Great Food in Morocco

spiced olives

lentil soup in a gorgeous tureen

lentil soup

chicken tagine

fruit for dessert

Just check out the food.

Welcome to Morocco

I met a colleague and new friend, named Marty, in the Detroit International Airport.  If you've never been to Detroit, I strongly recommend that you fly into the city.  The airport is worth the trip.  It is loaded with artwork of any kind, water sculptures, bronze sculptures, paintings and a lighted tunnel that felt like a mix between a disco and a space-age walkway. As I walked through it the walls lit and the colored moved to the beat of the synthesized Broadway hits playing.  It was very entertaining.  Marty and I got to hang out for a while before the long crowded flight to Paris.

Charles De Gaulle is not nearly as entertaining as Detroit, which I have to say is disappointing since Parisians they proclaim Paris to be the Western art capital of the world.  No artwork there.  Pas du arte.  Just stark beige colored walls.  The boutiques were very chic.  A cup of mediocre coffee cost about 9 dollars.  It would have been nice to have the time to leave the airport.  I'm sure the airport must not be representative of France.

Now, the Rabat airport is small, colorful and lovely.  

Morocco is a beautiful country.  It had been raining here so everything is lush and green.  The bougainvillea and trumpet vine are in flower.  The city reminds me of some of the places in southern Spain; whitewashed walls, modern apartment buildings and lots of small cars driving quickly.  There are various kinds of palm trees and pine trees and trees that look like a cross between a palm and a pine.  

We are staying at Hotel Rabat.  Look for it online.  Go to hotelrabat.com for photos.

The greatest thing about this country has been the people with whom we are working.  We are in Rabat for a couple more days in conferences of different sorts learning about Morocco history and Moroccan customs.  An English teacher from Morocco is named Khadija Rahaoui.  She had spent a semester learning how to teach English in Dodge City, here in the states a couple of years ago with a program called ILEP.  She is a fantastic source of information as are our two other Moroccan guides, Kawthar and Hamidi.  They are interested in responding to all our questions.  They have organized seminars on the history and culture of Morocco and offering us tours of interesting places and monuments.  Today we explored the Medina, which is the old walled city of Rabat.  .

The big problem with my experience so far is the functioning of the Internet here.  I have not being able to upload any of the photos I took.  I'm sorry about that.  I wish I could show you pictures of what I am experiencing.  Sadly, the Internet connection keeps quitting out on my and so I am having no luck with photos.  So for now, I'll stick to the simple blog.  Maybe the internet in El Jadida will be improved.

TRAVEL PREP

Morocco

I will be traveling to El Jadida, Morocco with a fantastic program called Teachers for Global Classrooms  (TGC).

Morocco is a fantastic location for study.  One might ask, “Why is a Spanish teacher interested in studying the culture of Morocco?”  The answer is both simple and complex.

 I am curious.  I saw Morocco for the first time in 1992 from shores of Spain.  I can’t explain why, but the fact that I could look across a body of water and see, not only another country, but another continent is impressive. I was struck by the closeness of the world. I sat on the sandy beach long minutes watching the trucks moving along the steep inclines and the whitewashed buildings of a town, name unknown, somewhere between Ceuta and Tangiers.  Someone told me later that the sand blows to Spain from the Sahara Dessert.

More pertinent to my classroom, I’d like to develop a curricular unit regarding immigration.  It is my understanding that despite the improvements in education and economic development, there is a history of Moroccan immigration to Spain.  Some of that immigration is illegal.  Of course, this is a situation that mirrors the illegal immigration to the U.S. from Mexico.  I’d like to learn more from the point of view of Moroccan people.

We in the States have such difficulty understanding  what is happening in Muslim North Africa.   And because we, as a nation, have not informed ourselves about the countries of North Africa, they feel strange and dangerous.  Except for Morocco.  Morocco represents an exotic country that bridges the cultures of Christian Europe and those of Muslim North Africa.

I hope my visit and this blog will provide a bridge between the people I meet in Morocco and my colleagues and students in the U.S.  I hope this blog will be a space for learning and collaboration.

HELLO WORLD

“Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before.”

O.K. so I’m really not a Trekkie, but I love the mission statement.  I don’t know why more schools don’t adopt it as their own.  Something like:

The future; the final frontier. These are the voyages of Main Street High School.  Its four-year mission: to explore our world, to seek out the diversity of life and civilizations, to boldly explore where we have never gone before.

Don’t we as teachers hope to encourage a sense of wonder and adventure in our students? This blog is designed for teachers and maybe parents too.  I will describe my adventures in Morocco with Teachers for a Global Classroom and perhaps share my thoughts and insights about the way we educate our youth.

Welcome to The World is my Oyster