on and on and on...

Ok so class today was possibly the most long-winded experiences of my liiiiife. One third of the non-Arabic section of the program includes doing a few field studies research projects. Our first one (on the topic of Ramadan… specifying it as we wished) was due today. There were 6 groups of about 4-5 people that presented their final project and it just took sooo long. We’ve been giving updating presentations each week so pretty much everything everyone said had ALREADY been said. Ughhh it was awful, but kind of funny because this was our first paper that was due and our first real assignment so most people were so OBSESSED with doing it really really well, and being very committed to the project. This just cracked me up because obviously in a normal semester we have lots due all the time and when there’s ONE thing that’s due after 5 weeks, the commitment level of some very good students is so extreme it’s just kind of funny. Maybe I’m just a bad student, but I just feel that there’s a different kind of commitment level to this kind of semester. We still spend 8:30am-5pm, sometimes more, 5 days a week at the center. And although there’s not much outside of the classroom work, that’s still a lot of time to commit to ANYthing. But nonetheless, they chose to be uber students and I wanted to shoot myself in the foot…
So it ended up taking an hour longer than planned (2 1/2 hours to be exact) so we had to cancel the movie we were going to watch afterwards. Then I had office hours for Arabic (office hours in Morocco actually just mean an extra hour of class once a week in smaller groups) and my teacher told me that I was really improving. “I started slow, but she’s very proud of the progress I’ve made.” Although, she had to tell me this in French and the French-speaking students had to translate haha. And ok this is a complement… I guess? Except it means she thought I was slow at first? Haha My excuse is that we have finally moved onto using a real text book and there are real rules and themes to what we are learning. I apparently am not good at that whole ‘the teacher just spews out phrases we should transliterate it using English letters and then memorize it’ way of learning. She also still calls me Alice on a regular basis. Oh yeah, Fatiha and I have such a special bond. (To better explain this bond: today she accidently spilled water all over my pants and just kind of looked at me very apologetically and shuck her head in a “this would only happen to you Jacey” kind of way hahahaha. And it’s true, if she were to spill water on someone, it would be me.)
Also, before I left my hose this morning my mom, I think, told me that no one would be home before 7 so I shouldn’t come home until then. (Really all she did was hold up 7 fingers and this is what I translated that as…) Sooo I went to go get dinner with some friends. We went to Pizza Hut and I am not at all embarrassed to say that. It was the most delicious thing my mouth has tasted in what feels like years. Also, now that Ramadan is over, dinner is at like 10 aka right before I go to sleep and I just haaaaate eating then. I already feel gross and unhealthy about everything fried and white bread-based but then to ad digestion issues… it’s just frustrating and makes me feel icky. So Pizza Hut at 6 pm, I realize was not an answer to the greasy, white bread issue, but it was nice comfort food and exactly what I needed. So then we had to study for our Arabic test for tomorrow morning, so, naturally, we went to a hookah bar to do that. Now here is an interesting story: There’s another American program in Rabat along with SIT and it’s a CIEE group. Anyway, one of the boys in this other program, Zach, somehow got a job at this hookah bar? Yes, this is very illegal and against so many rules BUT how cool is that?! All he does is seat people and make sure they have what they need. He’s like a makeshift host/waiter. I think he had already taken a good amount of Arabic before he got here but apparently this job has been totally helpful in that aspect. He said he’s learned so so so much more working illegally and for less than 2 dollars an hour than in class. I’m jealous, and wish I had thought of that first.
ALSO, another very funny Morocco story: My friend Madeline has such a cool family story. First of all, she has two moms. Polygamy in Morocco is almost totally obsolete but this is a recent change, so families of men who are legally married to more than one woman do exist. Anyway, she has two moms and that’s fun all on its own, but yesterday she said she walked into her house and there was a live, full grown cow in her living room. Yep, a cow was lying down in the middle of her living room. She asked about it, obviously, and the answer she got (she communicates in French which she is not totally fluent in…so language barrier may be an issue in this case) but she thinks she was told that the reason for the cow is for next Aid (the holiday that celebrates the end of Ramadan). That date is more than one year away, so what this cow will be doing for a year I have no idea, neither does she. Again, I’m so jealous these cool things don’t happen to me instead. In my house, fitting a cow in our doorway would be nearly impossible and then where we’d put it I have no idea. Our idea of exciting is finally having couscous for the first time. (This meal also lasted approximately 8 minutes, none of which were spent including me in any of the conversation… yay family time)
So tomorrow we leave for one week for the southern excursion. I’m very very excited. We got a quick orientation about it and it’s going to be very cool. We’re going to see a lot and learn a lot more. Hopefully many many picture to come!