Those in mud houses should not pour water.

The reason it is impossible to discuss the “Peace Corps” experience is because every single experience is different. Vastly different. Even when those volunteers are serving in the same country. Take Morocco for example.

I serve in a pretty large city. It is located on the southern coast, influenced by centuries of occupation by different forces, and the immigration of people from the south and south east. Most people speak two or three or four or five languages with equal poetic fluency. I have access to French-owned grocery stores which have things like tampons (not found elsewhere in Morocco – they take your virginity for future reference) and peanut butter. 

My girlfriend served in a different yet stunningly beautiful environment, surrounded by mountains atop an oasis. She had access to a destination many from Europe travel to on holiday and was surrounded by people extremely proud of their Tamazight culture.

I’ve had the luxury of traveling to quite a lot of other sites. Each one has been breathtaking. Each one has been a place I could see living for two years – yet each one has completely different challenges and opportunities.

In the days leading up to our mid-service training I took a different long trek. I ended up 52 km from the start of Timbuktu. The houses are equal parts mud and concrete, you fight sand flies and camel spiders, and to get here I had to change buses 4 times despite being told it was the most direct I could get.

It is stunning. With scenery out of a Jurassic Park set in the desert, an unforgiving sun, and generosity immediately extended to me by association. I’m happy here.

I’ve had the pleasure of seeing what a fellow volunteer does for part of his service – meeting the band he has worked with and hearing them play around on brand new equipment. After much work they have a grant to create a music studio to teach folks how to keep the music of this location alive.

I got to sit, in a tank top dress, sipping Moroccan mint tea expertly prepared by a close friend, listening to absolutely incredible live music performed by four talented musicians, under an enchanting banquet of stars, until dinnertime. For dinner? You ask. A glorious meat and vegetable tajine made with care by the same friend.

We slept under the stars.

I woke with the sun, put sunscreen on my face and lay studying darija (Moroccan Arabic), going over verbs that I have forgotten since our intensive language training. I stayed that way until the boys came back over to practice – this time, with renewed excitement as they broke out the new speakers. Huge smiles crept across their faces as they ran head first into meshing perfectly.

They are unreal. I can’t wait to help promote them in anyway – I know their music will be appreciated by my friends worldwide.

In the meantime, check out their soundcloud:
https://soundcloud.com/search?q=daraa%20tribes

When you are rightly awed – remember this is what they sound like recorded with a regular garage band microphone. They just opened the new equipment up this morning. It’s about to blow your world from half way across it.

After that I was lucky enough to accompany two volunteers to the house of their friend, an elderly blind man who speaks excellent English – which he learned by communicating with folks via a special e-mail program which reads him what is typed. After a long wonderful conversation he asked us to teach him some proverbs.

He could remember part of one having to do with glass and stones. Ahh, yes “Those in glass houses should not throw stones.”

A fellow volunteer chimed in “but those in cement…”

Of course it was followed by laughter.

The man replied, with a truth I can't forget...“Ahh yes and perhaps those in mud houses should not pour water.”


#WaterSavesLives