bread honey butter tea

So...you've seen the pictures. and you've heard some ambiguous haikus. now for the story:

The week started with a five hour bus ride south east of Rabat to the village that would be our home for the next few days.
We met our host families just as the last light of the day was leaving, and we stumbled home through the twilight with Mama Fatna on the donkey.
one thing: the STARS. were so bright, beautiful, and unlike anything i'd ever seen...mostly because they were stars I had never seen...you know..different hemisphere.
we met the family, had the best chicken tajine i'd had since i'd been here, and experienced the delicious home made khobz (bread) that would be the foundation of our stay.

we even made it home in time to watch diablo...after noting my surprise that we had a television...
bedtime: 9 pm and we all (me, ericka, mama, sister, little girl, little boys) got down our blankets and went to sleep on the floor.

Next, hiking alll day throughout the area where we learned about deforestation issues and land disputes and then ate some rghyf (bread) with butter and honey...and i want some so bad right now. we had a discussion with some of the village women where we asked them questions, and then they asked us questions.
they would like a health clinic.

and in my journal i wrote this question, i'm not sure why: why do we tend to either romanticize or demonize the other?
then i got to see how couscous is made from scratch. awesome. delicious. i love cous cous fridays. but you know that already.

next day, more bread, more honey, more butter, more tea
we met with the village men
we learned how to weave.
we played with Sana and she pretended she was a donkey
we watched the sunset up on the hill top and watched the clouds begin to roll in

these are the questions i wrote in my journal this day: what is progress? is being 'poor' bad if you have all you need? are you poor if you have all you need?
(obviously there are things like medical needs, education that are super important, but...)

next day, rain.
i woke up around sunrise time to the sound of rain on the beaten dirt outside
it felt like fall, finally. the rain and the trees smelled lovely.

we wove more.
i was thankful for ericka.
we shared peanut butter with our family: success

next day, i asked Badredine, "why does Mama Fatna only use hand motions to communicate with us? I mean...we know some words..."
to which he responded, "Fatna is very shy..."

we taught the kids at the school "head, shoulders, knees, and toes"...toes and nose are very hard to pronounce. we cleaned out the schoolyard, and painted the trees with this white, explosive rock that keeps bacteria from killing the trees. yay. natural solutions! the sustainability nerd within me was happy.
more bread butter honey tea
sister fatima called me a maghribia :)
it was windy, and a little cold
we took an adventurous short cut back home from school, and it wasn't ANY shorter,
but my little brother held my hand the whole way home. cute, but also sweaty.

next day,
woke up, brushed my teeth in the yard as i watched the sun come up over the distant mountains
i learned how to make bread.
we went to school again. education is key. i was told i could eat acorns...you really can. i watched little kids with joy as they entertained themselves with this game: one kid rides the bike up the hill, while the other kid runs alongside, and then they ride back down the hill and do it again.
i felt uncomfortable with some things that i saw that i don't want to talk about here. ask emi about it.
we took refuge in the trees.
ericka and i got our hands covered in henna...then we slept with it on all night, in our clothes that we had been wearing all week...and the henna is still here today. gotta love it.

that's what we did, basically. sorry that it's not very deep, that i didn't give you a detailed analysis of my feelings and magical revelations, but i didn't want to write a book.

but i will tell you that i want to go back, that it has caused me to ask questions about poverty, about development (wait..i was already asking those questions.)
and i had some good conversations with people.