Note: I didn't write "Alli-Pants" on my own Manual. My dearest Jolie prepared my book for me.
So last week I was in a small town facilitating a series of sessions on English teaching to some new Trainees. Having no degree in teaching, I was clearly the best person for the job.
The week was long, exhausting, at times frustrating, but in the end I think it was really good for me. I needed a break from my life, and I stayed away just long enough to start missing it again.
Some things that happened:
So I stayed with a different host family every night. There were two single girls, one single boy and one married couple in the training group, and I stayed with each family once (except the single boy) and with the language teacher the remainder of the week. Each family had a different way of making me feel welcome. In one house, the host father taught me magic card tricks. In another, a host sister sat with me and showed me her homework. The most surprising demonstration, however, occurred on Tuesday night.
Usually when visiting a new town you want to locate the hemmam, or public bath. Drawing hot water for a bath can be an awkward favor to ask of your host, so if it's possible to just go to the hemmam, that's the option I want to pick. Unfortunately, the tiny town I was sent to DID NOT HAVE A HEMMAM. I know. I was thrown, too.
So Tuesday night rolls around and I'm a little smelly. The host family I am visiting seems really open and cool, so I decide to ask if I can take a bath there. My first warning signal should have been how ready and rarin' the host mother was to set up my bath.
About twenty minutes after I asked to bathe, the host mother came into the living room to tell me "it was time." She very nicely led me upstairs to the bathroom, then into the bathroom. Then waited patiently as I set down my things.
Oh, God. I realized. She's not leaving, is she?
No, self. No she isn't. I, an able-bodied adult who has taken the reins concerning my personal hygience since I was a child, was destined to be bathed by a strange woman.
I realize that this is far from the first time this has happened to me in Morocco. However, it's the first time it's happened to me outside of a hemmam. In the hemmam, you at least kind of see it coming.
The funny thing is, once she started scrubbing my back I was totally okay with it.
So another thing that happened was I got to feel smart for a whole week. Translating stuff for Trainees and their host families. Finding that someone actually values my opinion and wants to hear about my experiences in the field. It was nice.
I could go on to tell you oodles of anecdotes, but I'm going to just skip to, what I feel, is the defining moment of the week.
By day four, my body had completely started to reject the host family diet of a huge breakfast, followed by a coffee break, followed by a huge lunch, followed by a coffee break, followed by a huge afternoon snack of differing oily breads, followed by a huge dinner. Considering my body has grown accustomed to my usual lazy diet of hard-boiled eggs, I can't really blame it.
I do wish my body had been a little more forgiving when scheduling it's mutiny, because as it turned out, I was booting into a squat toilet at the exact same time that the Youth Development Program Manager and Assistant were waxing motivational to my group of stressed-out, fatigued Trainees. Let me tell you, the house we were in had to have been built with the idea of maximizing echo capability in mind. I did everything in my power to control how loudly my melodious wretchings wafted through the house, but I still think it was fairly obvious what was going on. I only hope no one saw the juxtaposition of my being violently ill against Peace Corps Staff's attempt to invigorate and inspire as foreboding.
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