Just Another Sunday

After a weekly visit to my town’s market, I saw Batoul, an Association member and close friend, making a fire for their Hamam on my way home. She said I should go see Naima (Batoul’s sister and Association President) at the Association. She had some updates to give me regarding the upcoming festival in town. So I dropped off my groceries and went to meet her. She was having mint tea with Latifa and Malika, who’d just finished their order of bread for the day. FtaH, Naima’s nephew, was off delivering. Once the 2 women left, Naima and I discussed the festival. The Commune has recently decided to organize a type of fair in town during school spring break. It will last a minimum of two days, April 5-6 (but may extend for the rest of the week if the turnout is good). There will be stands available for local associations to display and sell their products. One of the stands is reserved for us. We’ve got a lot of work to do in the next week, preparing pastries and figuring out the logistics. The Commune has also asked that I help them coordinate some environmental activities: trash management education, community clean-up and tree planting activities. (Finally, something related to my educational background!).

For the next couple hours, Naima and I organized the Association locale. We moved all the equipment we don’t use on a daily basis to the empty room, on top of the newly purchased table. Batoul and I had spent the day in Marrakech yesterday, buying the remainder of the equipment for the SPA grant. As we were emptying one of the large cardboard boxes of plates and bowls, I reached in to shift some items around and saw a sudden flash of dark fur swirl out of the box. I screamed and jumped upright. It was the biggest mouse-rat I’ve ever seen! Well, I’ve seen bigger in my house in Benin. But, it’s been years since I’ve been so close to one. Naima was in the other room and yelled back in alarm. I told her it was just a rat. She’d just filled two mouse holes in the room with pieces of rock and glass. I saw the rodent run straight for one of them and banged into the wall. He couldn’t find a way out. We slowly started emptying the rest of the equipment to move to the other room, wondering if the thing was still around. I eventually spotted it behind the flour bucket. As I moved it, the mouse-rat made a run for the oven. Naima and I cornered it there, emitting sporadic giggles and shrieks from the gross excitement of having a rat in our midst. We could hear its great mass clunking around between the gas tank and the storage cupboard. We shook the oven around until the rat finally exited the room and scurried out the front door to the gardens across the way. Hopefully it’s been terrorized enough never to return.

We finished organizing all the equipment and ingredient stock, making sure to keep all the foodstuffs in closed containers. We don’t have enough storage buckets for all the kilos of nuts, sugar, and flour we purchased for the upcoming festival. It will be good to get that display case and closed cupboard we ordered from the welder. Any day now… At 1, we went home for lunch, and returned a couple hours later to work with the women. A good group showed up: Naima, Rachida, Saida, Aisha, and Malika. Batoul was at home for her Hamam day. I’d made a comment to her about it yesterday while in Marrakech. I’d said, “what is it about the Hamam that renders women out of commission for the entire day?” She’d just laughed, then patiently explained yet another cultural norm I’d thus far failed to comprehend: The Hamam is a once a week event. It takes hours to prep the Hamam (if it’s in the home), scrub yourself down, and gather the energy afterwards to get yourself out of the hot steam room. It’s true, I’ve felt it. One is completely drained after that experience. Batoul gets a sort of flu half the time she goes. That’s why I’ve been staying away from the public bath. My flash bucket showers with never enough hot water are quick and sometimes painfully cold, but it gets my blood flowing fast and leaves me with enough energy to go about my day, most of the time.

Anyway, we made 4 kg of Qrishlat (little goldfish cracker-sized cookies with anise and sesame) today and discussed our gameplan for the festival. This will be good practice for the larger Moonfest taking place in September, and hopefully any other festivals we can attend during the summer. We are making Karbozel tomorrow: Crescent -shaped pastries filled with marzipan. I need to buy a carton of eggs and some margarine in the morning.