More Stuff

This is Muhamed, he is the potter artisan we're working with. He works from 7-7pm with no breaks, especially since it's Ramadan, and supports 11 people within his family. He makes about 60 pots/week and then sells them all on Monday in Skoura. Monday is the Souk day in Skoura so he has to travel 7km to get there, sell all of his pots, buy all of the food and supplies for his family for the coming week, and then travel back on his donkey cart. He uses a very basic kiln to fire his pots with the fire directly touching them. This can cause the pots to break, so sometimes he works an entire week and then his entire inventory breaks. Thus, his family doesn't get all of the food or supplies necessary to survive in the week. In the winter he can't make pots because his work is dependent on the sun to dry the pots so he has to take out loans to feed his family. This is where we come in. I enjoy working with him because I don't think I've ever met a more loving/ congenial/ hard working/ awesome person before. Every day is an honor to work with such a great man and we're working very hard on different ideas to better improve his life. This is why I joined Peace Corps!

This door leads to my room.

The view of the fields when I exit my house in the morning :)

One of the volunteer's host sister and her daughter... I think she's my cousin also. We're pretty much all related in our small village.

Linda, our 3 legged cat. For some reason all of the communal animals all have American names. There is Jack the dog, two Rex's, Magic the dog, and my cat Linda. I don't know if you can see or not, but when she tries to itch her ear with that leg she kind of misses since she's missing a paw. My family explained why she only has 3 paws which I understood none of so I just smiled and nodded my head. They now probably think I'm some sick bastard who likes taking limbs from cats.

My brother Jawad and Abdelrafour putting in a door frame in our new house. I helped when I wasn't taking pictures. They use very basic construction techniques using the resources around them. The walls are all mud reinforced with palm tree beams. The roofs consist of palm tree cross beams with bamboo shafts tied together to form the roof itself. Usually there is a tarp on top of the bamboo and then a thin layer of mud on top of that.