During the third day of the Morocco Intensive Learning trip we experienced a myriad of things. To start the day, we ate a traditional Moroccan breakfast on the top floor of our auberge. Breakfast included msemmen (similar to an American pancake), yogurt, hard boiled eggs, fresh bread, cream cheese, and the tea we have all come to love.
Once we finished breakfast we headed into the city of Azrou where we exchanged our money into Moroccan Dirhams, which we then used to shop in the Old Medina. Things people bought included hand-carved wooden statues, hand-woven rugs, clothes, etc. After we finished shopping, we met up with our host families for lunch.
While walking to our host family’s home, we met many of their friends and relatives in the street. Some of these friends and family joined different groups during meals, but most ate with their smaller host families. For lunch, we were served chicken, potato, and pea tagine with tea and bread.
After finishing lunch, we went out with our host sister to play soccer with her cousins next door. We split into two teams of two and played before switching to volleyball where we were joined by another cousin and a close friend. When we were done playing we were given our Moroccan names before setting out into the village, where we were joined by lots of different friends and relatives. We all walked about the village before stopping at a fresh water source to wash our hands.
When lunch was over, we returned to the cultural center as a group and began attending three different activities: dancing lessons, Moroccan Arabic lessons, and weaving lessons. We started with the Arabic lessons and learned common phrases like salam (hello), chnou smitek (what’s your name?), and smahli ndouz (excuse me). We then switched activities to a rug weaving workshop in which we got the chance to begin weaving our own small rugs. To conclude the afternoon we learned one traditional Moroccan dance and created our own western dance as well.
We left the cultural center and headed back to the auberge to create our schedule for the next day, which was our duty as leaders of the day. Once that was finished we returned to our host families. While we waited for food to be served we played card games like Uno and Slap Jack as well as teaching our host sister and her cousin, who joined us for dinner, how to shuffle cards. Dinner was Harira, a Moroccan soup with chickpeas, onions, lentils, noodles, and an assortment of vegetables.
Our host sister is 11, and during our first meal mentioned her love for makeup. So, for the second day, one of us brought our makeup bag and let her give us makeovers. Our makeovers concluded with sparkly eyeshadow, an abundance of blush, too much lip gloss, and a photoshoot. Afterwards, we exchanged different words in Arabic for English and taught our host sister the meaning of each word.
We returned to the auberge to hang out and reflect on the day as a group. This included lots of laughter about bad dancing, common grandma exchanges, and questionable makeovers. Afterwards, our free time included lots of board games and laughter before curfew.
We miss you Erika!!