at the ancient roman ruins of volubilis, built by the carthiginians in the third century bc.
i fell in love with this flower, i felt like i could breathe in this place.
near meknes, morocco
so its been over three weeks since I have arrived in morocco and it feels like a dream.
sometimes, even in the moments when i feel frustrated, i have to remind myself that this is my life. that i am really doing this. that i am here: in morocco. in africa.
recently i got into a slightly drunken conversation with my buddy here, christina, about how we ended up in morocco and both of us had these almost cosmic explanations.
originally i planned to go to rome this summer to study art history (one of my majors) with my housemate, alexandra. to plan ahead i attended a summer study abroad info session which just happened to be given by my friend mark. as mark was presenting he flashed through slides of the different locations and i noticed an arabic intensive program in morocco and was immediately interested.
some background: since i have entered college and decided to study politics i have been interested in learning standard arabic (fuseha) however, every arabic speaker i discussed this with would simply tell me that arabic was too hard to learn in a couple of semesters. and so i never took an arabic class. then in the bridging the gap diversity retreat i participated in an activity that asked me what was a place i would like to visit and i responded morocco. this was possibly because it was foreign to me, possibly because it is an arab country with a french influence, possibly because it is a very liberal muslim country, because of its notoriously rich culture and because of its location, in africa, between spain and the sahara.
i told my mother about my interest in applying to go to morocco and i must admit she wasn't too happy, the program was more expensive for me, the credits didnt count towards my major and it was a country that she didn't know much about: she didnt see the point. because of this lack of support and my longterm plan to go to rome i applied for summer study abroad with rome as my first choice and morocco as my second. alexandra and i both turned in our applications after the priority deadline despite the large number of students applying for the same program (we were busy, and sooo non proactive) and as we did, i confessed to her my feelings that i was not meant to go to rome and that if i was rejected i would decide go to morocco. two weeks later alexandra and i are waitlisted for rome, the first thing i did was smile. and so it was meant to be. me and al-maghrib.
to tell you the truth morocco is much more fitting to what i was looking for. i am the only rutgers student who applied, in a small group of 10 american students (all of whom are adventurous and committed and experienced travelers), living with a host family in the capital city of rabat, in an amazing and ridiculously rigorous language program with amideast, in a country where i speak at least (at least) three languages everyday just to get a point across in daily interactions. this is me. i am here, learning something new everyday, completely out of my element and despite the struggle and temporary frustrations i thank God for it every night. layla saida (good night) from morocco.
good job grace koehler on catching this
ps: i have been reading "a thousand splendid suns" by khaled hosseini and iyanla vanzant's "acts of faith" religiously since i have gotten here. couldn't imagine this trip without these two books. incredible.
