Day 100: Rabat, Morocco

With less than two weeks left in Morocco I have been thinking a lot about my experience abroad this semester.

Am I different?

Has this experience changed me?

What have I learned?

Will things be different when I go home?

Thoughts like these run through my head as I wait for the tram to bring me to school in the morning or as I lay in my bed at night, my head resting on a pillow that is not my own. Only time can really answer these questions but I am too impatient for that. Instead of waiting, I decided to try to quantify my experience in some way. I needed something concrete to reference. Something I could point to and say here is what I spent the last three months doing and I am changed for it.

So, here is my list of Moroccan Firsts, a collection of experiences that I had for the first time here in Morocco and that whether big or small, happy or sad, are a definitive part of my semester abroad.

First time in Africa

First time I lived abroad

First time I lived in a Muslim country

First time I felt discriminated against and unequal because of my sex

First time I experienced that amazingly rewarding feeling you get from teaching

First time I regularly ate from a communal dish

First time I saw an animal killed

First time I ate an animal I had just seen killed

First time I rode a camel

First time I traveled without my family

First time I washed my underwear in a shower

First time I saw first hand the disparity between the developed world and the developing world

First time I really understood and appreciated the benefits and privileges of growing up in the United States

First time I read a novel in another language

First time I learned to read and write in another alphabet

First time I discovered just how much you can communicate without a common language

First time I acted as a translator

First time I realized how behind the U.S. education system is in language

First time I kept a blog

First time I was ever a minority

First time I saw a wild monkey

First time I swam on the other side of the Atlantic

First time I ate couscous

First time I milked a cow

First time I drank sugar cane juice

First time I held a baby chick

First time I played hearts

First time I made my own bread

First time I celebrated a holiday (Thanksgiving) without my family

First time I celebrated a holiday with friends and realized they are just as great as family!

First time I went to a desert

First time I wove a rug

First time I took an overnight bus (last time I will ever take an overnight bus)

First time I smelled leather tanneries

First time I ate a date

First time I successfully haggled for my purchases

First time I felt normal sitting and eating in silence with others

First time I took a cold shower

First time I used a Turkish toilet

First time I waited until seeing a guy’s teeth to judge his appearance

First time I rode on top of a 4x4

First time I ate a magnum bar (heaven!)

First time I altered my dress to be culturally sensitive

First time I really thought I might die

First time I sang happy birthday in Arabic

First time I ate a sandwich cooked at a gas station

First time I went Berber sand skiing

First time I stayed in a hostel

First time I traveled with only what I could carry and actually had to carry it

First time I drank mint tea

First time I hitched a ride on a tractor

First time I danced around a campfire

First time I lived out of a suitcase (closets aren’t really a thing here)

First time I wore a djellaba

So, on my 100^th day in Morocco I am celebrating this list. It may not be much, but it’s what I have. Here is to these firsts, the others I can’t remember right now, and the ones yet to come!