PACA! And other substantive things

I am excited to say that we have been in CBT for almost 4 weeks now! The experience has been complex, to say the least, and I for one have experienced an astounding array of emotions over the course of the past month. I've been excited, overwhelmed, exhausted, inspired, homesick, happy, frustrated...and the list goes on. Through all of it, though, an awareness of the amount we are learning every day remains with me. After only a month in country, I am certain that I know more Darija than I ever knew of German, a language which I studied  for more than 2 years - and that's incredible!

We only have about 3 and a half weeks of training left (wow!), and have now started delving into some of the more substantive, work-related elements of our training. Communicating in Darija and adjusting culturally are both clear necessities for doing our work well, and they remain the priority - but I'm excited to be gaining tools and frameworks for the kind of development work we'll be doing in our final sites.

For the past week or so, we have been particularly focused on PACA: Participatory Analysis for Community Action. We all heard a lot about PACA during our orientation in Rabat, but it wasn't until I actually read the manual that I realized how essential and meaningful it is to Peace Corps service. Per the PACA manual, the basic philosophy is as follows:

"PACA is a development approach that has evolved out of a concentrated effort to put participatory development principles into practice. Peace Corps has long espoused the principles of community-based participation, and PACA represents a commitment to that tradition." 

 "The process is a gender-sensitive one which must include the voices of women and men; that community members are partners, not laboratory specimens; that the approach is based on group participation, not household surveys; and that the goal is the development of a partnership, not the extraction of information."

I was so excited to read about this approach, as it fits so well with my own ideas about how development work - and all social programs - should work. Since applying to be a Peace Corps volunteer, I have thought a lot about my intention to participate in culturally-relevant projects - in other words, my commitment to not become a culturally imperialistic, "I'm-the-American-who-can-save-you" type of development worker. Not only is that attitude incredibly ethnocentric, it is also typically unsuccessful and even harmful to those being served. Thus, when I found that Peace Corps not only embraces this methodology, but that also emphasizes it and integrates it into training - wow. Plus, I was pleasantly surprised by the purposeful emphasis on gender issues, both in PACA's philosophy and throughout the methodology. Rather than being a side issue, casually mentioned every now and then (which happens all to often), gender is continually framed as an inseparable element of our analysis and our work. Reading PACA, I was once again reminded of how awesome this organization is and how great a fit Peace Corps is for my passions and goals in life.

PACA involves many steps, and we are going to be practicing a bit with implementing each one while we are here in our CBT site, with the help of each other and our Language-Cultural Facilitator, Omar. The goal is for us to get our feet wet and have some experience with the process, so that when we get to our final sites we can feel confident implementing it on our own.

We started last week with something called Community Mapping, and I'm excited to say that it was a great success! The goal of Community Mapping is to learn about the community as a whole in a participatory, interactive way, gaining an understanding of a variety of things: different spheres of activity, resources available, who benefits from which resources and why, frequently visited areas, what resources are lacking in the community, gender differences (division of labor, integration, relative importance of resources, etc), population centers, etc.

The point here is not to draw a simple map outlining various streets and locations; rather, it is to tell the story of a community - to understand what is important to whom, the reasons behind it, and what the needs of the community are, from the perspective of those living and working there. It is a truly wonderful concept, and such an effective and meaningful method for understanding a community.

Last week, we invited members of the community to the Dar Chebab, where we have language lessons, to participate in the Community Mapping with us. We were very lucky, because we're already connected with one of the active associations in Marja that work on youth/community issues. Two members of our group - Lee and Kitty - have host family members who are active in the association, so they were able to help us out with inviting interested people to the meeting!

We broke everyone into two groups - men and women, and had them draw Marja, as they see it - what's important, what's utilized / not utilized, what happens where, who visits different places, etc.

Both maps were incredibly detailed, and it was clear that everyone was really invested in drawing socially, economically, and spatially accurate maps. When they were complete, we came together as a group to discuss what was included on each map, why, and what it meant for the community's needs. The discussions were enlightening on many levels: we learned about the different areas of Marja (and the fact that it's actually comprised of three different neighborhoods), resource distribution, and the problems facing those working on youth and gender issues. 

The men's map

The women's map

A recurring theme from both groups was access to resources - since so many of the services (youth center, women's center, bank, government office, etc.) are located in one small area, it is difficult for those who live outside of that area to access those resources. This is particularly true for youth and women who could benefit from the centers, but who face safety concerns when walking long distances across the community alone, especially at night. They told us that if we want to get more youth into Dar Chebabs and more women into women's centers, this issue has to be addressed. Even though we can't feasibly solve that problem with our remaining 3 weeks in Marja, we can certainly take this lesson with us and apply it to our future work in our final sites.

Marja, as drawn by us PCTs - clearly not as detailed!

Although there's still so much to learn before swearing in, I'm getting excited about the prospect of developing projects in my final site. Two years is a short time in many ways, but it is long in many others, and I'm pumped about all of the work that could be done in that timeframe. I still don't know where I'll be, but trust that I'll be writing all about it as soon as I know!

A day off and a breathtaking adventure

Training, training, training! There is so much to tell, and so little time to share all of it with you!

Last week we had the opportunity to help out with the spring camp for youth at our local Dar Chebab - it was at once challenging yet easy, fun yet exhausting, and above all, eye-opening. It was a great chance to see the kind of work currently being done for youth in Morocco - and a chance to spread our wings a bit and do some real work. I'm still doing some mental debriefing about the experience, but I hope to write about it in greater detail soon. I know I keep making promises to write about this and that at a mysterious time called "soon," but I will, bear with me! :)

For now, what I'd really like to share with you is a bit about our adventure on Sunday. A group of us took advantage of our day off (they are few and far between, yet so very needed during training!) by taking a trip to visit some PCTs living in Moulay Yacoub. Moulay Yacoub is a tad touristy, but I could understand why immediately upon arriving: it is an absolutely breathtaking town built into a hillside, amongst miles and miles of rolling hills and small mountains. A walk through the town is a beautiful maze of winding stairs, and the view of the hills beyond is never father than a look over your shoulder.

A group of 8 of us - two from my CBT, four from other CBTs around Fes, and two who are training in Youlay Macoub - went on a day-long hike and picnic through the hills neighboring the town. It was exactly what I - and I think all of us, in fact - needed, especially after weeks in cities like Rabat and Fes. Everyone knows how much I love citites, but I also never underestimate the sheer power of nature's beauty in warming the soul. Training, frankly, can be exhausting at times - we are living in a new culture, staying with a host family who speaks a different language and has different customs than those we're used to, studying Darija almost contstantly, and adjusting to making new lives for ourselves here. All of that, although helpful and wonderful in many ways, is a lot to take on - and a day in the magnificent rolling hills of Moulay Yacoub with wonderful friends was rejuvenating for the mind, body, and soul. Even now, looking back on it almost feels like a dream.

It's difficult to express this experience in sentences, so I'll share with you the poem I wrote while sitting atop one of the peaks on our hike. It's about nature, wonder, and the truth that can be found in the world's beauty:


Simultaneity

Nature, like music,
Charms the soul
Truth plays like notes on the wind
And mysteries unlock
From times long forgotten
Yet still to be found

Hills, new and changing
Yet older than we know
At once rolling, yet still
Singular, plural

Unison, simultaneity
Faith, perspective

Clouds, as shadows
Roll time across hills
As sky with earth become one

Grasses, billow in a breeze
Like water under wind
Water’s waves, a sea of golden earth

Unison, simultaneity
Faith, perspective

Nature, like music,
Charms the soul
Winds blow melodies into hearts
As lungs inhale new hopes
Exhale old fears
And remember dreams once lost




 

A Day in the Life of a PCT

I’m excited to say that I’ve made it through my first full week of CBT (community-based training)! I feel as though it’s been much less than one week and also much more than one week, both at the same time.

I already have so much to write and tell everyone about, but there isn’t nearly enough time left over to cover it all here, even if I wrote for hours! Rather than trying to cover everything, I thought I’d give a general picture of what a typical day looks like in my new life as a PCT (Peace Corps Trainee)! This post is going to be long, so hold onto your hats! J

- CBT in brief: For about 8 weeks, we train and live in a community known as our CBT site. There are 6 of us in my group, plus our LCF (language-cultural facilitator). We’re living in a neighborhood called Marja, which is on the outskirts of the great city of Fes and has a breathtaking view of some small mountains. We each live with a different host family in the neighborhood and come together during the day for language and cultural lessons.

- My host family: I live with a wonderful family in an apartment right around the corner from the Dar Chebab where we have our lessons every day! I have a host mom, host dad, two host sisters and a host brother. My host sisters are ages 17 and 26, and my host brother is 16, so it’s a really fun dynamic in our house. Plus, the rest of the family lives in the apartments next door and across the street from us, so there are usually various people coming in and out, saying hello and visiting with us. My host family is incredibly generous – they’ve welcomed me into their home with a level of hospitality that amazes me every day. My host sister made me a beautiful bracelet with my name sewed into it with beads, and they bought me a pair of Moroccan house slippers to wear as well! Just when I thought the generosity might have reached its peak, they surprised me with two gorgeous Moroccan outfits to wear and threw a huge party for me with henna and everything! I am so blown away – I feel as though even in English I don’t possess words to adequately express how thankful I am for them!

     

     

    

Here’s a look at our typical daily schedule:

- Wake up around 7 and have breakfast with my host family, which consists of various delicious breads with jelly, cheese, olives, and eggs. (Don’t worry – I will of course dedicate an entire post to describing all the wonderful food of Morocco in more detail very soon J). My host dad is the principal of the school near our house, so sometimes after breakfast he takes me by there to meet the teachers and say hello to some of the kids. It’s really a wonderful opportunity, because meeting with local teachers and students will obviously be a key part in developing new activities for the Dar Chebab later in our training.

- Intensive language lessons all morning at the Dar Chebab (youth center) with the CBT group, led by Omar. Our Darija is progressing, shwiya b shwiya (little by little)! Some of the sounds in Arabic that were really difficult to pronounce in the beginning are starting to be more familiar, and we are actually putting together some nifty sentences now! We work hard and learn a lot each day, but we also have a ton of fun together, laughing at ourselves and having fun with the new language. Just as an example, we’ve discovered that the phrase for, “Do you need help?” -- “Wesh en Eawnik?” sounds a lot like, “Wash an owls neck!” It sounds silly and cracks me up every time I think of it, but you know what?: I’ll never forget how to say that phrase! I’m finding that a sense of humor and at least a few good belly laughs every day can make anything more manageable.

- We each have lunch with our respective host families from around 12:30 – 2. The lunch break here is typically long like this, and it seems like Moroccans often come home from school/work to eat and spend time with their families for a bit during this time. As someone who’s been busy and eating lunch on the go a lot in the past, I have to say that the built-in long lunch break is awesome. It’s such a great way to recharge, especially when my brain feels fried after hours of language classes. My host dad usually talks to me about my day in Darija, such as inquiring about what we learned that morning or what I think about the weather. It’s such a great feeling every time I have a full conversation in Darija, and those moments are happening more and more often, shwiya b shwiya!

- In the afternoons, our CBT group gets together for various cultural and community education activities. Some days we have conversations about specific topics such as norms and values; sometimes we walk around, familiarizing ourselves with the community; and sometimes we simply sit at a café drinking kahuwa (coffee) and talking about our experiences with the culture so far. The café chats together are truly therapeutic for us – it can get really exhausting constantly feeling as though you’re struggling to communicate, so it’s nice to sit with each other, talk, listen, learn from one-another, and be understood. I honestly don’t know what I would do without my CBT group! Support systems manifest themselves in various ways during Peace Corps service, and it’s already obvious how important we will be to one-another during these weeks. We’ve also met with local officials and seen the women’s center in the area, which is really amazing. Just as there are Dar Chebabs in communities all over Morocco, there are many women’s centers like the one in here in Marja, dedicated to empowerment, literacy, various clubs, and much more. I’m sure I’ll write more about this soon, but I was really encouraged and inspired by what I saw of the center here, and I hope to be involved with one like it in my final site, wherever that might be.

- I return back to my host family around 6 or 7pm, and hang out with them the rest of the night. We have the pre-dinner “snack time” when I get back, and its usually some yummy combination of breads, jam, cookies, olives, peanuts, eggs, and other appetizer-type things. My family is super excited about helping me learn Darija, so oftentimes they teach me new words and phrases through conversations, or they point out objects and tell me the Darija words for them while we watch the Turkish soap operas or Moroccan Idol (that’s right – Moroccan Idol. It’s pretty awesome, not going to lie). I feel really lucky to have a family that is so eager to help me with the language – there are many words or phrases that I’ve learned from my family even before encountering them in the language class. When I brought out my Darija book a few nights ago to study before dinner, my host sisters immediately gathered around me to have a look and learn some of the English translations of phrases. It was truly inspiring to see how excited they became for the opportunity to learn – they were asking me how to pronounce things, pulling out notebooks and copying phrases down, and practicing alongside me. I wouldn’t have really expected this, but teaching them the English versions of phrases actually helped solidify my Darija on an entirely new level. Plus, it helped to significantly reduce the self-consciousness that I experience sometimes when I have trouble pronouncing words - hearing them learning (and sometimes stumbling over) new words and asking me questions really boosted my confidence and reminded me that learning a new language is a process for everyone.

- We eat our actual dinner around 9pm, which is early compared with most of the families in our group - it’s actually fairly common for Moroccans to stay up late and eat dinner between 11 and 12 at night! Dinner is usually a smaller meal compared with lunch, and my family goes to bed soon afterward, which also seems to be fairly less common amongst Moroccans. I usually head to my room and journal a bit, listen to music, or whatever else for a few hours before going to sleep – it’s my much-needed “me time!”

Whew!! As you can see, our days are extremely full! CBT is designed to be an immersion into Moroccan culture, and it definitely succeeds at being just that. The language classes and cultural discussions provide us with some structured learning and guidance, while our interactions with host families and other community members serve as real-life learning experiences with Moroccan customs and lifestyles. I would be lying if I said I didn’t feel utterly exhausted from time to time – nearly every interaction with Moroccans is an exercise in the new language, and you can imagine how that can get overwhelming after awhile. Even so, I’m really impressed and happy with how thorough our training process is, from the LCF’s structured training to our integration through host families. I think some people have an idea about Peace Corps that we are just dropped in the middle of a new country, with no more than a handbook and a “good luck,” and that couldn’t be further from the truth! These two months are going to involve a lot of effort to learn Darija and become comfortable with a new culture, but I truly feel confident that we’ll all be ready to work when our training period ends and we move to our permanent sites. Of course we won’t be fluent, and of course there will be much yet to learn, but we’ll be ready. With a host family like mine and such a wonderful CBT group, I feel more supported than I think I expected. Shwiya b shwiya, we are becoming more comfortable – and it’s only the end of week one!

To those back home: thank you so much for all of your love and support! I miss you all, and I think of you every day! I don’t have a lot of spare time just yet, but I look forward to talking with some loved ones back home on Skype sometime in the future. Check out the “Contact Me” tab for information about how to mail me letters, if that’s something you’d want to do (p.s. I love letters J )!

Much love!

KAZ