Shopped Till We Dropped!

There's lots of shopping around here. During my lunch break today, I picked up (bought) a caftan that a school administrative assistant had made. I loved the silk and the pattern, as well as the beautiful buttons. I think she had worn it a few times before the sale as the shoes were pretty scuffed up on the bottom, but anything is potentially for sale here. I had to buy the shoes because they matched the caftan. We have Moroccan dress day next week, so I am totally outfitted!


It was the last day of the first week of school today, and all went fairly well. It's a bit of a learning curve each day as I sometimes teach 3 and 4 year olds as well as 13 and 14 year olds! A fifth grade teacher came up to me after school today and said, "I asked my students what was their favorite thing they had done today, and they said ART! very enthusiastically". I am so thankful to be part of starting art on the elementary level. Kids generally love art.

After school and 2 meetings, Jill and I went on a hunt for a grocery store in our neighborhood. We have still not found it. However, we found a mini-mall with all sorts of shops. You could buy cow hooves at one place to cook up for supper, or you could buy used shoes at another place. Jill found a really nice quilt and shams for her bed at another store. We also found the barber, the plasticware place and the fabric shop for making jellabas and caftans. We stepped around a sleeping man who feebly asked, "Madame? Mademoiselle?" and then lay back down.

In the end of our shopping spree around town, we saw: cats eating fish heads, a tomato vender who turned his donkey around to sell to us, narrowly avoiding oncoming traffic, and we bought a bit of pastry for dessert after prompting from the elderly gentleman who was friends with the tomato seller. Said gentleman made sure we headed right into the bakery, after helping to bag up a few kilos of tomatoes. I'm thinking he is the town mayor. 

While bumping our way through the final blocks (roads here are sort of roads/dirt potholes off the main drag) anyway, while bumping along through the final blocks we came upon these goats just hanging out. They were kind enough to stand still for a photo shoot, and then took off when we put our cameras away. 


Do you think those hooves were goat hooves? Just thinking.


We came home, made a homemade sauce with the fresh tomatoes, zucchini and fresh basil. And a pale red wine. Yum! We felt quite refreshed from our work week and local shopping extravaganza! I am really looking forward to the weekend! I am going to try earplugs tonight because the services have seemed to have lengthened and intensified. 


Interesting comment from a Moroccan graduate of our school I recently met - question to student: "Are you keeping Ramadan?" answer from student: "Are you kidding? It's so unhealthy!"