Bah Humbug!

Gender class just now discussed women and their portrayal in the media here in Morocco. We all had a cow about how the stereotypes seem to be consistent cross-culturally with women being shown in commercials concerning beauty and cleaning products. Hmm, I wonder why. The professor still hasn't told us when he wants us to turn in our papers or what page length they ought to be. Prof Mekouar from culture class at least got that part across, even if he does want us to go way out of our way to print out our papers. I hate cybercafés here. They're much more complicated than they need to be.

I took a really nice walk last night on the outer edge of the wall of the medina. Rabat actually looked urban to me. There were sidewalks and cars and neon signs and the occasional square of green as an effort towards city beautification. It was around 7.30pm, thus nighttime, and I walked by myself - a lone white women without her head covered, and not once did anyone say anything to me! It's not the city in general that's sketch, it's just the medina! Had I made that walk at any time of day anywhere in the medina I would have gotten much unwanted attention, like I did today when I walked with Amanda and we were called "spice girls." Spice girls is a pretty common calling. Others include Barbie, California, beautiful eyes, beautiful lips, beautiful American, enchanting, blonde, and you get the idea. Sometimes the callings are full out requests for dating, dinner, or a café rendezvous. It's gotten to the point that I am so used to ignoring anyone talking to me in the streets that even the girls from my own program have a hard time getting my attention in the street.

Mother made what she calls "spaghetti" last night but was in fact shell noodles with red sauce. The sauce here is always strangely sweet, and I really look forward to eating and drinking things not swimming in sweetness. The ladies and I are making plans for a macaroni and cheese dinner this weekend at Kim's house. Now that we have found the cheese capital of the medina, we intend on using it as much as possible in our two and a half remaining weeks. A half kilo of Gruyère is roughly $9, so it's not cheap but it's delicious enough that we don't get stingy.

Most of us girls here are on régime (diet) of some sort. Some do it to lose the bread baby, some do it to regain control of their body functions, and some of us do it to avoid the monotony of at-home meals. All of our families react to it strangely and seem confused even though it's very simple to understand that we want to take only two pieces of bread per meal instead of five.

Right now we are discussing all of the things that we steal from the dining halls. Brahim just offered us some of the lunch for the SIT kids. It's spiced carrots (cinnamon and ginger), peas, pseudo-tabouleh, and fuul (crazy shelled beans). I need to go home and try to eat the greasy dish that will await me. Since I have gone vegetarian, my family prepares and serves my food separately from their own and I have had every single possible variant of potatoes imaginable. I have had plain potatoes, potatoes with carrots, peas, tomatoes, cumin, tumeric, cinnamon, onions, preserved lemons, peppers, fuul, cream, and even dates. I swear if any of y'all even think of preparing potatoes when I get home, I will slay you.

Here in Morocco exists a response to someone saying "no," that sounds an awful lot like "aw humbug." Just last night Mohammed was having a dispute with Mother and they both said it a lot. It's quite funny to hear a conversation going on, none of which you understand, and then have a line from A Christmas Carol jump out at you. I tried to explain to the family why I had started laughing but I don't think I got the point across.