7.21.07

Counting down the days until the end of homestay, and there’s just over a week left. I can’t wait to have my own place. A lot has happened since I’ve last updated.

First of all, I have a house! It’s the little mud one, and I think half of town thinks I’m nuts, but I think it’s perfect. Our very own Safety and Security Coordinator came down to inspect it, which made me happy, and he says it’s fine and stable and secure. He also bargained the price for me and got them to build an indoor bathroom. This still just means a hole in the ground, but it means when it’s cold out, I won’t have to walk in the cold to the hole in the ground, but I just have to walk through my kitchen. Hamdullah. I’m paying the maximum Peace Corps will let me pay, which is really about twice as much as the place is worth, but they okayed it and I wasn’t the one bargaining. It also comes with a few pieces of furniture and later today, I’m going over to talk to them about buying the others. I won’t let them rip me off though.

Other big news: I got my settling-in allowance, which is a huge chunk of money. I’m still trying to plan it all out and budget it well, which is difficult when I have to bargain for most things, but I made my first purchase today: three banyos. These are essentially, for lack of a better word, plastic tubs. I bought one small one that I can bleach my fruits and veggies in, a big one for washing clothes, and a big one with holes (think of a giant colander) to dry/rinse clothes in. I may buy some more today; we’ll see, but I’m planning a trip into town Monday (most likely when this’ll be updated) to go on a spending spree. I keep thinking of things to add to the list though, so it’s really a challenge to budget well. I’m hoping I can buy a lot of furniture off the landlord.

Big news number three: I feel like I have a real friend in the woman next door. Either that, or she’s lonely and thinks I’m safe because I don’t speak Tam enough to tell her secrets. She told me yesterday, on one of our “Hey, Katy, let’s go for a walk for two hours” times that she has a pseudo-boyfriend in a different town, then sang for him at the top of the small mountain. I told her about a few different men in our stage who are good guys and she sang for them to come to me. It was pretty fun. We walked to the hanut on the border of a neighboring douar and she talked to the men there for awhile and they gave us free soda in little teacups. By teacup, of course, I mean Moroccan teacups, which essentially are small clear double-shot glasses. They’d never be used for anything other than tea, coffee, or soda though. But I like this woman a lot. There’s something nice just about walking hand-in-hand with a friend around the road, up the hills. I love that it’s appropriate to walk like that here, just the way it was the norm in China.

And, last, but certainly not least, big news number four: the road is (pretty much) finished! This means that the trip time to my souk town is essentially cut in half. It also means (so people tell me, though I haven’t seen it) taxis and other tobises (erm…transit vans) will start coming to site so I won’t rely on the one lonely 15-passenger-van-that-usually-becomes-a-25-35-passenger-van that only leaves twice a day. Again, I haven’t seen it happen yet, but this means when you lovely people come to see me, and I know you will, we may be able to buy out a taxi instead of sitting in complete strangers’ laps. Of course, if you want the real experience…

Big news number five was big news a few days ago but not that big of a deal anymore. I had strep throat. I’ve been sick pretty much continuously for the last two months (if you count a second-degree sunburn, diarrhea numerous times, a nasty cold, more diarrhea, and now strep throat as illnesses), but now that I’m less than two weeks away from cooking for myself, I feel like I will be a lot healthier. It was rather frustrating though. I got sick on Tuesday, could tell it was strep, and watched my fever shoot up a degree Celsius in an hour. Not a good sign. I called the Dr. on duty, and she said to wait until tomorrow to see if it took care of itself; if not I could get medication.

Okay. That meant the earliest I could get medication would be Thursday, because I’d have to go into town to a pharmacy, but okay. Tuesday night was probably one of my worst since I’ve been in site. All I wanted to do was to sleep in the late afternoon/early evening. The room was too hot, and outside proved to be too loud. I tried sleeping in my room.

Every hour or half hour, someone would wander in the house looking for me or my hostmom. They’d yell for me or for her. They’d knock on my door, and if I answered, want to have a long conversation and try to get me to eat something. I couldn’t swallow because my tonsils hurt so much. They wouldn’t listen and told me I got sick because I ate too much frozen Monaish. This would get me angry and I’d try to relax, but I get sick all the time because of the hygiene practices in the community and the change of environment: NOT because I eat the one thing that gets me protein or because I walk around with wet hair.

I tried to sleep outside, thinking people would at least know I was sleeping and would leave me alone. From the one year old trying to play peek-a-boo with me, to the five-year old begging me to make her “jumkin” from the powdered drink mixes I got in a care package, to my hostmom trying to get me to eat, to the neighbor trying to get me to eat, to the neighbor kids playing two feet from my head to people asking “What’s wrong? Don’t sleep. It’s not time to sleep yet,” it was, needless to say, frustrating. What I wouldn’t have given for a nice air conditioned room, medication, a bed with sheets and a blanket, and peace. Situations like this will be much easier out of homestay. But I digress. I was sick, I was hot, I was tired, I was ready for bed and I had no medication. It was a rough night. I finally did snap at a neighbor (the same one who told me to take pictures of the school during site visit, if you remember that story) and said, when she woke me up for the third time at about 11 at night to try to get me to eat “No. I can’t eat. I need to sleep. Enough. That’s enough. Thank you for food, but enough. I need to sleep now. I am sick. Enough. Enough.”

And then, at midnight, my hostmom who had been at a wedding (“Are you sure you don’t want to come?”) woke me up with a plate of couscous. I knew she had brought it all the way from the wedding for me, so I felt like I had to eat it. I choked down a few bites, felt a bit better, and finally was able to go to sleep.
However, two of the interruptions during my sick time were from some association members. I really couldn’t concentrate on language, so this is what I got out of it, “Tomorrow, at the neddi... doctors…souk town… women…pregnant women…television…you come…tomorrow…neddi.” I didn’t understand what it was but I understood I should go. “What time?” “Ten.” “Okay.”

The next morning, Wednesday, I woke up at nine and prepared to go explain to the doctors that with strep throat, I shouldn’t be around pregnant women. I headed over, thinking I’d be home within the hour and able to get the sleep that I so desperately needed.

My nurse was there, working on his vacation day. It was great to see him. I could hardly talk. The head of our conscription hospital was there, as well as some of the men from equippe-mobile runs. It ends up, the association worked to bring them there to give sonograms to pregnant women, and to sonogram other parts of the body as needed. How amazing is that? They see a need, a health need, no less, and work to do something about it. It’s wonderful, but it makes me feel utterly useless at the same time. I don’t need my ego stroked or do any big, wonderful projects to make myself feel justified, but I feel like there are so many communities that do nothing with health that I’d be of better use there. Nevertheless…

I explain that I just came to say hi and bye because my “timsgines” are sick but they looked and said I wasn’t contagious and that I should just get a shot. Hm… three doctors want to give me a shot of penicillin. I was all for it, but that’s not PC policy, so I called the Dr. who said no way, I have to take pills. Okay. My nurse hopped on his motorcycle, went to the clinic (this took place at the womens’ center), and brought back pills. I called PC again. Not the right pills. After all this, despite the head of the district’s hospital being the one trying to diagnose and treat me, I still had to wait until tomorrow for medication. Oh well.

They convinced me to stay awhile. I did. Then, after chatting with the equippe-mobile men, who are great and know Peace Corps because they worked with a previous volunteer in another site, I went to say goodbye to my nurse.

He was standing in front of a room of 35 women, talking animatedly. “Come here.” I went over there. He said he had introduced me and exactly why I was there, and told the women to listen to me about health things. He then lectured on different health elements: not putting freshly baked bread on the dirt ground after baking, not washing teacups with just water or sharing them, washing the handtowels used after meals, why flies are bad and carry disease, and other things that I had mentioned to him that I had observed a few weeks earlier. I was amazed he remembered.

I was in shock, especially about the bread. Here he was, talking to the same women I had seen bake bread and put it in the dirt about it and they were listening. He listened to me, they listened to him. “Katy, do you want to talk about anything?”

I got up and talked (around my bulging tonsils) about washing hands. It was basic; maybe two minutes, and my nurse talked some more about it afterwards, but it felt good to do at least something during this wonderful event. A few more times, I suggested things for him to talk about and he went on; family planning, dental hygiene, and more. He controlled the group going even to the point of separating some chatty women, or calling them out by name if they turned to their neighbor and whispered. Great stuff. But happening in my community already, without my being there; this is the best way things can be! But what is the point of me being in Tamazitinu? I’m trying to be patient, and I know there are issues, but the people are so empowered and motivated, I have no idea what my role is or what it can be. Time will tell, enshallah.

At least the next day, I got my Zithromax. I asked the Dr. if the SSC could bring it to me when he comes to check my house, which is easier anyway because I don’t need to fill out a reimbursement form. Within a few hours of taking the first one, I could feel my tonsils start to calm down and now I’m almost at 100%. Hamdullah. Surprisingly, my hostmom told me I had to take medicine fast or else it could make my heart sick. I had just read about that a few days before and was impressed that she knew it.

Along with housing forms and medication, I got my Newsweek from the Safety and Security Coordinator when he came, and a copy of Peace Works, the quarterly PC Morocco newsletter. I thought it would be two or three pages and was impressed to find the quality of the material (most of it) and the length. Great information and updates from different departments and committees, and, best of all, hilarious stories with inside jokes that would only make sense to us… if I can have a few daqiqa of your luqt. It feels so good to remember there are other people doing the exact same thing, and to know that other people get a kick out of the way you say “dinosaur” in Tamazight (“dinosaur”), or the satisfaction you can get on a bad day from whipping out a huge “Hshuma!” complete with pulling down on your eyelid. I found it hilarious when a RPCV who writes a column in a US newspaper called Tinejdad a “village” (to me, it’s a huge town, a small city. Definitely not a village, Andy Allen of the Arab Washingtonian), or how many points a vomiting person on a souk bus is worth in the PC Morocco version of “I spy” is. Yes, Peace Works is much more enjoyable than I had imagined it would be.

Take, for example, the description one PCV gave of when he was trying to translate acupuncture into Berber. “take shot that has no medicine inside and put it into the top of head but not too far in. Before you do this you must make flame on shot without medicine in order that there are no bacteria, but it is cold before putting into head.” Yep. On a good day, that’s how I sound. When I talked about dental hygiene the conversation went sort of like this:

“Do you know what this is? Yes, it’s a tooth brush. Brush teeth twice a day, one time morning, one time night, good health teeth. You understand? And take string… right word? String? (sometimes instead, I’d say “stairs” and have to correct myself. Slk, not sllum) String between teeth like this. You see? Good for gums (the word for gums is meat). First time string maybe there is blood but not problem, gums not used to string. Later, no blood. You understand?” (and, again, once I said “money” instead of “blood.” “Idamen” vs “idrimen.” Oops.). Tam is difficult sometimes, though my nurse berates me if I say that in front of him. “Katy, if you say it’s difficult, you will never learn it.” Point taken.

I learned something else about Tamazight while reading the Moroccan Arabic phrasebook from Lonely Planet one day while having stomach issues (oh, the simple pleasures. I also imagine I will put a small bookshelf in my bathroom of my house): Tam uses a lot of Darija verbs but conjugates them the way they’re conjugated in Tamazight. For example, in Darija, “I don’t understand” is “Mafmtsh” but in Tamazight it’s “ur fhmgh.” Examples are: to understand (fhm), to learn (3lm), to get used to (wlf), and to read (kra) (though that may be “to write” in Darija and “to read” in Tam).

After my last out-of-site weekend that involved me getting sick but also spending quality time in two swimming pools (yes, swimming pools in the Peace Corps. Who’d have imagined? It’s not the PC of the 1960s, sometimes for better, sometimes for worse), I came back and have noticed my Tam is getting better. The lady who is not my landlord, but is her sister and lives next door to me told the SSC when he came down, “We won’t have any problems because she speaks really good Tashelheit* and we communicate well.” It’s true: I have no problem understanding her most of the time. And I realized it: despite not really studying on my own, having a tutor, or thinking that I’m learning anything, I am getting better. Of course there are some people (a friend’s fiancée, a woman who very well might be the richest woman in town) who I don’t understand at all. But shwiya b shwiya; imiq s imiq, or, in our accent “imiH s imiH.”

Oh! I finally worked up the courage to get out the PC bike and give it a try. I love it. It only takes about five minutes to get from my house to my host family’s house on the bike and people still wave and say hi. I was also able to get there without being too tired. I’ll be able to work up to taking long rides, hopefully. I’m so out of shape, but finally even feel myself getting smaller.






*Yes. It’s confusing. The language I speak is Tamazight, but at my site, everyone calls it Tashelheit. If you ask “What language do you speak?” they’ll answer “Tashelheit.” If you ask “Tashelheit or Tamazight?” they’ll answer “Tamazight.” If you ask “Tashelheit or Tassusight?” they’ll answer “Tashelheit.” In training, we called Tamazight the language spoken in the Atlas mountain region, and we called the language spoken in part of Ouarzazate, Tata, Zagora, Taroudante, Agadir, and Essaouaria “Tashelheit.” In my part of the country, they call Tamazight “Tashelheit” and Tashelheit “Tassusight.”