So that's the bad part, but I'm still trying to focus on the good stuff. For example, this morning we toured an arts school in Tetuan where young men (and a few women) learn traditional Moroccan an Andalus art forms like wood carving, ceramics, calligraphy, and costura. We all signed up to do a workshop in one of the classroom, and I chose costura, an ancient embroidery art that is used for wedding dresses and other special occasion items. As it happened, this was also the workshop of all women, which was really interesting because we had no common languages, but managed to communicate enough to learn their embroidery basics.
I worked with a 17 year old girl named Hanan Aoulade who is in her first of four years of study at the school. She attends costura class all day, every day except for Sunday, and will maybe study more traditional academics after she graduates from arts school. With a little help from an Arabic-Spanish translator, I also learned that this is a really good career path for women, not only because it's flexible on time and location, but also because it pays really well, and I completely understand why. The intricacy of their work was incredible. I tired to make mine look as nice as theirs, but to no avail.
It was so fun to sit and try to communicate with them. One girl asked of we knew Justin Beiber, and then proceeded to play us a few songs off her phone, and all the costura girls sang along. It was such an east-meets-west moment, and certainly something I'll remember for a long time. At the end of our session Hanan gave me her photo, the embroidery we had been working on with extra thread for the road, and we exchanged contact information. She says she has a Facebook, so hopefully I'll be able to find her once I get an internet connection somewhere.
Anyways, hanging out and doing crafts was just the distraction I needed from the whole bedbugs fiasco. Now we're on a bus to Asilah, the next city we're visiting, and eating lunch. I've heard no mention of us actually going to a doctor to get a prescription to help us, but I'm praying that's on the agenda for some time today. If all else fails, Kim and I know that Carlos, our host dad, will be able I get us prescriptions when we get home tomorrow night. Until then... scratch scratch.
So amazing morning, but we still have untreated bedbugs. Good and bad. My two concerns are that the hotel that we're staying at tonight is supposedly the "less nice" of the two, and that I really don't want to bring bedbugs back to Cordoba to my host family. I hope Preshco has a plan of action for both.
Location:Rue Mansour Eddahbi,Asilah,Morocco
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