Tuesday, November 23, 2010

My very first L'Eid Kbir! Yay Meat!

Posted by Allison Spence at 8:56 PM 0 comments

Last Wednesday was the Islamic holiday of L’Eid Kbir (Big Celebration). This is the holiday in which they remember Abraham’s sacrifice and they too slaughter sheep! It’s one long, fun, filled day of killing and eating sheep or goats. Reminded me a lot of Thanksgiving in that family travels to be together and most of the day is spent eating, talking, napping, and sometimes watching football (soccer!). Sound familiar?

Let me recap how I spent my first L’Eid. It started the day before when one of my friends in town came over to do henna on my hands. I was in the middle of making the best pasta/cheesy dish and told her I’d head over after I was done eating. After I get to her house, she meant business. She had the henna, her needle, and everything set. I love getting henna done by her, because she’s pretty creative and she had the English movie channel on… I got to watch an hour of Two Weeks Notice and felt right at home.

Afterwards I headed to my host family’s house to ask what time to show up the next morning. My host dad said oh 7:30 is a good time, but you have to eat dinner tonight! I ask my host mom… her answer 6:30. I was like Whoa whoa…. That’s early, Dad said 7:30! She compromised and decided on 7. The nice thing about Moroccans and setting times… usually you can get away with coming later, earlier… whenever you want. So 7 meant I was coming at 7:30. Ha

I had dinner that night with my host family and it proved to be a preview of the day to come. Dinner was tagine. Tagine usually has meat, potatoes, onion, and other various veggies sitting in a pool of oil and spices. This tagine was basically just meat. A purely meat tagine, with one little onion cooked on top of it. How my household divides the meat is… every veggie is eaten first (we eat everything using bread, no forks, no knives, NO) and then the meat is divided equally by someone at the table (usually my host mom or aunt). That night we divided the tagine by 8 people and I had enough meat that I couldn’t hold it all in one hand. Times that much by 8 and that’s how much meat was in that tagine. It was probably half a small goat (that’s an exaggeration for sure).

The next day I woke up at 6:30. I was dragging, but threw on my awesome tejlabit (check out flickr pics, it’s like a big one piece w/ a hood), put in the contacts (lots of pictures were to be taken, must look fancy for family events), and made myself a cup of instant coffee.

As I walked to my host family’s house, I was greeted with many hellos and Mbruk Laweshk. (which is just a way of saying happy celebration, it’d be like saying Happy Thanksgiving or Merry Christmas). I also got tons of funny looks, smiles, confused faces, because every time I throw on the traditional Moroccan dress I get even more attention. Look at the crazy foreign lady wearing the tejlabit! Silly foreigner. Indeed, I am that.

When I got to the host family’s at 7:20… of course no one was ready or even started thinking about breakfast yet. And to think my host mom thought 6:30 was a good time! Ha! I sat around for a while watching the morning news and decided to head over to the friends who did my henna. There I had another cup of coffee, amazing cake/bread, and more plain bread with oil. That was my first breakfast of the day… My second was cookies, tea, and more bread at my host family’s. They also had rice, but I have become very skilled in refusing food.

After breakfast, the family photo shoot started. I knew I’d be taking lots of pictures that day and would be taking tons of requests from my family and other friends. This is when the attempted matchmaking by my cousins began! I had one time! ONE TIME! Asked about where this older guy cousin of mine was and ever since his sister brings him up every time I see her. It was pretty cute and funny… at first. So this guy had come to town for the holiday and the sister was insisting that he and I take a picture together. I was like “uh… okay… but hey you get in” and I’d grab another cousin or someone. Well they managed to get a picture of just the two of us and I look frustrated and he looks a little annoyed himself. We may not speak the same language, but we were certainly on the same page. Stupid little sisters/cousins!

Finally we all started walking to where the town gathers to pray together for these holidays. We kinda, sorta, missed it. Oops. As we made it through town everyone was already walking back. I did observe the community prayer for L’Eid Sgir, so it wasn’t such a big deal.

Back at the house I started getting antsy waiting for the actual slaughter. I heard that people will wait until the King slaughters his goat/ram and it’s broadcasted on television. I went with a cousin down to where our family keeps its animals and my uncle had already started on his family’s huge goat! The first thing I noticed was how incredibly red and bright the goat’s blood was and the poor thing’s tongue was sticking out.

Here’s a basic how to slaughter a sheep/goat:

1. Don’t let them eat for at least 24 hours. Have to make sure the inner piping is as clean as you can... this reduces the chances of bacteria infecting the meat SIDENOTE** (there was still A LOT of digested food/ crap in the stomach/intestines)

2. Pose for pictures with the animal.

3. Pin animal to the ground, facing Mecca, and slit throat.

4. Keep animal pinned down while it bleeds and kicks around, pose for more pictures.

5. After animal has finally gone to the other side, make a small slit near the ankle of one hind leg.

6. Use bike pump to pump air into slit thus separating the skin from the meat.

7. After bike pump breaks, use your mouth! The animal is like a balloon!

8. When you are satisfied with the amount of air between skin and meat start removing the hide using a knife.

9. Break the hind leg and hang the animal up by its tendon. Oof.

10. Little by little remove the hide. Oh and head on or off at this point is optional… (uncle left the head on.. host family removed it right away)

11. After hide is completely off… pose for pictures! Insist the crazy American touches the animal in one picture.

12. Slit underside of animal… watch intestines and other inside bits fall out.

13. Throw water all over the animal and try to keep the insides clean as the intestine is removed first.

14. Remove all inside bits, wash stomachs out, and get ready to start making kebabs!

So I watched two animals meet their ends and I was surprised by how little the gore fazed me. Sure there was a lot of blood and watching them break the hind legs was a little rough, but all in all I enjoyed being a part of the process. I felt like part of the family and was happy that I could take pictures for the family. Also the nerdy biology part of me was really excited about seeing the different organs and how they’re all connected. Where’s the heart?! Lungs?! What is that?!!! I had fun.

When it came down to eating our ram and goat… the insides are eaten first. This means liver, lungs, heart, stomach, and all that fat. They cooked everything over coals and seasoned with salt and cumin. I already knew that I hate liver! Stomach! Yuck! And I’m not a huge fan of eating just a hunk of fat either. My host dad read my mind, because he made me kebabs of just meat. I was very grateful. I did try the heart, which was rather tasty. At one point I did eat something that took me almost 5 minutes of chewing before I had to swallow it whole. That was rough.

After the first round of meat with the host family, I walked around town to other families. I was lucky enough to only have to drink two cups of tea and eat one piece of liver. Again, I’ve gotten good at the food refusal dance.

When I headed back to my host family’s for dinner… I knocked on the door... No answer. Again... nothing. The neighbor lady across the street yells at me... Just go in! It’s your house too! And so yeah, she’s right... I head in. I walk down the stairs and go to the back room. I walk in and everyone in my family is sleeping. The room is completely full with sleeping people. It was 7:30pm… I was so confused. Why are they all sleeping right now? I shrug to myself and make a “Well, now what do I do face”. One of the little girls pops her head up and starts bursting with laughter. Every one of my family members starts popping up from under blankets, laughing hysterically. Yes! My Moroccan family played a prank on me. For a half hour, my host mom kept making impressions of my face and laughing to herself. It was a pretty great moment… you know you’re part of the family when they start playing jokes on you. Least I hope so… ha.

Later that night was round two of inside kebabs. My uncle and host dad had their respective stations and had a rhythm going. They used the all-purpose tables and had the meat just sitting there. The liver and lungs were slightly cooked and then wrapped in fat and cooked again. As kebabs were finished my host mom would go from person to person and they would grab a piece of meat of the skewer using bread. If a lot were done at once, everyone got their own. I think for lunch I had 3 full skewers and 2 for dinner.

The next day I spent both lunch and dinner with my host family. I tried brains… almost puked brains. Not a texture I would call appetizing.

All in all it was a really good experience that I won’t forget. I was afraid of getting sick, because of the less than sanitary meat handling practices. We were warned that a lot of volunteers have digestive issues after L’Eid, but L’hamdullah I did not get sick.

Now I’m looking forward to our own Turkey day. I will be heading to the gorgeous Bougamez valley and excited to eat the turkey that the volunteers bought. I wonder how close to a Butterball it is. Hope everyone at home as a wonderful holiday. Words cannot express how much I wish I were in Illinois for the holidays, but the nice thing about Peace Corps is that we’re a family too. So don’t worry about me… I’ll be with family.

Thursday, November 18, 2010

The Many Colorful Backgrounds of Peace Corps Volunteers

Posted by Allison Spence at 9:00 AM 1 comments

Since I finally bought a modem and the first month is free… I’ve been on a lot lately. Too much time I say! And usually the internet works in spurts of a half hour here, half hour there. Other times I’m walking in circles on my roof looking for the sweet spot. Why do I bring this up? Well after my last post, I got bored… read one of my very first posts.

The post was about things I thought I might miss and what I was looking forward to the most. The part of that post that really made me chuckle was I said I was looking forward to meeting the other volunteers and I wondered if any would be crazy like me… I could not have guessed then the amount of characters I’ve met through this whole process. I say characters in a very endearing way.

I’m trying to remember before I joined the Peace Corps what I thought actual volunteers must be like, in a very general, stereotyping way. Well Peace Corps is competitive… and before I came I thought this process was cut throat. So I assumed volunteers here must have an open mind, sense of adventure, smart, hard workers, nailed the interviews, and specifically to health I thought… well no way you’re in health without having some sort of background in health. I mean they should have volunteered in some way before right? Well let’s just say our health staj (training group) was so much more hodge podge, out of left field, group of people than I expected. Like I said we’ve got some characters.

Also I’m writing this just to be some sort of support to people who want to join Peace Corps, but might think they haven’t done enough or taken a language or any reason you might doubt being accepted. It’s amazing the diversity that Peace Corps has and Morocco has it all.

I’ll start in Azilal province, because we definitely have a lot of diversity. First off we have the oldest volunteer ever in the Peace Corps (86 I think?) and the youngest volunteer for Morocco (Just turned 21 or 22 I forget…?)! So the age range right there says a lot. There are quite a few of us straight out of college, but more than I expected in the late 20’s early 30’s range. One guy in health was a history major and sold insurance in a mall before coming! One health girl studied forensics and for a time volunteered in an orphanage in the Dominican Republic. We have a civil engineer in Azilal and an officer in the Air Force turned journalist. The small business development volunteer left a job in the banking/the money industry (I’m so bad with economics, I have no idea what she did. Financial advisor? Something that made lots of money). One youth development volunteer has a masters in War Studies from a college in London.

Our crew comes from all over the States. West coast has a strong showing, throw some Texas in there, Midwest represents with Illinois and Wisconsin, then head out to Philadelphia and Boston. We’re from all over!

So even just in Azilal we all have pretty interesting, diverse backgrounds. A few other stand outs in our health training group… There is a veterinarian, a retired couple who decided to join later in life, because their son joined and had such a good experience, a lot of people with backgrounds working with HIV/Aids either in clinics or outreach, a few who studied classical Arabic in either Jordan or Lebanon, people who have lived all over the world, Singapore, Italy, France, and some like me who have barely made it out of their state.

Just like the differences in our backgrounds, a lot of us come for so many different reasons. Sometimes with us newbies out of college… It’s a I have no idea what else to do now sort of thing. Sometimes Peace Corps is the stepping stone to working in the Foreign Service. A lot of times, it’s an adventure, I’ve always wanted to try this thing. So so many reasons.

I like to think I came here for the right reasons and I will stay for the right reasons. I struggled a lot with my reasons for coming and how those reasons have changed and evolved. Some of them… like the big one… I have no idea what I’m doing in life, so I’ll take 2 years to try and figure that out… Well I figured that out. The big one and after you figure out the big one… well now I feel like I should be doing, what I just figured out. Getting closer to that ultimate goal. And so I had to re-evaluate my experience here and what I wanted from it.

I mentioned to a friend that I thought about leaving early after a year of service, if my current situation hadn’t changed at all. This friend’s response was “So you can do that. You can leave? I had no idea.”. And I write that because I think a lot of people at home might think similarly. This is a volunteer program and yeah for many different reasons volunteers may choose to or have to leave early. I gave myself such a hard time, because I didn’t want to feel like I was giving up or quitting. But honestly with all the different reasons for joining Peace Corps, I say if ever a volunteer’s reasons become resolved or change or they’re just plain unhappy… then you should have all the support in the world from Peace Corps and home on making the decision to return early or not.

In Azilal province, there was a health volunteer who ended his service early and I only got to know him for a month or two. He explained that he had gotten from this experience all he had come for and had hoped for. He didn’t need the two years to accomplish what he wanted and had some great oppurtunities and relationships waiting at home. At the time I didn’t think badly of this person, but I’m not sure I fully understood, until I started having similar feelings. It’s amazing the ups and downs of this experience.

But! Again I write all this to be a support to other volunteers, other hopefuls, and to myself when I have a bad day and am too tired or frustrated to remember all this. Also isn’t it pretty cool we have a 80 something volunteer in Morocco! That’s like saying hey Mom wanna join the Peace Corps when I’m older than you are now! Shoot! I can’t imagine my 80 year old self thinking learning a new language is a good idea… No sir. Even if I’m only in my 60’s and retired… no thanks. So we’re a pretty cool bunch and I hope that this short post paints a picture of Peace Corps Morocco for you all.

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Adventures with the Brits

Posted by Allison Spence at 6:48 AM 0 comments


It has been a busy month and a half and hence I haven’t written in a while. I apologize, but I’ll try to make these next updates worth the wait. I left off with how Operation Smile went and I just want to say again how great of an experience it was.

So what happened after Operation Smile? Oh you know… just helped host a group of British teens and helped them build a bathroom. Very random, fun experience, which I wasn’t even going to be a part of until the day before. Such is my life in Morocco. The best adventures so far are the ones not planned for. But let me explain how I got involved with this bathroom project…

An environment volunteer about 2 hours away from my site, texted saying she had a group of British people coming to build a bathroom and wanted to know if I could help her translate between the kids and the builder. I had been working out of site a lot lately, but decided to go for. **Side note: Pretty sure landlord was/is taking advantage of my foreigner status and getting me to pay wayyyy too much for electricity. So I reduced my usage to almost nothing… I was desperate to leave site. **

When I got to her site, she gave me the full scoop on what we were doing, since I basically said yes having no real idea of what was going on. Good times. She had met a Scottish guy who owns a rafting company in Morocco, who has a friend in London who works for an adventure company. This guy’s company takes British teens/young adults to developing countries where they first do a development project, which they fund, and then do a hike or some other outdoorsy wilderness type of adventure. So through the wonders of networking, this PCV got a bathroom project funded in one of her outlying villages. The kids would be coming to her site and would help build a bathroom at a two room school.

Believe me I was excited. A SUV and a mini-bus pulled into this tiny mountain village and they drew a crowd. I think every village boy was around the bus trying to discover what was going on. It was a weird feeling of being in a huge crowd of non-Moroccans. Once in a while I would approach one of the boys and start speaking Tamazight. They were quite surprised by that little trick.

The first day on the bathroom project went well. The walls went up, half of the pit was dug, a door was painted, and kids were entertained by a Frisbee. The next day rained and threw a kink into the groups plan. I left the kids later that day and last I heard they all decided to head back to Marrakech. They were great group of kids, but not quite what I would call the mountain hiking types. I mean they were from London. True city kids.

Random right? Well it gets even crazier, because that wasn’t my last adventure with Brits. Nope! The month ended with my best experience in Morocco! Thank you Scottish guy with the rafting company and environment PCV.

So our In-Service Training started November 1st and so we had to be at the hotel on Halloween. I decided to go to Marrakech a day early to hang out with friends, relax, and just enjoy city life (i.e. McDonalds and adult beverages). I was waiting in Ouaouizerth around noonish and going to head north to the big town of Beni Mellal, take a bus, the usual. As I was waiting, the environment volunteer I had just helped out pulls into the taxi stand and is also heading to Marrakech, but going a different way. We catch up about how the rest of the bathroom project is going and she convinces me to head to Azilal and so we can travel with another guy volunteer in our province. I say… Why not!

It turns out we had to buy out the whole cab the three of us… but so worth it. Then she convinces me to come see the Riad (nice house/hotel) she always stays at, who is owned by the Scottish rafting guy. It didn’t take much convincing, I’d heard a lot about it and he was also nice enough to host a Halloween party for PCV’s the next day. I was hoping to join this party, so of course I wanted to see where it would be.

It was tucked into the medina and souk area. The souk in Marrakech is a wonderful maze and this guy did good finding a great place. His riad has…. A flat screen! What? Comforters on the beds? Three levels? What luxury for a PCV like myself and I was handed a beer when I walked in the door. It doesn’t get much better than that.

After hanging out a bit, the Scottish guy brings up to the environment volunteer that tomorrow he is going to be hosting two British celebrities for their television show. They wanted to do an adventure themed show and would be featuring his company. Now this is really cool in itself, but it gets better… For the filming they needed four extras! Just turns out that there were four of us PCVs staying at his place that night.

Yep people! I went white water tubing (nope, not rafting) for free and will be on British television in April or May on a show called Location, Location, Location with Kristi and Phil. It was amazing! We went an hour outside of Marrakech to Ourika Valley and got to go tubing. I had a wet suit, helmet, and the whole nine-yards. The river was a little low, because November is just the beginning of the season, but there was still quite a bit of white water.

It’s official… I’m an adrenaline junky. There were always hints of this… sky diving, driving too fast... oops, and well yeah other things. But whenever I have money to blow on vacations, my vacations will probably have some sort of adventure element. I really want to go white water rafting now and tubing is even more intense I think.

So those were my October adventures with the Brits and when I visit Chloe in December I’m sure there will be plenty more. I mean I’ll be in their backyard and New Years in the UK again! Adventures will be had.