General

Morocco II

The way to the desert goes through the mountains of the atlas. Our first small stop was at a restaurant to have tea. The view was breathtaking!

the route was bendy and seemed endless. We made another stop at a cooperative for organ oil and a woman explained how it is made.

In Ouarzazate we stoppend to buy palm, olive and eucalyptus trees for our project. We spent the night in a beautiful hotel at Agdz. At the hotel we spent the evening outside with a dinner under the night sky and talked for a long while in with each other.

The next morning started calm. We gave time to have breakfast and enjoy the pool before going on with our route. I learned some Arab phrases at that morning which was not only funny, but interesting as well.

Then we finally went to our main destination: M’hamid; a small village in the desert. The road ends here in the desert.

In M’hamid we stayed with a family in their house which was very interesting because it is so different to the way of living in Germany. They have a big living room and small bedrooms with mattresses on the ground.

But we didn’t sleep in there because it was too hot. We slept on mattresses on the rooftop which was nice because you had fresh air and amazing because of the night sky.

In M’hamid our project started. The plan was to plant trees and to make a sculpture out of garbage.

So we went outside on the first morning to search for garbage. We previewed one hour therefor. But after 10 minutes we realized that 20 minutes would be enough. There was so much garbage in the sand behind the houses of the village. It reminded me of the pictures you see from beaches around the world. Empty plastic bottles, shoes, broken tables,…

The afternoon we spent at the pool again and in the evening we went to the center of M’hamid and had something to drink with a few of our group.

The next morning the French Organisator of the group, two guys from Morocco and me went to the downhill to see the mayor and ask him where we can plant the trees and where to put the sculpture. He was very friendly to us and said that it is a pleasure that we are there.

Afterwards we went to the souk, the weekly market to buy oranges. One member of the family made fresh orange juice out of them for the whole group – it was extraordinary, I never drank such delicious orange juice before.

In the afternoon we went to the desert by 4×4 cars. It took us about two hours to go to the Chigaga dunes. It was a stunning view from there with the sunset. Nearby was a camp where we spent the night. We slept on mattresses too because it was too hot in the small tents.

The night sky with the stars was amazing.

After the breakfast we started our way back in the three cars. Our car stopped by at a nomadic camp. We got out of the car to say hello and bought fresh bread from them which was very good. In the afternoon we went to the pool and in the evening we worked on the sculpture our planted the first trees. Afterwards we went to the village for some shopping.

The next day was the birthday of the Organisator and so we sang for him at midnight and had cake and people played traditional music.

On our last day we finished the sculpture, installed it at the local high school and planted the last trees.

In the evening we had to say good bye to the moroccan teens and on the next morning we started our way back to Marrakech. This time we did not stop overnight so we were back at Marrakech in the early evening.

We went outside for dinner and enjoyed the nightlife of Marrakech by a little walk.

The next day was already our last day in Morocco. We went to the Medina to do some shopping again and spent the last evening together talking and playing games.