At long last, I am blogging.
We are actually well into our trip, and now I am sitting in the lobby of Caesar's Palace in Casablanca, sipping a glass of red wine, waiting for a 10pm overnight bus to Taroudant, in the southern part of the country. Thankfully, this hotel is right next to the bus station, and with free wifi, live guitar music, a 5-star restroom, and Sharolyn's fine company-- it makes for a nice little hiatus from our hectic schedule of the past several days.
So I need to catch up on the highlights of the trip thus far. Our journey out last Saturday/Sundaywas uneventful until the last leg, when our flight from Paris to Rabat was rerouted to Casablanca due to high winds. From there, we took a long, slow, stinky bus ride back to Rabat. Naturally it took the bus quite some time to get going, and after we had sat waiting outside the Casablanca airport for about 45 minutes, a Moroccan guy in a Red Sox jacket got up and started yelling at the driver in Arabic. Then he turned to the rest of us and shouted in English, "You should all get off this bus! I'm Moroccan and I know what he means when he says 2-3 minutes. Try 2-3 hours!" He then stormed off the bus, and clearly he hoped the rest of us would follow in some sort of protest. We, however, we sheep. He came back after a minute, defeated.
We left about an hour later. Dinner in Rabat was late, and very welcome. Finally in bed around midnight-- adventure underway.
The next day we had conferences in the hotel for the better part of the morning, lunch in the hotel, and in the afternoon a visit with the Moroccan Minister of Education. He emphasized Moroccan's lack of natural resources, and explained that the government sees human capital as the country's greatest resource. For that reason, Education is the largest budget line in the national budget.
Imagine what American schools would be like if we decided to spend more on Education than anything else?
That afternoon, we toured Rabat's medina-- a maze of little shops selling everything from rugs to leather goods to turtles and sheep's heads. It was fantastic-- probably what most westerners picture when thinking of Morocco.
Moving ahead to yesterday (Tuesday), we spent the morning in conferences again, and then left for the Fulbright center for Moroccan-American exchange. This was fascinating, and I left half-convinced that I should take my Foreign Service exam and go into the diplomatic corps. Maybe in my future life...
A really funny thing happened as we were boarding the bus that day. As we were all boarding a bus, and I was digging in my bag for those Altoids I bought. In the meantime, the door to the van was open, and some vagrant/beggar guy with rotten teeth came up and started talking obtrusively to the people sitting near the door. I was behind them and I didn't really notice. The I found the Altoids and staring offering them to everyone on the bus. When I looked up, the vagrant guy was looking at me and talking to me in Arabic, except I thought he was the bus driver, and that he was asking me for an Altoid. So I reached over the woman in front of me and gave him the box of Altoids, thinking that he would hand them back. He looked surprised, stepped back, and then took about 7 of them and ate them while putting the box in his pocket. That's when I realized this was not our bus driver. The look on his face, though, would have been perfect for an Altoids commercial-- "curiously strong." He was totally surprised by them, and shouted out in French, "C''est bon!" It was pretty funny.
That night I had an amazing dinner-- lamb Tagine. Look it up online-- it was exquisite. Honestly, the food here is the best I have EVER had.
Finally, today we spent the day in Casablanca, and I had a chance to interact with some high school students in a senior level English class. They really went out of their way to impress us-- they put on a play with costumes, trying to teach us about Moroccan customs and culture. Then, afterwards, they really wanted to talk with us, take pictures with us, hug us-- it was really touching. Their hospitality and appreciation of us was definitely genuine, and it really touched me. It makes me eager to get into the school in Taroudant to interact with kids again on a daily basis.
Pictures will come soon! Signing off for now!
We are actually well into our trip, and now I am sitting in the lobby of Caesar's Palace in Casablanca, sipping a glass of red wine, waiting for a 10pm overnight bus to Taroudant, in the southern part of the country. Thankfully, this hotel is right next to the bus station, and with free wifi, live guitar music, a 5-star restroom, and Sharolyn's fine company-- it makes for a nice little hiatus from our hectic schedule of the past several days.
So I need to catch up on the highlights of the trip thus far. Our journey out last Saturday/Sundaywas uneventful until the last leg, when our flight from Paris to Rabat was rerouted to Casablanca due to high winds. From there, we took a long, slow, stinky bus ride back to Rabat. Naturally it took the bus quite some time to get going, and after we had sat waiting outside the Casablanca airport for about 45 minutes, a Moroccan guy in a Red Sox jacket got up and started yelling at the driver in Arabic. Then he turned to the rest of us and shouted in English, "You should all get off this bus! I'm Moroccan and I know what he means when he says 2-3 minutes. Try 2-3 hours!" He then stormed off the bus, and clearly he hoped the rest of us would follow in some sort of protest. We, however, we sheep. He came back after a minute, defeated.
We left about an hour later. Dinner in Rabat was late, and very welcome. Finally in bed around midnight-- adventure underway.
The next day we had conferences in the hotel for the better part of the morning, lunch in the hotel, and in the afternoon a visit with the Moroccan Minister of Education. He emphasized Moroccan's lack of natural resources, and explained that the government sees human capital as the country's greatest resource. For that reason, Education is the largest budget line in the national budget.
Imagine what American schools would be like if we decided to spend more on Education than anything else?
That afternoon, we toured Rabat's medina-- a maze of little shops selling everything from rugs to leather goods to turtles and sheep's heads. It was fantastic-- probably what most westerners picture when thinking of Morocco.
Moving ahead to yesterday (Tuesday), we spent the morning in conferences again, and then left for the Fulbright center for Moroccan-American exchange. This was fascinating, and I left half-convinced that I should take my Foreign Service exam and go into the diplomatic corps. Maybe in my future life...
A really funny thing happened as we were boarding the bus that day. As we were all boarding a bus, and I was digging in my bag for those Altoids I bought. In the meantime, the door to the van was open, and some vagrant/beggar guy with rotten teeth came up and started talking obtrusively to the people sitting near the door. I was behind them and I didn't really notice. The I found the Altoids and staring offering them to everyone on the bus. When I looked up, the vagrant guy was looking at me and talking to me in Arabic, except I thought he was the bus driver, and that he was asking me for an Altoid. So I reached over the woman in front of me and gave him the box of Altoids, thinking that he would hand them back. He looked surprised, stepped back, and then took about 7 of them and ate them while putting the box in his pocket. That's when I realized this was not our bus driver. The look on his face, though, would have been perfect for an Altoids commercial-- "curiously strong." He was totally surprised by them, and shouted out in French, "C''est bon!" It was pretty funny.
That night I had an amazing dinner-- lamb Tagine. Look it up online-- it was exquisite. Honestly, the food here is the best I have EVER had.
Finally, today we spent the day in Casablanca, and I had a chance to interact with some high school students in a senior level English class. They really went out of their way to impress us-- they put on a play with costumes, trying to teach us about Moroccan customs and culture. Then, afterwards, they really wanted to talk with us, take pictures with us, hug us-- it was really touching. Their hospitality and appreciation of us was definitely genuine, and it really touched me. It makes me eager to get into the school in Taroudant to interact with kids again on a daily basis.
Pictures will come soon! Signing off for now!
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