This has
probably been the very hardest post to start writing of my entire service. As
you might expect, with less than two weeks left in my site before I head first
to Fes (to visit my original host family), then to Rabat (to officially sign
out), and lastly to Andalucía (for a couple of weeks of R&R), this is a
pretty emotional time. Bittersweet is the go to adjective, but it hardly does
justice to how I feel, because while I’m excited to get back to America and on
to the next stage in my life the immense realization that I’ll probably never
see most of my students and Moroccan friends again overwhelms the excitement
and almost makes me wish I was extending my service just to spend time sitting
in cafes and eating meals with them. As such, I’ve spent a lot of the last few
weeks trying to spend quality time with as many people as possible, which is
surprisingly exhausting, but does lead to some great stories.
A couple of
weeks ago a couple of sisters in my adult beginners class invited me over to
their house for cous cous. As always happens, it turns out they’re related to a
bunch of people I know in town, none of whom ever mentioned that they were
related—I didn’t even know these two students were sisters until the family
members lesson! The topics of conversation ranged all over, from one of the
sister’s ill-fated attempt to teach herself guitar, which ended with her mother
smashing the “racket making device” after just two days (her mother looked pretty
embarrassed at this point in the story), to the distinction between anime and
other cartoons. This came up because their ten-year-old brother flip-flopped
back and forth between two animated channels, each showing one or the other. He
was very excited I was there, and was very proud of the English words he
learned over lunch. Their mother cooked an astonishingly good batch of cous
cous, and showed off her weaving skills on an impressive loom stored in a side
room. The conversation almost took a turn for the disastrous when the topic hit
the almost inevitable “do you pray” question. One aunt, who has emigrated to
Italy but was back visiting, started telling us all that in Italy she knows
many Muslims who are, in her words, “better Muslims” than Moroccan women. These
Muslim women in Italy always hide their hair and never shake men’s hands. Her
nieces, who are in their twenties, only rarely cover their hair and have never
hesitated to shake my hand, nor did her sister, or herself, in fact, so I
objected to her saying that the Italian Muslims were “better” Muslims, arguing
that neither way was better, just different. I started to argue that no version
of a faith is better than another, all Islams are true Islam, just as all
Christianities are true Christianity and all Judaisms are true Judaism. Then I
stopped and revised myself, if people believe their version of faith to be so
right that they kill others for it they believe a false version of the faith,
so that Al Qaeda operatives and the Afghani Taliban are not Muslims at all,
just as a man who murders for Christianity is not a true Christian, and a man
who murders for Judaism is not a true Jew. Except for the aunt, who looked
miffed, and the ten year old, who was engrossed in a knockoff version of Full Metal Alchemist, the family
applauded. Which was cool.
A couple of
days later was the start of the school holiday. Since most of the students with
whom I’m closest were going back to their outlying villages for the holiday or
were travelling around Morocco, and since my Dar Chabab is still being repaired
(the new floor goes in soon!) I decided to use the opportunity to go to a few
nearby places were I’ve made friends to say my goodbyes. First, I went down to
my friend Melanie’s site, were she has gotten yet another set of toilets built
in the elementary school in an outlying village. Just like last time she did
this (just before I went home in December) she had PCVs and local high school
volunteers put on a health fair for the students. I partnered with one of her
students, who had also gone to BRO camp, teaching an exercise lesson to the
little kids. A passing herd of cows temporarily disrupted us, but otherwise the
fair went very well and I was glad for the opportunity to say goodbye to those
students of hers I’ve met and gotten close to over the last two years.
The next
day I was in Khenifra to help the volunteers there with their spring camp.
They’d decided that instead of an English focused camp this time around we
would teach about art in various forms: drawing, painting, music, theatre, and
dance. I helped primarily with the music, teaching the students an American
song everyday and one day also teaching them the harmonies to “In the Jungle,”
my first successful attempt at getting harmony going among Moroccan youth. My
favorite part of the camp was a group of local volunteers. A friend from my
site who is a fantastic painter came in and helped the kids plan and paint two
canvases for the “Global Art Exchange.” These canvases, on the topic of world
peace, will go to an American high school (in Colorado, I believe), and in
return the Khenifra Dar Chabab will get a piece from that school. On another
day, some men who run a performance art association came and taught the kids a
dance to Katy Perry’s “Roar” (yeah, I was confused as well), and helped the
kids write a couple of short theatre sketches.
On the last
day of camp the students, many of whom I’ve gotten to know well through various
camps and events I’ve helped with, threw a surprise good-bye party for me. It
was incredibly sweet and incredibly sad. Afterwards a few kids wanted to say a
few words about the camp, and one kid's speech was incredibly touching. He said,
in English, that we Peace Corps Volunteers “are like angels, coming from far
away just to help us fill our empty time, time we didn’t know was so important
until you came.” It was a really hard day not to cry.
The next
day I stuck around Khenifra to join on a hike with those volunteers’ C.L.I.M.B
program, which ended up meaning I saw most of the same students again. We went
up a mesa outside of town that I’ve been meaning to climb for whole service, so
it was great to finally get up there. In a nice twist the grade and quality of
the slope is actually very similar to Toubkal (read: steep and covered in
scree), so I was able to tell the students from experience that it was good
practice for Toubkal. Just multiply it by 10 or 11 times.
The next
day was this past Monday and I am back to my regular schedule in site, the only
big differences being that I spend even more time trying to hang out with folks
and that I spend a lot of time helping my new site mate learn about town and
meet people. She is doing very well integrating and is already a huge hit with
my students, and I’m excited to know that even though I’m wrapping up my own
service, my students are not wrapped up with.
