Halloween & Morocco

Today I was very hungry on my way home from wandering around town, so I popped into my favorite market and found that all I wanted was a jar of mini pickles.  So I bought said jar of pickles and proceeded to eat them at home dipped in pesto that I had left over from my trip to France this weekend. The moral of this story is lacking.

They tell us in writing classes to grab your reader with an interesting lead in sentence but this is all I could come up with. Sorry folks. Since I appear to be unable to blog in a timely fashion I am again left with no choice but to condense all my adventure of the past few weeks into a potpourri post.  Meaning random stories = smelly flower petals; and this post = small bowl in your bathroom full of smelly flower petals.

Halloween: 

Marta made us wear Borja and Fernando's goalie sweatshirts
because she thought we would be too cold. Love her. 

First, I can't not mention Halloween in Sevilla (oops double negative.. try not to be too confused.)  Marie and I dressed up as Cruzcampo cans, which is basically the only beer sold here.  We were going to be diet coke cans and then we decided we needed to be more Spanish sooo.. Our host dad Juan Luis thought it was so funny that he took this picture to tweet at the Cruzcampo twitter account.  Halloween is not really a thing in Spain; I was continually told at the school where I volunteer that they only talk about Halloween in English class so as not to let the kids forget their own tradition of Día de Todos los Santos.  The people our age that dressed up were all wearing terrifying face paint.  Apparently here they take the whole "scary" part of Halloween seriously.  Which meant that the two cans got some weird looks.  Definitely worth it.


Morocco (take 1):
The first weekend of November a bunch of kids in my program peaced out to Morocco for the weekend.  We went with a program that takes students (basically all Americans) to Morocco for weekend trips frequently.  So no, it was not an especially authentic experience, but hey, Morocco is Morocco so no complaints.  The program took us to Chefchaoun, the incredible blue city in the northern mountains of Morocco, where we were given a tour and then set loose upon the aggressive and tourist-savvy vendors.  I tried to haggle for a scarf and proceeded to be severely routed by the sassy storeowner when he didn't fall for my bluff that I would NOT spend 8 euros on that scarf.  In reality I most definitely would pay 8 euros, and would have taken it for 10.  But once I had asked for 7 and not a penny more and been refused, I awkwardly shuffled outside, face red and feeling fooled. After a moment of thought I stamped on my pride and went back in to buy the scarf for his price.  I don't like haggling.

Day number two we all piled back into the buses and drove to Asilah, making stops to visit the Cave of Hercules and ride some camels.  Whenever we were in the buses they popped in a movie, as if we were overactive toddlers that needed a distraction so we wouldn't start banging our water bottles on each other's heads.  Although really I shouldn't complain about that either because I did get to see Grease and Catch Me if You Can for the first time.  The Cave of Hercules looked like it was once a neat little wave-formed cave, and once it had a tourist value it was chiseled into a large cavern.  So that was sort of anti-climactic.  The camel-riding was equal parts exciting, hilarious and sad. Exciting because camels are pretty cool, and when in my life am I going to get to ride on again? Hilarious because of their TWO KNEE JOINTS which was one of the weirdest things that I've ever seen.  And sad in the same way that I get depressed when I go to a zoo or an aquarium and I always think about watching that documentary The Cove in high school.

We had been seriously warned (with stories of puke-filled 6-hour bus rides home) of not drinking the water or eating any fruits / vegetables that might have been washed in the water.  However the first night the salad looked really good and then I accidentally ran my toothbrush under the sink and after that I decided it was pointless to resist.  However my stomach pulled through and no sickness happened. So there, germaphobes.

On the way back we almost had some stowaways when a bunch of young hooligans jumped on the back of our moving bus.  Unclear on whether they were just having a fun time (..?) or trying to run away to Spain.  Because apparently that's a thing that happens.

Overall, despite my snarky comments about how touristy the trip was, I had a great time.  Now I really can't wait to head to Fez in two weeks to visit Passage!!  21st birthday celebration, Moroccan style.

Note : I have a lot of other fun things to write about but Friday night activities call and I am going to have to update more later.  Maybe someday I will write things on time.  But its unlikely. Shoutout to everyone at NU - yell loudly at the Michigan game tomorrow!!