Gibraltar is at levels I never thought were possible! Finally, after a long trek, we managed to find the cable car which goes to the top of the Rock. The view was incredible. Also, we got to see the monkeys; legend says that as long as the Barbary monkeys live on the Rock, the British will remain in Gibraltar. Not surprisingly, the monkeys are treated extremely well. After many photos on the top of the Rock, we descended, almost ready to go “home.”
Before we left, though, I had one obligatory stop: one of the many pubs in the territory. After sitting down to a pint of bitter (incredibly the drinking age in Gibraltar is only 16!), my friend and I decided to take in the atmosphere of the pub. There were three separate sporting events going on, all involving British teams: Scotland-Lithuania in soccer, England-India in cricket, and (as we were leaving) England-US in rugby. I found out later that we showed a lot of spirit in a 28-10 loss to the current world champions! But we needed to get back to Algeciras in order to get to Tanger, so we took a bus to the border, meeting an American couple along the way, and then the bus back from La Linea to the port.

Several hours later, we were back on Moroccan soil, where we found several of our friends quite ill (possibly a case of food poisoning, possibly a bit of a bug). The rest of the group decided to go get some food, so we walked over to the local Pizza Hut. I had some Pizza Hut while in Casablanca before returning to the States, and what I had remembered (some of the best pizza ever!) remained just as true in Tanger. A Moroccan friend and I split a large pepperoni (beef pepperoni, of course!) pizza with what they called “Cheesy Volcano” crust. Imagine an over-stuffed stuffed crust pizza with mozzarella and cheddar, and that’s what it was. The next morning, we hopped on the next train homeward, and got back in the middle of the afternoon.
Looking at this, I think it was a bad idea to remind myself of that incredibly delicious pizza, since we are in the middle of Ramadan. However, as it seems that I’ve run out of space for now, I will have to leave that for next time, which hopefully will be sometime this weekend. Of course, given my track record, I make no guarantees!

Feel free to drop me a line at golladayp@gmail.com, and let me know what you think!

Good night from the Middle Atlas,
Phillip

PS: I have set up an account at Flickr for my photos, and I am slowly uploading a small selection of pictures from my travels. Feel free to visit it at http://www.flickr.com/photos/12487417@N03/.

Of Delays and Travels remains copyright of the author golladayp, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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What a Day It Has Been

2007-08-21T10:48:25Z

FES – It is now around 8:30 PM local time here in Fes, and I am only just now getting a chance to review what has happened over the past twenty-eight and a half hours. They started fairly in-noccous enough when I parted ways with my father at Charlotte-Douglas International Airport. Unlike my flight over back in May, though, this trip was going to be slightly trickier. First off, instead of taking Royal Air Maroc’s (RAM’s) daily flight from JFK to Casablanca, which would have required taking a domestic flight from Casa to Fes (something which I have heard needs to be avoided if possible), I instead flew from Charlotte to Philadelphia, from which I departed to Charles de Gaulle in Paris and then finally on to Fes. Additionally, this trip was somewhat com-plicated by the fact that as soon as I got on the ground I needed to make my way to my hotel, which I will discuss later. On top of all of this, this was my first time in Philadelphia’s, Paris’s, and Fes’s airports, which exacerbated the fact that I was doing all of this on my own for the very first time! Needless to say, it was a bit daunting for he who is with very little solo travel expe-rience.
Keeping in mind these potential problems, I had decided to set up my flights in such a way that I had enough layover time to account for potential delays, so I wouldn’t need to worry about po-tentially missing a flight. The inevitable outcome of this travel schedule was that if my flights ran on time, I was going to have a marathon day involving close to 24 straight hours of flight and layovers until arriving in Fes. True to form, there were indeed no delays. My first flight – a 1:25 PM flight to Philly – was only about ninety minutes long, meaning that I had about three hours before my connector to Paris. Fortunately I still had cell phone service, so I spent most of the time talking to family and friends. After getting a last bite to eat in America (appropriately enough, a burger and fries from good ol’ MacDo’s), I got on the plane bound for France, which departed around 6:45 PM local time.

This was only my third overnight flight, and this flight gave me a chance to compare and contrast with my previous two on Delta/Alitalia and RAM/Delta (the first airline was the operator of the plane, in case you were wondering). The first thing I noticed was that the flight was not very full: in fact, yours truly got a three seat middle row all to himself! The obvious upshot to this was that I got a lot more legroom than usual, crucial to how well the flight goes for me. Another difference with US Airways was their entertainment system for the A330, which is what we flew over. Even though I was in coach (4 rows from the back of the plane, in fact), we received an on-demand entertainment system, complete with movies, TV, and even CDs. Given this new-found freedom, I decided to keep myself entertained. After reading this week’s Economist dur-ing takeoff, I decided to start a massive Sudoku book to the sounds of the Scissor Sisters’ Ta-Dah! Incidentally that was the only album of music I had with me after I was forced to reformat my computer during the summer, so the album which kept me sane while in Morocco also relaxed me during my return. Over dinner (an interesting barbecued beef dish with – among other things – a packet of organic white chocolate lemon cookies from Flat Rock, NC) I got to watch a fascinating show highlighting the rivalry between Hershey and Mars, the two largest candy man-ufacturers in the US. Finally, I decided to watch the film Breach, which is based on the opera-tion which entrapped Robert Hanssen, possibly the most damaging mole in American intelligence history. I highly recommend the movie. Finally, I tried to get a few hours of shuteye, but the next thing I remembered was them serving breakfast. Then I started thinking about jetlag over breakfast, and I realized something very funny: I don’t think that I’ve ever experienced jetlag. What I have experienced has been the extreme fatigue of running what amounts to an all-nighter and then getting to have another stress-filled day on top of that. If that’s what jetlag is, then I’ve had it; I’ve just never thought of it like that.

Finally we got on the ground in Paris at around 8:00 AM local time, which gave me a very slim window of almost eight hours in which to sit around with my bags, since I was switching air-lines! The reason why is because Charles de Gaulle (CDG) is like most major airports in that its terminals physically separate. In other words, we flew into Terminal 1, home to long-range in-ternational flights. Terminal 2 is where mainly Air France and its affiliates fly, while most short-range international flights and charters go through Terminal 3. After spending nearly three hours in Terminal 1, waiting for when I could find the check-in counter, I found out that I needed to go to Terminal 3. No big deal, though, as a quick ride on the fully-automated shuttle train gets you there, albeit with an additional five minute walk attached to it. After arriving in the terminal, I quickly learned something: As it deals with small carriers and charters, Terminal 3 doesn’t have much in the way of permanent check-in counters; instead, they are shared by the airlines as they are needed. The short of this is that I got to sit for an additional two and a half hours in the terminal with my bags at my side. Oh, yeah, there’s another problem with traveling solo: if you need to do important things like, say, go to the restroom, it’s not really possible until after you’ve checked baggage. Five and a half hours of torture later, I at long last earned a reprieve. The other problem is that focusing on not having baggage stolen for that long really numbs the mind, especially when you’re running on maybe ninety minutes of sleep (in large part my fault, I know) and when your reading is A Political History of Zambia (again, my choice; the book is really quite interesting, just a little thick at times).

After getting the baggage checked again and going through passport control again, I got to wait for another two and a half hours to get on my final flight, which was on Atlas Blue, RAM’s dis-count carrier (how a developing country’s national airline has a “budget carrier,” I really don’t understand), and it went straight to Fes. The flight was quick and straightforward; dinner and service were very good, as it has been for me on RAM. When we touched down and I walked down the staircase to see one of the peaks of the Middle Atlas, a massive smile came across my face. It was akin to returning home to me (well, kind of like a second home in my heart). Another passport control and customs check, and I was finally back in Morocco. A grand taxi (French for “large taxi” and not necessarily a grand ride!) ride into Fes took me to my hotel for the night: the Sofitel Palais Jamaï. The reason it is for only one night is twofold: first, nearly every hotel except for the Sofitel were booked up for tonight (again, my error); secondly – and more importantly – it is prohibitively expensive (my room’s going rate is close to US$300 per night, though I got it for significantly less). However, upon getting here, it has been truly one-of-a-kind. After checking in to a pot of mint tea to consume as I overlooked the medina at my own leisure (and having a talk with the concierge and general manager of the hotel!), I was taken up to my room, where a table had been laid out complete with roses and carnations, fresh bananas and peaches, bottles of spring water (a necessity here, for reasons stated in previous entries), and a box of Moroccan cookies, including a type of thin biscotti with dried fruit in it, a sesame seed roll, an oatmeal and almond cookie with a peanut “thumbprint,” a coconut and almond con-coction covered in confectioners’ sugar, an almond cookie that simply melts in your mouth, and a cookie that has a delicious almond filling (see a common theme here?). As if that wasn’t enough, the bed was turned down, complete with two espresso truffles! The hotel (and its incredible service) has been the perfect end to what has been an obscenely long day for yours truly.

I’ve certainly gone on a lot longer than I had anticipated, and as I haven’t had a full night’s sleep in…well, I’m not completely sure how long!...I suppose that I will wrap things up here. I will definitely try to get in the habit of publishing an entry once or twice a week, although unlike the summer, I will try to make each entry more of a column on a particular issue. That’s where you – my loyal readers – can come in to help. Think that my topics are mundane? Hear too much (or not enough, for that matter) about food? By all means, let me know what you think! Just drop me a line at golladayp@gmail.com, and I’ll be happy to read your comments, praise, and even *gasp* criticism! Also, if you have any column topics you want me to address – from Moroccan tea culture to Islam in Morocco and everywhere in between – just send me an email at the same address, and I’ll try my best to answer your questions. After all, one of the biggest benefits of studying abroad is the ability to dispel rumors and stereotypes of the host country! Many people I have talked to were indeed surprised that the average Moroccan street does not resemble its Saudi counterpart. I’m just trying to give you what I’m seeing from my perspective.

Farewell from Fes for now.
Phillip

What a Day It Has Been remains copyright of the author golladayp, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Daily Journal Time!

2007-06-26T16:21:24Z

Monday, June 18, 2007
Playing the Poor Student

Well, classes began once again, after an extremely short break for us. While the bulk of the school's students went out to the desert, our group went to Rabat, the capital of Morocco, and the nearby town of Kenitra, where there is an extremely nice beach on the Atlantic. The trip itself was extremely short, as we left from Fes early on Saturday morning. We arrived in Rabat a little after noon, where we checked into our hotel, the Hotel Majlis. The hotel was almost like walking into a completely different country: I had left the, for lack of a better term, Moroccan feel of the Medina in Fes for the European comforts of the hotel, which is beside the train station in the French-designed Ville Nouvelle ("New City" in French; almost every major Moroccan city has this quarter). The afternoon was somewhat open, as we all had the choice of going to the beach in Rabat or going to the souk. Knowing that we were going to the beach the next day, I (with a couple other people) opted for the latter option. As a result, we had a wonderful time. One of the cadets, Daniel, was leaving Morocco on Monday, and he was looking for some various items to take home. This was the point where we both decided to have a little bit of fun with regards to our identities and conduct a little experiment: Daniel and I decided to "become" English and Dutch students respectively and see whether there would be any effect on our ability to bargain. After a bit of fun, we had managed to purchase 3 pairs of Moroccan shoes and a Moroccan tea set. Our ability to bargain was somewhat hampered by several factors:

First of all, it is extremely important to not have all of your money in your wallet. By placing the bulk of your money in another pocket, you give the appearance of having less money with which to work.
Another problem was knowing when to leave during bargaining. If you walk too early, then it is possible that the owner won't try to bring you back, as you do not appear to be very interested. At the same time, waiting too long to leave can mean that you will not get as good of a deal as you could have.
Finally, it is extremely difficult to shop around for good prices, as the bargaining process means that the price you are given is good only as long as you are at the stand. As a result, several better deals were missed on our part.

After returning to the hotel, Daniel and I decided to ask a couple of people if they wanted to - this is great - walk back over to the souk. I changed my clothes, since it was getting colder out, and we went for a bit of a walk. The evening was a lot of fun, and we eventually wound up at a little restaurant across from McDonald's, where I had a chwarma, which is shaved meat on bread. Mine was beef, and it is truly the closest thing I have had to barbecue while over here. Finally, after chatting with some folks in the hotel lobby (I thought that my quasi-insomnia had passed), I went up to my room, where I quickly fell asleep.

The next morning saw a rather hurried breakfast on my part, since I had gotten up a little on the late side. The hotel's breakfast was quite French, with my meal consisting of several pastries and glasses of orange juice. After packing, we made our way over to the Hassan Tower/Mohammed V Mausoleum, which is the burial site of the two former kings of Morocco (Mohammed V and Hassan II). The site is truly incredible, and unfortunately my camera malfunctioned inside the mausoleum, which meant that I was not able to take pictures of the tombs. Oh well, perhaps it was a sign...

We then got on the road to Keneitra, where we spent the greater part of the afternoon. While most of the folks went swimming, I was not overly thrilled with the ideas of a 240 km/150 mi bus ride before I had access to a shower, so I decided to have a relaxed lunch and walk along the beach. It was a beautiful day, and perhaps the biggest problem was that we had to leave around 4:15 in order to get back to Fes at a reasonable time. After a brief stop at a gas station on the motorway, we soon returned to Fes. A lovely surprise was that the bus was dropping us off in the Medina, which saved me the cost of a bus or taxi ride. After getting back to the room, I got to doing some of my homework, and then I quickly got ready for bed.

Unfortunately, Monday meant that it was a return to the routine of classes. 7 AM always comes way too early for me, especially since sunrise is around 5:30 AM here (no Daylight Saving Time here). Add to it that I have four hours of language instruction each day (in addition to any sort of homework and/or leisure activities) and time quickly adds up. I got back my second quiz; it was a 39/40, which is about a 97.5%. Needless to say, I was extremely pleased. After going home for lunch, I came back to school for the afternoon session, and after that (and some socializing/email checking in the garden) I finally made my way home. More work; always more, it seems. Toujours les devoirs; Da'imaan ouaajib (French and Arabic respectively). But I really do think that I'm finally getting in the language groove.

Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Henna

Classes were as per usual; lots of work, lots of progress. I'm finding that the grammatical constructs of Arabic have parallels in some of the other languages I have studied; as a result, picking up the grammar is not as difficult as I had thought. Vocabulary, on the other hand, is a bit of a different beast; for the most part, there are not many similarities, so memorization is a little tougher. Since today was Tuesday, I got to go to Khadija's (one of our program directors) apartment for our culture and history course. We had a henna artist as our guest lecturer, who also did henna for us (it's apparently an important Moroccan tradition). As it was voluntary, I decided to not have henna done. I'm certainly not regretting that decision!

Since I had a bit of work to do before the afternoon class today (our afternoon class is bumped up 2 hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays), I decided to skip lunch, and I am not completely unhappy with the result. I was able to get my work done, and I thoroughly enjoyed my later meals. Sometimes I do wonder if the homestay was a good idea, although it is certainly not because of my family. In fact, I suppose that it is indeed me at times; I'm thrown for a loop with certain things, such as the meal situation or the language/communications issues. Each time I think that, though, I realize that I'm probably just having a bad day. Oh, well. Not every day is bad, and hopefully tomorrow will be a little better.

Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Murphy's Law Strikes!

More work. Big surprise! It's really incredible how much work is being shoved into this course. Over the past week and a half, we have completed three full chapters in this textbook, and we've started the fourth today. To give you an idea of the pace, most schools go through about eight chapters a year. Needless to say, this has been a little short of torture, and I chose to do this! As if that wasn't enough, I've also been dealing with some other various problems, not least of which has been the slow and painful demise of my computer. The 30-45 minutes needed to turn on the computer due to repeated crashing was tolerable, and I had planned to reformat the hard drive once I had returned to the States, but a new problem has popped up: every 2 hours or so, the computer randomly locks up, meaning that I get to - yes, you guessed it! - restart the whole process! I obviously need to speed up my plans. I began to back up all the files I had not previously taken care of, but I have run into a problem: I'm still about half of a gigabyte short in terms of needed memory. Sounds like I need to go to Marjane, which is like a massive Wal-Mart. I'll do that at the end of the week. Until then, I've got other things with which to deal.

Thursday, June 21, 2007
Murphy's Law Strikes! Again!

AARGH! I woke up this morning to a sore throat. The problem is that it has not gone away. Goody, a cold! This should be a lot of fun! In addition, tomorrow is our weekly quiz, and I still have not completely figured out the plural in Arabic, which is perhaps even more confusing than the plural in English. There seems to be very little pattern to the whole thing, and it's the sort of thing that makes you want to tear your hair out. If I can make it to the weekend, that would really be wonderful, as we are going to the Middle Atlas, where I will be in the fall. We'll also get to see monkeys. Yay!

We had our culture class today, and we talked about the succession crisis following the death of Mohammed in AD 632 and the establishment of the caliphate, as well as the Sunni-Shi'a schism. I know that sounds like dry stuff, but the repercussions of these events are being felt even to this day; one needs only to look at the sectarian violence in Iraq to see that. I submitted my research paper topic today: the history of the Western Sahara conflict following the withdrawl of the Spanish in 1975. This topic, which I will address in later posts, is a crucial aspect of contemporary Moroccan politics. After all, the Moroccans left the OAU, a kind of African UN, because it decided to give recognition to the Polisario movement, which has fought against Morocco for an independent Western Sahara. It's rather important.

Hopefully, this is all just allergies, though, and this sore throat will be gone tomorrow.

Friday, June 22, 2007
I was wrong. But there are good things too.

Nope, it wasn't allergies. Sore throat today, but now there's nasal congestion too! As soon as the day was done, I wanted to be out like a light. Unfortunately, there was a bit of work to complete, including a quiz. While preparing for the quiz, I finally got the hang of plurals, which couldn't have come soon enough. The quiz went well, although it was a lot of work. In addition to providing the plurals, there was a reading passage complete with questions, a vocabulary section, subject/predicate identification, sentence tranlations, and a short essay! I was even more exhausted after finishing that, although my instructor told me that I did very well on it. That really made my day.

After class, I went with Megan, one of the people in my group, to Marjane, in order to get the flash drive for my computer as well as some other items. After a rather hectic trek across the store, we finally checked out and got in a taxi. The driver was very friendly to us, and he asked us where we were from. I decided to try my Dutch routime out. Big mistake, as it turns out that the driver had lived in Einhoven for three years! Once he started speaking in Dutch to me, I made up a little story about how I left when I was very young and moved to England. Meanwhile, Megan was sitting behind me laughing her head off. Finally we got to our destination, and I went back to the institute for a couple minutes of email and socializing.

After wrapping that up, I went over to the apartment of a few cadets who had invited me over for a bit of a get-together. After chatting with some folks for a few hours, I decided that I might want to get home. But there were a couple problems with that, not least of which was that I didn't have a key to the building. Additionally, I didn't have my host family's phone number, so I had no way of contacting them. Faced with the prospect of going into the Medina in the dark without knowing whether I could get inside, I decided to play it safe and stay at the apartment. After all, my roommate had seen me earlier, so he knew of my plight.

Unfortunately, I couldn't sleep, so I decided to work on my computer. I finished up the backup, and I started the reformat. It worked perfectly. Finally, around 3 AM or so, I drifted off to sleep.

Saturday, June 23, 2007
Monkeys, Mountains, Musicians, and Medications

7:30 AM came way too early for me, especially since I was not able to get any of my medicine, which was sitting in the Medina. Fortunately, one of the cadets is a medic at VMI, so he had some packets of Sudafed on him, which saved me a lot of trouble. After seeing my host father and explaining what had happened, I got into Dr. Taifi's car, which is a Mercedes E-Class Diesel. I learned some interesting facts about this car, as it had previously been in the motorpool of the palace in Fes. Since license plates are kept with a car after it has been sold in Morocco, this car still has royal tags. As a result, there were several instances of police officers saluting the car as we drove along. It was a lot of fun.

We made our way through Ifrane, which is home to Al Akhawayn University, where I will be attending classes this fall. The campus appears to be extremely beautiful. Unfortunately I was not able to take any pictures, since we went through town merely to get to other destinations, the first of which was a forest with monkeys. They were extremely friendly and (almost) disgustingly cute. Not as cute as some of the little kittens here in the Medina, but very cute nonetheless.

Our next stop was Azrou, which is the administrative capital for the region. We visited an artisanal center, which is a government-funded and regulated shop. I was tempted to get some things, but alas, I didn't have the funds on me. Oh, well. After Azrou we drove up to a mountain spring, and this is where the day gets extremely hazy for me, as I was forced to change medications to something that made me very drowsy. The next thing I know is that it's three or four hours later, and I had fallen asleep along the banks of the spring, which is also the source of a major river, and we were driving back towards Fes. After a stop at our driver's mother's house for some tea (a very neat experience), we again stopped in Azrou, where a couple of friends and I sat in a cafe until we were ready to go. After returning to Fes, Zac and I got back to the house, where an American Idol-style show was on. The difference was that there were a lot of musical guests, including a French singer named Helene Segara, who Zac (and I) think is possibly the most beautiful woman in the world, and a Moroccan "international folk rock" group called Hoba Hoba Spirit. Finally I crashed, and I got in bed, not caring when I awoke.

Sunday, June 24, 2007
Rest!

I was lucky to sleep until around 9 AM, when I finally got up. I've had two communications problems (other than lacking the ability to speak) since I've gotten this cold. First of all, my host father remains convinced that the cold was caused by the window being open during the night, which would be difficult when the low gets to around, oh, 50 degrees F or so. This has led to some headbutting, particularly when I feel like I have a permanent fever. The second concerns - shock! - food. When I get sick, I typically do not want to eat, a concept my host family fails to grasp. Oh well, I'm compensating by eating more slowly.

After lunch, I decided to take advantage of my free time and watch The Last King of Scotland, starring Forest Whittaker as the late Ugandan dictator Idi Amin. While the film was extremely graphic, it was an extremely good movie, and I gladly recommend it as such. After the movie, I decided to make some phone calls Stateside and then get to some homework. After slipping into yet another nap, I had dinner, took a shower, and got in bed.

Monday, June 25, 2007
Back to the salt mines.

Well, it feels like I went a good five steps or so backwards, or at least I feel that way. Today I did get a little bit of good news: I got a 98 on my test from Friday. Unfortunately, the rest of the day was extremely infuriating. While the work has been going rather well, I have been having my share of problems with loneliness and the like. I feel that at times I am completely unable to fit in with the other folks here. Needless to say, I am finding this a bit difficult, and my happiness from work has been eroded as a result.

My health has improved, at least more so than yesterday. That much is good, although I would like to be completely healthy by this upcoming weekend. I need to get to knocking out my paper on the Western Sahara. As for my work, I suppose that somehow it will manage to work itself out.

The funniest thing is that the problems I am experiencing are all personal; that is, none of them have any sort of cultural issues. How strange. Perhaps tomorrow will be better.

Tuesday, June 26, 2007
...like the Sword of Damocles.

For some reason I am still extremely upset; I can't seem to shake off this feeling. As the title suggests, it's hanging over me.... But I do still feel like progress is being made on the language. It really is hard to believe that in three weeks I will be returning to the States, and only two more weeks of classes. It truly is incredible how quickly time flies.

It's been one of those days where I simply cannot get into the rhythm of things. Although I have a massive amount of work, I can't seem to focus on it. The simplest nuisances are infuriating me more than I could imagine. I really hope that it's illness, which is continuing to improve, rather than me that is causing this. The culture class is coming up soon, and I am not really sure whether I am completely here at the moment. I suppose we'll see in the next hour or so.

And that's all I have time for right now. If there are any questions or comments you want to direct at me, feel free to email me at golladayp@gmail.com, and I'll see what I can do. Until later, good afternoon from Fes.

Phillip

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Culture Shock?

2007-06-19T16:35:49Z

Apologies for not posting recently; unfortunately, my workload seems to only increase as I stay in Morocco. However, this post is obligatory, and not only because it is a journal entry for a course I am taking here! Since my most recent bit of writing, I have taken two different excursions: to the Roman ruins at Volubilis and the city of Meknes, and a weekend trip to Rabat, the capital of Morocco. As both trips certainly deserve an article each in their own right, I will come back to those trips in future updates.
Before that, though, I would like to take a little bit of time to talk about the phenomenon known as “culture shock,” or the reaction of people when they are in places unfamiliar to themselves (paraphrase of Stephen Bochner, as are parts of the following). Essentially, the idea is that there are predominately two major groups among foreign travelers: sojourners and settlers. While settlers are coming to an area for a permanent stay, sojourners (as their name suggests) are merely in an area for a temporary period. As a result, settlers tend to become active participants in their new cultures, while sojourners confine themselves to an observer status. The sojourner instead looks towards that which is familiar to him or her and subsequently determines that things not familiar are thus not as good as his or her own customs. This mainly comes from four so-called “push” factors – uncertainty coming from the unfamiliarity of the new culture, helplessness and self-doubt, confusion about one’s role, and revulsion at unfamiliar and controversial customs – and two “pull” factors: loss of status and homesickness.
Now that we’ve got a simple definition from which to work, I’d like to recap my past (almost) three weeks in the Kingdom of Morocco. First of all, I will state up front that I suffered an acute case of “culture shock;” however, my overwhelming fear of the country was caused in great part as I read Orin Hargraves’s book Culture Shock: Morocco, and I began to wonder if it really was a good idea to go to a country where I would be starting an unknown language from scratch. However, by the time I landed in Casablanca, I had finally wrapped my head around the idea that my French would provide a useful crutch until I had some Arabic under my belt. Indeed, perhaps the most surprising thing that has happened over the course of my stay has been the assumptions towards me on the part of Moroccans. While most Americans would expect to hear English spoken towards them (even in foreign countries), it came as a bit of a surprise that I – a foreigner – was being treated as if I was French, since the natural assumption is that any European-looking person is French or at least speaks French. In fact, the only times I have been addressed in English have been moments when I have been speaking to another person in English.
On the topic of English, one thing I have taken into account from the cultural prereading has been the way that Americans are viewed in Morocco. While the United States and Morocco have had a long and meaningful relationship spanning over two centuries, the image of the American – especially the American student – certainly conjures certain images, especially since (in the words of a school administrator) “[some Moroccans] think that you’re in the medina because it’s got the best kif and hashish in the world.” As a result, I have conducted a little experiment of my own. In certain situations, I have put on a Dutch accent and pretended to be, well, Dutch. This has occurred on two separate occasions, both of which occurred this weekend. The first time was in the souk in Rabat, where another student and I – in an effort to look less wealthy – decided to pretend to be poor students, which was in part true. As a result, I believe that we were seen by the merchants in a slightly different light than had we been American tourists looking to spend money, and we were able to have a better situation during price haggling. The second situation occurred yesterday after classes, when Zac and I were walking back home. We were approached by a Moroccan contemporary, who introduced himself to us. The conversation also moved to such things as drug use, particularly hashish. Being in a Dutch guise (the irony of which I realized soon after the encounter) made me more able to reject his advances, as we were able to get away from the situation.
Language and nationality has not been the only surprises I have encountered while in Morocco. As pointed out in my previous post (see it for more details), there have also been differences in dining here as well. Additional topics, which I shall address in future updates, include religion, gender relations, and whatever else any of you want me to look at. Feel free to send me an email at golladayp@gmail.com, and I’ll be happy to give whatever you send me a look.

Au revoir from Maroc.

Phillip

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What about second dinner?

2007-06-11T13:57:20Z

Unfortunately the internet at the institute has been rather spotty in the past week; additionally, what free time I previously had has now been consumed with large amounts of classwork. That being said, I will probably try to make my updates on a weekly basis, although I might try to have them more frequently.

Now that the administrative things have been taken care of, I’ll now move on to the meat and potatoes (pun partially intended) of this entry: food. As you may have noticed from my first entries, my life in Morocco is constantly revolving around food. Don’t get me wrong; it’s not a matter of the food being bad. There are some crucial differences regarding Moroccan dining versus American:

• The most notable difference (in our family, at least) is the total of meals. While almost everyone in the States have three meals a day, a common day in Morocco seems to have up to four meals: breakfast, lunch, a small meal around 6-8 PM, and a larger “dinner” served after 10 PM, usually between 11 PM and midnight.
• Additionally, the lunch and late dinner meals tend to be a lot larger than their American counterparts. A fast or light lunch is extremely unusual here; the Moroccan “lunch hour” is from noon until 3 PM. Following in the footsteps of the French and other southern Europeans, everything except for restaurants and café’s close during these hours.
• The serving of a meal is a little different from the States in that the main dish is typically served from a central dish from which you pick out your portions. This is also crucial when considering the use of hands: while it is completely normal (in some cases obligatory) to use hands in the common dish, it is taboo to use the left hand for religious (left hand is the devil’s hand) and sanitary (try living in areas where toilet paper is a rarity) reasons. However, it ultimately depends on the family. While my family does not really care about my choice of hands, I still use my right hand for common dishes.
• On the note of service and common dishes, another massive difference is with the base of the meal: bread. While American meals may have rolls or biscuits as a side item, bread in Morocco serves not only as the ubiquitous item during any meal but also as a utensil for the main dish. In order to do this, you tear the piece of bread in half and use the non-crust portion (with the right hand, of course!) as a sponge for the food.
• In all likelihood the most apparent difference once the meal begins is the prodding. You see, the cultural importance of sharing a meal with someone is massive in Islam in general and particularly so in Morocco. The idea is that sharing a meal is the ultimate show of peace towards someone; therefore, any refusal by the guest is considered to be extremely offensive. As a result, it is quite common for guests to be told to “Eat! Eat!” during the course of a meal. My roommate Zach has a theory on this: the two most important aspects of Moroccan society seem to be eating and talking. If a guest is not talking, he or she should be eating. As a result, the prodding tends to happen during lulls in conversation.

In short, I suppose that should explain what has been happening over the past (almost) two weeks with regards to food. If anybody has any specific questions about food or any other topics, feel free to send me an email (golladayp@gmail.com) and I will try to answer them in future updates.

Inshallah (God willing; I’ll explain fatalism and other topics next time) I’ll get another one of these up soon.

Phillip

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Recapping the Past Few Days

2007-06-04T14:37:50Z

Unfortunately, I hadn't been able to sit down and type until yesterday evening. As a result, some parts of this brief summary of my past few days are a bit hazy, but I've done my best to relate it here:

Wednesday, May 30, 2007

The day for me began not terribly early: 8 AM. I woke up at my grandmother’s house, which is around 100 miles from Washington, my first stop of many on my way to Morocco. The day began simply enough, as my father and I went for a short walk in order to work my leg muscles. In hindsight, this was a very wise move, as my opportunities to walk around later were somewhat inhibited. After having breakfast (sausage, the last time I’ll be having that for a while) and saying goodbye to my mother and grandmother, I got on the road to DC with my father. The first part of the drive was straightforward enough: we finally hit a wall of traffic on Interstate 66 driving into the capital, around Warrenton. Fortunately, we had just exited the interstate to get a drink (Vanilla Coke is back, and the Vanilla Coke Zero is the finest drink known to man), so we went along the parallel roadways going into Manassas. We got to the airport around 1 PM, almost two and a half hours before my scheduled flight, a Delta commuter jet to JFK in New York. While checking in, I was offered an opportunity: there was one seat left on a plane scheduled to leave around 2:30. Not wanting to sit around the airport for any longer than I had to, I gladly accepted. The flight was efficient and uneventful; it took around 47 minutes to get on the ground in New York.
That’s when the fun started. You see, I have had to make a connecting flight only twice in my life, one of which was an international flight. In both cases, the airports I went to (Cincinnati and Atlanta) had connecting terminals, so once you had entered airport security at the first airport, you did not have to repeat the process once you arrived at another airport. However, JFK is a different kettle of fish. When I was looking for my flight (Royal Air Maroc, more about them later), I was told that I had to leave the terminal, which was itself not a big deal. The problem was that I also had to check in at the Royal Air Maroc (hereafter abbreviated to RAM) desk in order to receive my boarding pass. The first hurdle came with trying to find their desk. JFK’s directory listed the RAM desk is area D. The only problem with that was, well, it wasn’t there. I looked everywhere, and then I resorted to asking a person at the Turkish Airlines desk (who was in area D) where RAM was. The response – area A – answered one question, but soon other problems developed. I first entered the ticket desk line (there was also a Delta person there, as this was a codeshare flight), and they told me that I had everything needed for the flight, and they directed me to the check-in line. Cue problem number two: not only did I not have a boarding pass, but I was not even in RAM’s system. Needless to say, this is a significant problem. I was directed back to the ticket desk, where they told me about an interesting problem: Delta’s e-ticketing system (from where we had the tickets) had been having some issues with the RAM computers. Fortunately, these problems were quickly resolved, and it’s not like I had to be on the plane in a hurry, since the flight’s departure was not scheduled for another four hours. Back through line I went, with replacement check-in tickets in tow, and I finally got a boarding pass (this took around an hour/90 minutes).
The terminal did indeed have issues. Perhaps the biggest problem – besides the fact that the food court was actually behind the security checkpoint, so once you entered the terminal, there was no chance for food – was the fact that I had not found any people who were a part of the VMI group. So I sat and read, while some time passed. And passed. And finally slowed. Suddenly, I saw one of the W&L students walking around, at which point I met the folks in the group, so we all began chatting before the flight. As H-hour got closer, I made all my last phone calls to my parents, sister, and girlfriend, after which the plane (at long last) began boarding.
Because I had had done transatlantic travel previously, I knew that an aisle seat was absolutely necessary for any sort of comfort. Unfortunately, my bungled check-in meant that I had lost my reserved seat and instead got – yep! You guessed it! – a middle seat. So I first try to sit beside another VMI person. But that seat was soon claimed by the person whose seat it was. As a result, I got to take my original seat, beside a young woman about my age in a headscarf and robe. We began talking some small talk, and she spoke English with an American accent. Her father, though, asked a favor of me: to switch seats. His seat was on the aisle two rows ahead. As it was the best case for all involved, I quickly agreed. The other two seats in my row were held by two Americans named Jack and Allen. They were going to have a fourteen-hour layover in Casablanca (our destination) before flying to Niamey, the capital of Niger, where they would be teaching English. Allen was born at Fort Bragg, so we three quickly struck up a conversation.
Unfortunately, the happy little world created in our row did not extend to the rows around us, as there were many, many small children and infants around us. So much crying! In any case, I had decided that my trip would not be ruined by the noise of either people or airplane engines, so I had brought my noise-cancelling headphones for the flight. Two problems developed, however: my MP3 Flash drive had quit functioning for reasons as yet unknown, and the in-flight music system had its own problems. When plugged in, my headphones received a nasty bit of static in the right ear. I naturally assumed that the problem was with my headphones, so I plugged into my neighbor’s system in order to check. That one had the other ear go out, even though I had the airplane adapter with me. Oh, well, the static was reduced if the proper amount of pressure was applied to the adapter, which was a bit tedious when you are also trying to sleep. The food was surprisingly good, as we had lasagna with salad and a chocolate cake with apricot filling. Also, drinks were a part of the meal (including options like wine or liquor), which I found out only after the flight! Finally, coffee and tea capped off the meal. The in-flight movie was planned to be The Pursuit of Happyness, but it was not shown since they did not have any headphones for the flight. An overnight kit was handed out, including a night mask and (oddly enough) socks, and I spent the rest of the flight trying to sleep. I failed in my task.

Thursday, May 31, 2007
After a light breakfast (a croissant, chocolate mini-muffin, yogurt, and coffee/tea), we were soon on the ground at Mohammed V International Airport in Casablanca (Caza, for short). This was definitely not the land of Humphrey Bogart; it was sunny and in the 60s (Fahrenheit) with a strong sea breeze coming in from the Atlantic. We got on a bus and made our way to the terminal (the entire airport is under renovation, so the gates at the terminal are currently closed). Then we got to experience the universal joy of going through passport control. One of our W&L students, Jackie, walked up to the counter manned by Derek Jeter’s clone, and the response she got was reminiscent of the one Maleah received when we went to Italy! Our line was moving extremely slow, especially since these two African women (don’t know what country) were taking a lot of time to pass through our line. Finally, we got through the checkpoint and went to get our bags. I got mine without incident, which sent me over the moon. After passing through customs (i.e., showing an American passport), we entered the airport proper, where Dr. Taifi was standing and waiting for us. We then walked over to the ATM and/or exchanged money and waited for everyone to exit customs. Fortunately only one person had baggage missing, and that was quickly resolved.
Once we had all gotten outside, we finally got to the vans for our trek to Fes (a four-hour drive). The group split into two: the first van had primarily cadets, and the other was had the remaining cadets as well as the non-cadets. We first drove from Casablanca to the other side of Rabat along the A1 motorway. Everything was going well for us until right before Rabat, where our van was pulled over by the Security Police (the standard national police force) for speeding. We had seen some other vehicles, usually late-model luxury sedans, being pulled over along the route, where the smiling drivers handed over a “payment” to the smiling policemen, and we knew that this would most likely not be a problem. However, one of our students had just woken up, and she had picked her camera up from her lap just as the officers were walking over to the van.
This was the point where all hell broke loose. You see, the security forces in Morocco are extremely sensitive regarding any sort of photography of what is “important to national security interests;” in other words, any sort of filming of any government facility or officer is strictly forbidden. But the problem was that this student didn’t speak any Arabic (Moroccan Arabic or Modern Standard Arabic, which I will cover later) or French, and the officers did not speak any English or Spanish, which the student knew. Our driver then got out and started talking with the officers, as did Dr. Taifi. They demanded to see that the student wasn’t taking any photos, and despite showing them that there were no offensive pictures, they remained quite aggressive until she offered to erase the contents of her camera. Finally they stood down from their stance, allowing us to go. Then they realized why they had originally pulled us, and gave the driver a warning. We then drove off.
Getting on the A2 from Rabat to Fes, we quickly learned two important things about the highway system in Morocco. Firstly, outside of the A1, the highways, while in pretty good condition, are extremely bumpy. Additionally, all of the drivers in Morocco are extremely aggressive and, well, bad at driving. This lovely combination meant that the route was full of excitement. The short answer is that anyone who wants to drive in Morocco is either crazy, suicidal, or both. In between short bouts of sleep interrupted by those two factors, we finally made our way to Fes.
Once we finally arrived at the school (around 2 PM), we were greeted with a meal: couscous. I was finally able to get online (the school has wireless access), and there was indeed some semblance of home. We had a couple of meetings, and then we finally met our host families. I was paired with Zach, a cadet from VMI, and we are living with … in an area of the city bordering the Ville Nouvelle (the French-built part of the city) and the Medina (the old part of town). Our host father drives a “petit taxi,” which is a small red FIAT used for intra-city transport. They have four children: two daughters, (who is engaged) and , and two sons, and Hamza.
The mother and the older daughter both speak a little bit of English, but in communication we quickly encountered a problem. While Zach has taken one year of Arabic, he has taken Modern Standard or “Classical” Arabic; that is, Arabic taken directly from the Quran. The local dialect of Arabic, though, bears little resemblance to Classical Arabic. Zach’s other language is Spanish, so for the first day we were forced to communicate solely through my one year of high-school French, which I haven’t studied for over four years. In a move which would have made my high school teachers proud, I surprisingly remembered much of my French, and we were able to have some form of rudimentary communication.
Things quickly moved to what I think is the most important part of Moroccan culture: food. I seriously do not understand how so much food can be consumed! When we arrived at the apartment (around 7 PM), we had what we thought was dinner. It was quite filling: mint tea, olives, eggs, olive oil, cheese (La Vâche qui Rit, or The Laughing Cow back in the States), a sweet paste, and – of course – Moroccan bread. No meal in Morocco is complete without plenty of bread, it seems. By the end of this meal (which was full of our host imploring us Kul! or Mange!, or eat! in Arabic and French respectively), we were stuffed. I also had to get accustomed to one important difference: I had to become right-handed, since the style of eating mandates eating from common plates, and the left hand is considered taboo for religious and sanitary reasons. We chatted with our host and the family for a while, while the television played in the background.
The way that television works in Morocco is – if you don’t have a satellite dish (these are quite common) – that you have the TNT (French for Digital Terrestrial Television) system of state-run channels. There is Channel 1, 2M (a play on the French deuxième, or “second” channel), and a couple of others. The programming is bilingual, but it tends to focus on Arabic-language broadcasting. It alternates during the day, so oftentimes an Arabic show will be followed by a French show, and vice versa. There are a number of movies and American shows dubbed into French, as well as Arabic-language broadcasts from (primarily) Egypt. For example, our first night had a mixture of Arabic soap operas, news programs in both French and Arabic, The Shield, and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Go figure.
In addition to watching television, our host mother helped me practice my French by showing me some photos. First, she showed us the photos of her older daughter at her engagement ceremony. Her fiancé doesn’t really look Moroccan; he is extremely fair-skinned, has blond hair, and has very blue eyes. In fact, I had to ask, since I was not sure. After that, we looked at some pictures of Mohammed VI, the king, and his family. Mohammed is extremely young, having acceded to the throne following Hassan II’s death in 1999. His wife, who looks quite European (red hair and extremely fair skin), is originally from Fes. The photos include pictures of their two children and the king’s siblings. Finally, we found out (Zach told me about this as well) that the royal family is currently in Fes for the “Global Sacred Music Festival,” an event which brings in a lot of international guests. This year the queen of Jordan is one of the guests of honor. Needless to say, this would explain why the entire city was draped in the red and green of the Moroccan flag.
Finally, around 11 PM, our host father returned home from work. We then sat down for dinner. Yes, dinner. Yes, at 11 PM. We had a tomato-based soup with noodles, carrots, and potatoes, with the ubiquitous bread and tea. Yes, tea at 11 PM. Zach and I quickly became stuffed once more (an aspect of social protocol in Morocco mandates that you eat as much as possible, as refusing food is considered a great affront to a host). Finally, around midnight, our first day in Morocco came to an end.

Friday, June 1, 2007

The day started around 7:10 AM, about 40 minutes later than I intended. There was no time for a shower, so I resorted to washing my face and putting on cologne (a wise item to pack, in retrospect). We had breakfast, which was toasted bread, margarine, cheese, tea, and coffee, and walked over to the area where our host father would pick us up, since the streets are too narrow for a car to go right up to the door. Our journey took 10 minutes (hooray for lax traffic laws!), although it was a hair-raising 10 minutes, especially as the taxi has no seatbelts. Getting to the school, Zach and I walk up to our first class, which is a crash course in Moroccan Arabic. The information is extremely helpful, especially since learning Arabic in Morocco is much more beneficial than knowing French. This is for several reasons, such as the fact that Arabic is universal in Morocco, while French is not universally understood. Additionally, speaking in Arabic is seen much more positively by Moroccans, especially when the person speaking looks like a European, due to the cultural and colonial implications of French. After a short break, I then went to my class for Modern Standard Arabic (hereafter referred to as MSA), where we began to learn the alphabet. Those two hours flew by as well, and we then got together for lunch, where the school again prepared couscous for us.
We ended class at noon, and we did not reconvene until 4 PM. The reason for this is partially cultural. In the Mediterranean tradition, Morocco has always had a long “lunch hour:” noon until 3 PM, to be precise. All stores, except for restaurants, close up, since people usually go home for lunch. In short, this means that very little gets done during the middle of the day, which is not the worst thing in the world, especially since it closes things during the hottest part of the day. I got online to check email and such, and then I sat down to work on some classwork and chatted with some other students until it was time for class. The afternoon class (also for MSA) went by just as fast as the morning’s, and by the end we were actually writing words in Arabic. A brief seminar on Moroccan customs and etiquette followed class, then Zach and I went back home. We encountered some difficulty getting back to the house, since the security forces had blocked off some roads leading to the music festival as well as a nearby hotel, where former French president Jacques Chirac and family are staying.
As with the previous evening, we had bread with “fixings” and tea as soon as we arrived. More importantly, we had a breakthrough regarding language. The previous night, Zach (through me) tried to explain that he spoke only MSA, while the family was speaking Moroccan Arabic. Fortunately, I was able to say the correct words in French, and our host mother understood. Even more fortunately, she, the older daughter, and the older son all speak MSA (which is known in Morocco as “global” or “classical” Arabic), so Zach was able to partake directly in discussion. Following a musical variety show (which had a Fesien singer who looked strangely like Henry Kissinger) and a bit of CSI: Miami, we had dinner, which was another large meal. Finally, we went to sleep around 1 AM, before which I began to read a book, Tor!, which is a history of German soccer written by Uli Hesse-Lichtenburger. I highly recommend it.

Saturday, June 2, 2007

I woke up around twenty minutes to noon, and I was finally able to take a shower for the first time since arriving in Morocco. This gives me an opportunity to talk about the bathroom facilities in the house. We have a “Turkish toilet,” or a squat toilet, which is a bit different but in some ways not as frightening as some regular “porcelain thrones.” The hole for the toilet also acts as the shower’s drain, and gravity forces the, well, waste downwards. After a long-awaited shower and an even longer-awaited shave, I was ready to face the world. Zach and I had breakfast, which was the same as the day before. Our host mother then took us out with her when she went shopping in the Medina.
The Medina was indeed what I expected: that is, unexpected. It is a tourist area, so many of the shops specialize in various tourist items, particularly pirated items (clothing especially). I now believe that you can judge a country’s development on its piracy; in that case, Morocco is certainly on the top of the list of developed countries. Other more authentic items were for sale as well. We stopped by a store in order to purchase some honey and butter, and the butter appeared to have been churned in the barrel from which it was collected. Another aspect of the Medina, in addition to its crowded nature, is its geography. The Medina is in a bowl, so to speak, with the Ville Nouvelle on the top parts of the bowl. The hills make for quite a bit of exercise. After we returned from the Medina, we prepared for lunch (what is with the meals here?).
Lunch was slightly different from the other meals, as it consisted of bread (surprise!), fried sardines, and a small salad of carrots, lettuce, olives, and potatoes. During the meal (as with all meals, Zach and I are practicing our Arabic and French respectively), the French Open was on television. After a dessert of a very tangy orange, the television was changed to Channel 1, where the Moroccan Under-21 national soccer team played against Botswana for an Olympic qualifier. Morocco won 1-0, but one interesting memory of the game was during halftime.
There was this one Coca-Cola commercial, which I had seen previously on YouTube. This ad, which had been from Argentina, shows various fans celebrating their team’s goal. For example, the butcher hugs the chicken, lumberjack and a tree, cactus and a balloon, and so on. One of the final scenes shows a couple in bed; the man jumps out celebrating, when another man in boxers jumps out of the closet. Both men look at each other, pause, and then hug. In the Moroccan version, there is no illicit lover; instead, a robber jumps out of the closet. Amazing what cultural differences do for you.
Following the game, I began to do some work (we weren’t assigned any homework for the weekend) by practicing my writing in Arabic. At that point, our host mother’s mother and sisters, who all live in Meknes, came to visit. I got to visit as well, while Zach worked on his (fairly lengthy) assignment. After working on my French (remember, I have had only one day’s worth of Arabic study) for a while, they soon left. We then watched an Egyptian movie (after the pre-dinner bread and tea meal), a comedy involving tons of slapstick, and finally the older brother took Zach and me out for a walk.
We walked around the Medina and parts of the Ville Nouvelle. The whole town was buzzing with life. In addition to the festival, there was a match on the television: Morocco’s national team against Zimbabwe in an African Cup qualifier. It was a good night, as “Les Lions d’Atlas” (The Atlas Lions, as the national team is called) won 2-0. We went for a nice walk, and Zach and I practiced our speech with the older brother. We talked about life as well as cultural differences between the United States and Morocco, and we dropped by to buy a six-pack of water on the way back to the house (six 1.5 liter bottles for 31.50 Dh, or 9 liters for a little under $4.00).
Upon our arrival, the match was ending, and Morocco had nearly scored a third goal. After it had ended, we sat down for dinner, which was something resembling a large potato pancake/omelet with pasta and – you guessed it – bread. It was interesting, as talk shifted to the fact that Zach and I had become family. As my parents and sister know, this inevitably meant that I was bound to make some sort of faux-pas. The first came as we watched NCIS, when I was curious about the nationality of the Israeli character. Apparently in the dubbed version of the show, she seems to be American. However, this was not a terrible comment, as Morocco has traditionally had a liberal view regarding Israel (a lot of Israelis are of Moroccan descent).
My second mistake, though, was not so minor. There was a news story about a boat accident near Laayoune, the largest city in the Western Sahara, a region administered by Morocco under disputed circumstances. In other words, some Sahawis want independence, while the Moroccan government sees the “Saharan provinces” as an indivisible part of Morocco. Put it this way: the equivalent of July 4th here, “The Green March,” commemorates the day when Hassan II led 350,000 Moroccan soldiers into the Sahara. This is a big deal. So when I heard the name of the city, I asked my hosts whether that was the capital of the Sahara. Big mistake. There is only one capital in Morocco, I was told. Realizing what I had said, I quickly took up a wise strategy: I played dumb. I said that I thought it was like in the US or Britain, where individual states or political subunits have their own capital. It turned out to be an extremely safe move. The mistake was understood, and we quickly moved on.
After a dessert of nuts (resembling sunflower seeds, pistachios, peanuts, and chickpeas) and tea, we quickly called it a night. The day ended with some more of Tor!, and lights were turned off around 1:30 AM.

Sunday, June 03, 2007

Another late start today, as we didn’t get up until after noon. “SbaH l-khiir” (“good morning”) quickly turned to “msa l-khiir” (“good afternoon”), and we had another breakfast of similar variety. Having not learned our lesson from the previous day, we had another large lunch in the afternoon not too soon after breakfast: beef cooked in a delicious sauce, French fries (or are they “freedom fries?”), and a fruit salad of sorts with carrots, bananas, and fresh orange juice as the base. Wonderful indeed.
Since our work had been for the most part completed, I decided that I would spend the afternoon reading Tor! and starting up this journal. Unfortunately, Zach needed to use the computer in order to update a spreadsheet of Arabic vocabulary, something for which I was more than happy to allow computer use. So I read. Then we had some guests come over to the house: the older daughter’s fiancé and his mother and aunt. Zach and I stayed out of the way, doing our work in the bedroom (we still received desserts in the form of a banana cake with orange-banana glaze, a sort of banana-milk smoothie, and a small glass of “Kuukaa-Kuulaa,” the Arabic for Coke) until summoned to the pre-dinner meal. After the guests left, I decided to add some French to the Arabic chart, and then I finally got down to starting this journal. After writing for a few hours, we got to dinner. Rice pudding. Very good. Finally, after catching the tail end of War of the Worlds, we wrapped up and went to bed. Before falling asleep, I finished Tor! It was indeed a very good book.

Hopefully everyone else is having a relaxing summer in the world of air conditioning and English! I will try to update this as regularly as possible; hopefully the 12-3 hours in the afternoon will be
a time to do writing.

Phillip

Recapping the Past Few Days remains copyright of the author golladayp, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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