Endi portabl -- call me!

That’s right – I’ve joined the 21^st century and finally procured a cell phone here in Morocco. Last night was my first overseas phone call, from my favorite little brother – it was so good to hear your voice, Matt!

Email me, y’all, if you want my number. I would LOVE to hear from those of you stateside, if your calling plan offers reasonable international calls, but no way am I able to afford calling overseas. Or, if you use Skype, you can call me for free … I really need to get one of these young’uns to get me signed up with Skype so I can make calls from the cyber.

Thanks, by the way, to those of you who are keeping in touch … you’ve no idea how much a word or two of encouragement props me up for the rest of the day!

Committee-d.

My stage had our first elections last evening, for our representative on Peace Corps Morocco’s Gender and Development Committee. I ran, against two awesome young women, and I’m excited to have won. We’ll meet several times a year to discuss ways to increase awareness of gender and equality issues, both among other volunteers and in the communities we serve.

The Youth Development sector has a special focus on the education and empowerment of young Moroccan women—it’s what made me so sure this location was the perfect fit for me. I can’t wait to get started.

Darenglish.

After two weeks of intensive language training in Immouzzer, I finally found myself beginning to understand the stray phrase or two, and even to string together one or two of my own. We learned present and past tense, and I’ve memorized a handful of infinitives (well, there actually aren’t infinitives in Darija, but I don’t want to put you to sleep with an explanation).

Now we’re back in Azrou, with the full Youth Development group, for some teaching methodology and seminars on gender issues, SIDA (AIDS), harassment and other topics. Need to keep going over the language I’ve learned so far, lest I lose the little progress I’ve made. As you can see, my dear friend Trish and I are plenty confused already:

Training so far in a nutshell: Not enough language procurement, personal hygiene or exercise; lots of busy work, babysitting and CYA; plenty of cultural readjustment; laughter still overriding irritation. Inching along, which is better than the “two steps forward and 10 miles back” of my favorite BSOJC lyric.

Tomorrow marks one month since we arrived in Morocco -- we're a third of the way through training. Guess that's more than two steps forward.

Quote of the day.

“One lives but once in the world.” – Goethe