"you are all so beautiful, oh my god!"

The title of this post was from a passerby while we were out searching for dinner. As the only non-Moroccans around aside from French tourists who are never to be seen out and about and an odd Asian convention occurring in the hotel, we get a lot of stares. However, most of them aren't sketchy or anything, so there is nothing to worry about -- as long as you don't go to a random stranger's house for couscous, as Driss warned us about!

I can't believe that we have been in Morocco for nearly a week! Time flies when you're studying Arabic for forty hours a week and getting horribly lost the rest of the time. Actually, today's homework only took a couple of hours, which was a reprieve from the usual four or so, which are spent in the hotel lobby accompanied by some awful CD full of orchestral versions of American songs, including Little Drummer Boy and Take My Breath Away.

My Arabic is definitely improving, along with my ability to understand our teacher. The four hours of class time actually goes by quickly and we have been doing some fun group activities for the last hour. I have a feeling our teachers think we're crazy because our inside jokes from W&M have transferred to our group names -- for example, Team Dejaj (chicken) and Team Sinjab Mujnoon (Crazy Squirrel).

One thing that I like about Morocco is that is improving my French a lot. Lavanya and I have been watching television in French for an hour or so before bed. The shows are generally dubbed English shows. So far we have seen CSI, Lost, House (very difficult to understand), and Criminal Minds (I understood about 85% of this one). Our teacher also speaks French when she cannot explain to us in Arabic (we have a fluent student who translates), and I understand everything she says. It's funny because in Arabic, I am weakest in oral comprehension, but in French I can understand what people say but have not retained much in terms of speaking and writing. However, those five years of study are starting to come back quickly. In Morocco, speaking French is a sign of education, so you cannot assume people will speak it. There are a lot of signs in French and Arabic, though, especially in the ville nouvelle.

Today we went on two adventures. The first was to the supermarket ("Label Vil") which is in a mall-like building. We took the "petit taxi" or "taxi sagheer" (little taxi) there for the first time. There are no seatbelts and the drivers are crazy but they are experienced and hey, what else can you do? It took us a week to learn how to cross the road but the best way is to just be forward and go for it or you might cause an accident. Anyway, at the supermarket we bought some toiletries (I spent an obscene amount ~ $8 on a Venus razor because my disposable ones have been cutting me constantly), food (Twix! and "Breenglez - Pringles), and a notebook. We walked back to the hotel afterwards which was long but enjoyable as the weather has been cool, though we got a bit lost on the way back. Afterwards we went to try to find a restaurant in a girl's guidebook (getting lost again in the process, of course) but failed. Many of the cafes/restaurants are for men only, especially right now as they are packed due to the World Cup. In the end it was getting dark and there were seven of us girls and no boys, so we went to "Beeza Hut" (Pizza Hut), which is the same as the US ones except a bit nicer and with more menu options. This was probably a good thing are we are leaving at 5 AM for Marrakech tomorrow and no one wants to get sick.

Hopefully next week I will have photos. I am having some troubles with my SD card reader but I will borrow Lavanya's computer after this weekend's adventure.

PS I have seen multiple little children wearing Lightning McQueen (from Disney's Cars) and an autoshop with him as their mascot. I always knew I liked Morocco. Also, today must have been unofficial tracksuit day because every other Moroccan man was wearing a ridiculous Nike tracksuit.

Also, I have internet in the hotel now so I can be online more often. We celebrated by watching the finale of Glee together. Hooray!