My time here is flying by and I’m realizing how fast the experience is going to go. I am becoming so comfortable here. The call to prayer is less of an annoyance and has faded into expected background noise, the craziness of the medina is now normal daily life and my Arabic is slowly improving. Navigating my way through the medina has become a second nature to me. I have brief moments when I think about things that I miss about home but other than those passing thoughts I haven’t been homesick at all.
Last week I visited the largest mosque in the world besides the one in Mecca and the one in Medina (so technically the 3rd largest mosque in the world…). It was incredible! It is in Casablanca and it might be the most amazing building I have ever seen. It holds 2500 worshipers at one time 500 of which are women. The entire thing is ornately decorated in tiles and wood. The coolest part of the whole thing was the ceiling. It is all dark cedar wood and absolutely beautiful AND get this, the ceiling opens! It takes all of 3 minutes for the entire thing to retract. Sadly we did not get to see this in action; it was closed when we were there. Underneath the main room where everyone prays there is a hamam where everyone can do the ceremonial washings they always do before prayers. It is a giant room full of fountain looking things, just imagine a place where 2000 men can wash their hands, face and feet….ya it’s big! There is a separate smaller hamam for women, which is actually open for public use. It is what we were all picturing before we came to the Morocco, what a Turkish bath would be like. A giant pool of water in the middle, the entire room colorfully tiled… ya it is what one would imagine a Turkish bath to be, not like the ones I go to in the medina :o(. The entire mosque is guessed to be priced at 800 million dollars….but is most likely more than that (up to 4 times that much according to the tour guide). People and businesses “donated” money for the project. I say “donate” because the government actually gave businesses a set price they had to give and craftsmen were forced to do the work for less pay then they would normally receive. Funny fact about the mosque is that it was actually designed by a French architect…. It is an incredible place. Other than the mosque there really is nothing in Casablanca….I mean sure there is Rick’s Café, but it is French owned I believe and was built after the movie Casablanca came out for tourists (LAME!).
The beginning of this week my group spent in a tiny village 4 hours away from Rabat, in the middle of nowhere. We were there Sunday through Wednesday. The majority of the people living in the village live on less than one dollar a day, which puts them below the poverty line. Living there is an experience I will never forget. We were all put with a family for the duration of the time. I loved the family I was put with. I had two little sisters and a little brother. I’m so glad I had children in my family it made the experience more fun. The first night was the hardest. We had basically no communication. The 15 year old girl knew some basic French so that was how the majority of our communication happened. The first night I had some moments where I felt like I was going crazy because everything was happening around me, the family was talking and laughing with each other and carrying on with normal life, while I sat there unable to understand anything they said and unable to talk to anyone. It was such a strange feeling not knowing what was going on or what anyone was saying. The morning after our first night with our families was a sight. Our group assistant went around to all our houses and was supposed to just visit and make sure we were ok then move on to the next house, but we all went along to everyone else’s house so it was more like we picked up everyone from their house. It was a sight though because about half of the people we picked up (keep in mind my group is all girls except for 1 guy) were in tears or sick. Everyone fell apart! After only one night! I was kind of disappointed with a lot of people. I think everyone, including myself, was pretty stressed out by our new surroundings and that on top of no communication made some people lose it. The next couple days more people got sick and some more had nervous breakdowns….it was a rough experience for a lot of people to say the least. There were probably only 4 or 5 of us (including me) who really enjoyed the experience (but I didn’t get sick which I can understand would have made things a little more miserable). There is so much that I took away from that experience I could write pages on it but I will spare you and just touch a couple things that really stuck out. For one because we were in the village the government sent police in basically to keep an eye on us and see what we were doing. In other words we were being watched! There is a funny story that goes along with a run in a student had with the police but you will just have to ask me about it later. Our second night there we had a meeting with the men of the village and a couple women (including my host mom who was awesome!). The most interesting part of the meeting for me was when we asked the villagers if they had any questions for us. Their first question was why are you here? Haha. It was not asked in a mean way but they just had no idea what would prompt us to leave our homes in America come to Morocco and on top of that visit their little village. What the reason boiled down to was so we could see the poverty they live in because we have never lived in a place with such poverty….of course that was not the response we gave them. We told them we were there to study migration, which is true because about 90% of them have a relative working abroad who sends money back to them, which is how they survive when it doesn’t rain. Their next question was if we were Muslim. They did not really understand that we were not Muslim because in their world everyone is Muslim…on this topic I wish I was able to communicate with them more it would have been an amazing conversation. I wish we were able to spend longer there, but I have the feeling I will return sometime. I also wish we could have done more for them. We pay the families to stay with them which I’m sure helps them a lot but it would have been so easy for us to bring with us things that aren’t accessible to them but are easily accessible to us. For instance some socks! Everyone had holes in their socks. Or even some basic text books. The school text books were well worn out and they did not have enough. I did bring a small gift for them (mom you will love this!); we were told toothbrushes and tooth paste would make good gifts so I left them well supplied with some new ones…..and a big bar of chocolate :o). There is so much I still need to process regarding the village, but I won’t do it on this blog.
Ok stay with me there is one more thing I’d like to tell you about. After the village on our way back to Rabat we stopped at an NGO that helps families of clandestine migrants abroad and immigrants. The position of the organization baffled me a little because they are helping the families of people who are migrating illegally….legally I’m not sure how to look at this. With such a shortage of jobs, the poverty and lack of freedom many peoples only chance for a better life is to migrate illegally. Living here has made me look at illegal migration so differently. At the NGO we visited we talked to three men who had migrated illegally to Italy. One man worked in Italy for 8 years before he was deported, another lived there less than a year and came back because he could not find work and another lived there for a little over a year but could not find work and was deported. The thing that surprised me the most about our talk with the migrants was how much I found myself relating to them. Their main objective in migrating is to find work but there are so many other reasons they go abroad, curiosity being one of them. One migrant said that there may be a possibility of a job opening for him here in Morocco but even if that happens he would not feel fulfilled in that and wants to go abroad again. One of the men also said that they feel the quality of living and the way people are treated is overall better in places like Europe than in Morocco. I could relate to them in that we all wanted to travel and see the world. The next destination for one of them was Australia and the other wanted to go to Canada, they want to travel as much as I do and if they get work in the process then great!
On a lighter topic tomorrow I am going to watch some horse races. It will be my first time at any sort of horse race and don’t worry I don’t have any gambling tendencies! This Sunday I am going to visit the English speaking, non-denominational church that is here and some girls from my program want to check it out with me. My only sadness now is realizing how short my time here is and wishing I had more time here. Thank you for all of your prayers and keep praying for me!
