Morocco 101: Funerals

One of the most amazing parts of living in another country is getting to experience its cultures and traditions firsthand. We've experienced observances of life - birthday parties, engagement and marriage ceremonies (I haven't seen these in person yet, only from afar and through people talking about them - hoping for an in-person experience in the coming year!), traditional events for a newborn baby... each with its own set of music, festivities, atmosphere, and food. And now in addition to those observances of life, we have experienced an observance of death. Recently, Justin and I returned from our travels to learn that our landlady had passed away. Since death is an important part of any community's culture and traditions, I thought it might be interesting to talk about how Moroccans observe death.

Moroccans follow Islamic tradition by burying the deceased within 24 hours of their death. The body is prepared at home by family, or if needed, by someone in the community who has some experience. The body is typically wrapped in a simple and modest cloth and some perfume may be applied to the cloth as well. After prayers have been said, the body is carried through the streets as a mark of respect, and then buried in a cemetery facing Mecca. 

It seems as if almost as soon as a person dies, a tent is erected right next to their home. Neighbors immediately mobilize to prepare food for the family in the tent (it is truly an amazing show of community!). For three days, family and friends gather together in the tent to mourn and read parts of the Qu'ran. After those three days, the tent is removed and the family (particularly the spouse) continue mourning for 40 days, and during that time friends and family come by to pay their respects. 

Justin and I visited our landlady's family during those 40 days of mourning. We had returned from our travels and were doing laundry on our roof, when we heard a neighbor yell over to us from an adjacent roof to tell us about our landlady's death. We were spending that afternoon with two of our good friends who speak English well, and so we asked them to help us understand what we should do when visiting the family. They advised us to bring two large cones of sugar, a typical gift that is brought to families on a wide variety of occasions, and to greet the family with a traditional phrase in Moroccan Arabic, "Baraka f rassk," literally meaning "Blessings on your head" but metaphorically meaning something more like "May God grant you grace." The following day, we went to our local shopkeeper (who also made sure we knew about the landlady), bought our cones of sugar (8 pounds worth) and headed to our landlady's home. We arrived there just as a group of other people were leaving. The family brought us into the "salon," the Moroccan equivalent of the living room. They brought out tea (no Moroccan observance seems to be without it) along with some cookies and traditional breads, and we ate and met new members of the family. Our friends had advised us not to stay too long, so we left after an hour or so. The family seemed really touched that we came there and took the time to understand the customs and traditions.

Certainly there are many variations in funeral observances throughout Morocco - the Imazighen people, for example, have their own set of customs, and Moroccan Jews (which I talked a bit about in a previous blog post) observe death very differently. As our last year ticks by, I hope to experience much more about Moroccan observances of both life and death that I can share with you!

Morocco 101: Eid al-Adha

Today is the third day of Eid al-Adha, one of the most important celebrations in the Moroccan calendar. "Eid" means "Festival" and "al-Adha" means "of the sacrifice." We spent the day with one of our good friends and his family, so I thought I would use this blog post to talk a bit about the day and also include a few photos from our experience (don't worry, nothing too graphic!).

So what is this sacrifice?

Eid al-Adha honors the story of the prophet Ibrahim (or as many may know from the Bible, Abraham), who was commanded by Allah (God) in a dream to sacrifice his first-born son Isma'il (Ishmael), as a test of his faith. Ibrahim blindfolded himself as he could not bear to see the sacrifice of his son, and as he cut Isma'il's throat and removed his blindfold, Ibrahim was astonished to see that Isma'il was unharmed and instead, he found a slaughtered ram in his son's place. As a reward for his faith, Allah granted Ibrahim the good news of the birth of his second son, Is-haaq (Isaac).

Wait, didn't Abraham sacrifice Isaac in the story?

This is slightly different from the story that many may know. In the Torah and the Christian Bible, Isaac is the son that Abraham was about to sacrifice, whereas in the Qur'an, Ibrahim (Abraham) was about to sacrifice his first son, Isma'il (Ishmael). The theological importance of the distinction is that Jews trace their descent from Isaac and Christians believe that Jesus was a descendant of Isaac, whereas Muslims believe that the Prophet Mohammed was a descendant of Isma'il.

Special Practices during Eid al-Adha

Preparing for Eid
To prepare for Eid, Muslims are encouraged to put on new or best clothes available, and to ensure personal cleanliness (people get haircuts, sometimes women will do henna). Muslims pray in the morning of the first day as a congregation before performing the sacrifice.

Justin and I in traditional clothes (the sheep, in his birthday suit)

The Slaughter
Muslims who can afford it purchase an animal prior to Eid to be slaughtered after the morning prayers. Those who cannot afford a sheep buy a goat or a less expensive animal. Justin and I guesstimated that there were about 10,000 sheep in our town the night before Eid, and we could hear the "baaaaaaaa's" echo through the night! After the morning prayers on Eid, the head of the family slaughters the sheep, or in some families, a butcher comes to the house and performs the ritual.

The men getting the sheep ready for the slaughter (don't worry, I didn't post a photo of that!)

Charitable giving  

As with many other Muslim holidays, in Eid it is important to give to the poor, through money or through sharing meat of the sacrificed animal.

The Hajj
One of Islam's revered observances, Eid al-Adha corresponds with the end of the Hajj - the pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia that annually draws 2 million Muslims.

Greeting Friends and Family
It's important during this time to visit friends and family and to wish them a "Mbrouk L'Eid" (Congratulations on Eid).

The Foods

Breakfast
Families eat sweets and cookies for breakfast, along with traditional bread-based fares. Here are some of the foods that were on our breakfast table!

Milwi, a traditional pancake type dish. Also called msemen in some places.

Lots and lots of cookies!

Post-Slaughter Meal
It's Moroccan tradition to prepare organ meats such as the liver and the heart on the day of the slaughter. What seems to be typical is wrapping pieces of the liver and heart in a fatty film that surrounds the stomach, skewering these on kabobs and grilling, and then eating with bread and spices.

Making kabobs with the family

The spices: cumin, salt, and hot pepper (here they call it sudaniya).

The finished kabobs... pretty tasty!

Other Meals
The days following the slaughter are very meat-heavy, as families continue to eat the remainder of the animal. Almost no parts of the animal go to waste - even the head and legs, these are roasted and eaten in the days following the slaughter.

And there are a wide variety of cooking methods, from roasting to grilling to slow cooking in tagines or otherwise.

Sheep head and legs roasting on the fire (I won't be eating this!).

This was our second year to celebrate Eid al-Adha (last year was during our training period). I found that it's a really great feeling to be experiencing things a second time around, to compare our experiences from town to town and year to year, gaining a better understanding of how customs and traditions can differ even within the country. And once in a while, having an idea of what to expect can be really nice when each new day in Morocco can bring us something very unexpected!

On an unrelated note - Thinking about everyone on the East Coast with Hurricane Sandy approaching. I hope that the damage is minimal and passes through quickly! And doesn't mess too much with Halloween :)

Morocco 101: Ramadan

Today is the second full day of Ramadan in Morocco. Justin and I are only going to be in Morocco for the first 4 days of it (we leave on Wednesday for a vacation) and then we'll be back for the remaining 2 weeks, but we are trying to experience as much as we can in the beginning! I thought I would use this blog post to talk a bit about Ramadan and our experiences so far.

The most well-known aspect of Ramadan for non-Muslims is the month-long fast between sunrise and sunset. For the last month or so, just about everyone we know or meet has asked the same question...

Are we fasting?

The answer is yes - sort of. Justin and I have committed to fasting while we are in Morocco, out of respect for the community and to try to get a sense of Ramadan from a closer perspective. However, since we are leaving on Wednesday to travel out of the country for 2 weeks, we'll be starting with a mini-fast of just 4 days, and then we'll try to resume fasting when we return. It's been really interesting to hear people's responses when we tell them that we are fasting - Some seem happy and proud of us, others are confused as to why we would fast if we are not also praying, and most warn us that it will not be easy! But people seem to really love Ramadan - they say that it's a beautiful time when the community comes together and experiences something very special. And just in our first day, I felt like fasting was something that mentally tied me to the community - As I walked around yesterday, I felt that I shared something in common with the whole community, which is a pretty cool feeling when you are living far away from home. And the flip side of fasting is that you have an amazingly delicious meal to break the fast each and every night. Some pictures from our first break-fast meal are at the end of this blog post!

As I mentioned above, Ramadan has started in Morocco - but exactly when it started is not as simple a question as you might think...

When does Ramadan start?

Well, that's a funny question that has been baffling me.

Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic calendar and as with all months in the Islamic calendar, its start is based on the sighting of the new moon. There appears to be a lot of disagreement over the starting date of the month.

Since Muslims live all over the world, but Islam started in what is now known as Saudi Arabia, they may not agree as to which country’s first moon sighting marks the start of the month. Some Muslims believe that a new moon sighting from their individual country marks the start of Ramadan. Other Muslims believe that the sighting of the new moon from Saudi Arabia marks the beginning of Ramadan. And yet other Muslims believe that technology should be used to mark the true date, and use astronomical calculations instead to determine the start of Ramadan.

In Morocco, it was based on the sighting of the moon here. So for several nights we stayed awake, waiting for a friend to tell us whether or not the new moon had been sighted. Seems like a tough way to mobilize a whole country to start fasting, but it works for people here!

Many of you may already know a lot about Ramadan, but here's a bit more information that I have learned during my time here.

What is Ramadan?

Ramadan is the month-long period of fasting that Muslims all over the world observe to commemorate the month in which the Qu'ran was first revealed to the Prophet Muhammad. Many Muslims also believe that during this month, the gates of Heaven are open, the gates of Hell are closed, and devils are chained in Hell. So it is a very holy time, filled with special practices which are only done this month.

Special Practices During Ramadan

Fasting all month

Although Muslims fast during other times of the year, Ramadan is the only time when fasting is obligatory during the entire month for every able Muslim. From sun-up to sun-down, Muslims (with exceptions for the ill, travelers, nursing mothers and pre-pubescent children) are required to abstain from eating, drinking, or sexual relations during daylight hours.

Charitable giving

There is also an increased emphasis on alms-giving during Ramadan. Many Muslims believe that their good actions bring a greater reward during this month than at any other time of year, because this month has been blessed by Allah. 

Increased prayer and recitation of the Qu'ran

In addition to fasting, Muslims are encouraged to read the entire Qu'ran. Some Muslims perform the recitation of the entire Qu'ran by means of special prayers which are held in the mosques every night of the month.

Iftar (the break-fast)

At sunset, the family gathers for the fast-breaking meal known as Iftar. The meal traditionally starts with the eating of three dates (as this is what the Prophet Muhammad did). Then a festive meal is served after prayers. This is a time of fellowship with families, friends, and the community.

Suhoor

A small meal eaten just before dawn; the final meal before the day's fast begins.

And very important... some special foods during this time!

Don't worry, I haven't forgotten about the eating portion of this month. There are many special types of food that, while available in Morocco at other times in the year, are emphasized this month. Here are the 3 big ones that I have seen so far:

Shbekia: A sesame cookie which is folded into a flower shape, fried and soaked in honey, then sprinkled with sesame seeds. Justin and I have spent HOURS making shbekia with our host family; it takes a really long time but is very good!

Sellou: Made from toasted sesames, fried almonds and flour that has been browned in the oven - very sweet!

Harira: A very tasty chickpea and tomato soup. Although eaten year-round, it seems to be especially popular in Ramadan for breaking the fast.

Making shbekia with my host mother.

The shbekia "before" picture - sesame-based dough
that will be fried and then drenched in honey.

The completed shbekia! Covered in honey and sesame seeds.

The break-fast table - Ours was a little nontraditional; note the pizza in the middle!
Also pictured are sellou, fried fish, shbekia, juices, and harira to come.

Close-up on the sellou.

And last but not least, the harira!
I could eat this stuff ALL. DAY. LONG. When I'm not fasting of course :)

I hope you enjoyed hearing a bit about Ramadan. Wishing you a Ramadan Kareem, a month filled with generosity and holiness!

What time is it??

One of the toughest adjustments to living in Morocco has been getting used to cultural differences regarding the concept of time. During our first two months of training, we learned that Morocco tends to have a "polychronic" culture, compared to America's "monochronic" culture. In polychronic cultures, people are not as ruled by precise calendars and schedules; human interaction is valued over time and material things, leading to a lesser concern for "getting things done" - they do get things done, but more in their own time (sometimes quick, sometimes not so much). Additionally, a polychronic system has a much more fluid approach in scheduling time, and many things are done simultaneously, in a way that Americans might consider less efficient.

Interesting stuff huh? Well, it's very interesting to read about but waaaay harder to live it! A few examples of how this has affected us - We might speak with a friend about meeting at a cafe in the afternoon and we set up an exact time to meet. As you can imagine, we arrive at the cafe right on time (because that's how we monochrons roll, right?) and the Moroccan strolls in an hour late. Are we upset? Maybe a little, but if we take off our American cap we realize that this is due to cultural differences in the approach towards time. 

Another example is with lines at the post office. Well, I can't really call them lines, it's more like mass huddles of people around the service window. The postal employee does not help people one by one; rather, she tries to help five people at the same time and whoever gets their letters nearest to her are the ones who are helped next. What works here to my benefit is that she often sees me (because as you can imagine, I stick out here a bit!) and will gesture to me to come up to the front of the "line." In America this would be unheard of, but here, with a more fluid approach to time, it's the norm.

And just when you think you have it all figured out, Moroccans throw you a curveball - daylight savings time! Which started a few weeks ago, changes back during Ramadan, and then changes back again afterwards. But what gets confusing is that not everyone changes their clocks. Government-run offices (i.e. banks, post offices) seem to run on new time, and our Youth Center runs on new time, and schools run on the new time, except for Fridays when schools run on new time in the morning and old time in the afternoon (that's because prayer time at the mosques runs on old time and Friday afternoon is the most important time for prayer). Local stores and the markets seem to run on old time, so whereas we used to get groceries around 4 PM, now we have to remember not to go until at least 5 PM. Individuals are totally mixed; we have some students and friends who automatically made the switch, but many who stroll in at the end of our classes and then realize that our classes run on new, not old time. And many times when we make plans with people, we have to confirm with them if our plans are based on new or old time (but they'll be late anyway, so I guess it doesn't matter too much!).

Confused yet? On a positive note, it's a really great way to shed the impatient-New-Yorker mentality :)  I spent an hour on the phone today, booking plane tickets due to a delightful quirk in Iberia Airlines' website. In New York I would have been fuming. Here, no big deal. Where are we going??? In true polychronic style... I'll post it when the time is right!

Morocco 101: Meals

Justin and I recently put together a short language and culture "cheat sheet" for his parents and friends, who spent about 10 days traveling through Morocco (more on their visit in my last blog post). Developing the cheat sheet was an interesting opportunity to distance myself from day-to-day life and to think about some of the differences between Moroccan and American culture. In today's post, I thought I would talk a bit about Moroccan meals and the differences that I have seen.

To start with the basics - Moroccans seem to eat 4 meals a day: breakfast, lunch, dinner, and a lovely little "snack" between lunch and dinner called "kaskrot." I used quotations around the word snack, as it seems to be considered a smaller meal but often is NOT the case! Here's an example of a kaskrot meal:

Now, this is certainly on the larger end of kaskrots, but we've experienced this type of spread on several occasions. It usually seems to be a combination of breads (the dish in the middle is milwi, a very tasty fried layered bread) and often a few sweets (or as the case may be, more than a few!). And of course, always Moroccan tea - which is not always mint tea, by the way - sometimes just green tea, and sometimes green tea in combination with another herb - such as sheba, also known as absinthium or wormwood. But always lots of sugar.

Another kaskrot - this one has skewered meat (pretty unusual)
and an AMAZING thing called sellou, made from sesame,
almonds and flour and usually served during Ramadan.

Lunch seems to be the largest meal of the day. The most frequent main dishes that we have seen are tagines, couscous, fried fish, lentils, or beans. Often the main dish is accompanied by a salad, and bread is almost always on the table as a means of eating the food. Dessert seems to almost always be fruit (the Moroccan word for fruit, "deeseer," also means dessert!). Here's an example of a lunch spread:

It is customary for families to eat couscous on Fridays. Not everyone does but it is a widely observed custom, and Justin and I go to our host family's house every Friday for lunch. Couscous is usually topped with a variety of vegetables and starches, ranging from squash to carrots, potatoes to fava beans, zucchini to tomatoes. Sometimes there will be meat in the middle of the couscous too.

Breakfasts seem to be fairly basic, usually with some sort of bread (milwi, as I described above; or harsha, like cornbread except with semolina flour and cooked on a pan rather than baked; or sometimes just basic baguettes or round loaves of white or wheat bread), sometimes egg or cheese, sometimes honey, butter, or jam. And dinners also seem to be light and fairly simple, sometimes soups, or pasta with tomato sauce or milk, or leftovers from recent meals.

I should also mention that the times for meals are a bit different - Breakfast and lunch are similar to the U.S., with breakfast happening before kids go to school or adults go to work (7/8 A.M.), and lunch around 12:30 or 1 PM. Kaskrot is usually slightly before our dinnertime, around 5 or 5:30 PM. And dinner can be served really late - we've had it as "early" as 9:30 or 10 P.M. but as late as midnight. When we were in training, we had a lot of difficulty staying awake for dinner; fortunately now that we live on our own, we are able to keep to our own schedule (and no, we typically don't add in the kaskrot meal, though we do sometimes have tea or coffee at our local cafe during kaskrot time).

Rfisa - my favorite Moroccan dish so far.

Meal preparation is also quite different (you can read more about that in a guest post that I wrote). In a town like Tiflet that has a market open every day, people just buy whatever is needed for that day. In smaller communities that don't have a daily market, people travel to the nearest big town, usually once a week, to get the food items that they need at what is called a "souk."  And common cooking apparatuses include the pressure cooker, tagine pot, couscoussier (a double-chambered food steamer), mjmar (a clay charcoal grill), gsaa (a large, shallow clay vessel used for serving and also making doughs), stock pots, and of course, tea pots.

Shopping at the market in Moulay Yacoub.

In terms of eating - Typically main dishes are eaten from shared platters. With couscous, people often use a spoon (though many people have an amazing technique of eating couscous with their hands), but with most other main dishes, people either eat just with the hand, or with bread as a means of dipping into the platter and getting sauce, vegetables, etc. There's an unspoken system of triangles in which each person keeps to his/her own area when eating. And typically meat is in the middle of the platter, and is not eaten until towards the end of the meal, when often someone in the family will give portions of meat to each person (in most meals, the portion of meat eaten is significantly smaller than what we might eat in a meal in the U.S.).

That's all for now on Moroccan Meals 101! And speaking of eating, my own cooking adventures have continued...

Yes, that is my first-ever challah baking experiment, which was a phenomenal success, and led to some REALLY good french toast and a spin-off on hamburger buns which got the thumbs-up from our Moroccan host family. Thanks to the wonderful Jessie who contributed her recipe via one of my most favorite cooking blogs, by my friend Nishta - you can get the recipe here (I didn't change a bit of it, it's perfect!).

By the way, if you are interested the full cheat sheet (including both language and cultural info, geared towards short-term visitors), you can view and download it here.

Boundaries (and children)

It's my first blog post of 2012! I hope everyone is off to a great start in the new year.

The inspiration for this blog post came from one of my daily trips last week to and from Rabat for physical therapy (if you read my last triumphant post, my cast is now off and the doctor has recommended a month of physical therapy – so far, so good!).

In order to get from our site to Rabat and back, we take what is called a “grand taxi” - essentially an old Mercedes Benz that would be fairly spacious, except that 6 passengers (along with the driver) are packed into the car – 4 in the back, 2 in the front, plus the driver. This is a fairly common way that I've seen in Morocco of transporting people from place to place. So there I am, in the back of a grand taxi, waiting for 2 final passengers before the taxi would leave, when an older woman gets in the backseat along with a young child, maybe 2 years old. I make pleasant conversation with the woman for a few minutes as we begin riding back to Tiflet, and then she proceeds to hand me the child (without my asking), who sits and plays on my lap for the rest of the trip. The child was adorable and I enjoyed the distraction which made the 45 minute ride go by much quicker, but it also highlighted two cultural observations that I wanted to share: 

1. Moroccans love children 

I mean, everyone loves a cute kid here and there, but I have never seen such a love for children that this country seems to share. People coo and smile when a small child enters a room and kids are passed around from person to person (whether they know them or not) to coddle them endlessly. Which leads me to... 

2. Thin boundaries, no barriers 

I knew before coming to Morocco to expect less physical boundaries. The grand taxi experience is one of many in which spatial relationships are very different than in the U.S. Here, many families sleep together in small rooms, greetings always involve handshakes and more often than not hugs and kisses (even amongst strangers), boys think nothing of sitting on each others' laps or walking arm-in-arm. And then there's the passing around of children. I laughed to myself trying to compare my situation to the U.S. - what would happen if I were sitting on a subway train in New York and a total stranger sitting next to me struck up a conversation and handed me their child to play with?

While I expected there to be fewer physical barriers, I have been surprised that there are fewer emotional barriers between people as well. Greetings involve hugs and kisses; that's because you almost instantly become close friends, even family. And what I found most interesting about my experience in the grand taxi was not necessarily that of our spatial closeness, but rather our emotional closeness. That this woman seemed to feel as comfortable with me after 5 minutes as someone might feel after 5 years.

One of our friends from the Youth Center invited us over for lunch today, and this was the first time we met the rest of his family. They fed us a huge lunch (rfisa – recipe forthcoming, as I am determined to learn how to cook because it is amazing!), and then immediately after which they asked us to stay for kaskrot (the next meal following lunch, several hours away). When we said we needed to prepare for upcoming English classes, they sent us away with a bag of lemons, a massive jug of olives freshly brined, and a full bottle of fresh zeit bldya (traditional olive oil) . All this after 1 hour spent with the family - which of course, involved lots of time spent playing with the children.

In other news, we traveled to Ifrane on New Year's Day with friends from our Youth Center. En route, we made a few new friends (photo below). And the apartment is coming together. We cooked our first meal this week - a little taste of home. Enjoy the pictures! 

In a shop in Azrou, on the way to Ifrane

One of our new friends

My Italian in-laws should be proud!!

A History Lesson

Happy December everyone! I have been looking forward to this month for several reasons – it’s the last month that (hopefully) Justin and I will be living with a host family, as we are looking for a place of our own to move into in January; I am excited to see how Moroccans bring in the New Year; and most importantly, I am counting down the days until I get this friggin’ cast removed from my leg! I am in Rabat now for a check-up tomorrow (Monday) morning, so I’ll give more updates after my appointment – but right now the countdown has me getting the cast off on December 30th or 31st, so keep your fingers crossed that all goes according to schedule and that the doctors work that day!

It’s been a fun few weeks spending time with our new host family in Tiflet and getting to know the town. Last weekend, Justin and I went with our host mom and sister to visit our host mom's brother, sister-in-law, and sister-in-law's family in Khemisset, which is the next city over (only about a 20-30 minute drive). I soon found out that the sister-in law and her family are Amazigh and I spent Saturday evening watching beautiful videos of Amazigh dancing and music, and learning some dance moves from my new extended family. As I was thinking back upon the weekend, I realized that likely most of you don’t know what Amazigh means (I did not before coming here) so I thought that today’s blog post could serve as a quick history lesson for everyone! I will commence with putting on my teacher hat now :)


Who:
The Imazighen people, plural of Amazigh. You might recognize the word "Berber" as a term used; however, "Berber" is believed to have been derived from the word "barbarian," whereas the word "Amazigh" is believed to mean "free people" or "free and noble men" and to many the word "Berber" is considered offensive.

Amazigh jewelry

When:
Archaeological evidence suggests that Morocco’s first settlers (known as the Capsian people) arrived between 10,000 and 6,000 B.C.E., after the end of the last ice age. It is from these earliest inhabitants that the Imazighen people (plural of Amazigh) are believed to have descended.

Amazigh pottery in Marrakesh

Why:
Following the ice age, Morocco’s landscape was largely made up of grassy savanna, particularly on the coastal plains, which drew inhabitants with an extremely fertile land that are well-suited to cultivating crops and rearing cattle. The Imazighen people developed into numerous groups and inhabited most of the land that makes up present-day Morocco (in addition to other parts of Northern Africa), although in the years following many of the groups moved to mountainous regions as precautions against foreign invaders.

An Amazigh silk hanging; also designs are reminiscent of
tattoos that many Imazighen people have

What:
Today in Morocco, about 40% of its people acknowledge an Amazigh identity, though likely many more have Berber ancestry. Imazighen are identified primarily by language but also by traditional customs and culture – such as the distinctive music and dances.  

A book that I am hoping to read soon!

 
Amazigh Language:
The language of the Imazighen people has many dialects, but the 3 main dialects used in Morocco are called Tashelhit (spoken in southwest Morocco), Tamazight (spoken in the Middle Atlas region) and Tarifit (or Rifia, spoken in the Rif area of northern Morocco). In our town, it seems like a good number of people speak Tamazight so I may try to learn at least some basic words.

Sample Tamazight text - what it means is
"All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.
They are endowed with reason and conscience
and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood. "
(Article 1 from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)

Amazigh Music:
From what I have read, Amazigh culture is extraordinarily rich and diverse, with a variety of musical styles that range from bagpipes and oboe (kind of like Celtic music) to pentatonic music (reminiscent of Chinese music), combined with African rhythms and the use of oral storytelling. These traditions have been kept alive by small bands of musicians who travel from village to village to entertain at weddings and other social occasions with songs, tales, and poetry.

To hear some of the more traditional music, here's a sample website (not a lot in English but you can click to artists and watch videos). To hear some more modern takes, here's another site to try.

A moussim, or traditional festival, in a small town in the Middle Atlas mountains

Imazighen People Today:
While the Imazighen people have a storied past in Morocco, their heritage was not always recognized by the state. After Morocco won independence in 1956 the King sought to solidify a unified national identity and banned Tamazight in schools and public places (such as hospitals and the courts). Eventually there were 2 major Amazigh revolts, one in 1973 and a second in the 1980s, both of which were suppressed by the Moroccan government and for years, Imazighen people who continued to assert their identity were jailed. By the 1990s the Imazighen movement had built up momentum but little was done until the current king took over (Mohamed VI - whose mother is Amazigh). He reintroduced Tamazight in primary schools and commissioned a research institute to develop a curriculum and promote study of the language. And in the recent constitutional changes Tamazight became an official state language.

 

Below is the official Amazigh flag, adopted by the Amazigh World Congress in 1998. Each color in the flag symbolizes a territory inhabited by the Imazighen people:

- blue symbolizes the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean;

- green symbolizes nature and the green mountains;

- yellow symbolizes the sands of the Sahara Desert

The letter in the middle of the flag is a yaz, which symbolizes a "free man", the meaning of Amazigh, and is in red, the color of life and also the color of resistance.

 

There are so many parts of Amazigh and Moroccan culture that I have yet to learn so this is just a small sampling – hopefully, over 2 years, I’ll be able to impart lots of new lessons as I learn more myself! Lots more to come on Moroccan music in general – Justin and I have been spending time at our Youth Center where they LOVE playing music and singing and dancing together, and last week we went to a concert at a local high school with about 95% Moroccan music - the remaining 5% was a small rock band who seemed to really like Bob Dylan :)

And by the way - if there are any aspects of Morocco or Moroccan culture that you are particularly interested in learning, just leave me a comment and I’ll try to address it in a future blog post. Sending everyone best wishes for a great month, and more to come soon!

Lots o Learning

Before coming to Morocco, I read a book called “Culture Shock” which is geared towards Americans coming to Morocco and some of the many adjustments to expect in daily life. Almost every aspect of Justin and my lives have changed, from the type of place in which we are living (4,000 people total is a big change from 8 million!), to our 6 meals a day (if you missed it, you can read all about our MANY meals in my last post), to even the process of showering and using the restroom (public baths called hammams and squatting toilets have taken some getting used to but have quickly become a routine part of our lives). But the most significant, and definitely the most interesting adjustments for me, have been learning about cultural norms and values for Moroccans. Some I have been fortunate to learn from our “Language and Cultural Facilitator” Malika (or LCF as we call it – Peace Corps has a LOT of acronyms); others have been discovered through a faux pas or two on my end… but all have been an important part of learning and respecting all the aspects of our home for the next 2 years. There are many, many cultural lessons that I have learned and I hope to pass them all along in time! For now, just a few…

Greetings

One of our first language lessons upon arriving in the country focused on Moroccan greetings, and it was a very long lesson! I was absolutely amazed at how many different ways we learned to say “How are you?” but once we got into our training community and began to have conversations with family and friends, it made much more sense. Here’s an example of a typical greeting and the translations – and I am seriously talking about just a walk-by hello with our local shopkeeper (abbreviated SK):

Me: Salaam Ealykum! (translation: Peace be upon you, i.e. Hello)

SK: Wa Ealykum Salaam! Kif dayra? (translation: Peace be upon you too! How are you?)

Me: Labas, Hmdullah. Labas? (translation: Good, thanks be to God. Are you good?)

SK: Labas, Hmdullah. Bixir? (translation: Good, thanks be to God. Are you fine?) *Here’s where the conversation gets funny. They start to ask about 15 ways if you are SURE that you are fine, and if everything is fine, and if you are absolutely certain that everything is great.

Me: Bixir, shuqran! Cinq cinq? (translation: Fine, thank you! Are you all good?)

SK: Cinq cinq, Hmdullah. Swiya ulla mizyan? (translation: All good, thanks be to God. A little or very good?)

Me: Mizyan, Hmdullah. Unta? (translation: Very good, thanks be to God. And you?)

SK: Mizyan, Hmdullah. Kulsi mizyan? (translation: Very good, thanks be to God. Is everything very good?)

Me: Kulsi mizyan, shuqran, kulsi bixir? (translation: Everything is very good, thank you, is everything fine for you?)

SK: Kulsi bixir, Hmdullah. (translation: Everything is fine, thanks be to God.)

Sometimes they will even repeat the same word over and over just to be absolutely certain that everything is okay... such as (him) Labas? (me) Labas. (him) Labas? (me) Labas. (him) Labas? (me) Labas, I promise!!!! (I don’t actually say the last part but I definitely think it!)

That’s before asking anything else – And once you ask about their family, it starts ALL over again! This is a very standard way of greeting people and I find that I need to leave extra time to get somewhere to allow for long greetings along the way. There are many other cultural norms with greetings – For example, when coming upon a group of people, even if you know only 1 person in the group, you greet each person with the same level of friendliness and enthusiasm, and you greet from right to left. Women typically kiss, sometimes 1 on each side, sometimes 1 on the left and 2 on the right, sometimes 3 on the left and none on the right. Once I even got 5 on the left side. All of this as you can imagine is a BIG change coming from New York, but I’m happy to say that we have adjusted well and have embraced 20 minutes of saying hello :)

Hospitality

Similar to the warm greetings is the amazing hospitality that the Moroccans we have come across have shown us. I read in my “Culture Shock” book that you should be careful about complimenting something of a Moroccan or he/she will try to give it to you. Well, I am reporting that this is very true and has already happened to me! I complimented a small sculpture hanging on the wall in one of my host brothers’ rooms, and he immediately took it off the wall and tried to give it to me! Justin and I pleaded for a while and finally got him to put it back on the wall, and now I try to restrain my urges to give too many compliments out!

I have a long list of other cultural lessons that I have begun to pick up on here and I’m sure you will be learning along with me as the adventure continues! I’ll end with a few unrelated pictures so you can see what we’ve been up to.

A place called "Lalla Shafia" on top of the mountain near us; I will tell the whole story about it another time!

Our town is well-known for their mineral water, so lots of cool looking bath products are sold here

The Blue Gate, the entrance to the Old City in Fes

There was a lot of love for the food pictures so I will keep including them!

Beautiful tile design on the wall in the home that we use for training

The "Dar Chabab" (House of Youth) where we work

A sheep being brought through town on top of a donkey