Market Day

Market day is my favourite day of the week. Something random or interesting always happens so I thought I should write a blog entry about a typical trip to the souk in Tafraoute.

We get up early and walk up to the road by 8am to wait for transport into Tafraoute. This is sometimes a bus that passes on its way south, sometimes a min-van or sometimes a taxi with 10 people crammed in the back on top of each other. We prefer the bus which is what we hopped on this morning as it slowed down just enough so that it was still moving but gave us time to jump on.

Upon arrival in Tafraoute we usually find a dustbin to dispose of our rubbish that accumulates over the week. There is no waste collection service in the valley so rather than throw it in the river bed like everyone else does we prefer to take it to Tafroute once a week. We then head to the souk to buy our fruit and veg. We usually buy a massive bag of veg for the equivalent of about £1.50 and various dried pulses and spices. Today we bought a 3.5kg squash for 80p!! We’re going to carve it into a lantern for Halloween. Then we head up to a café at the top of town where Stacey usually sits writing postcards and getting chatted up by the locals while I go to find things like cheese and cereal. These things are a rarity and usually take a while to find but the shopkeepers are really friendly and I usually learn a bit of Tashleheet from them at the same time. Occasionally while we’re sitting in the café French tourists will come and chat to us. Today 3 french aid workers came to ask us whether there were any nightclubs in town! No such luck, there isn’t any alcohol within a 150km radius of Tafroute! They must have just arrived.

Once we’ve got everything we head back to the taxi rank usually bumping into a few people we know from the village on the way. We have to sit and wait until there are enough people wanting to go to Imin’Tizeght to fill a taxi. Moroccan transport is crazy and we never quite know what we’ll be in for on the trip back to the village. Today we got a lift with a guy who was taking an oven to someone in the village. The oven was wedged in his boot with more of it sticking out than in. We were wedged in the back as usual with a couple of women trying to talk to us in Tashleheet, fearing for our lives as the taxi driver navigated the numerous potholes in the single track road back to the village whilst turning round often to ask us questions in French. I’m always so happy when we arrive back at the village in one piece!

A frustrating week in Tiznit

We’ve just got back to our house in the village after another rather frustrating week in Tiznit. After the 1st disastrous meeting with the women last Thursday we had a very constructive meeting with Brahim (one of the members of AIDECO) to discuss our proposals for the treatment of the water from the communal washing area and then another disastrous meeting with the women on Saturday. This time Maggie was present so she was able to explain things in Tashleheet and it started off well with just a few women. Maggie explained the sand filter system we’re proposing and they seemed to understand and said it was a very good idea, but then some more women turned up and it all kicked off again!

For some reason they were angry that we had called a meeting and said that we should have been having a meeting with everyone in the village including AIDECO to make decisions like this. Maggie tried to explain that we just wanted to hear their views and ideas and that nothing was going to be decided in the meeting but there were a lot of raised voices and then one woman tried to get everyone to leave. A few stayed behind and ate the cake we’d baked for them and apologised for the others but it left us feeling quite disillusioned about what we’re doing here. We thought we were doing a good thing by encouraging community participation in the project and consulting the women about a part of the project that will directly affect them but it seems that giving opinions is something that women don’t do in Moroccan society. They don’t want to be seen to be making decisions because that’s for the men to do. I’m still trying to work out the role of women in Moroccan society, you think you have it sussed and then something like that happens and you’re back to square one.

So on Monday we went to Tiznit in the hope that we would be able to discuss our ideas for the washing area with Mostapha and Hassan at the DPA and maybe find someone who knows about sand filters and could tell us whether our proposals would work or not. We thought being in our office at the DPA we’d have plenty of time to write the report for this part of the project but it didn’t really go according to plan. There were people that Mostapha wanted to introduce us to and things he wanted to talk about which had nothing to do with the project. Despite all the distractions we did get a good chunk of the report done and organised a very interesting site visit. There is a local architect called Salima Naji who Mostapha put us in touch with when we first got here. Last time we were in Tiznit she wasn’t around but this time she phoned us to say that again she was not in Tiznit but that her assistant could show us round and talk to us about the project she is working on in the centre of Tiznit. It is a project to redevelop the ruined Kasbah (a fortified area in the town centre) into an exhibition centre, museum and gardens. We went to look round the site - not a hard hat to be seen! The site office was a tent and there were a group of men lifting cement up to a higher level using a bucket on a pulley system. We climbed up a very rickety ladder to get a better look. They were using traditional mud bricks for much of the new structure and we saw freshly made bricks baking in the sun. Salima’s French assistant told us how they keep coming across parts of the town’s old drainage system and things like grain silos as they are excavating. Salima sounds like quite an inspiration! She’s a successful Moroccan woman, trained to be an architect in france, married a French man and now has her own practice in southern Morocco working on many heritage projects like the Kasbah. Not only that she is a very welcoming and friendly person and despite her evidently elevated status, has taken the time to be interesting in our work. We’re really hoping to meet her next time we’re all in Tiznit. This is her website if anyone’s interested: www.salimanaji.org.

Village politics

Wow, the politics in this village are crazy! We’ve just got back from the community centre where we had an impromptu 3 hour meeting with the women of the village which turned into a massive debate about village politics.

We went to the community centre at 3pm for what we thought was a meeting with a couple of members of AIDECO to discuss water treatment options for the soapy water runoff from the communal washing area. However, due to a big miscommunication beyond our control, about 20 women unexpectedly turned up for a meeting to discuss our project in the village (we had planned this meeting with the women for saturday and had thought everyone knew this, but obviously not!). Despite being a bit shocked and unprepared we decided to go ahead and discuss the project since there were so many of them there. There was one girl there who could speak French so she acted as a translator.

The first thing they told us before we’d even said anything was that they would not accept our project. We worked out quickly that they were referring to the works that are due to start on the earth irrigation channels. AIDECO have funding to line 640m of channels with concrete to reduce the loss of water through infiltration into the earth and therefore increase the flow of water to the fields. This work has good intentions but in reality lining the earth channels means that all the trees that grow alongside them will no longer have any water and will die. This work was due to start this week and the site office (a tent!) and all the materials were on site on Monday but the work has now been called off after a massive argument between the women of the village and AIDECO yesterday.

So once we’d explained that we had nothing to do with the work and that the first we knew about it was when we arrived in the village last week, they were more willing to listen to our ideas. We discussed the work we will be doing in the village but the meeting soon descended into a debate about AIDECO. It appears the organisation is very unpopular amongst the villagers, particularly because they feel that they are not consulted about the works they are proposing and do not listen to their views and opinions. AIDECO’s unpopularity puts us in a difficult position but we hope to be able to facilitate the communication between the association and the people of the village and to find solutions to the problems that the people agree with.

I think we ended the meeting well by saying that AIDECO had invited us here but that we want to work with everyone in the village. This seemed to go down well and they said that we are very welcome here. Phew! There are so many issues in this village, it’s impossible to stay out of the politics!

After 3 hours of heated debate we got back to the house and our next door neighbour randomly bought round a hoover for us which actually sprays the room with dust! Very useful! We’ve given up for the day and are now making pizza and bean burgers.

Une mille étoiles

Last night we went to Mostapha’s mother-in-law’s house for dinner and sat on the roof looking at the stars. I have never seen so many! You can see whole galaxies that you would never know existed if you looked at the night sky of London, and lots of shooting stars!

So this week we have been settling into village life and meeting different groups of people: the women’s cooperative who produce argan oil, the women’s English class, the members of AIDECO (the main organisation we’re working with out here), Maggie the American Peace Corps volunteer and a girl called Rachida who speaks excellent English. Yesterday we gave a presentation to the villagers in the community centre where we told them about our lives in England and the work we’ll be doing here. We spoke mostly in French but had learnt a few phrases in Tashleheet which went down very well and afterwards we served cake and biscuits which we’d baked ourselves (previously my baking repertoire consisted of banana and choc chip cake and not much else so this is a new experience for me!)

At the end of the presentation we invited all the women of the village to a meeting next weekend to discuss the problems with the communal washing area. The men and women in the village, and generally in Moroccan society, do not mix so we have decided to make a conscious effort to work with the woman on problems that concern them, something which the members of AIDECO (consisting totally of men) are finding difficult to understand. Maggie told us that previously the association installed a pipe to the communal washing area limiting the flow of water and the women were livid because they could no longer wash their rugs, but they couldn’t tell the men because men and women don’t communicate! This is a real problem here and something which we’re hoping to assist with by being a medium between the women of the village and the men of AIDECO.

Today, we’re having a bit of a day off and are going to go climb a mountain later on and pop into Maggie’s English class in the community centre.

Les bêtes sauvages partie 2

It seems a lot has happened in the last few days again involving wild animals! We are now in our house in Imin’Tizeght where we will be living for the next few months. Mostapha was supposed to come to move us in at the weekend but instead he said he had to go to Agadir to do some shopping (!!) so we decided to stay the weekend where we were with the family in Ighalen and go walking. On Saturday Mohammed took us up one of the smaller mountains behind his house and we saw some gazelle. Then later on in the afternoon we walked up the valley to visit one of the natural springs. On the way up to the spring we saw a massive scorpion (which apparently are rare at this time of year) and a red snake swimming in one of the irrigation channels. We misjudged the time and it was dark by the time we reached the spring. As if the scorpion and snake weren’t scary enough, on the way back down in the dark Mohammed suddenly stopped and signalled for us to stop too. We could hear the snuffling of wild boar just a few metres away and had to make a quick dash for the village. Apparently they can be really dangerous at night because they are almost always found in large groups of up to 40! We’re either going to have to get very good at climbing trees or not go out in the dark!

So we moved into our house yesterday and immediately set about cleaning it. Most of the year it is empty so the creepy crawlies have taken over somewhat. There was a big nest of massive ants (there are no small bugs in this country) by the front door and in the kitchen which we had to get rid of and the biggest spiders I have ever seen. The house is quite large but there is only really one room which is useable together with the kitchen and bathroom. The room we sleep and work in is a long room lined with cushioned benches. The kitchen and bathroom are very basic. The bathroom consists of a squat toilet and a shower (cold water only!!). The kitchen has a sink, a gas hob for cooking, a fridge and various pots, pans, plates and cutlery. Upstairs there are several rooms which are locked and a terrace where we can dry our clothes. I’ll post some photos soon which will give a better idea of what it’s like. It’s a pretty dingy house but it’s nice to have some independence after living with families for the last 2 weeks, and we had our first cup of English breakfast tea! It was amazing!!

We’ve spent most of today meeting people in the village and trying to cook food on the small gas hob with the limited items that can be found in the village shop. There is an American Peace Corps volunteer called Maggie who lives and works in the village so today we met up with her and she showed us round and took us to meet the women at the cooperative next door to our house. They make argan oil and associated products which they sell in a small shop. They were all really friendly and welcomed us to the village.

Tomorrow we are going to Tafrout, as its market day, to stock up on food. Then in the afternoon we are off up the mountain to look at the khettara (the upper part of the irrigation system for the village).

Les bêtes sauvages

We are just recovering after having been chased round a field by a cow! Mohammed was showing us his family’s plot of land and well in a walled area behind their house. When he opened one of the sheds to show us the cows, one of them escaped. There was a very scary moment when it was charging straight at us and all I could hear was Mohammed saying “Allez!” Luckily we got out of the way just in time. Phew! It’s been an eventful day with regards to wild animals as we also encountered a snake on the way back from the village this morning! Luckily we haven’t seen any wild boar yet as I doubt we’d be able to outrun them.

This morning we went to the village of Ighalen which we are studying at the moment to conduct an interview with one of the residents about the current agricultural situation. He was a very old man who only spoke Tashleheet (the local Berber language) so Mohammed acted as a translator. It was fascinating finding out about the agriculture and history of the village and the problems they are faced with today. He told us that the main problem is that there are not enough people left in the village to cultivate the land as most of them have moved away to cities in the north. The village has experienced 4 years of drought but he said that even if there was plenty of water people wouldn’t grow more crops as it is now easier to buy them in the local town. It made us realise that a lot of the problems that the villages face in this area are social and that there is no simple engineering solution.

When we’re not surveying in the midday sun or grappling with the French language as we write this report for the National Assembly to get funding for the village, we go walking in the valley with Mohammed. We learn a lot about the valley as he points out the different villages (whose names we forget immediately) and tells us of the traditions of the people who live here, occasionally stopping at his aunt’s house or a friend’s house for mint tea and some lessons in Tashleheet. It’s very interesting talking to a young Morrocan and learning about the country from his point of view. He is studying at the university in Agadir at the moment and tells us often of the problems with the education system. When I asked him what he wants to do when he finishes university, he replied that it’s not so much what you want to do in Morocco but what you can do as employment opportunities are limited in a country where you can buy a degree certificate for a few thousand Dirham. It seems that it is not what you know but how much money you have that will make you successful in Morocco!