A week of firsts

Last week was a week of firsts.

I rode the bus for the firs time, home on Tuesday and to school on Wednesday. My friend Leah and I, who is an avid bus rider here hopped on and payed the incredible 3.60 Dirham price (about 50 cents). The other great thing about the buses here is that you don't have to have exact change, any amount will do and there is a always someone walking around taking your money and giving you change and a ticket. Of course there was another "medicine man" preaching his word but we found seats and were left alone for the ride. At one point the bus stopped but we paid little attention and continued talking. Eventually I Noticed the bus driver looking back and us but I couldn't tell if he was talking to us. As I struggled to understand I looked around the bus and realized that there was no one on it and that the driver was trying to explain we were at the last stop. We got of laughing at ourselves and made out way home, successful bus ride with more to come.

Taught English for the first time Tuesday night. Two friends and I headed to our service

learning organization on Tuesday night for out first english class.organization helps underprivileged youth and women mostly through education. We had gone once before to meet the President, a talkative goofy man, and check out the location and facilities. It is not much, a concrete building that is dark, cold, and damp inside. When we were there it had been raining so everything inside was wet somehow and we kept getting dripped on. We had brought some paper and pencils and a rough idea for a lesson plan. At first we had only a couple students. We had them write their names on name tags and then we introduced ourselves. We started by checking what level they were at and we really had so many different levels. Students kept trickling in for about 30 minutes so we slowly branched off into smaller groups and worked with the students more individually. We had students ranging from age 11-28 and all different levels of beginner. I worked with three rowdy boys and one girl. We practiced greetings mostly and a little bit on numbers and the alphabet. They were all so eager to learn and quick to catch on that I found myself being swept up in their excitement. It was quite exhilarating. We ended up teaching over about half an hour we got so caught up in the fun of teaching. At the end of class every single student ran up to us asking us for our facebook info so they could add us. What a world of technology it is today, crazy!

Got my first scrub down at the Hammam on Thursday. I've already explained much about the hammam a place which I love. I usually try to go once a week relax in the steamy room, wash my body and hair, and of course use the "kiis" to scrub off all my dead skin.

So far I have stuck to scrubbing myself and maybe the backs of the friends I am with. However there are women who work in the hammam and for a small price will bring you buckets of water and scrub you down. I had been a little wary of this experience watching the almost violent scrub down others get but my three friends and I decided to go for it, this was the day! It took some time and at least 2 languages to explain to the woman what we wanted but eventually she brought us some buckets of water and called over the first of us to lay on the mat for the scrub down. We all watched closely to see her reaction and though the women was scrubbing hard and at times she looked in minor discomfort she came out of it feeling rejuvenated. So we all went ahead one by one. When it was my turn I laid down the matt and she began to scrub my arms, then stomach, legs, back, and neck. Some places almost tickled me and it was rough but it was also wonderful. I came out feeling alive and tingly and the softest I have ever felt.

I rode the train the first time on Friday. Transportations around Morocco is great. You can travel by train, bus, or Taxi to basically anywhere. So on Friday my three friends and I met at the train station to catch a train to Meknes. We waited in the sunny cafe at the train station and drank coffee and orange juice while waiting for our train to arrive. We met an Australian man named Heath and an interesting American woman named Laura who wore a head scarf. There were teachers in Fes returning from travels for the Prophets birthday.

We made our way down to the train platform with them and soon realized that we simply had to ask if we wanted to know what train was ours. Eventually the oldest most rundown train we had seen turned out to be ours and we crowded on. The train was already almost full so we were left to stand in the narrow hall that runs along the compartments. Many people on the train seemed to think that if they kept moving down the hall either way they would find a compartment that was open which proved difficult when the hall was only wide enough for one person let alone a person with a backpack. Things settled down and we did find one seat in a compartment which we rotated sitting in. The scenery was beautiful, lot of green countryside and small colorful towns. And in the end we safely made it to Meknes by train for only 65 dirham ($8).

Then we were on to the next part of our journey to the saint town of Moulay Idriss for the weekend....