Back in time for Ramadan

After some work-related traveling, I'm back in my site with two more weeks of Ramadan to go! I tried fasting and lasted about five days. It's hard! No food or water from 5 am until 6:30 pm! It was a good experience because I learned what it must be like to go hungry all day and also understand better how the Moroccans must feel during this month. I wish I could have stuck it out longer, but I couldn't.

The first day of Ramadan I spent fasting with my extended host family. I rode my bike out to their douar (village) the night before Ramadan began. We ate spaghetti for dinner and went to bed around 11:30 pm because we would be waking up very early the next day. Around 3:30 am a siren went off to wake everyone. The women got up and started preparing the last meal before the official fasting began. Everyone else, including myself, woke up around 4:00 am to eat a tajine. It was very strange eating a heavy meal at 4 in the morning. I drank as much water as I could and brushed my teeth before crawling back into bed. At 5:00 am we heard the first call to prayer (there are five each day) and the first day of Ramadan began. While my family prayed together, I was trying to fall asleep, but found it hard with the full tummy and all the thoughts spinning through my mind: would I be able to last all day? What was I getting myself into?

I finally fell asleep and slept in until 10:30 am. Usually the first thing I do in the morning as part of my daily routine is drink a big glass of water, but not that day! I basically spent my day lazily counting down until breakfast at 6:30 pm. I watched arabic television, tried reading Harry Potter, took a two hour nap, played with my two host twin cousins, and helped prepare the breakfast. Around 5:00 I couldn't even stand anymore without feeling light-headed, so I sat and waited. At that point, I felt no hunger or thirst, mainly just emptiness.

At the call to prayer signifying the end of fasting, I ran into the salon where my host cousin stood smiling and handed me a date. It is tradition to break the fast with dates, so I ate three. Then I chugged a ton of water. My host grandma yelled at me and said I shouldn't drink too much water because it would fill me up and leave no room for food. Ha! The first thing I ate/drank was hirara. Hirara is my favorite soup in Morocco! It is only served during Ramadan and is so delicious. Its a tomato-based soup with lentils, chickpeas, cilantro, lemon, and pieces of meat. I had one and half bowls. Then I ate a hard-boiled egg, which I seasoned with salt and cumin. After that, shebekia. Shebekia is another Ramadan special, and another favorite of mine. It is a cookie that is very very sweet and made with tons of honey and sprinkled with sesame seeds. After all this wonderful food, I was feeling full, but that was not the end of our meal. Next, they brought out a giant platter of baked and fried fish. I tried to eat as much as I could, but I was so full! After being scolded by my host grandma for not eating enough fish, they brought a heavy yellow cake. Then, we all drank a coffee.

While everyone was munching happily on Ramadan goodness, we watched the Moroccan tv channel. Besides the food, this is another favorite Ramadan past-time of mine! During Ramadan this channel shows special Moroccan shows that I can actually understand because they are speaking Moroccan arabic. Normally, most shows are in French or Standard Arabic, so this as a language-learner, this is an exciting time to see if all those tutoring hours are paying off! Last year, my favorite show was "Multaxi." The word Multaxi means taxi driver, so the show featured a Moroccan taxi driver and all his crazy adventures. Unfortunately, this show was canceled this year. Probably the best show this year is one called "L3awni" which means God help me. It is a show about a man whose name is "God help me" and his family and each episode they cook up some scheme that ultimately fails or surprisingly succeeds. There is another show about a woman police officer who specializes in forensics, its kind of like CSI, and probably the only Moroccan show that somewhat resembles an American sitcom. They talk fast and use a forensics-themed vocabulary, so that show is harder to follow.

Once everyone was good and full, almost everyone went to the mosque to pray. They were probably gone for two hours and when they returned I went home. I was exhausted and wanted to get back to my house because the next morning I would be leaving early for Fes. Around 10:30, 11 or midnight, depending on the family, dinner is eaten and then everyone goes to sleep and the whole process is continued! Talk about a total change in your sleeping/eating/working pattern! My first day of Ramadan, I didn't eat dinner because I was still too full from breakfast.

The next morning I began my two-day journey to Fes, where I gave a presentation for the newly arrived group of volunteers. They had only been in country for one week and still seemed to be adjusting to the shock of being in Morocco. (Which I still am, to this day!) After my presentation I had a meeting in Rabat. I'm the representative for my training group in the Volunteer Support Network, so I sat in on a few meetings and now find myself back in my town, looking forward to getting back to work with my kids at the Dar Chebab!