a place of my own!

Happy New Year!

I am celebrating by being in my very own Moroccan apartment! bwaHedi! ("by myself") Usually when I tell people who ask,that I live alone they all say "aw, mskina! (poor thing!)" And invite me to live with them. They can't imagine anybody WANTING to live alone, and when I tell them that they just look at me weird like "well....whatever....weirdo...."

It is in the center of town, not far from the Dar Chebab (the youth center where I work.) The downside of that is that everybody knows where I live but it has helped me when I've gotten lost. It's on the second floor. Since it's the same apartment Melanie (the previous volunteer) had, it's fully furnished. It has running water and electricity. The electricity has been quite reliable, though I don't have it every morning.

Occasionally I do not have running water in the morning and I think I have figured out that it's because morning is a peak time for water and people are using it and the water doesn't actually make it to my tap. I'm figuring this out because when I do have water in the morning the pressure is really really low. Shower: I have a shower! But don't think of shower in terms of the type you're used to. I mean that I have a working shower head. So I still shower over the "toilet" (which is the turkish toilet I have previously described). So consequently you get water EVERYWHERE, but the floors are all tile and there are drains so it doesn't really matter. I have yet to take a shower where the water doesn't cut out in the middle. I've figured out that the shower is very demanding of the water pressure and if my across-the-hall neighbor turns on his tap, my shower stops running. But I just patiently wait and eventually my shower water comes back. I even have a hot water heater. These are a luxury and very few people have them. This one was installed by the volunteer before Melanie. Good ones cost about 1000 dirhams, which is half a month's salary or more for most people. And it's not like you can go to Sears and get on a payment plan. I'm really living quite luxuriously. I share the propane tank that heats the shower water with the across-the-hall neighbor, so I don't overuse it because it's really heavy and replacing it is a pain. I'm still on a two-shower-a-week program and it will probably stay like that, at least until it's summer. When it's 120+ degrees here though I probably won't be worrying much about hot water.


My apartment has two rooms. One is the bedroom and the other could be a bedroom, but instead it serves more as a living room/office. The bedroom is probably 10ft x 10ft or so and equipped with a twin bed. This is the first bed I've slept in in Morocco! It's very "western" of me to have. I'm glad I brought the set of twin sheets that I did. I'm also glad I didn't waste luggage space on a comforter because I have lots of blankets that Melanie left. My "dresser" consists of old vegetable crates stacked to resemble shelves.

The other room has a hip-high table that is my desk with some books and papers. The room also features two low ponges, which are like thick mats, just a few inches high on the floor. These are poor Moroccan couches. It is more common to sit on the floor here than it was in the Fes region. I have two small carpets made from ram skins from previously eaten Eid Kbir rams. I will be bringing those back with me to the states, if possible. They are so soft! There's also a cute green coffee table. It serves as the table where I eat all my meals and drink coffee in the morning. It's the perfect height for floor sitting.

No there's no heat or air conditioning. I sleep with slippers on because I am COLD. The buildings are relatively new and constructed with cinder blocks with no insulation so the buildings stay really cold in the winter and very hot in the summer. I blame that on the French because when they came around Moroccans stopped building out of mud, which was much more insolating, in favor of more modern concrete.

The building is three storeys. (American storeys, not European storeys, where it would only be considered two.) On the first floor (ground floor) is a shop where they sell ponges, sofas, teapots, carpets, and things like that. On the second floor live me and a neighbor. On the third floor are two more neighbors, so together four of us live in the building. Because of this, we all have corner apartments and so I have four windows and get lots of sunlight. I haven't figured out whether the landlord lives here, or somewhere else. I know he manages the sofa shop though. There is a roof with clothesline where we hang our laundry and it's very picturesque. That's the spot where I took the photos of Bouarfa that I posted in the blog a little while ago.

It's going to be a comfortable place for the next two years, I think.

Here's a link to the photos!
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2225886&id=18806879&l=d878614dfc