Yay!

A friend of mine texted me today to let me know my laptop was done! So excited, :). I charged my internet USB and can now happily sit on my roof and surg the net, :). I went the past 18 months internetless, but it will be very nice to have in my final 6 months. A friend of mine visiting the states is also going to bring me back a 500GB external hard drive which will be very nice. Music, movies and shows take up some space and unfortunately I can only burn things onto 700MB CDs as I haven't found a DVD brand that works yet... Inchallah.

Otherwise this past weekend I did a lot of baking. Finally found a good white bread recipe that turned out well and made myself a nice turkey sandwich with some of the chedder cheese I'd made. Which by the way turned out ok. Taste is a bit off, but I am used to sharp chedder. It's also crumbly so a bit difficult to work with but makes a great pizza. Also found a very yummy cheesecake recipe that I really like so far. Just something basic that I can play around with. And of course my now infamous cheesecake dark chocolate brownies. Very yummy.

The grand thing about me now having daily access to internet, or nearly daily anyway, is that I will now be able to update my blog more often! Or, I will try anyway, haha.

No update on a building for my women yet, haven't had a chance to bug the delegate again. I am excited that we just received a bunch of new health and environment volunteers in the region, though it had increased our numbers significantly. Never dreamed I would be near so many other Americans during my service. It is nice to have other people to collaborate with, but it's also nice to just stay in site and be around my Moroccan friends. Though I haven't visited my host family in a long time and feel terrible about that. It's been a busy couple of months. I have every plan to see them tomorrow as well as my neighbor. She has invited me to tea so many times and I adore her. I hope to spend more time in site these next 6 months and get several projects up and away. Lots to do.

Been awhile...

So...I went to the health run in Midelt the weekend of May 1-2. I had a good time, lots of volunteers helping. Even had 3 of us volunteers from Iowa. I spent Sunday making shishkabobs for about 5 hours with 2 other volunteers and 2 moroccan women. My sinus infection had unfortunately returned full force so I went back home that night. I had a great night's sleep and awoke with a bit of a fever and was dizzy and out of it. So the plan was to watch movies and TV shows on my laptop all day. This happened for about 2 hours as at one point I swung my keyboard cord around my laptop, caught the back of it and it flopped onto the floor backwards off of it's stool, :(. At the time I just put it back up and it was still functioning fine, but what I didn't realize was that it has stopped charging...big mushkil (problem). I noticed this fact when the computer died while watching a movie. I checked the cord and outlet and electricity but alas it was something internal, :(. I took it to a cyber guy who fixes laptops and really hope he can fix it. I finally got wireless internet in my site and use my laptop for many things. Moroccans are very good at fixing electronics so I am hoping. I won't know until Monday.

Otherwise I had fun working at Spring Camp end of March/early April. Of course they wanted a wedding again this year and as I was the only female volunteer I was the one married off again, this time to a Moroccan. I have been to 0 weddings and in 2 now. Always the bride and never the bridesmaid, haha. Spring Camp was so much fun. Me and 9 other male volunteers from around the region. A good group. There were quite a few trouble maker campers, but some really sweet ones as well. I taught hand arts of course, :). We also did an American games night, an american movie night where we watched Wall-E, the Moroccan wedding, a talent show night and then final good byes night where they played a Moroccan game similar to Jeopardy. I also got very little sleep and began a sinus infection.

Then later on in April I went to Rabat for a warden conference where the wardens of each province meet and discuss what we would do in the case of an emergency or evacuation situation. Learned several useful things and had fun getting to know new people and enjoy some time in Rabat.

The day before the Midelt run my region had out going away party for those ending their service and returning home soon. Am very sad to see many of them leave. I have known the ones in my region for the last 18 months. I am excited to meet the new volunteers and they will be great, but life will be a little different without these familiar faces. It also marks my final 6 months mark of service. It feels like such a short amount of time considering I have been living in Morocco for the past 21 months.

Then these past couple of days I have been in Kalaat-Mgouna at the yearly rose festival attending a SIDA training of trainers (AIDS) and helping with a booth at the festival where Moroccans and volunteers are explaining different health information and what AIDS is. It has been a good couple of days. I am looking forward to returning to my site today for some rest and to do a few things with my site. I have been out of it for a bit of time now.

I need to speak with the Delegate again about getting land and a building built for my women. They are not able to share the elementary school anymore and there are no buildings currently available to buy or rent even if my women had the money which they don't to buy a building. The Artisana has funds to build a building for a cooperative if the community donates a piece of land, so that is the current direction I am trying to pursue. Inchallah.

Overall a busy month. Had internet in my house, well, on my roof, for about 3 days before I killed my lap top. Unfortunately all of my photos are on that, so I will be unable to share any until it is either fixed or I am able to retrieve the information off of the harddrive. I am hoping it can be fixed. Keeping my fingers crossed!