Giggle

If Garren and I hadn't already had the fantabulous wedding that we did and I had a bigger budget to have a band, I would have hired, World Peace Leaders. I have mentioned them before. They are a band that at least used to play in Santa Barbara. They do all sorts of cover songs and their front man is just the most entertaining thing ever.

Garren and I were randomly thinking of them the other day and so I did a search of them on the internet and found the youtube video below of them performing at someone's wedding. They made me giggle and laugh all over again. Thank you World Peace Leaders for cheering me up again all the way in Marrakech. I hope your still out there playing together somewhere.

Cats of Marrakech #1

I miss my cats. I miss the weight of Willoughby on my chest while he stretches his paws at me to pet him. I miss Maggie's playfulness in the morning and her meows for pets. I miss their greetings of happiness when I get home in the evening. Obviously they want food but they're still happy to see me.

There are tons of cats here in Marrakech. The truth is they break my heart. They have no homes, they fend for themselves and they only want to be loved. I wish I had the time and know how to start an animal shelter for all the dogs and cats in this city. I am sorely tempted to adopt one, but if I adopt one I won't want to leave it here and 1. trying to get it home and 2. trying to then integrate a new cat with Maggie and Willoughby when I return when they will probably already be pissed at me....not so much fun.

So instead I placate myself by petting the cats in my neighborhood and naming them. And maybe giving them a bit of food if I happen to have it. I will soon be the neighborhood cat lady.

On my first Cats of Marrakech post I give you daisy. The cutest calico I ever did see.

It looks like a Lime

Garren and I made stir fry the other night. The recipe courtesy of Martha Stewart called for limes. So at the store Garren and I found two limes (small round green looking citrus things) had them weighed and ticketed and threw them in our cart along with all our other groceries.

This is not a strange occurrence as Garren regularly buys limes for our G&Ts. Last night as we were preparing said stir fry Garren cut open the lime to reveal, an orange.

Maybe it's just a strangely colored lime? Nope smells like orange. We cut open the 2nd one to reveal the same thing. We substituted lemon instead. The lemon thankfully was lemony when we cut it open.

Just another thing to prepare for in Morocco. Sometimes the limes are not limes. And always always wash your veggies and fruits. It's amazing how dirty food really is when you don't have American Grocery Marketers making them look all shiny and clean. Who knew they did that?

This is hard, but.....

This whole transition from SF to Marrakech has been hard, both personally and professionally. It's draining me both emotionally and physically and now I'm sick too.

I miss my family. I miss my friends. I miss my easy job back home. I miss familiar venues, restaurants and areas. I miss feeling comfortable about where I am and what I'm doing. I miss not feeling like an idiot when I talk or not understanding something simply because I'm not familiar with the word.

But with all the crappy things there are some good things too.

1. Garren and I will not starve. Bread is available for 2 MAD or $0.25
2. There is a French Chocolate store down the street for when I really need a pick me up
3. Massages are relatively cheap 350 MAD opr $45 for one hour or (This gets me out of my wifely duties of providing back massages - sometimes!)
4. Internet is cheap and stable enough to stay in touch
5. Taxis are cheap - when you can get them to turn on the meter
6. The weather is nice. Since it being super hot when we got here it's cooled down to be more like Santa Barbara weather. We're diggin' it.
7. Garren and I are planning a trip to the coast one of these days. There's a hippie surf camp just north Agadir of which looks fun and relaxing.
8. We're hoping to do another trip up to London sometime soon to get some much needed time in an English speaking country

So instead of focusing on the bad things, in the future I will be trying to focus on the good things, or the absurd or the just plain weird. I hope you all look forward to hearing about some of them.

Still Here

I know that some of you have been wondering where I've been.

Well I'm still in Morocco and still alive. The truth is I'm just exhausted. I sit all day at my desk trying to get anything done, feeling like I get nothing done, cursing the lack of internet and computer (still on our personal laptop) and by the time I get home all I want to do is cuddle with my husband, turn my brain off and watch TV.

I'm happy to report that re-runs (for me anyways) of The OC and The Biggest Loser are on nightly as well as many random movies. Top that off with our ability to watch streamed videos of almost anything we want, and Ashley on Top Chef, I'm pretty much set on the entertainment front.

So basically things are going. Slowly. Mostly at this point I'm just frustrated. There is a general lack of direction and as with any opening there are a million changes. My main problem at the moment is that I'm expected to create a training plan/matrix and all SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures) for my department as well begin to hire my staff and prep myself for setting up both an online and local system. It's all pretty standard, really, but having never done it on my own before, I don't have enough hands let alone enough brain space to even attempt to accomplish it right now.

I'm going to take this weekend to have a stable internet connection and try to get myself organized. I'm hoping my wonderful husband can help me. When things get to big for me I get overwhelmed. And I find I avoid everything. I'm hoping if I can nail things down a bit more, get an actual plan in place that maybe things will be more manageable. Right now I'm all over the place. Even this post is all over the place.

Have a computer and files at work would be a freaking help. But that would involve other people being organized or things being easy in Morocco. Yea uh-huh. So another thing to do this weekend, buy some work supplies!

So I apologize for the partly depressing nature of this post, but it is what it is. I think once things start running more smoothly at work and we get a workable opening date, I have better more exciting things to talk about.

On the home front we may have our stuff in the next few weeks. It's supposed to arrive in Casablanca around the 24th and we're making a trip up to Casablanca next week to get a document from the American Embassy which states that we are living in Morocco. (The amount of paperwork needed is never ending and everything has to be done in person) We're talking about taking the train so hopefully a more upbeat and exciting post will be forthcoming.

Nuala out!