Development

Prompted by a reader, I’m going to give my thoughts on foreign aid and development.

I took an International Politics class in college that I enjoyed very much. One article in particular that made an impression on me (don’t remember the author) suggested that there was no correlation between foreign aid and development. The money that rich countries give to poor countries has no effect on their development. It’s a pretty depressing claim.

The article had two big flaws, in my opinion. First was that it measured development based upon a country’s GDP (Gross Domestic Product), which, for reasons that I will discuss in greater detail below, is not an accurate way of measuring a country’s growth. Second, the article failed to take into account the fact that some aid was given during natural disasters and thus will not lead to economic growth. Countries that receive aid in times of turbulence will probably see their GDPs decrease because of the disaster (not because of the foreign aid). Failing to account for this could have thrown off a possibly real correlation between aid and development.

Nonetheless, the author and others like him ask an important question: why is it that countries that receive so much aid (particularly African ones) are still so poor and only a little better off than before? The argument is that foreign aid resources are poorly distributed. Although I believe aid has become less of a political tool now than it was during the Cold War, aid is still often given to corrupt governments. Rather than benefiting the people of the country, the aid is concentrated amongst the powerful.

In fact, by supporting these governments, foreign aid has the perverse effect of allowing them to further establish their dominance. Dictatorships can spend more money on police and security. Moreover, since the government’s treasury is filled by foreigners, it meant that it is less accountable to its people. For those familiar with the idea of “resource curse,” it’s basically the same idea: when a government does not have to depend on its citizenry for taxes (because it has oil or gold or foreign aid), the government can be more autocratic. (Quick side note: I just finished Thomas Friedman’s “Hot Flat and Crowded” and the idea of resource curse is given nearly a whole chapter in the book. I recommend that anyone interested in the climate change discussion read this book.)

Another common problem with aid (domestic or foreign) is that it is often wasted in unnecessary projects. In my town, which is the seat of commune (our town and 7 surrounding towns), a new community center was recently built. The commune was given money by a Moroccan foundation to build it. They finished working on it in July, but it has yet to be opened. It sits locked and unused. The project cost some 3 million DHs ($375,000), which is a lot of money in these parts. I am currently trying to fund a 300,000+DH project that would bring free, clean running water to 800 people. With the money from the (unused) community center project, I could fund some 9 similar running water projects. You tell me what’s a better use of resources. I don’t think this sort of waste is uncommon. The problem is that there is no dialogue between the organizations giving resources and the community in order to establish need.

Given how poorly aid is distributed, I find this argument that aid is often ineffective fairly compelling (and depressing). Despite this, I joined the Peace Corps.

The Peace Corps is not listed as a development agency. We have such a meager pool of grants and financial resources at our disposal that we are not on the same level as an agency such as USAID. The Peace Corps has three goals: 1) to improve Americans’ understanding of the rest of the world, 2) to improve the rest of the world’s understanding of America, and 3) development. So, to ourselves, we are both a development organization and a friendship one. I think the “friendship” goal is important, but in my opinion, that is not a job (of course many Peace Corps volunteers do not treat their service as though they are employed).

The question posed to me was: what do you think of the idea that foreign aid is a waste now that you are working in development?

Well, I think that development is possible and that outside forces can be helpful in that process. I don’t really have any experience in foreign aid distribution since Peace Corps has no money. But we do have resources that we can distribute, if we do our jobs well.

Our resources are primarily knowledge/information based. We are educators. I am a health educator. If I do my job well, I will improve the lives of the people in my community by talking to them about ways to live healthier. Mostly these are small improvements, like dental hygiene or teaching about vectors of disease transmission. Once in a while they can be a little bigger, like improved birthing practices or getting people to treat the water that they drink (which drastically cuts down on diarrhea, and thus infant mortality). I’m also (unsuccessfully so far) trying to get people to think about their environment and how their actions are hurting it. Specifically, the fact that if they keep cutting wood down at the rate that they are, they will not have any wood to cut down in 10 or 20 years.

None of these changes will impact the GDP of Morocco in a significant way. I suppose reduced infant mortality could bump GDP up a little bit, but GDP growth is not the goal of this sort of development work. And that’s my gripe with using GDP as a measure of growth/development. If I and every other PC health volunteer in Morocco were wildly successful (which we aren’t) we could significantly improve hundreds of thousands of lives without affecting GDP. By measuring growth through GDP, I think that development agencies can lose focus on the most cost effective ways to improve quality of life.

Now, can I (and others like me) be successful?

It’s difficult, but I believe that Peace Corps’ approach to development is the right one. I think that working with people on a local level is the right way to do development. Peace Corps is very concerned with sustainability; they make empowering local organizations one of their greatest priorities. The idea is that once the Peace Corps volunteer has finished his/her work in a community, development will continue because communities and people will have the tools to help themselves.

The difficulty is that changing behavior is very hard to do. Anywhere in the world, people have a way of doing things and a belief system that justifies those habits. Here in my community, one frustration I have is convincing people that the water they drank or a microbe they ingested has made them sick with diarrhea and not the cold or the sun. Every single person I have met, educated or not, believes that the sun and the cold are the main vectors of disease transmission. And for every time that I tell someone that a microbe made them sick, five other people will tell them that it was the sun. This difficulty is complicated by the fact that I speak the language poorly (making a convincing argument difficult) and that I have no credibility or authority. I’m a 23 year-old kid who doesn’t know how to do anything. I can’t plow a field, I can’t go to the mountain and get my own wood, I never dress warmly enough, and I’m not married. People here worry about me surviving because they think I am incompetent. Being an American gives me some credibility, but not enough. Which is why I’ve always tried to work with local people who give me credibility.

Generally, my impression of Peace Corps volunteers is that they are mildly successful in their development work. There are some volunteers who Peace Corps calls “super” volunteers. They learn the language, they integrate into their communities, and they have small-scale projects that do make an impact. But the fact that a volunteer who does his/her job is described as “super” shows how low the bar is set. There is a culture of failure and disappointment in Peace Corps. Many people come in with good intentions and energy for the work they want to do, but struggle. Volunteers are often discouraged by how their work is going. Either their language isn’t good enough, they have difficulty motivating local organizations, or the community itself may not be receptive to change. In my opinion, these difficulties arise because of 1) poor training on the behalf of Peace Corps, 2) the volunteer themselves, and 3) the real difficulty that doing grassroots development presents. It is not easy.

As I alluded to above, having money for projects would greatly improve my effectiveness as an aid worker. Why doesn’t a big aid organization (like USAID) pair up with Peace Corps volunteers in order to better distribute resources? It seems to be a good match as they have the money and we have the time to do the proper research. I have a couple ideas on why this doesn’t happen. First, if PC volunteers were given actual responsibility, then PC would have to recruit better-qualified individuals and pay more. It would change what it means to be a PC volunteer. Second, giving money volunteers money to work with would probably distract from their attention to education. If I had tons of money at my disposal for infrastructure or other big projects, I might be less inclined to deal with the frustrations of small steps achieved through education.

So, in conclusion… working for Peace Corps has confirmed a lot of what I learned in my International Relations class: development through foreign intervention is difficult to achieve. Resources are wasted. Aid is not distributed through the community but eaten away by corruption. And doing grassroots development (like in the Peace Corps) is a long, slow process. But I think that change is possible through dedication, patience, and hard work.

Update

It’s still cold here. My host mom has gone to see her family for a couple weeks, so my host dad is now all alone in his house. I’ve been going over there more often to keep him company. In a typical day, he comes over to my house for a lunch that I’ve cooked (I always cook him the same thing: a tajine, because it’s the only thing that I can cook that he will eat) and I go over to his house for a small dinner meal and help him with some household chores. Given that the health center has been closed recently (nurses appear to be allergic to cold) and that the school is on vacation, I’m happy to have a little something to do everyday.

A Moroccan told me: the conflict in Gaza will have a significant, long-term impact on the attitudes of Muslims in normally moderate countries. It will lower their trust in the United States. It is a blow to democracy. A couple others (seemingly the minority opinion) have told me that Morocco and other Arab countries are also to blame for their inaction. Mostly what I say to people is that it was a catastrophe and that I am ashamed of my government.

On the positive side of things, Obama. He gave a speech at the State Department a few days ago in which he said he would work on withdrawing from Iraq, close Guantanomo, and stop torture. First of all, it was awesome. Second, people here love him for it. Especially for closing Guantanomo. If it weren’t already obvious, he will improve the world’s impression of America.

My work is currently in a lull. It’s cold and people don’t want to do much. Like I said, I’m happy to be helping my host dad out while his wife is away. The water project has made a huge jump forward, however. The commune said they would put forward 260,000 Dhs (of 312,200 Dhs). I can get a little bit of money from Peace Corps. I’ve found a couple organizations that might give a little. And now I’m trying to fill in the rest. So if anyone wants to give a couple thousand dollars (or knows where I might apply for it) let me know.

Frannys post

First Ill respond to the political question. Its tough. I agree with my Dad; both sides are wrong. Hamas is provoking Israel and I think that they expected such a response from Israel. Having public opinion turn against Israel world wide is perhaps good for their cause.

But of course Israels reaction has been competely disproportionate. The UN bombing is, in my mind, absurd. How does that happen?

Someone that I have more nuanced conversations about this subject asked me, "who is the biggest winner of this conflict." I thought for a little bit and said, "Iran." He agrees.

But without any further delay, here is my sisters blog on her experience of Morocco.

On January 7th my mom and I left Duncan in Rabat and we set off alone for Marrakech where we would fly out the next day for Madrid. We went back to the same hotel we had stayed in while we were waiting for my baggage to come. The guy who ran the hotel loved Duncan because Dunc spoke Tamazight and so we hoped he would remember us even if he couldn’t communicate with us. As it turns out, the guy did remember us and in fact spoke really great English so we had a nice chat with him. We got checked in and decided to head out to Jamaa El Fna, which gets packed at night. There are many different food stands, all serving great soup that we loved to eat and all trying to get you to their stand and not their neighbors'. I once saw a guy get pulled to a table by a server who would not let go of this guy's hand. It’s a great place to hang out at. So mom and I set out for this place, which was very close to our hotel (down a short alleyway, turn right on the street which will take you in two short minutes to the destination). As we stepped out of the hotel into the alleyway, there was a young man (probably in his 20's) leaning up against the wall of the hotel. He looked at me and said, "inshallah" which I took for a greeting and so responded, "inshallah." As soon as I spoke the word, I realized that he had not said a standard greeting to me. No, he had said, "God willing" as in "God willing I will marry you" and I had repeated the phrase. Horrified, I started walking as fast as I could toward the busy street up ahead but this young man did not seem to care that I was practically running away from him as he fell in step behind my mom and me and started to ask me where I was from. "Where are you from? Where do you live?" I could only respond with a laugh as I sped up even more. My mom meanwhile thought this was hilarious and I think slowed down on purpose so the interaction would take longer. This fact might have led to him to switch from talking to me to trying to convince my mom to let him marry me. First he offered her $2,000 and then $4,000 and when that wasn’t working, he said that we could have anything in his house. My mom just laughed and thankfully said no to his offers. But this guy was persistent. He followed us all the way to the street and at this point I thought he was going to follow us until I agreed to marry him but as we turned onto the street he said his farewell, "I will remember you for the rest of my life" and turned around and went back down the alley. Thankfully this was the last time someone wanted to marry me while I we were in Morocco.


Duncan had warned me this might happen. In fact while my mom and Duncan were emailing each other trying to come up with plans, he even said that we would go to his CVT site so that I could "fend off marriage proposals." However when the conversations turned to marriage it was still very bizarre and uncomfortable. On the other hand, by Moroccan standards, I am still in my marriage prime (I am 20) although approaching an unmarriageable age (25 is normally way too old). Once while we were in a grand taxi being taken up to Duncan's site, the men in the taxi had a very loud and apparently funny conversation with my brother about marrying me. As I could hear everything they said but could not understand it, Duncan told me later that this happened. He thought this would be a good opportunity to explain to these Moroccan men that American women expect more from their husbands and that I would not want to stay home and cook all day and I would want to go out and travel around. I thought this was a pretty good argument until Duncan told me that it had backfired when the guy responded, "I don’t care! I'll cook… she can work!"


All in all, I am very glad that neither my mom nor my brother broke down and tried to sell me off.

Poverty

Different communities and groups of people have different ideas about what it means to be poor. In the United States, the poverty line is something like $18,000 per year, which works out to about $50 a day. Worldwide, a person is considered impoverished if he/she lives on $1 per day or less.

Here in my community, the people are mostly somewhere in between those two figures. It’s harder to measure people’s wealth here, as most are self-employed farmers whose product is not sold, but consumed within the house. Some men work outside of the community in bigger cities and have a salary, but not much of that money makes it back here. The main source of income generation is herding sheep and goats and selling them when they get big. A goat might sell for 400 Dhs ($50) while a big ram will sell for as much as 1200 Dhs ($150). Some people have smaller flocks (5-20) while there are others who have herds as big as 80 or 100. But having such a big flock doesn’t mean that you can sell them all every year. Obviously some sheep must saved in order to reproduce. So it’s difficult for me to estimate how much a family with a big flock can make, but seems to be decent money.

My host family, on the other hand, is an exception as they are on a fixed income. My host Dad used to cut wood for a logging company and now receives a quarterly pension of about 2,500 Dhs, or 10,000 Dhs ($1250) per year. That works out to $1.71 per person per day. They just sold the bull that their cow birthed for around 6,000 Dhs, but that is an event that happens irregularly, perhaps once every two years. They get milk from their cow and eggs from their three chickens. They harvest wheat and barley every year, but the harvest is only enough for half a year’s worth of bread. My family here is fairly well off. They are never worried about running out of food. They don’t have much money for extras or luxuries, but they live comfortably enough.

There are some families who are wealthier than mine, but most are probably poorer. My host cousin, for example, has no external source of income. His family has a small flock of sheep, but it’s not enough to generate very much money. Mostly they live on the wheat, barley, and vegetables that their fields generate. And they have several chickens and a cow for milk. I found myself unexpectedly at their house for dinner one day and all we had was this greasy flat bread and butter.

I am probably the wealthiest person in my village, earning 2,000 ($250) Dhs a month ($8.33/day) from Peace Corps. However, this is more money than I need here; on average I spend 44 Dhs/day ($5.5/day) on non-work related expenses. I travel far more than anyone else in my village and I spend more money on food. Also, I’ve had to furnish my house, while most people have families to inherit things from.

While life in my village is difficult for American standards, it is nothing like some of the outer communities of my commune. I recently visited a douar that was much poorer. Poorer soil quality and colder temperatures mean that they are unable to grow any vegetables other than potatoes and turnips. This also means that there is less land for grazing, so people are unable to have big flocks of sheep. Most difficult of all is the fact that there is hardly any wood in the nearby mountains for stoves. So people’s houses are cold. These people have a much lower standard of living.

In my communities, no one (that I’ve seen) is dying of hunger. It may just be bread, but I believe that people can always feed themselves. There are some health problems due to malnutrition, but not severe. Water borne illnesses are a problem, but nothing like other parts of the third world. Living in a mountainous, sparsely populated place means that most water is coming from springs without facing too much threat of contamination. As there is little access (and people don’t take advantage of what is available to them) to health care, infant and maternal health is a problem, but I don’t believe that infant/maternal mortality rates are as high as other places.

What I’m trying to say is that life in my community is hard and people are impoverished, but there are other parts of the world where it’s much worse. Getting by on subsistence agriculture and herding doesn’t provide a lot of surplus, but people do have enough to get by.

News Commentary and Update

The effect that the conflict in Gaza has on Morocco is huge. There are protests all across the country. When I was in Rabat, there was a protest there. There was also a protest in Tounfite, my 6,000 person souq town. People are angry. When I was in Midelt, someone approached me and started talking to me in English about the conflict. Then he said, “Tell your Jew friends that there is a message from Morocco. Fuck Israel.” Whoa. I saw on the news that there was a large protest in Istanbul, Turkey. When moderate Muslim countries like Turkey and Morocco are so angry, that is a bad sign.

People here in Agoudim ask me what I think of the conflict. I tell them Israel is wrong. They ask me why Israel wants to kill women and children. I say that it is an accident. Then they ask why they would blow up a school. I say I don’t know. Talk often turns to America; people ask why George Bush isn’t saying anything. They say that if America told Israel to stop they would stop. They ask why Obama doesn’t say anything and if he will when he becomes President. I say I am worried that he will not say anything.

This kind of incident really fans the flames of anti-Semitism in the Muslim world. It’s the kind of thing that turns moderates to extremists. Popular opinion in countries such as Morocco probably isn’t Israel’s first priority, but given that we are trying to win “hearts and minds,” you would think that America would be a little more concerned about the lasting consequences of such a conflict. America is seen as siding with Israel and thus siding with the slaughter of innocents.

In other, more personal news, I’ve been on vacation for the last three weeks. My mom, sister and I went to Marrakech, K’lah Mgouna, Hdida, Midelt, my site, Meknes and Rabat. They flew back to America on Thursday the 8th. It was a great trip. Most of all, it was good to spend time with my family, but it was also nice to see other parts of the country. There wasn’t nearly enough time to do everything we wanted (or even everything we had planned on doing). I really like Meknes and hope to go back there. It’s a city with a ton of history, but doesn’t have the constant nagging of tourists. As someone who lives in Morocco, it can be frustrating to go somewhere and be identified as just another European tourist. But at the same time, when I was able to make connections with people, they were really excited to meet an American who lived here and spoke Tamazight.

I hope all is well at home.

The Parable of the Lost Shepherd

In order to get a different voice on my blog, ive asked my mom and sister to post their impressions of Morocco during their trip here. Here is a post from my mom.

So Franny and I had an uneventful flight to Marrakesh, although Fran’s luggage had a vacation in Orlando and Madrid. The extra days spent in Marrakesh meant that we didn’t get to do some of the hikes we had sort of planned. But it was GREAT to see Duncan / Sma3eel! He’s gone so native! But in a very respectful way: he’s super conscientious about what is polite and what is not, very adapted to the cold (although his feet look rather sketchy) and folks light up when they hear a Westerner speaking the Berber language. Folks here are immensely polite as well. A hawker (in M-kesh) might come up to press us to go to this hotel or that restaurant, but when they discover Dunc knows ‘Tash,’ they give us the addresses of their families back home and tell us we are welcome to stay with their families on our travels. It was also fun to meet up with other Peace Corps volunteers traveling for the holidays.

After Fran’s luggage arrived, we bussed 8 hours through mountain passes to arrive at the home of Dunc’s first home stay family outside of the rose capital of Morocco. You can read more about this family in Dunc’s previous posts, but suffice it to say we were feted with food, tea, henna and evenings of relaxing with a complex array of family members. This would be an ideal homestay situation [aside from the generosity of the hosts], because the children are available for language training! We were served a delicious wheat / sugar / spice mixture scooped up with a spoon for breakfast, which went immensely well with the milky coffee served as well. That was followed by a thick chicken broth with spices and barley. Lunch was a tajine of root vegetables and a chunk of chicken or beef, which was divided for all sharing the pot. The veggies and juices were scooped with a yummy bread. Dinner was couscous with veggies and meat. All meals are eaten from a common plate or pot.

What with all the eating and drinking, it was a challenge to get away for a hike. The first day we had a tour of the family fields where beans, grains and vegetables are cultivated. The little plots are lined with fruit and nut trees (apricot, peach, figs) and rose bushes. A ‘rock garden’ is laid out for drying everything for storage. One of the funny little items ‘lost in translation’ is that I wondered if we could have some almonds for our travels; of course they gave us a bagful, but alas, they were still in their husks. I guess I expected them to come shelled the way they are at Kroger’s! We also hiked along the river valley that separates them from the next series of mountain ridges.

Family members arrived and departed on mysterious errands to and from other households or other towns. Actually just about everything was mysterious to me, given that the only thing I could say is “I don’t know Tash!” On our second day there, a story came from across the river and up the mountain that a sheep had wandered over the edge of the mountain facing us, and the shepherd had followed it over the edge. They were now stuck on the side of the mountain, and had been for 15 days, where apparently the shepherd had gone without food or water. I went up on the roof of our compound with some of the young adults and they were able to find the guy in my binoculars. They said they thought that the sheep must have given birth, as there seemed to be a lamb with the sheep. No one knew how the guy was going to get off the mountain. I could see a tall figure in a dark jellaba, but I’m not sure I saw any sheep.

It is hard to express both the sumptuousness of family life, the extent to which the rhythms of life are connected to harvest and food preparation and the raw simplicity of the family we visited. Nobody has anything of their own aside from their clothes, and these folks are relatively affluent for rural Moroccans. But they have this complex web of relationships that links them to their place and their time. It is good to be here in the harshness of the winter so that it is impossible to romanticize the easy life of a semi-nomadic people based on the bounty of the harvest. These folks work hard in extreme circumstances. We have just landed in Duncan’s permanent site, where there is far, far less than we have experienced so far. All of us are stuck on a mountain somewhere. The lesson of the parable eludes me at this point.

Travelling

Excuse my short and inconsistent posts while I travel.

I met my family in Marakech, where we stayed for three nights while we waited for Frannys bag to be rerouted from Orlando Florida. Kind of a bummer but at least it came.

Marakech was OK. After 10 months in Morocco its about time I went there; since probably every tourist to Morocco has been there. Its really busy, full of tourists, lots going on, expensive (for Morocco). Worst part is that everyone there harrasses people to buy stuff. You cant leave your hotel without someone giving you a hard time. So that gets exhausting after a while. But there are really nice gardens there, cheap orange juice, and people there loved it that I spoke Berber. I mean loved it. It probably saved me like 100 dirhams and everyone was giving me the address of their house in another city to go to. So nice to me.

Then we went to my training host family near Klah Mgouna. If you are a old fan of my blog, you may recall that they are a big family that was really nice to me and I liked a lot. Well nothing has changed. They liked meeting my mom and sister, even though communication was difficult. And they were thrilled to see me again. They stuffed us with good food and it was good to visit. I definitely hope to go back again, maybe next august when they are harvesting all the fruit trees.

Going there highlighted some aspects of my community that I hadnt noticed. The people in Klah are much better to their women; it was really good to see that. The women have a lot more freedom and their lives arent as hard. Also it made me realize how poor my current community really is. My training family is pretty well off for a rural Moroccan family and they do not lack any necessities.

The other big difference was the language. Im pretty decent at Tamazight by now, but the language down South is much different. I understood, but not as well as I do in my community.

Tonight we are in Midelt. Tomorrow we go to my site for a few days. Im looking forward to going home. Which it does feel like. Hopefully there will be a longer blog post on Wednesday or Thursday of next week. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays.

L-Eid Ixatr (Literally, The Big Holiday)

L-Eid Ixatr (Literally, The Big Holiday)

First let me reply to Jasmine. I would love to give you advice, please give me your contact info or email me at duncangromko@gmail.com

It’s taken me longer to post this time because I had some problems with my USB. Also, be forewarned, the next few weeks the posting might be more irregular as I will be traveling with my mom and sister.

Let me just apologize in advance if I get any religious aspects of the story wrong here. My excuse is that I’m learning about this all in Tamazight, which is not my first language.

L-Eid Kabeer, as it’s known in Arabic, is celebrated every year by Muslims. It is a day to remember the story of Brahim (Ibrahim) and Smaeel (Ishmael). Just in case there are readers out there who don’t know the Old Testament, the story goes like this. God told Ibrahim that he should slaughter his only son, Smaeel, as a way of proving his devotion. Ibrahim was devout and going to listen to God. He took his son, following God’s every instruction, and was about to slit his throat when God told him that his faith was proven and he didn’t need to actually kill his son. Instead he was told to slaughter a sheep. Personally, I never liked the story (what kind of sadistic God do we have?), but anyways this Old Testament story is the basis for the biggest celebration in the Muslim world. Given that my Moroccan name is Smaeel, it was also a day for young men to make plenty of jokes about slaughtering me.

Every year, thousands pilgrims make the trip to Saudi Arabia to fulfill one of the five pillars of faith of Islam. The culmination of the Hajj, as it’s called, is on L-Eid Kabeer and is a big deal in the life of a devout Muslim. Other Muslims all around the world mark the celebration by slaughtering a sheep (or more) and having a day of prayer. Like any Christian holiday, I believe that there are some folks who are more into the religious aspect of the holiday and others who enjoy the day off and all the food.

Here in small town mountain Morocco, we celebrated as well. About a month ago, my host family bought a smallish goat and kept it in their barn to fatten it up. They’ve been talking about the size of the goat all month long, eagerly anticipating l-Eid and the celebration.

This morning, Tuesday, I woke up at 6:30 am and went to my host family’s house. With my host dad and four other men, we visited each man’s house. My house was exempt from this tour because I don’t have a wife and obviously am unable to prepare food for myself or others. We sit down in the nicest room in the house and tea is poured. Little cookies/cakes are served and everyone snacks on them. After a little while the snacks are removed and aharir (a kind of milky barley oatmeal sort of thing) is brought out. We eat a little and then go onto the next house. This ritual of visiting other people’s houses is observed on two other yearly holidays as well. It’s nice for me to get to go to people’s houses who I haven’t seen before, but at the same time it means that I drink a lot of tea. Since we’re visiting five people’s houses, no one wants to eat or drink very much at any house, but every host still has to go through the ritual of insisting on you eating more. And who wants to wake up so early on a holiday?

Afterwards, everyone met outside, near the mosque in the center of town. It’s a nice time of year because all the young men who work outside of the town come home for the holiday. So everyone’s socializing and talking and having fun. There was nice weather today, so that made the experience even better. Then the call to prayer goes off and many of the men enter the mosque to pray. Me and the rest of the sinners hang around outside some more. On the other hand, hanging around outside is what most people do every day, so it’s hardly that different. “National holiday” has a different meaning when you’re a self-employed farmer.

After the prayer, (which was about an hour long) I met my host family at their house. We went to the barn and got the goat out. (I don’t know what the Koran says about slaughtering a goat as opposed to a sheep). The goat had grown pretty big over the month and my host parents were happy with it. First, some barley is brought out and fed to the goat (Why? Because that’s what God told Ibrahim to do with his son before he almost slaughtered him). Then some sort of makeup is messily applied to the goat’s eyes. (Why? Because that’s what God told Ibrahim to do with his son before he almost slaughtered him). Then my host dad knocked the goat over onto its side. My host mom grabbed the goat’s legs, all the while saying stuff like, “God help this poor goat.” I assumed a good position as photographer. (My host family had been telling me for a week not to forget my camera. Glad I didn’t. Important note, there are pictures of the slaughter below. They are not for the feint of heart. If you don’t want to see a raw picture of a goat being slaughtered, don’t look.) My host dad said a prayer and slit the goat’s throat with his knife. It died pretty quickly.

Next up is skinning the goat. You would think that by the age of 72, my host dad would be pretty good at skinning a goat by now, but no. It took a while. Our neighbor started slaughtering at the same time and finished a good half an hour before we did. Meanwhile my host mom is making smart ass remarks about how our neighbor is doing such a better and quicker job of skinning his goat. Luckily my host dad is pretty good at tuning her out. Hilarity. To be fair, it is a difficult thing to do and he is an old man. I helped with the skinning. The best thing I did was blow out the intestines. You take one end of the intestine, open it up, stick your mouth over the hole, and blow for all you’re worth. This pushes everything towards one end of the digestive tract (not actually sure which end) and makes the skinning easier. My host dad didn’t have the lung capacity to really blow the shit far enough (literally) so he handed it over to me. I was happy to oblige. Later on, my host dad kind of messed things up: he accidentally cut the stomach/intestine of the goat and spilled its semi-digested contents over the rest of the carcass, which isn’t exactly sanitary.

The goat was finally skinned and we went inside to eat lunch. We had chicken, carrot and potato tajine (what we have for almost every single other lunch). The only difference is that there was much more chicken and many fewer vegetables than normal. I went to my house and read for a little while, then went outside and found a game of soccer to join. I passed some more time talking to people outside. Everyone wanted to know if I had slaughtered the goat. Luckily I had some blood on my pants to prove that I had at least participated in the slaughter.

Around six o’clock I went back to my host family’s house. We watched some TV, drank tea, and I showed them the pictures from the morning, which they loved. We watched the news on TV, which was mostly just pictures of people slaughtering their sheep across the country. We got to see the King slaughter his sheep, which was the biggest, cleanest sheep I’ve ever seen. About eight people surrounded the sheep, holding it down and keeping a white sheet between the King and the sheep so he wouldn’t get any blood on him. He walked up and sliced through that neck like it was butter. Then we set about preparing dinner, which was goat meat. My host mom brought out the plate of the goat’s innards and set it down on the table in front of my dad. He then prepared some delicious food. The goat’s liver has been steamed. Cut up into little chunks, the liver is wrapped in something that literally means “the fat of the innards.” It’s some sort of fatty tissue that lines the inner cavity of the animal. The chunks of liver, wrapped in fat, are put onto skewers and then cooked over coals. Unsurprisingly, the room filled with smoke. I didn’t care: the meat was delicious. The liver is hardy and dense. The fat is soft and yummy. I had three skewers worth of the stuff. My host mom meanwhile had cooked some other organ (not sure which one, possibly kidney) by sticking it in on a skewer and putting it directly in the stove. It was pretty well burnt, but tasted good with salt and cumin on it. I was pretty full, but the main course still remained: goat and potato tajine. In the tajine were the lungs of the goat, which were squishy and moist. The meat itself was pretty darn good as well. As we say here, I ate until my stomach burst. We sat back to relax and watch a film dubbed over in Syrian Arabic, which neither my host dad or I understand.

I left the house and walked back through the snow with calls of “don’t let the cold make your stomach sick” following me to my home. An inch or two of snow had already accumulated.

L-Eid, Day two

Day two wasn’t very different than day one, except for the absence of prayer and slaughtering. We woke up with about four inches of snow on the ground and I went to my host family’s house to help them shovel it off of their roof. The road was cut, but it didn’t matter since no one is going anywhere at this point anyhow.

I was invited to my friend’s house for lunch, so I went over there around 11:30. About 10 other people were invited, so it ended up being a little party. We drank tea and talked, waiting for the food. Typical topic of conversation: is there snow in America? Answer: yes, but not as much as there is here. Then came the food. The first course was a sheep tajine. First time that a Moroccan has served me cauliflower here and it was pretty good. But the meat was the highlight of the meal; it was tasty and there was lots of it. The second course was couscous with sheep meat on top. It was also pretty good.

I spent the afternoon playing soccer and resting, like yesterday.

In the evening I went over to my host family’s house for dinner. The appetizer was similar, but when we ran out of liver meat, we used heart meat instead. Not a huge different. The main course wasn’t quite as good. The meat was stomach and intestine parts. There weren’t that many vegetables and it was very saucy. I’m told that tomorrow we’re eating the head.

L-Eid, Day Three

Only one thing from day three deserves reporting: dinner. We ate the head of the goat that we slaughtered two days ago.

I had imagined the head being served intact, but instead it was broken up into many pieces and served over couscous. I also thought that a head was mostly bones, but it actually has a lot of meat in it. Some people eat the brain, but my family gave it to the cat. My host mom says it tastes like eggs.

Eating the couscous, I was worrying the whole time about the meat coming at the end of the meal. The head juice has soaked into the couscous and it didn’t taste great. Once we finished with the couscous, the meat was divided and we dug in. I started with a piece of tongue that was given to me. It was tough and chewy; its taste was OK. Next, I dug into the skin of the head. There was surprisingly a lot of meat on it. When I finished with the skin, the eye caught my eye. My host dad and I had each been given an eye (only men get to eat eyes). The eye is accompanied by the surrounding skin. I ripped the skin of the eye away and ate that part first. Then I tossed the whole eye in my mouth. Its texture was kind of squishy, but the taste was OK. People cook everything to death here, so I guess it all kind of tastes the same. Finally I had an ear to eat. I took a bite of cartilage and made my first complaint of the meal: “It’s hard.” My host dad didn’t miss a beat, “You have teeth don’t you?” (This comment is even funnier considering he doesn’t have teeth). All in all, the head was OK. It’s not as good as regular meat, but it’s definitely not disgusting. If I slaughtered my own goat, I would not eat the head myself. But sitting down with my family, I don’t mind chocking it down.

My evaluation of l-Eid Ixatr? Any holiday that requires you spend most of the day with your family eating good food until you burst is all right with me.

Extended Update

This past Friday I went to my most isolated douar, which is about 28km from mine. Those people have a tough life, let me tell you. They are higher in elevation and so the weather is colder. Due to poor soil, over harvesting of wood, and overgrazing, there is hardly any wood for them to burn there. Those with money buy wood from a nearby douar, but those without get by burning dried up shrubs. The road from the community to market market town is about 54km, but it took us 5 hours because the road is so terrible. 5 hours to get to a weekly market! Most families don’t have the money for buying food anyways, so they don’t go. People get by on what they can grow in the cold conditions: wheat, barley, turnips, and potatoes.

I went to the community to visit with a woman who attended our Traditional Birthing Attendant training. I was hoping that she would, with my encouragement, lead a meeting with other women about what she learned in the training. However, she was unwilling to do it on her own and I was unable to help because of my gender. So hopefully I will go back another time, accompanied by a female.

The trip was quite successful, however, for another reason. I met with a local association president there and we talked about a number of projects that would benefit the community. The president had also set up a meeting for me to lead with a number of men where we talked about health problems and how they could be solved.

Back in my market town, I met with another man from that community and we had a good talk about further needs there. I hope that working with these two men, we can do something for this isolated community.

Other work news is the meeting I had the women in my community from the TBA training and the new doctor and nurse at our health clinic. The meeting was supposed to reinforce what the women learned during the stage and to plan out ways for the women to have a forum to speak with other women. It went very well and I am happy with the new doctor and nurse (who is a midwife). They seem motivated to reach out to the community and do education, so I hope to be working together with them a lot in the future. One negative thing: despite having a midwife assigned to the community, births will still be done in the home. Our health clinic has no equipment needed for delivering babies, so our midwife expects that she will probably not deliver a single one. Unbelievable.

Final big work news is the water project I have going on in one of my outer doaurs. We just got the estimate for the project and it’s a lot of money: 310,000 Dhs, which is about $36,000. Unfortunately, Peace Corps doesn’t provide a lot of money for volunteer projects (about $3,500 for the two years), so I mostly have to raise the money on my own. So if anyone knows where I can find that kind of money for development work, let me know. Seriously. I have some help from Peace Corps people on foundations that I can apply to, but I need all the help I can get.

Well that is all for now. I hope all is well back home. The goat that we slaughtered over a week ago is still being eaten. We ate its stomach tonight. Gross. Like I mentioned above, my mom and sister are coming to Morocco and I am taking my first vacation of my service to travel around with them. Right now the plan is to go to Marrakech to meet them, then K’lah Mgouna (where I had my training host family) then Tinrir (where my host mom is from) then Merzouga (sand dunes) and then my town, where we will stay for a little while. Once my mom and sister are sick of the cold, hopefully we’ll head up to a bigger city like Meknes or Fez and spend some time there before they head home. It’s very exciting. Look forward to reading their blog entries in this space, as that is their assignment over the course of their travels.

PS
The Bush shoe throwing incident has been wonderful for life here in Morocco. I loved it, people here love it and they love it that I love it.

9 Months and 4 Days

First Id like to respond to the post by c a ben.

I appreciate your input and your opinion. I type my blogs quickly, which can lead to mistakes, especially when discussing serious cultural issues. So if I mischaracterized Islam, I apoligize.

I realize that Islam forbids alcohol and extra marital relationships. In fact, the point that I was making is that it is this very prohibition that can lead to an unhealthy relationship with both alcohol and relations with the opposite sex. I would argue that similar prohibitions in other cultures can lead to the abuse of the same things.

Also, I am sensitive to the statement that the people that Im living with are less Muslim because of their activities. It is a common accusation of the Amazigh (Berber) people that they are not true Muslims because of their race. Not having had extensive experience with Arab Muslims, I cannot say whether or not the same behavior exists, but my guess is it does. For me, belief is what defines a persons religion. And only the person themself (and God) can assess their own belief. Thank you again for your input. Now onto the scheduled program.

9 Months and 4 Days

No, this is not the title of a movie about pregnancy. That’s how long I’ve been in Morocco. It’s by far the longest time that I’ve even been out of America (previous best was 3 months spent in Spain). It’s also 6+ months that I’ve been in my site and 3+ months since I moved out of my host family’s house and into my own. 9 months of 27 months in country is one third. I’ve finished a third of my time here. So it’s as good a time as any for a little reflection and an expanded update on what I’ve been doing recently. I haven’t been writing as good as posts recently because I lost my USB, which meant that I had to write the posts at the Internet café. Hopefully this one will be better (bought a new USB for about 10 dollars!)

I’m feeling very integrated in my community. Clearly it can get better, but I’m doing well. I still spend a lot of time hanging out in public spaces, which I think a lot of volunteers stop doing once they finish their first few months. Partly I do it for language and integration reasons, but mostly I do it because it’s better than sitting in my house all day long reading. I’ve started playing cards and another game here with the guys. People are surprised, they say, “You know how to play cards?” (The game we play is Rummy, so of course I know how to play. I want to tell them: ‘you’re playing my game’).

Now that the winter months are here, I’m also spending more time in other people’s houses. It’s mostly just 3 people’s houses: my two friends’ and my host family’s. I don’t like to have my wood stove going all day because it burns so much wood, so it’s nice to go over to someone else’s houses. They almost always have their stoves going. It’s also nice to get to know a few people especially well and to spend time with the women of the village (who spend almost all of their time indoors when they’re not working). Both friends have baby daughters less than a year old who are fun to be around. It’s also nice to eat meals at other people’s houses now and then so I’m not eating alone all the time. I’ve tried inviting people over for meals, but they refuse because a) I don’t eat meat at my house, b) I don’t eat bread at my house, and c) I (and not a woman) will be cooking. Another advantage of eating at other people’s houses is not having to dishes with freezing cold water.

That’s right, winter is here. We got our first big snow of the year on Tuesday. It’s hard to tell how much because the snow drifts a lot, but it was probably 6-8 inches. It was enough to close the road out of here for two days, not that I wanted to leave anyways. From talking to people, it seems like we’ll get big snows like this every so often and the road will be closed for a day or two until the snow plows make it out to the sticks. But mostly the road is open and no big deal. It’s not super cold; during the day it gets above freezing and the snow starts to melt.

Some people here complain about the snow, others like it. Obviously, for subsistence farmers and herders, inclement weather is not good. But people are mostly prepared for the winter and used to it. When it snows a lot, just like in America, people have to shovel snow. But here they are removing it from their roofs. I helped my host family with their roof yesterday. If you don’t remove the snow from your roof (which is flat), then you will have a leak, or worse, as the snow melts (because your roof is made of mud). The roofs are at least a foot thick, so they have potential to absorb a lot of water and become really heavy, potentially collapsing. So that’s why you shovel your roof here. The people who like the snow are mostly kids. Kids here sled by taking a walking stick, setting it between their legs, sitting down on it, and sliding down on the stick and their own two feet. Definitely inferior to American sledding. I would love to concoct a sled out of a piece of cardboard and some plastic and show them what they’re missing out on, but people here might think it ridiculous that someone my age is sledding. Very undignified.

My language is pretty good now. I feel as though I write that every time I talk about my language, so it’s probably hard for the reader to differentiate. At this point, the biggest whole in my language is vocabulary. Before, I might not understand a phrase because my ear wasn’t used to it. Now, if someone says a word I know, I will almost always understand it. Having this comprehension means that if there is a word I don’t understand I can isolate it and have it explained to me. As for speaking, I can always get my point across. I might have to rephrase something or simply repeat it, but people will understand me. Syntax and grammar here is very different/difficult. There are some nuances that are very hard to pick up on because you can’t read about them in a book and will only be apparent to you if you’re listening very carefully. It’s always gratifying when I hear a construction that is new to me. One sign that my language is decent is that a joke amongst the boys my age is to speak Arabic to each other around me so I can’t understand. However, since their Arabic is pretty bad and filled with Tamazight and unbeknownst to them I’ve started studying Arabic, I hope to be speaking that language better than them before I leave.

Another language note is that my French has improved a lot as well, from speaking with my nurses/doctors/other non-Tamazight speakers. I started reading a book in French to improve my vocab.

As for work, I’m pretty satisfied with what I’ve accomplished during my first 6 months of service. The midwife training was a huge success. And the tooth-brushing thing, although small, has gone over well.

But there’s a lot ahead of me if it’s going to be a successful service. The follow up to the midwife training has been complicated by some things going on at my health clinic. The big news is that the male nurse (the only health worker who lives in the community, the others commute daily) is leaving and being replaced by a female nurse, whose specialty is midwifery. So I think that any serious follow-up needs to first include a meeting between the Ministry of Health midwife and the midwives here in the village…but that has to wait until the new nurse shows up, which could be any time now. The next step in my eyes is to hold a bigger meeting with the women of the village and the new health clinic staff, with the women from the training acting as intermediaries. Two goals: first, to disseminate information through the population. Second, to improve the relationship between the population and the health clinic staff. If you read my community health assessment, then you know that I think that is a big obstacle to health here. Especially with this new midwife. Are women going to walk a kilometer (or more) to freezing cold health clinic (which lacks proper birthing facilities) to give birth with a woman they’ve never met? No. So I think one of the most valuable roles that I could play is as an intermediary between the health care staff and the community, in order to build trust and friendship between the two groups. We’ll see.

The other big project I have going on is the water infrastructure project in an outer douar. For those who haven’t heard, the project is to connect an existing, but empty water tower and local pipe system to a mountain spring some five kilometers away. The water tower is currently empty because people can’t pay for the electricity to pump the water up into the tower. The bill for the project has just been estimated at 310,000 Dhs, which at today’s favorable exchange rates (8-9Dhs/dollar), is about 35,000 dollars. It’s a lot of money. So raising that money is the main work. The other work is negotiating the politics of the Commune (local government) and my own community. People in my community will be mad at me if I do a project in another community, especially because the Commune is interested in working the other community for political reasons. I’m doing the project there, rather than in my community, because there is greater need. But that doesn’t mean people won’t be pissed. I may be seen as a tool of the Commune. One saving grace (sort of) is that the timing of the completion of my project (much later than the Commune realizes) will ruin their political reasons for wanting to work there. Hopefully we will be too invested in the project by the time that is realized.

Another project for the near future is more water work. In the douars without running, centralized water (most of them), I plan to go around and do tests of the water. Hopefully these tests will be followed up with education about how to treat water. I’m having a tough time getting this project going though, we’ll see how it precedes. There are a few other projects that I’m thinking about, but that’s enough for now. It’s very difficult to do work at this point (and probably for most of winter) because most people stay in their homes when it’s cold and snowy.

My final topic for this brief summary is my mental health. I’m doing well. I think I’m suited to do this kind of work/living. Some people have expressed surprise at the austerity of my life style, but at this point in my life it doesn’t bother me (except for doing dishes with cold water). I really enjoy the challenge of getting to know people who are so very different from me and the rewards that come from fitting in and being accepted. People have asked me if I’m slaughtering something for l-Eid ixatr (literally, the big holiday), which is on Tuesday. I tell them that I’m going to my host family’s house and it makes perfect sense to them: to a lot of people, I am my host family’s son. I’ve gained that status by living with my host family, by working their fields, by riding their mule, by spending hours upon hours there, and by helping them shovel the snow from their roof today. In a society that values family so highly, it is critical that I’m seen as a part of someone’s family. Additionally mental health has been helped greatly by having some work to do and feeling productive at it.

That said, this winter is going to be harder. My community is smaller now and less time is spent outside in public space. It’s cold. It’s harder for me to get out and hike, which thus far has been an outlet when I need a break. I’ll probably spend a lot of time in my house reading. And more and more (I thought it would be less and less), I miss home, my friends, and especially my family. I don’t think that’s something that I’m going to get used to. I had a great Thanksgiving and spent it with people that I care a lot about, but it was nothing like being home. Luckily, my mom and sister are coming in a little over two weeks. I’m very excited for that. And Zach’s wedding is just around the corner!

One more thing: a number of people (and not just my parents) have expressed to me that they think Peace Corps may be changing me. I wonder about this a lot. Of course it is, but how dramatically? I feel like the same Duncan, but I think that I may be more expressive than I was before. One part of my behavior that has changed (and I think is exemplary for the rest of my life) is my attitude towards dancing. I used to be a very reluctant dancer who was kind of shy. But now I love dancing and don’t care if I make a fool of myself. (One important caveat: this is only with Americans, I’m unable to let loose with Moroccans).

So all is well. Enjoy the holiday season. This may be my last post (or maybe not) for over a week because of the holiday here. I will be helping my family slaughter a sheep, eating every single disgusting part of it (including its head), and staying warm by the fire.