Advertisement
Having been in Meknes for a week now, and having received so many requests for updates, I decided to be that person and start a blog...I know, but isn't it better than tons of facebook updates that don't have the whole story attached? So here it is!
My six weeks here are primarily to study arabic, and so despite adventures and traveling, we spend most of the week doing the same thing. Arabic class is every day from 9-1, with classmates from Arabic at William & Mary. Then lunch at the riad where we are staying. The riad is more of a guesthouse than a hotel, and we are provided with either "crepe" bread with butter and jam, or olives and olive oil, with coffee every morning. The coffee is SO good! We also get Moroccan bread, hobz, with every single meal we eat. Lunch is always traditional Moroccan fair. We eat kofta, lentils, white beans, chicken, and couscous. After lunch we have siesta time, since everything in the medina, where the riad and the AALIM institute are, shuts down. Then on M/W we have small group study, and on T/Th we have Darija, Moroccan dialect, class. We also have random cultural activities sprinkled into the week, like an outing to the Meknes museum last Thursday, and a Calligraphy workshop this week. We also eat with a family in Meknes every other Friday for lunch, to practice our Arabic. This past Friday my friends Gace and Zann, and I ate with a family who did not speak a single word of English, though we managed to have a legitimate conversation. Friday's in Morocco are like Sunday's in the US, and lunch is the big meal. Friday is also couscous for lunch day, and our lamb couscous at the family's house was delicious. We also got to practice our Darija with the older woman. Darija is the Arabic dialect that is furthest from Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) which is used in the news and international communication. Compared to MSA, Darija is much more slurred and is written exactly as it sounds, short vowels are not too important.
Meknes is a pretty cool city, and I have definitely enjoyed wandering the medina and eating at a rooftop restaurant overlooking the Bab Mansour, the biggest city gate in Meknes. Last week my friends Shannon and Alyssa, and I went to the covered market and got olives, dates, and Moroccan sweets for dinner, of course with the prerequisite hobz to accompany the meal. Considering how much I enjoy eating olives, being in Morocco has been awesome. We are making a bigger effort to get into the New City, which is more modern and progressive than the medina. So far we have made it to the Marjane, the Moroccan Walmart, Palais du Poulet, and Label Vie, the mall, which has a food court. Since we are responsible for finding our own dinner, the small, quick, and cheap restaurants in the New City are much better for our budget than the touristy sit-down places in the medina, which can take over two hours for dinner. We also made it to McDonalds, which is proportionately much more expensive than in the US. We also peaked into the next door Pizza Hut, which, like in India, is a really nice place.
Currently there are just under 8 Moroccan Dirhams to the US Dollar, and we can eat dinner for roughly 30-50 dirhams every night. Cabs are also very cheap, going anywhere in Meknes for 20 dirhams or less. We buy big bottles of water for 5.5 dirhams usually twice a day from little convenience stores which are sprinkled all over the medina. This is the first night that I have been in bed by 12, since our homework, combined with getting dinner and afternoon classes, usually precludes early bed time, so I will take advantage of that and write again soon!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.063s; Tpl: 0.009s; cc: 8; qc: 49; dbt: 0.0345s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Ilsa fe NoVA
non-member comment
jayed jiden!
Sounds like you are having a fantastic time! Some things I learned that I will share with you: (1) take toilet paper and hand sanitizer EVERYWHERE you go. (2) If you get to go to Rabat, GO TO RABAT. its gorgeous and there are beaches :D (3) Casablanca is sort of lame. and dirty. and smelly. Go, see the mosque (get a tour - its really lovely), eat at Rick's Cafe, and peace out. Say hi to Zann and Andrea for me? HEARTS.