S-salamu alakum! Where do I begin? I have been in Morocco somewhere between 10 days and a lifetime. It might as well have been a lifetime, since I already traded in the American name that suited me quite well for my first 24 years for a proper Moroccan one: M’barek, “Brok” for short. According to Sayid, my Tamazight teacher, the name happens to mean “he who brings peace and prosperity to a community that had none before”—no pressure or anything.
Pre-service Training
Two weeks ago, I ventured into the Moroccan bled (the Darija term for countryside) alongside 59 PCVs (Peace Corps Volunteers). That’s right—60 of us all started on the same day, and that’s just Health and Environment volunteers in Morocco. All told, Morocco has about 200 active PCVs, making it the country with the second largest group of PCVs after Ukraine. Combine those numbers with the fact that Peace Corps has been in Morocco since 1963, only 2 years after PC was started by JFK on the steps of the University of Michigan Union (you remember the famous speech—“Ask not what your country can do for you, Ich ein Berliner and GO BLUE!”), and you’ve got a LOT of Peace Corps Morocco alums who can attest that this is a great country to serve in.
So what are the other volunteers like? Well, they’re actually more impressive than I imagined. My roommate for the first night in Philadelphia is embarking on his third, yes THIRD, tour with Peace Corps. I don’t know if he keeps signing the wrong form when he’s ending his service or if he really means to keep reenlisting, but he seems to be happy with the outcome and he’s accomplished some incredible things during his 4+ years with the PC. Our group also includes a remarkable woman who will be the oldest Peace Corps volunteer currently in service once she swears in, clocking in at 85 years young. And here I thought I had to do this now or I would never do it? Turns out I could’ve waited another 50 or 60 years and still do the PC 3 or 4 times. Oh well, I’m here, so I might as well do it now.
Of course, our group also includes roughly 57 twenty-somethings like me who bring various skills, backgrounds and experiences to the table and are ready and willing to figure out what this Peace Corps thing is all about. I won’t go too much into details about the group for now since I’m sure I’ll write more about them as the weeks go on, but suffice it to say that I have already learned a lot from the other volunteers and we ended each night of training with guitars, singing and chilling on the roof of the hotel overlooking the Middle Atlas Mountains—we get along just fine 
CBT—Community based training
One week ago, we left the hotel and drove upward over the mountains to our CBT (Community Based Training) site where I will spend the next 2 months living with a host family and studying Tamazight along with 5 other volunteers and Sayid, our muellhim (teacher). Our CBT site is beyond gorgeous—nestled above a river in the verdant Middle Atlas mountains and a mere 15 minute walk from a breathtaking view of a glistening lake at the foothills of the High Atlas mountains (also a 15 minute walk from a cyber café, hanut (store), souk (the market that comes very Sunday) and what I believe to be the only garbage can within 15 kilometers of our site)—this place leaves little to be desired.
I don’t have much time to write now before heading back to my host family’s house for tea, but I promise to do another update very soon. I know I didn’t get into much of the details yet, but suffice it to say I am having a wonderful time and I am absolutely looking forward to getting to know Morocco and its people over the next 2 years. I have actually written quite a bit on my computer, I just need to organize my thoughts and upload them, so stay tuned for entries on my host family, learning the language(s) and some of my early observations about this fascinating country. To give you a taste, shwiya b’shwiya (little by little), I will leave you with the first of many “Moroccable Moments”TM:
Moroccable Moment # 1: Grand Taxis
One of the primary forms of transportation in Morocco is a fleet of beat up, white, diesel Mercedes sedans that only depart when they have reached capacity (at least 5 passengers, not including the driver—you can get them to leave earlier by buying the extra spots). Grand Taxis go between all major and many minor spots and are a great way of getting around, a good place to practice our new languages, and of course, they are Moroccably entertaining. So far, my experience with Grand Taxis includes watching a driver hot-wire the car; sweating as the driver filled up the hot-wired car with diesel while the engine was running; asking to open the window and receiving the metal lever which I was to first reattach and then, if successful, use to roll down the window; squeezing 7 people into the car (4 in the back, 2 in the passenger seat); and my personal favorite, watching from a distance as a Grand Taxi gunned it up a winding road on the side of a mountain, in reverse. Utterly Moroccable.
Insha’allah everyone is well! Also, I finally uploaded some pictures from PST (our first 5 days in country). Click on the Flickr link on the right sidebar of this page to check them out.
Bislemmah!
M’barek
M’barek! You sir are Moroccably entertaining.
Glad to hear that you arrived safely and are having adventures. We miss you at work!!
Brok!
Love the pics, love the blog. And I hope you Morocked out on your big bday.
xx
jamie
hey mark,
cool beans that you are in morocco! i actually work for the peace corps in their marketing office in dc, so it’s cool for me to read blogs of current pcv’s and see how things are going. have an amazing adventure!
cheers,
]
megan [that girl from your faulkner class at michigan
Oops. Forgot to tell you about the taxis…..just don’t forget: Balak!
Sounds like you have having a wonderful time, Brok.
Besos!
Not to worry M’barek, diesel fuel is not combustible except under pressure, or from direct, very high heat from a flame, or when sprayed in a fine mist, like a fire eater. So you can drive and repair as Moroccably as you want. Have a great time and keep up the good work!
Chances are you will never read this, but I read your blog and think it is crazy how different our experiences are. Here I am, in supposedly one of the most developed and richest countries on the African continent (and I often feel like my PC experience is sort of a joke cause I can take a minibus taxi 3 hours and be in a city where people come to vacation), and my first week in country was spent in a training center that we weren’t allowed to leave on our own because it wasn’t safe. My training village was a tiny village that didn’t even have a store that sold food, much less an internet cafe. I didn’t check my email until my 2 months was almost up! There was nothing where I lived except miles of dirt and donkeys and South Africans. I suppose it is just strange to me to see what other experiences are like in other African countries. Where you are sounds amazing and I am glad that you are appreciating it cause most people don’t get what you have for their first two months of training (at least not other PCVs in Africa). Good luck with it all! And thanks for making me see that SA is in fact a very African country that really does need voluntters like us. Sometimes I forget that… I miss you dearly Mark.
Ngiyakuthanda~ Gugs
You should feel right at home in those Grand Taxis after our TC trip freshman year. Mercedes probably aren’t as nice as a ’94 Honda Civic, though.
And the ’94 Honda Civic went backwards too!
Mark, I’m so glad to hear your first days are already full of excitement and good people. Go Blue! (well, it feels like the only way to end a comment to you…)