Week 3- New favorite food, halfway, and a (birthday) party: July 8th-12th

Monday we began our new text book, Al Kitaab, which gets into more grammar and vocab. I snagged some avocado juice after school and then headed home.  I had picked up the cold that everyone else had over the weekend so it was good to spend a night in.  

Tuesday I discovered a new favorite food! There I a type of bread in morocco called raif- it's a basic flour, water and butter bread cooled on a griddle.  In the old medina you can buy tomato raif- it's got onions and tomato and is delicious! Not to mention it only costs 3 dirhams (about 38 cents).  

Wednesday the tenth was significant for two reasons: it marked the halfway point of my trip as well as the beginning of Ramadan.  Basically during Ramadan everyone fasts between sunrise and sunset, eating two big meals at night.  The meal just after sunset is called Iftar and consists of dates, prunes, milk, juice, various meat pastries, raif, khobz (bread), and different kinds of Moroccan sweets. Iftar is announced both from the minarets as well as on tv. I spent my first Iftar in the old medina at my host grandmother's apartment.  

Beginning Thursday we started eating breakfast at Qalam- I have no complaints because it's always delicious.  This means none of our host families have to get up for us in the morning during Ramadan. After classes we met a woman, Emily, who works for American Councils, one of the organizations involved with the NSLI-Y  application process. We walked around the ruins of an old mosque called Hassan Tower and the showed her around the old medina. I then went home for the night because I still wasn't feeling too hot.  

Friday the 12th was an early morning- I was at Qalam before 7 to help Jack ( who incidentally is from Concord Mass) bake a cake for our other friend Emily's 17th birthday.  With the help of some of the women who work in the kitchen, we had a chocolate cake out of the oven by 8. After class we had "cinema club" which left us more confused about Moroccan films than we had been going in.  I'm still not sure what the movie was about.

That evening was the graduation and party for the group who had just finished a session at Qalam. The was a lot if food and music.  We took the opportunity to give Emily her birthday cake (candles and all!). 

It was nice to get in bed that night knowing we didn't have to get up rediculously early the next morning.