Morocco Part 2

Our friend Emily is very into sustainability so I took a cue from her and my sister in law Kathleen and one of my New Year's resolutions is to try to live more sustainably.  We recycle, compost, and one of the reasons we decided on our apartment was because they renovated our apartment/barn in an ecologically friendly style:  solar panels, hay insulation, etc.  At least 90% of our Christmas presents were sustainable. 

Emily wanted found out about the Al Kawtar organization through a Lonely Planet guidebook.  This non-profit association was founded to assist women and children in Marrakech by providing day care, meals, technical, medical, and personal assistance.  They also have an embroidery workshop to help fund the center.  Many women learn traditional Moroccan embroidery through their families and disabled women and children who did not learn the craft can receive an apprenticeship in order to learn.   Al Kawtar sells these embroidered items in their store - which has set prices (wonderful after all the haggling at the souk).  They do gorgeous work! 

We stumbled upon the Al Kawtar workshop on our walk to the Medersa and Ben Yousef Mosque.  The workshop was modern, beautiful, and light with women and children sewing.  A woman saw us come in and showed us around.  It was very cool to see the detail up close and the women working on their pieces.  It is a great organization and if you are in Marrakech, you should definitely visit their store.

The Ben Youssef Medersa was an Islamic college founded and built in the 14th century.  There were about 180 rooms with 900 students: close quarters!  The main room has beautiful stonework and mosaic surrounding a reflecting pool.  The stonework was amazing to see. 

We also visited the Moroccan Museum  where we saw traditional Moroccan tapestries, pottery, swords, and art in what used to be a royal residence.  Everywhere, the stonework and mosaic is beautiful. It is also reputed to be haunted!

We then when to the Qdobba - a cupola built as a public bathroom, clothes cleaning area, and water fountain.  Water fountains were the center of the social scene back in the day.  Many of them are gone but the fountains that survived are beautiful. 

The outside of the Qdobba

More gorgeous stonework

Emily and I then visited a hammam where we sat in a hot steamy room and scrubbed clean.  It was...interesting to see the amount of dead skin that came off.

Our friends Dave and Melanie arrived, without Eric, which sort of surprised Dave and I because we thought he was supposed to be coming with them.  Turns out, he was coming into Fes (4 hours away) the next day. So, we decided to go on a culinary tour of Morocco.  We met up with our friend Mounir and visited the Djemma and ate these delicious snails.  Quite different then the escargot we get here.  It is served in a dark garlicy broth and very good!

We decided to visit one of the restaurant stalls.  There are many workers who try and convince you to visit a stall, but we picked a pretty delicious one.   (We visited another one a few days later that was not that great.  I would advise not to go to 117 - straight to heaven because it didn't bring us there.)

After dinner we discovered these amazing cookies - Ghoribas!  They were SO GOOD.  They taste like meringues with coconut and citrus.  We also visited the same juice bar and got delicious juices. From the pink one clockwise:  strawberry, mango, almond, kiwi, and jus royal (strawberry + kiwi + papaya). 

While writing these posts I look back on my journal.  In Marrakech, there many people begging.  Its very hard to turn away from them in any country, but I find it especially difficult in developing countries. 

It is hard when you see small children being goaded on by their parents to beg, or sell tissues, etc.  Mounir said he hates it but that they make a bit of money since lots of people feel bad for them.  We bought cookies from a lady who had a little boy and I gave him a piece of candy, he was so happy.  Then he ran over to his dad to show him, which was very sweet, but someone pointed out that he probably does it out of habit to show his what he got from begging.  That obviously may not be true, but I still makes me sad.  It is hard for me to see someone beg, especially when they look so sad and hold out their hands. 

It was difficult to see - but I know that giving them money would not help or make it better. Purchasing from Al Kawtar helps a bit, but I wish there was more I could do.  We are going to Egypt in a few weeks, and Kathleen showed me this great organization:  Stuff Your Rucksack.  This website shows different organizations that need certain supplies that are low cost and can fit in your bag.  You don't have to bring a lot, but you will bring will be very useful.  From now on, I'm definitely checking out this website before I go anywhere.  I'll be packing for the Sunshine Project! 

Gosh, sorry to end on a sad note.  Hopefully my next one will be better! 

Morocco Part 1

We went to Morocco for a week in December and visited Marrakech, Imlil, and El Kebab (where my friend Yorda is working for the Peace Corps.)  This is going to be a series because it was awesome, and I wrote in my journal a lot. 

Welcome to Marrakech!

Em, Dave, and I flew into Marrakesh after a stressful ride to the airport. Our ride had been sick for weeks and did not wake up to her alarm, phone calls from us, or Emily throwing soft yet dense objects at her window - which all occurred at 5 AM.  In a panic, Em called me and my 'brilliant' plan was to take our car and leave a key in the secret compartment and bribe a friend to pick the car up from the airport.  Luckily, Emily's host mom was awake (since she was leaving for Nicaragua on the same morning) and she awesomely drove us to the airport.  After running through the airport trying not to knock little old ladies and families down - I believe Dave hurdled over a chair, we saw that the terminal was quite far.  So, we had to run down a hallway, down a set of a stairs, over a moving sidewalk, through customs, and up another set of stairs, and we finally make it to the gate, with maybe 2 minutes left.  Somehow, I was one of the first people on the plane* and managed to snag us 3 exit row seats and we were finally off to Morocco.  

We booked a beautiful Riad (Moroccan guest house) through Homeaway that fit 8 people for the same price as a hostel. It was a traditional Moroccan house with 3 floors, beautiful stonework, a rooftop terrace, and a courtyard with 2 orange trees and a fountain where we ate our breakfast.  When we arrived Fatiha, our host, served us traditional Moroccan mint tea.  Yum!

D outside our room on the balcony overlooking the courtyard.

Our beautiful courtyard.

Our Riad was a quick 10 minute walk to the main square of Djeam el Fna. We left and went to meet Mounir, someone I contacted though CS in order to get a real, un-touristy view of Marrakech.  We quickly became friends because he is awesome.  We could not have gotten through our time in Marrakech without him, and our friend Eric would have been stuck in Fes but more on that later. He took us to an AMAZING restaurant and juice place called Agnaoue which we went to every day we were in Marrakech for their juices.  We then walked around the famous Marrakech souk (market) and ooggled at the beautiful fabrics, crafts, shoes, etc. 

The twisted derbs of the souk - getting lost is half the fun!

Beautiful Cookies

That night we visited Djema el Fna - a UNESCO world heritage site.  It is crazy walking there - you have to walk through narrow streets dodging people, motorbikes, cars, bikes, donkeys pulling carts, horses pulling carts, people pulling carts, beggars, merchants with their wares spread on the ground and more!  The Djema at night is amazing:  storytellers, gnawa musicians, impromptu banjo and drum concerts, women applying henna, and people selling these amazing delicious cookies.  During the day the huge square is full of snake charmers, monkeys, water sellers, and merchants.  By night is totally different:  more people, more things to see, and my favorite - where bare concrete was a few hours before almost a hundred restaurant stalls are set up!  It was amazing.  

Storytellers speaking in Darija so we didn't understand it - but very cool!

Dried fruits/nuts stalls

We went back to our Riad where Fathia had spent hours cooking a traditional Moroccan dinner- a fresh salad with argan oil, Beef Tagine with prunes rolled in sesame seeds, preserved lemons, and soaked almonds.  For dessert:  an amazing chocolate, banana, and orange blossom pie.  Wow!  We spent the night drinking a Cote du Rhone style (Moroccan!) wine in our awesome candlelit courtyard.  We tried not to eat the whole pie, buton unsuccessful. 

Fatiha decorated our courtyard with candles and put our amazing dinner in the dining room. 

LOOK AT THIS PIE!!!!

"The smells are amazing:  Fathia's cooking, spice stalls, people, diesel.  The last two don't smell bad, just different - it actually reminds me a bit of the Philippines.  As I write this the call to prayer is sounding and I'm sitting on our rooftop terrace watching the sunset.  What an amazing city!" 

*  Differences between Europe and the States:  EasyJet doesn't assign seats, so its basically first come, first served, much like Southwest used to be.  However, people don't really line up, its more of a giant mob. 

Esquire!

Long time no update!  D and I traveled to Morocco in December with some friends from SwitzerFrancerLand, Baltimore, and Belgium.  It was great fun and I can’t wait to share it.  We went to NY for Christmas where we battled the Great Compost Fire of 2010 and survived the Crazy Blizzard of 2010.  I will share the Great Compost Fire story soon.  D and I were supposed to travel to Las Vegas to spend New Year’s Eve with my family.  However, the Crazy Blizzard was on Sunday 26 December, and we were going to fly out on 30 December but everything was still not back to normal and we finally flew here on 3 January.  

Yesterday, I was finally sworn in as an attorney!   It’s been a long road and I am so appreciative of my family and friends.  I couldn’t have done it without you all!  Thank you for all the support and love for the last three years.  

I was supposed to be sworn in on 4 November 2010 at the 1^st District ceremony with most of my friends who stayed in the Chicago area after law school.  The Illinois Supreme Court even sent the tickets to our house…in SwitzerFrancerland.  So, obviously I couldn’t go.  I figured I would just get sworn in at the Embassy.  Organizing that was a huge pain, and in the end they told me I could get sworn in at the Embassy but that no one could come in with me, I couldn’t bring a camera or cell phone, and I could only come in the walk in hours and if they had higher priority issues, I would have to come back the next day.  The Swiss Embassy is 3.5 hours away from Geneva.  I knew I was going to be in Las Vegas, so I figured I could get sworn in here.  

Scheduling that was a bit of a pain as well, the IL Supreme Court granted me permission to get sworn in at another district.  I found a list of State Court judges and called them to schedule a time to get sworn in.  I finally found a judge who agreed to swear me in, and told the wonderful woman, Jan, who I have been working with at the IL Supreme Court.  She told me I would have to pay for the overnight shipping, which was fine.  I get a call back a few hours later and Jan says that she has no record of me taking the Bar in IL.  I have a minor meltdown and realize it’s because I used my maiden name with my married name.  OK minor glitch that’s fine.  A few hours later I get another call back and Jan says that they can’t find the judge in their records – because the judge I was working with is not a federal judge.  Jan tells me I have to get a FEDERAL judge to swear me in.  OK major glitch – where am I going to find a FEDERAL judge to swear me in within the next 3 days?!  So, I Google the Federal District Court of Nevada find the judge list…and start cold calling Federal Judges.  Luckily for me, the first judge I called agreed to administer my oath.  I confused his assistant quite a bit, as they don’t normally get calls like this…

Me:  Hi, I’m looking for a Judge to administer my attorney oath.  I passed the Bar in IL but missed my swearing in ceremony in November.  I need a federal judge to administer my oath, and the IL Supreme Court Clerk will send everything necessary to Las Vegas for the oath.  Does Judge Foley have any free time to administer my oath?

Assistant:  I’m sorry, what?  I wasn’t really expecting a call like this, so could you explain it again?

Me:  explains again

Assistant:  OK let me talk to the Judge….[she comes back on the phone]  Hi, I’m sorry I’m still a bit confused, you are an Illinois attorney but you are getting sworn in here?

Me:  Yes

Assistant:  How?

Me:  Well, they gave me special permission to get sworn in here because I missed my ceremony, and I’m here visiting my family.

Assistant:  And why don’t you get sworn in in Illinois?

Me:  Because I live in Switzerland.

Assistant:  ….OK, um hold on.  [she tells the judge, I hear them laugh]  Well, we are very excited to meet you. 

Me:  THANK YOU SO MUCH!  Also, my family would like to come is that OK?

Assistant: Sure no problem. 

So the Honorable Judge George Foley, Jr.  agrees to administer my attorney oath.  Awesome.  Yesterday, we leave the house very early just in case.  We have to take 2 cars because there are 7 people coming to the courthouse.  We pop the address into the GPS and drive to 333 Las Vegas Blvd. – yes I was sworn in on Las Vegas Blvd.  We drive to the where the GPS says it is, and see the buildings for the City of Las Vegas.  We park, and try and find the Courthouse.  We can’t find it and finally talk to someone who tells us its not here, and a few miles down the road.  We run back to our cars and drive like madmen down the street.  Dave and I are in the car with Justine and her boyfriend Jayce, who is making evasive maneuvers because the GPS told us the wrong way to go again. We finally see the courthouse and Dave and I jump out of the car and run in.  The cars have to park, and FINALLY with maybe 2 minutes to spare, we make it to Judge Foley’s courtroom.  It’s locked so we get buzzed into his chambers. 

We meet Judge Foley and his assistant and they tell us that their courtroom is occupied because there is a trial going on but another Judge has allowed us to use her courtroom.  THe Federal Judges in Las Vegas are awesome.  We walk in the back way and my family is excited that we get to go into a Federal District Courtroom.  Everyone gets into the courtroom and then starts taking pictures.  Justine says “Wow I’ve only been in a courtroom when I’ve been in trouble!” (She means traffic court).   Judge Foley administers my oath, I say I will uphold the Constitution of the State of Illinois and the United States Constitution and then I’m a real lawyer!!!

 

I take pictures with the Judge and thank him for accommodating me.  D shakes his hand and says thank you, my dad introduces himself and shakes his hand and says thank you…and then introduces him to my mom, my sister, my sister’s boyfriend, and my uncle.  Hahaha!  I told my good friend Stacy about this and she says that this judge will be talking about this for the next few months because they don’t normally do these things, and that I probably should have warned him that I am Filipino and that a LOT of my family was coming. 

Mom, Dad, and Uncle Marcial had to go back to work, so Justine, Jayce, Dave, and I went out for a celebratory lunch.  Since I was sworn in on Las Vegas Blvd, we thought let’s just make it super Las Vegas-y and eat on the Strip.  We decided to eat at La Cave in the Wynn.  It is a great wine and tapas bar, and the service was incredible.*  Our server, Rafael was probably the best server I've ever experienced.  The food was so fresh and they had a fantastic wine list.  We celebrated with champagne, Justine found a new favorite wine (Kerner), and I highly recommend this restaurant if you are in Las Vegas! 

After a fun and delicious 2 hour lunch we went to Max Brenner in Caesar’s Palace.  It is a chocolate place and everything was so rich and decadent.  We had hot chocolates and hazelnut milk chocolate milk shakes.  We also had peanut butter, chocolate, and marshmallow pizza.  We also had a ‘sharing’ which consisted of chocolate fondue, chocolate bark, chocolate brownies, chocolate egg rolls, chocolate crispies, chocolate waffles, and even more stuff I can’t remember.  Then we rolled home. 

Last night we had some family and friends over to celebrate – I am very lucky to have such a wonderful and supportive family!

* Another difference between SwitzerFrancerland:  customer service is practically non-existent unless you are at an amazing restaurant, and it extends to more than restaurants: schools, banks, etc.   

Sweden and an improptu Baltic Sea cruise to Finland.

While D is processing his pictures from Tuscany, I thought I could skip around a bit and talk about our visit to beautiful, cold, dark, cold, fun, cold Sweden.  

The Ytterjarna Fjord

D and I went to Sweden to visit his sister Kathleen who is helping out with an amazing organisation here called The International Youth Initiative Program .  It is based in Ytterjarna, Sweden, south of Stockholm.  We flew into Arlanda and had to take a bus to a train to a different train to a bus to get to Ytterjarna and cost us about 500 krona (or 50 Euro).  It took us a bit more than 3 hours - usually it only takes an hour and a half and only costs about 10 krona!  It was a fun journey though - we don't know Swedish so it was fun trying to pronounce the stops.  We took the bus and kept getting deeper into the Swedish countryside and finally pulled up to our stop in the middle of a field.  Kathleen (thankfully) met us at the stop, since otherwise we would be wandering the countryside knocking on doors and asking (in English) if anyone knew Kathleen.  

The first thing we did was have fika - a coffee break but so much more.  It was amazing to see Kathleen again, sit by a warm fire, drink hot coffee - or cocoa, and eat delish Swedish food.  The buildings in Ytterjarna are beautiful and designed to mimic the land.  Sweden (especially the area around Ytterjarna) is very good at waste management.  They compost, and have a new technology that consists of burning waste to get energy, and their sewage system is basically all natural.  I'm not really sure on the details but I all the soaps etc. have to be biodegradable because there is little chemical filtration. 

Fika is also a great reason to come in from the cold - we had fika at least twice a day!

For the first time in my life I had nothing planned for the trip.  I did a bit of research reading about Stockholm but didn't even have any sights or anything picked out.  Shocking.  It ended up being a great thing because on the day we arrived we decided to take an impromptu Baltic Sea cruise to Finland the next day.  It is called "The Booze Cruise to Finland" because during the summer you don't need to get a cabin for the overnight ride, you can just sit at the top of the ship and drink. The three of us went into Stockholm and purchased tickets for the ferry which left a mere 4 hours later.

Snowy Stockholm

Two of the 10 tourists visiting Stockholm in November

The colors were beautiful

The street names were unpronounceable.

 Stockholm is situated on many different islands.  We walked around the old town area of Stockholm called Gamla Stan and saw amazing architecture, the royal palace, Stockholm's narrowest street (and where they filmed a Moby music video apparently), and explored.  We then took the bus to the ferry (where they have signs on the road pointing to 'Finland').  I was expecting a large ferry but it was actually a small cruise ship!  We took Viking Cruise Line and it cost us a mere 30 Euros for a round trip ticket with a cabin for 3 from Stockholm to Helsinki.  We stood at the top deck as we pulled away from Stockholm, it was cold, snowy, and gorgeous.  

Kathleen and Dave in the narrowest street of Stockholm, which only got smaller!

Braving the cold - that plastic bag is full of reindeer sausage!

Impromptu Baltic Sea cruise.

We also chose to do a Julbord - a traditional Christmas dinner in Scandinavia.  The Julbord had cheeses, caviar, different types of bread, salad, Swedish meatballs (way better than Ikea), and  we had so much cold smoked salmon.  It was amazing.  They also laid out a wonderful dessert buffet - we had something called a Cone Cake which was shaped like a pine cone, and apple cinnamon charlotte, and a lot of other delish desserts.

So much Salmon!

After dinner we explored the ship and it had a karaoke bar, pub, a nightclub, and just like a normal cruise ship, a hot tub and sauna.   We decided to digest and sit in the sauna, where we met Sum 41, a band that I used to love in high school.  Very random.  We ended up hanging out with them for the rest of the night.

Helsinki was gorgeous, and we met two of Kathleen's friends and had a wonderful talk with them.  One of her friends, Matt is involved with a group called Homeboy Industries.  If you haven't heard of the group check it out, it is doing some amazing things.  It was started by a priest who wanted to give LA gang members a second chance, if they want it.  Homeboys gives at-risk youth counseling, tattoo removal, and employment.    He runs a poetry workshop.  This summer, Kathleen let me borrow a book Fr. Boyle wrote a book entitled Tattoos on the Heart and it was very inspiring.  It was great to hear Matt's stories about his own experiences working with Homeboys.

No fika is complete with something to eat.  Here - a kannelbulle.

We walked around Helsinki and visited the Russian Orthodox church which towers over the city.  Their main shopping concourse has heated streets so the snow doesn't collect.   We also had some delicious Nepalese food (according to Kathleen's Finnish friend, Finnish food is not so good).  We visited the Market Hall in Helsinki and went back to the ship a bit early because it was SO COLD. 

More Salmon!

We have maybe 5 pictures of us without jackets on.

The next day we hung out in Stockholm and went to the Vasa Museum where a beautiful ship form 1628 was restored after it sank on its maiden voyage.  We visited Ostermalm Saluhall and ate more lox.  Finally, we figured we had to go to H & M since it is a Swedish store.  We went to the H & M flagship store, and when we exited we realized we could see at least 5 different H & Ms.  They have different stores like H & M children, young and trendy, home, men, women, etc.  Crazy.  We took the train to the bus home and were a bit lost when the bus driver dropped us off in the middle of a field in the middle of the night in rural Sweden.  Luckily, he also pointed us in the right direction. 

The beautifully restored ship

Julmust - a traditional Christmas drink.  In Sweden Coke sales fall 50 % in December.  Not all that delish.

GIANT TURKEY, surrounded by normal (European) sized turkeys.

Thanksgiving was wonderful, we were able to bring Thanksgiving to Sweden and show about 50 non-Americans what Thanksgiving is all about.  We cooked 3 turkeys, peeled and mashed a garbage bag full of potatoes, made a vat of Bernaise sauce, and a LOT of stuffing.  We also had apple, pumpkin, and pecan pie, and amazing Swedish bread.  Thanksgiving was wonderful.  At the end of it, everyone looked uncomfortably full and we told them they did it right. 

Dave mashing vats of potatoes.

The rest of the days were very relaxing, and we explored rural and not so rural Sweden.  We had lots of fika, hung out with Kathleen, discovered an amazing Swedish dessert, and enjoyed the beautiful light cast by the sun.  It basically looks like dawn all the time, and the sun sets at 3:30.  YIP put on an open mic and were fortunate to hear Kathleen's poetry, Ani's singing, and lots of talented yip-ees.  

We were lucky to be in Ytterjarna for the Light Festival.  They light thousands of candles all along the nature paths by the fjord, and it is a beautiful experience.  The candlelight on the snow and a clear sky made it magical.  They also put on a fire show, with flaming poi balls.  It was gorgeous!  It made a beautiful end to a very fun week!