Sarah's first cooking in Morocco!

Every so often I request more veggies from Cory. Usually he cooks me up something delicious! Every so often he suggests I cook them myself. 

I pondered this idea. 

I have gotten along for this long in my life without cooking very much. Here it's even easier because we could hire someone to cook delicious Moroccan-style food for us (since there's not even one Trader Joe's here ... so what am I supposed to eat?). 

I thought to myself: 'self, you've gotten this far in life without cooking, why start now?' I don't believe I have cooked a single thing since we moved here 5 months ago.

And I pondered some more.

And I thought at some point I might have to feed more than just myself and at that point the efficiencies of running out to the store and grabbing a smoothie to eat become inefficient and it would probably be good to have some other tricks up my sleeve. 

So upon my return from my trip back to the States, my goal was to cook *1* thing.

I fueled the flames by opening a pinterest account and pinning all the moroccan veggie recipes I could find. 

Last night with our friends was the perfect opportunity to dive in. 

I worked from this recipe but substituted my fave veggies.

http://www.deliciousmagazine.co.uk/recipes/moroccan-vegetables-and-chickpeas

First stop was to the veggie market on the first floor of our apartment building. 70 cents later, I had zucchini, carrots, tomatoes, and a chunk of pumpkin (they just off however much you want!).

Next stop was the grocery store to get the chickpeas and harissa spice paste. Then we were on our way to Heather and Adam's!

Delicious and nutritious - made even better by the great company and eating it outside by the fire.

First trip back to USA

Got to celebrate the birthday of the one and only ezra and the marriage of the hilarious darren and marsha. And lots of fun family and friend time in between ... And the best snowfall ever!

Also, i ate my first ever salad!!

Trilingual dinner parties

As we're getting to know more and more people here, a funny thing struck me today as I thought about inviting a few people over for dinner: In a trilingual culture and an even more multilingual expat crowd, I have to make sure that the guest list all has at least one language in common!

If everyone speaks French except one person who 'only' speaks English, Spanish, and German, that's not going to work. If everyone speaks English except the person who 'only' speaks French, Arabic, and Tamazight, that's not going to work. More likely, there will be a few people who all speak one language and a few who speak another, so everyone can find someone to talk to :)

This definitely comes up with just Cory and me too. If we have a guest over who speaks French and Arabic, but not much English, s/he has to have two separate conversations with us (if they want to go into any depth) because my Arabic is beginner and Cory's French is beginner.

We have tons of trilingual conversations in a given day. Often Cory's translating for me if the conversation gets over my head in Arabic, and vice versa in French.

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Oh, and we were videotaped sharing our thoughts on Valentine's Day this weekend! Cory gave his interview in Arabic, and I gave mine in French. Both of us are sputtering a bit because we didn't have a chance to think about what we were going to say before the camera started rolling, but it was tons of fun! Here's the link on the hespress website: Eid l'Hob.

Up North with friends

 We had friends come visit from Ohio and look at all the beautiful places we got to see with them!

Above and below are Volubulis, a huge Roman ruin in the northern part of Morocco.

 Carpet shopping in Meknes. Great group of guys and so many incredibly creative woven things.

 I think this was my first time seeing a donkey carrying a refrigerator. Pret-ty impressive

And one of the many delights of Morocco - double chocolate magnum bars! *Note for mom - Sharon helped me cover up in the sun :)

 Out for a hike outside of Chefchaouen

Our apartment neighbors

We are really happy with our neighborhood where we live: it's easy to walk to everything we need (grocery store, restaurants, green spaces, the tram) since we don't have a car. It's downtown, near tons of great things to see and the old market where we can explore and buy stuff for the house.

And we're also enjoying getting to know our neighbors in the apartment complex. Everyone has been so kind to us in the coming and goings in the stairwell.

And yesterday a couple of neighbors stopped by and chatted with us over tea. One is a nursing student and the other works in the media sector. It is lovely getting to know them and we look forward to much more time spent in each other's homes.

When inside is colder than outside

Rabat has a wonderfully mild climate - highs in the 60s in the winter (though this winter has been chillier than usual) and highs in the 80s in the summer. Yesterday was GORGEOUS jeans and tshirt weather with beautiful blue skies.

More than getting really cold in winter, Rabat (and Morocco) gets rainy. Not a huge deal, just need some rain-worthy shoes and a little more time for the clothes to dry out on the line.

The trick is this: we can see our breathe inside our apartment.

It's always colder inside than outside. Yesterday, I wore a jeans and tshirt outside, but inside I needed a fleece. Also, there is no indoor heating mechanisms in homes here. Space heaters are all we got.

For those of us who never used heat at home, it's fine!! I'm used to wearing my coat to bed :)

Cory is not much into wearing his coat to bed and has searched out all the warmest blankets he could find. He found some incredible ones. And we got a space heater.

But it wasn't quite cutting it. Cory was still cold.

UNTIL
A friend gave us an electric blanket.



This magical gift has made our bed a warm place to sleep at night and and we are no longer fighting each other for blankets in our sleep. Hurray! Thank you Shin Hyun!

Getting it Right

I love my dry goods grocer. He has been unfailingly kind to Sarah and me and extremely patient when I'm trying to remember what I need for the house or kitchen and trying to tell him in Tamazight. This story made me love him even more:

I was getting near the end of my long list of groceries for making a meal for guests. If it's just Sarah and me I don't get too fancy. But for guests, we roll out the culinary red carpet. So I was getting to the end of the list, and he suggested that maybe I wanted a couple baguettes too. I said something like, no thanks, those are not the bread of my people. And I could tell from his face that something finally clicked for him. He blurted out, you're from America, not France. You speak Arabic and Tamazight, but not French. You don't eat the French food. It's like, you're a foreigner, but you're not French!!! Exactly.