Camping

I just went on the most amazing camping trip, me and four other Peace Corps volunteers hiked from my house to the beach.  We left around two on Sunday and hiked the entire day until sunset.  It was so beautiful because all of the mountains are now covered in wheat fields, red poppies, and argon trees.  At some points we were even hiking in sand even though we were miles away from the beach and up in the mountains.  Once we were at camp we made macaroni and cheese from scratch over a campfire; it has been over a year since I have sat next to a fire.  After dinner we laid out our sleeping bags and stared at the stars for hours.                               The next day we hiked all day long and it was hot but nice. Two of the people that went with me camping are environment volunteers, Amy and Ben, and they both know a lot about nature.  Like Ben for example would stop to take pictures of every plant or dung beetle he saw.  I guess dung beetles get their name because they climb into cow pies and roll balls out of the poop and then lay their larvae in the dung.  We observed a lot of dung beetle rolling action.  I also learned a lot about animal tracks from my friend Amy.                                                             We ended up taking a taxi to the beach because it was just too far to hike to, so once we got to the road we went to town and had a Coke break and hauled ourselves a cab to a small town called Tadfna, which is a small beach town not found in guide books.  It is one of the most remote beautiful beaches that I have ever been to, and we camped there that night.  In Tadfna we met this Australian couple that was living out of a VW van and has traveled all over the world.  I was so excited because I’ve never met anyone who really lived in a VW van; I have only heard stories of these kinds of people.  I was so inspired by them because they were following their dreams.  We even got to ride in the VW van back to Smimou, so for fifteen minutes I got to live out one of my dreams too.                                                                                                          The camping trip was so much fun because all of the people I went with were laid back and we could take breaks whenever we wanted to. The sun became our clock and we woke up when we felt like it and stopped when the sun was about to set.  For three days we totally lost track of time.                                                                                                                                                             I have been home for a day and tomorrow morning I am going to go and stay at my friend Ben and Carrie’s house, which are also Peace Corps volunteers.  There is a festival going on in their site this week and we are going to do HIV/Aids education.  I am super excited because I will be working! And at this festival Moroccans ride around on horses and shoot guns in the air.  I have never been to a Moussem before so I don’t have the details yet but horses and guns are both a rarity in Morocco, so it should be interesting.                                                                   My friend Nicolet is coming to visit me next week, my first visitor!  I am super excited for someone to see my life.  I hope that Nicolet has a good time and isn’t too shocked by my life.  I love it here so I am sure she will too.                                                                                                    Life is GREAT!!!

Love

Emmy

            

Sick Chicken

Last week I was sick on the toilet and it was horrible.  When you are sick away from your mom it reminds you how much you love and appreciate her.  I am getting better though and I think the antibiotics killed the bugs crawling around in my stomach.  

Life is still great though and I am trying to get back on the horse because before I got sick I had a good schedule for myself but now everything has been thrown out of wack.  I am now on a wild goose chase trying to get permission to teach in the schools and it is proving to be a daunting task.  I came into Essa on Thursday and now I am back today and have to come back again on Thursday.  I might kill someone by the end of this journey, AHHHH!  But I guess it is all apart of being in the peace corps.  

I am feeling good about my service and excited that I am in the Peace Corps.  I miss you all terribly but I know I am where I am meant to be.

I love you

Emmy

You are in my thoughts and keep me in yours.

Just another magic Thursday

Today is a day that I don’t want to forget so I am going to tell you about it.  I woke up this morning and went to my neddy because I was told that we were having a big meeting today, on what I was not told.  I waited outside with the girls from my neddy for about two hours while we waited for all the big shots of my town to show up.  Once all the men came they had tea and chatted while the women, including myself, watched.  I was so hungry and all the snacks looked so good.  I got to experience what it is like to be a women in a developing country, did you know that 2/3 of the worlds impoverished are women.  Most women in developing countries eat after the men and are given their leftovers.  Today we weren’t even given the leftovers but as my friend Moira reminded me, that it is normal and I should have expected that.  But, I was so hungry.

            Anyways, enough about my hunger and onto the important part, the meeting was to get funding from the government for the neddy (young women’s cooperative).  It was interesting to observe a formal meeting Moroccan style.  In order for women to be given some kind of respect from men here they have to be obnoxiously aggressive and controlling.  Hafida, the lady who runs the neddy always gets on my nerves because she is so demanding but I refuse to let her boss me around like she does to all the girls.  Today I understood why she acts this way it is because this is how she is forced to act in order to get men’s attention and gain some sort of respect. After I realized this about Hafida I thought about all of the powerful women in my community and they all share this quality of control and power to an excessive level.  All three of these women I don’t particularly like.  The point here is not that powerful Moroccan women are annoying the point is that in order to be respected by men in Morocco you have to over assert yourself to be heard.  Today I turned over a new leaf and decided that I now have respect for these three women because they are the ones that are going to create freedoms for normal Moroccan women who are scared or unwilling to go the extra step to have their voices heard.  I am also proud to be an American woman where I am viewed to be as valuable as a man.

            I haven’t had a moment to myself today, after the five hour meeting of watching men eat, three Frenchies came over to interview me.  They happened to be in town today and they are journalism students in France taking a course on development and journalism.  They are doing a project on Moroccan culture and they wanted to get my opinions.  It was fun to pretend like I was an expert and an academic.   It was really cool to because they seemed to be really impressed by what I had to say and what I am doing here.  I needed a day like today to realize why I am in Morocco.  Two of the Frenchies were Moroccan but grew up in France and their Moroccan families are from cities.  I got to educate them on countryside Moroccans and how they are so different from each other and know so little about each other they might as well be from different counties.  It is interesting that today I taught a Moroccan about Morocco.  I also realized that one of my big jobs here is to just be here and be a strong women so the girls at my neddy can learn from me to stand up for themselves and be more independent. Maybe my influence will make it so one of my neddy girls sends her daughter to high school or university!

            This week has had its ups and downs all of the projects that I am trying to work on have started giving me problems.  For example, I am all ready to start teaching my tooth brushing lessons but I talked to the principle and he informed me that I need to get permission from the ministry of education before I can teach.  I knew this already but asked the principle earlier in the year if I needed it and he said don’t worry about it.  It is up to the principle if he wants to require me to have this permission or not, and my principle has unexpectedly changed his mind, huh.  So tomorrow I am going to go and try for the third time to get this piece of permission.  I just want to teach God damn it!  Then I am also trying to do this video project and I am waiting on a cord that my brother Sachel sent to me four weeks ago, I am trying to stay positive that it will come but to be honest I am starting to worry; it will come.  I just want to start doing projects God damn it!  But the week ended with me learning some lessons and I know my projects will start soon enough.  I also need to remember that my biggest project started the day I arrived in Morocco and that is just me being me.

            This weekend I am going to a meeting near Marrakesh and I am super excited because I am going to get some ideas for my video project.  I have also been in my site for three weeks straight and I need a break.  People have been knocking on my door none stop today but all in all I love it here.  As I am about to enter into my second year here in Morocco I am super excited because life here is finally starting to make sense.

Love you all,

Emmy

Come visit me!!!!!

Life in Morocco

It Had To Be a BRAIN Day

I have been having a great week but I knew I had to be challenged soon, and it happened when I went to eat lunch at my host families; we had brain for lunch today. But, to be honest it is getting better, what is wrong with me.
Anyways, I am going to take this time to tell you about my life the past three weeks. Two weeks ago I called Sachel and I was crying and wanting to quit Peace Corps, but quitting is not an option. That night I took action and made myself a schedule of things I want to accomplish everyday, one of those things is writting a letter everyday, so please send me your addresses to my email account: emmy.josefson@gmail.com. Slowly but surely life has been getting better here. I have been hanging out with people in my community more and I am about to start my toothbrushing project on Monday.
For my toothbrushing project I am going to go to the primary school in my town and each week I will brush my teeth and play games with one class each week. At the end of the week the kids get to take their tooth brushes home, and hopefully they will convince their families to brush their teeth too.
This past week has been exceptionally good. I started the week with watching my friends run in the Marakesh Marathon. Then I went to Tarrodant to watch two voluteers shoot a video because I am hopefully going to start a video project in my site soon. I am waiting to get some fire wire cord thing then I will start filming health lessons with the girls in my site. Once the videos are done we will distribute them throughout my entire town and surrounding area.
Wednesday and Yesterday were busy, this is a new thing for me. It feels great and I am so proud of myself for making this work. I was running yesterday and as I was running I thought to myself how cool my life was, as I was watching a shepard herd his sheep. At the end of my run one of the girls in my site insisted on giving me a riding on her donkey, that would never happen in America. Exercise is a really weird thing to do here, I think she was confused why I was running in the first place.
I have started being good about my new years resolutions, which were to get healthy and strong. So I have been smoke free for two weeks and I started exercising regularly; I even started running. I was inspired after watching the marathon. Who knows maybe I will run a marathon while I am here, don't count on it though.
I love you all,
Emmy

I Am Back!

As I sit in the airport of Milan I am going to take some time to talk about my time in America. I just spent two weeks in Bemidji and had the best two weeks of my life. It all started with me getting stuck in Chicago for a couple of hours but after a ham and bacon sandwich I finally made it to Minneapolis. I got to spend a couple of days hanging out with my good friends in Mpls, and then I headed up to Bemidji. The first week I was home it was jam packed with seeing everyone from Grandma to old friends. Christmas was a great time with family and Grooving with the family in the basement of Paul’s house. Then it was time for Sachel and Kari’s wedding, which was a beautiful ceremony, Sachel made us all cry. I spent my last week in Bemidji catching up with friends and family and tried to relax a little. I had such a great time with everyone that I saw. There are so many people I didn’t see that were on my mind; there just was not enough time. Thank you to everyone who drove me to the airport and drove me around while I was home. It was really hard for me to get back on that plane and come back to Morocco but while I was home I discovered that I am doing what I am meant to do right now. Being in the Peace Corps is the hardest thing I have ever done and when I finish I will be very proud of myself.
Today I am in Milan waiting out an eight hour lay over but my great friend Nikki urged me to go out and see what this city has to offer. My heavy backpack in tow I saw an amazing Cathedral today and walked into a Prada store. The storeowners looked me up and down and decided I was a waste of time to wait on. I am guessing my Peace Corps attire tells all that I can’t afford a 600-dollar purse. I went to my first Catholic mass in a Cathedral and it was amazing. I have traveled all over the world and been to many Cathedrals but never sat through a mass, it was one of my goals and now I can check that off my list of things to do. I asked God to give me strength for my future seventeen months of service and I can already feel He is on my side.
I miss you all already and can’t wait to see you but for now I am going to save the world, one toothbrush at a time.
By the way I am back in Morocco!
I love you
Emmy

Eid Kabir

Yesterday was Eid Kabir, which should be called meat fest 2008. Eid began at eight in the morning with a huge breakfast. I went to my host families for breakfast and then stayed for the entire day and ate all day long. After a breakfast we slaughtered the ram. I have never seen an animal being slaughtered before and it was intense. My host dad, Said, slit the rams throat and then it started making these awful noises because it was gasping for its last breathes, blood was everywhere. After the ram was slaughtered we took an insane amount of pictures and the ram was hung upside down. I guess this is the Muslim was of slaughtering because all the blood has to be drained out of it. They also blew up the insides so it was easier to skin; it reminded me of siphoning gas. Once all of the skin is off they begin to take out the organs. Let me remind you that none of the ram parts are wasted.
After the slaughtering and skinning was over we had a little snack of liver wrapped in stomach, which as it turns out liver is not my favorite food. For lunch we had the head and once again as it turns out is not my favorite thing either. I still have the tastes stuck in my head and have to go to a wedding today where all of the above will be on the menu. I went to someone's house last night and we ate the exact same things but I am doing a good job and keeping my composure. Everyone in my village thinks it is funny to watch me eat these body parts especially my host dad because one of the first questions he asked me was if I ate stomach or head. In saying all of this it has been an interesting experience but I am integrating! I also feel really tough because I have been eating all of these random body parts.
Today my landlord’s brother is getting married and I get to go pick up the bride who lives in a nearby village. I am excited to have a true understanding of a Moroccan wedding. Before when I would go to weddings the bride was already there and this time I get to help her get ready for the big day. If I were her I would be scared out of my mind because people here rarely get married for love. The man's family finds a girl from a family that they find suitable and then they go and ask the family for permission, the girl has no say in the matter. But, people rarely get divorced here so maybe America should reconsider our marriage standards. Even though I am saying this, Dad don't you dare try to go and find me a husband today, I am not ready for the commitment. This week there are four weddings in my site because after Laid they have a lot of meat anyways so why not have a wedding. This way the families don't have to buy two rams in one year.
I will be home in a little more than a week and I am so pumped to see everyone. I am also really excited to eat some meat that is not stomach or head. I especially can't wait for ham and fruit salad and Taco Bell!!!!!
I love you
Emmy