Turkey Dinners, American Gangster, and Sir Richard Branson

It has been a crazy/random past week. I arrived at my final site after spending the night in Marrakech, which is a must see by the way. I literally got off the bus and was all alone once reaching my final destination, the site in which I'll be living for the next 2 years. After talking to the hanut owner for a few minutes he led me in the right direction. Nothing like trying to find a house in a city of 10,000 with no marked streets or addresses. Seriously, I can do anything now. My new family is great-- I have 5 brothers (2 of whom I met), one sister who is scared of me, and an awesome grandpa. Grandpa is a crotchety old man with a routine snuff problem. He looks like Mickey Mouse if he lost Minnie to a Barracuda in a freak scuba diving accident, in which he also got pressure sickness, and then went on a 10 binge. People tend to age very quickly here. He also moves as fast as Joe Zilla did after his leg went out and he laid in the bushes in front of the frat house for 3 hours and his only words were, “Ow --extremely long pause-- somebody give me a beer, I’m going to be here for a while”. I can tell we’re going to have oodles of fun together because I also talk to myself and make ridiculous claims like I invented the question mark. We pretty much just hang out in the salon while I study and he yells since he is hard of hearing. My favorite day was when we were all eating lunch and he threw a pomegranate on the floor in a fit of rage... Over what? Who knows. We all just looked at each other and said to ourselves in our best inner 50's sitcom voice, "Oh Grandpa you silly old man"! Dad looks like a very weathered and tan Charlton Heston while my younger brother looks like Joaquin Phoenix in Walk the Line. Always in black. My sister is very shy of me so I play a game with her by making faces at her while nobody else is looking which makes her giggle. She is starting to warm up though as she's realizing I'm going to be here for a while and after she taught me how to write some script. The overall site is... decent. It is completely different than the life I have become to know and love in the mountains and beautiful fields all around. My new site is pretty much a pit stop/market for people traveling from Marrakech to Safi (ocean coast). There is the main drag of highway that cuts through the center of the town and then residences and small business scattered about on both sides. There are no small taxis so the main form of transportation is a horse carriage which is actually more expensive than petit taxis in the bigger cities go figure. It is also a lot dirtier than any other city I have seen. I remember ever since landing seeing the ubiquitous black plastic bags and trash scattered about along the countryside and in villages, but actually living within it is different. I wake up each morning and open up my shuttered balcony to look upon a shanty town, smoke, trash, and dogs roaming the streets. The town is also very conservative. 99% of the girls over 14 wear the zif (head scarf) and a handful wear the full veil where you can only see their eyes. In fact, I've already had a couple people try to convert me to Islam which is always uncomfortable especially since I lack the language skills necessary to give a politically correct answer. I simply tell them that my father is a Christian and his father before him was a Christian thus I am a Christian. Family and tradition is highly respected here so it usually puts the conversation to an end. I also try to tell them that I want to learn about Islam in order to teach other Americans about it, but have no intentions of converting.This also leaves the door open for some of those hardcore religious types because it gives them a chance to teach. The meeting I had with my sheik was probably the most uncomfortable time I have had here yet. He is super conservative and yells when he talks, something I hear that is typical of people in the West. Our meeting ended with him hovering over me with his hand on my leg and shoulder helping me read the beginning of the Qur'an. I think my family was slightly embarrassed and cognizant of the fact that I was uncomfortable so I don't think they'll let that happen again (they truly are great). Besides all of this I think it is going to be a good site. I will be working with a metal workers association which produces beautiful doors, tables, and window bars which my host dad is the president of. I think they also work with the orphanage in training young men in their craft so I could also be potentially working with the orphanage which excites me. There are also 2 big schools in town so I could also teach a few English classes. Thus, there is a lot to potentially do after I really learn the language.

In other news, I already had a turkey dinner with my family in which I also ate the heart. They conveniently told me after I had already put it in my mouth. Mashi mushkil. While in Kech I saw Sir Richard Branson biking through Djeema el Fna. Turns out he owns a mansion outside of the city somewhere. I also bought American Gangster on DVD for 15 dhs, or $2, which is perfect quality and we watched it in Oz on the projector. We all thought for an hour we were in America, we made popcorn and everything and it was awesome. We all got a little sad though and reality set back in when the power went out and we had to restart. Guess we were still in Africa.