BerlinBon

Obviously, it's been a while since I last posted anything here. The short update is that I am in Berlin and am about to embark on a one month course to become certified to teach English as a foreign language. Thus far, I love being here -- the weather is not nearly as nice as the weather in Morocco or India but it could be a lot worse than it currently is.

There is not a whole lot to report about Berlin. I move into an apartment on Sunday that I will be sharing with three other people who seem really friendly. I have eaten tons of Vollkornbroetchen (whole grain bread rolls) and saw some former co-workers from New York. I also spent the night sharing an apartment with a russian punk band and also somehow found myself at a house party full of 20 year olds. It is safe to say that my time here has thus far been random.

BonVoyages

And now my time in Morocco is coming to an end. Just as the spring weather is settling in in Casa, making it too warm to wear a sweater during the day, I decide to move north where you would be insane to not wear a sweater over the other 5 layers of shirts you are wearing to try and preserve what ever body heat you might have left. Tomorrow at noon, I am heading to Berlin where on Monday, I will start a course to become certified to teach English as a foreign language. I am hoping that the certification will help me find more work abroad, prolonging my life of as a world traveler.

I am super excited for Berlin since it is hands down my favorite city in the world. Also, some former co-workers of mine will be there on Wednesday, allowing for a mini-reunion to take place.

I will definitely miss my time in Morocco. The past month has been both an adventure and a huge learning experience. I'm lucky to have met tons of people and learned a lot more about Moroccan culture and ex-pats in Morocco.

'Cause Friday I'm in Love (with Couscous)

Fridays are the day when Moroccans gather around for a large Couscous lunch. I was lucky enough to be invited to one this afternoon during my trip to Asilah, which is a small resort town on the northern coast of Morocco. The Couscous is served piping hot in a tajine and set in the center of the table. Everyone grabs a spoons and digs in. There are no individual plates. When you are stuffed, you put down the spoon, lay back on your seat, put your hand to your stomach and say "hamd'allah". In my case, you do the aforementioned steps, then jump up, yell "shukriah" (means thank you) and then bolt to the train station so as not to miss your ride back to Casa.

Friendraiser Morocco: Outcome

I ended up making one friend in Casa on my own, a 23 year-old student named Mounia. She was kind enough to meet up with me and bring me around her area of Casa. My favorite part of out meet up was the fact that she speaks little english and I speak little french but am more confident in my french abilities than she is in her english abilities (in Mounia's defense, I'm sure her english is great but that she was hesitant to use it). She brought me to a market near where she lives, called Habouss. We walked around, talked a good amount, and eventually made our way back to her apartment where we ended up drinking tea and going through each other's facebook profiles. Ah, the digital age -- you have to love it for something!

The colors in this picture are not great but this is the only picture I took of Mounia that is not blurred. We bought olives here and I plan on returning to buy more for the planned "James Bond"* party we hope to throw at Basil and Hicham's apartment.



* It is impossible to order a proper martini in Morocco -- the bartender thinks you are ordering chilled vermouth -- or Martini & Rossi -- with an olive, so we've decided to rename Martinis the "James Bond" and hope to throw a party at the apartment with Martinis, Olives, and International adventure.

Out and About in Casa

As you may or may not have noticed, I've been posting more than usual -- this is because I have lots of free time in Casa, I have high speed internet and I now have my own computer to use before Hicham sells the laptop of his that I am using as if it were my own.

Last week we were lucky to have a couple (an American girl and Australian boy) stay at the apartment for two nights -- this meant friends for me to explore the city with! Teague and Rob are (get ready) friends of a friend of a coworker of Hicham's. They had been in contact with Hicham prior to us meeting them at a Sunday lunch at Soriah's that consisted of a feast of Moroccan cous cous.

I was lucky that they wanted to explore the city with me as their tag-along. I was even luckier to find out how much I liked them. This picture on the left is of them at the Hassan II Mosque, located on the waterfront in Casa.

Our time at the mosque was spent trying to catch up with the last English-speaking guided tour of the day (non-Muslims are only allowed into the mosque when accompanied by guided tours). We showed up late for the tour but were still allowed into the mosque and directed towards the English guided tour. We ended up finding the French and Japanese tours and eventually made friends with the Japanese tour group.

Here is one last picture of the mosque. We lucked out by visiting it on a beautifully clear day.

Rain, Rain, (Don't) Go Away

I've seen the most rain over the past two weeks than I've seen over the past three and a half months. We did not encounter any rain in India or Nepal until my last two days in India, where we conveniently traveled in a truck with our baggage in the uncovered storage area during a huge downpour. Awesome. Anyways, it has rained a good amount since arriving in Casa and I still am loving it (the smell and the feel of the air). Here is a picture I took from the thunderstorm that commenced an hour ago.

An Apartment with a View

This is the view from Basil and Hicham's apartment.

Le Marché Noir

Casablanca has a physical bazaar called the black market and, as you may have guessed, it is a literal and physical black market. Marc and Hicham often disappear from the apartment in order to shop around and learn the market. I was refused a trip there last weekend because my being a westerner would have affected Hicham's chances of getting a good price on a purchase. Today, all four of us went there. I regret to inform that I did not have my camera on me, which I regret because I do not know if my description of the place will do it justice. Basil has to return there tomorrow, so hopefully I will be able to accompany him there.

The black market is a labyrinth of vendors with walkways no wider than three or four feet. The overall architecture of the place is akin to that of a shantytown of sorts in the sense that it looks like a conglomeration of tin shanty towns that were smooshed together and forced to coexist under a single system of roofs. The walkways are essentially gutters with 10 inch curbes wide enough to allow a prospective buyer enough foothold to stand on the same level ground as the seller.

The black market was the perfect cultural experience that I have been looking for since arriving in Morocco. It's a place that I would not have been able to handle on my own but loved when accompanied by people who could literally guide me through it (I would have gotten lost on my own). The highlight of the visit was when Marc and I were left behind to drink tea with the vendor that Basil was about to buy his new desktop from. Marc and I both got to practice our intermediate french, while being lectured in French on Islam by the shop owner. From what we understood, he has no respect for people who smoke, he moved to Morocco a couple years ago from Brussels because of intolerance towards Islam, he was born in Algeria, and that I am invited to his house for dinner as long as I do not smoke (I don't). All in all, these types of experiences are the reasons why I love traveling -- I got to hang out and drink tea with an Algerian-born-black-market-shop-owner and his assistant who kind of kept making apologetic remarks for the shop owner's tendency towards preaching, which, as a side note, was not nearly as bad as the preaching we received from certain Indian farm owning hosts.

Messing Around

This is what happens when the maid isn't working. I'm not proud of this, I'm just showing how incredibly easy it is to get used to having someone clean up after us. Last weekend, we didn't leave as large of a mess due to the fact that I did a huge washing of dishes and cleaning of the counters because I wasn't comfortable leaving such a huge mess for someone else to clean up. This weekend, I'm officially a despicable slob who is virtually incapable of cleaning up after herself.