Food. An important part of this nutritious breakfast!

Monkey business aside, much of my mental energy has gone into food recently. Thinking about it, buying it, eating it, eating more of it...it would be a shame for me to not spend a bit of time causing you all to salivate as much as I have recently.

THEREFORE! It is only appropriate that I go over the mythologically-proportioned variety of deliciousness that lives here. Prepare your bibs - it is drool time. 

1. Tajine - previously featured, but so yummy it deserves a second nod - named after the clay pan-thing it's cooked in, tajine (or tagine) is essentially a sort of stew. It's actually rather hard to describe because it describes any number of things made in this pan (think Moroccan casserole)

2. Khobz - a thick, Moroccan bread that is pretty crumbly, but can be bought anywhere and is super-filling.

3. Sweet tea - seriously. Sa-weet. The Moroccans love, love, love sugar in their tea. It took me ages to figure out that their "special" tea was just regular green tea with mint and about 4 sugar cubes.

4. Couscous - the food so nice they named it twice - yum yummy yum yum yay yum. Most often served with chickpeas and roasted veg, comme ça:

5. Msemen - a layerey, doughy, oiley, stretchy, delicious pancake creation made of dreams and goey goodness. Serve it hot and filled with goats cheese and holy macaroni I'll take twelve million.

6. Spices and figs and dates and wow - so, not really exclusively Moroccan, but wowie wow wow wowie wow. Ruff. There are streets lined with vendors, and the impulse to buy and eat everything is almost unavoidable.

7. Pastries - speaking of impulsively buying and eating everything...have I mentioned the cheap pastries yet? Pastries that cost, oh, 1 dirham each? That are delicious and fresh and hot from the oven with an unmistakably French amount of butter and flakey layers?

The struggle is real.

8. Mille-feuille - yes, it is a pastry, and no, I don't care. It gets its own entry. My blog, my stomach, my rules! Translated to a million leaves, it is crisp flakes of pastry between layers of custard, with a sweet chocolatey frosted top. Despite being only 2 dirham each, I'm at high risk of bankruptcy because of these tiny delicious demons.

Ugh. Stupid. I hate you, mille-feuille. You're so stupid and perfect and delicious and perfect.

Holy 3 weeks, Batman!

Strange how time passes. Some days, it feels like I've only just arrived in Morocco. Others, it feels like I've been here for years. Maybe I've hit senility early?

Regardless! I'm beginning my fourth week of work tomorrow, and can't explain just how happy I am to be here. There are definitely tonnes of things (and people, especially people) I miss back home, but I can't imagine leaving this experience. Yes, it is cold and wet and miserable at times, but overall what a great adventure it's been so far.

Pssshhhtt. Here I am writing like I'm leaving when I have 2 months to go. Bah! Enough of that!

Not much to report over the last few days, so it's time for an overview post. At this point in my work, I'm feeling like a real part of the group. No, it hasn't been perfect and I've definitely embarrassed myself on multiple occasions (what's new?), but the research team feels like its growing closer and friendlier over time.

Another bonus - I've found myself getting to know the monkeys, too. Moving beyond recognition, I have recently become familiar with their own personal quirks and habits. For example, Caspar's always getting into fights and is a bit of a sociopath. Meanwhile, Rocky is a bit lazy, Gulliver is laid back, Tim is shy, Joey is an obnoxious teenager, Eliza's getting into fights she can't win in her senility, and Sarah's a bully...getting to know the monkeys has been incredible.*

Breaking news
As of 10 minutes ago, I've been told I passed my reliability tests! This means that, as of this week, I'm collecting data! Officially! Collecting data for science! ON MONKEYS! GAHAHAHAH!!!!

*Not to mention incredibly useful in my human-based endeavours. I can now apply more monkey terms to people than ever before!

Sores, boars, soars, and snores. Ai hiyena!

Or, as the old Jewish man in me might say, oy vey!

Yesterday was some kind of a day. Let's start at the top, shall we? BULLETED LIST ACTIVATE *brrzt*

Sores

• BLAM Woke up for a 6:30 departure = sleepy and dozy and generally unsavory attitudes
• Upon hitting up the Green monkey site with Jamie and Paddy, what do we find but no monkeys? 
• This is happening MUCH more often than I might like

• Therefore split the party - Paddy finds the group. At the top of a quarry. Covered in icy snow. That leads to a 75m drop. With a rock solid finish if you should slip up. Sketchy doesn't begin to cover the trek
• C'est la vie, we continue on...we drudge on, more like
• Ice + slush + sun + steep hills + hyper monkeys = exhausting field work (also sunburnt Mairin with windburn and weird cold-blisters all over my hands. Sun AND cold FTW)

Following monkeys as they run up and down an area called the Alps (I joke you not - these were some serious rocky ground protrusions) is killer for the legs though. I'm thinking of starting up a fitness routine called the Field Fifty - spend fifty days chasing 50 monkeys in 50cm of snow for 50 minutes of every hour. Guaranteed to at least make you a more patient person.

Also chilblains. Character and chilblains.

Boars

•  SUPER POSITIVE EVENT OF THE DAY GOES TO: BOAR SIGHTINGS! 

I knew there were wild boars in the area - heck, I've followed their tracks accidentally, seen the torn up earth evidence of their feeding, and stepping in their droppings. Never did I expect to see any.

BUT BLAMARAMA! At around 3, as the sun was starting to slant towards its less-deadly-angle, the monkeys go silent. Suddenly one alarm bark, then another, and the monkeys are running up the trees. Meanwhile, the other researchers and I have no idea what is going on. We are so far into the woods, there's no way that there are dogs or shepherds out here...
*shuffle shuffle*
"What's that?"
*snort shuffle*
Could it be?
ZOOM! Out of the woods runs this giant boar! An almost mythological beast, with a flowing brown mane and intimidating tusks runs along the hilltop, silhouetted perfectly against the blue sky. It was gorgeous! Snow spilling out from behind his feet, he ran around being territorial and manly and absolutely awe-inspiring. I had no idea that boars could be as big or as fast as this thing. Only after he had disappeared over the hill (after doing a lovely set of aggressive pirouettes) did I realize that we were in danger...before then I was just breathlessly amazed by this powerful creature.

Imagine this, but with added majesty

Wait, there's more! After walking over the hill to continue focalling monkeys, there was another snort and snuffle from across the valley. Not one, not two, but a whole family of boars rustled through the forest, complete with three baby piglets! GAH! SO CUTE AND SO AMAZING AND SO AWESOME!

Soars

• Warning - near death experience ahead, complete with dramatization fuelled by adrenaline.

After the final monkey was focalled, the final faecal sample was collected, and the monkeys settled in to sleep, we realized just how far we had come in the day. Paddy had no idea where we were ("Somewhere in the Alps, maybe? Portugal perhaps? I think the sun sets over Azrou, so if we walk this way..."). After trekking up a mini-mountain covered in ice so thick you had to stab your boots into the side to get any hold at all, we sorted out our directions as the last of the sun started to set over the hills. Not a good start to the walk back to the car.

We're moving along well, sliding as little as possible, when we reach a huge icy hill. This is not a small mound of dirt, but a 45 degree slope with no crunchable snow to be seen. Only a thick sheet of ice. Of course, we need to cross it. I went first, confident in my ability to hack a path across with my hiking boots.

It went something like this: kick the ground as hard as possible - boot creates a 2 inch shelf - use shelf to shift weight in order to kick the next step - repeat as required.

For the first 50 feet, this worked. Kick, shift, kick, shift...suddenly the rhythm changed when my kick failed to create a divet, and rather than shifting my weight onto a small ice shelf, I shifted it off the edge of the hill. There I was, gaining speed as I toppled down the hill towards a strand of oak trees, eagerly waiting to catch all of my momentum in an icy crunch.

As you may have figured out, no, I did not die. About 10 feet from the trees, I managed to flip myself over and stick my boots into the snow enough to stop. Luckily enough, I only sustained cuts along my hands, arms, and back with nothing deeper than a shallow slice.

I figure that I need to hurtle out of control down a steep hill at least once every 6 months to ensure that my adrenal glands are working. So far, can confirm, they are doing their bit.

Snores

• Unique cooking experience - I made a Moroccan dish for dinner - tajine (basically a sort of stew type thing...) with a bunch of vegetables, dates, tomatoes, and a curry base on quinoa, alongside a ramshackle banana bread 

Tajine (one variety, at least). I could, and plan to, eat this every day.

• Surprisingly delicious...still unclear whether this is the result of actual culinary ability or stomachs eager for calories in any form
• Of course, the flavour was likely augmented by impromptu dance parties and singing in the kitchen - research currently in progress

• Stomachs full and legs aching, it's time for sleep. All 6 hours of it...did I mention we leave the house at 6:30 now?

Bed. Sleep. Calm. Rest. Necessary things after a long day, wouldn't you say?

Unfortunately, the local dogs don't agree with this mentality. It's always a gamble with the pooches - which night is going to be calm? Which is going to be a futile effort in agonized wakefulness? Who knows?!

And although the mingling of dog howls and call to prayers from the mosque next door is stimulating enough to wake me up in the morning, I'd rather if they limited their activity to the hours after 5:30am. Maybe I'll put up fliers...anyone know how to say "Go the f**k to sleep" in Darija Arabic?

A meteorological aside

Although I'm sure you'd love to hear more about monkeys, some days are really more about coping with the elements than about chasing fuzzy primates around the hills.

Rather than delving into the antics of the green group, I'd like to explain to you all the complex evolution of my feelings towards snow.

It has its positives and its negatives. And because I'm tired, it's list time.

Pros of snow:

• Tracking -  it's far easier to know where a group is when you see a little trail of footprints leading from the sleeping trees
• Mobility - rather than stumbling around rocks buried in 3 feet of snow, you can just walk over them! Sort of. Mis-steps lead to some pretty major ankle-twisting-attempts
• Overheating effectively negated - hiking around all day getting you hot-headed? No worries. Stop moving for about 4 seconds and you're back to frigid temperatures!

Cons of snow:

• Tracking - it's far harder to find a group of monkeys when you knew where they were, but the snow has covered up their tracks. Also, following monkey tracks is deceptively difficult. Their tiny bodies don't break the surface layer. Our clunky meat-suits unfortunately do.
• Mobility - did I mention the hidden logs, ravines, creeks, and caves that eagerly await your legs? It's basically an arctic version of the Sarlac.
• Heat effectively negated - now, I have fond memories of playing in the snow in Ontario growing up. What I failed to remember was the length of the play sessions. Sure, 2 hours is no problem. After 4 you can't feel your toes. After 6, hand coordination is a distant memory. After 11, you aren't even sure if your body works any more.

Now, I should mention that today was the first day of sun after a long period of snow up in the park. In the deep patches, I'd say there are about 3-4 feet of snow. You might think the sun is an amazing blessing after all of this time, and it is! But...

Pros of sun:

• Holy cow my everything doesn't hurt
• What is this? Warmth? AMAZING.
• I feel alive for once

Cons of sun:

• Slush - as if 3 feet of snow isn't bad enough, when you add in 14 degree weather and sun (what happened today), movement is almost impossible. Yes, you will not freeze to death, but every step feels like a stair-climber made of molasses and fire. 
• Heat - no, drudging through half-melted snow-slush up to your thighs is not a chilly prospect. It's friggen hot, and incredibly exhausting.
• It tries to kill you - snow + sun = sun everywhere. This deserves explanation.
• Visibility nulled, which equals increased likelihood of falling into said ditches, etc. Also makes it incredibly difficult to watch monkeys who like to sit in the sun
• Reflecting UV rays EVERYWHERE - have you ever had a sunburn on your eyelids? Let me just say that it is not pleasant.
• Fiery ball of death. I mean, just look at it: 

In conclusion, until the snow is gone, I'm going to be a bit of an unhappy camper. Although I'll never forget how much snow has done for me...like the treacherous friend who does things for you to barter forgiveness.

And after snow day....poop day

9 poops. One day. Basically all you need to know.

By the way, that's a big deal. Enough of a big deal to merit beer and pizza dinner. Go team monkey butts!

Snow day?!

In spite of my most definitely being in Africa, we've had snow. Lots of it. Enough to merit a snow day two days ago, and a near snow day yesterday.


February 17 - We headed up the mountain - roads are clear, sky is looking promising, no worries whatsoever. As soon as we get out of the car and start hiking, it starts to snow a bit. Then the wind kicks in, and the fog rolls over our site.

Now, if you've ever tried to spot monkeys in the woods, it's hard enough when the weather is clear. When it is foggy, you're straight out of luck. Nevertheless, J. and I hiked for a few hours in the snow and fog trying desperately to find the monkeys. We returned to the car for a quick tea break, when suddenly blizzard.

So there we are, huddled in the car, watching snow pile on the windshield and windows, hoping beyond hope that we would get a call from Paddy saying "okay, call the whole thing off."

Instead we got a text: "Found them. I'm sending you the GPS."

Curses! Our warm selves were about to be subjected into the freezing once again! Fortunately, while we were still whining and whinging in the car, we got a phone call relieving us of our duties (not for our own sakes, but for the sake of the tiny car which was liable to get stuck on the road if the snow continued).

So we went home, drank tea, practised our ID's, and began data entry. Luckily for me, I also got the chance to practice my programming! The data that comes out of the tiny computers is terribly messy (shocking! Another issue with the boxes of death? Who might have guessed?!) and it takes hours to convert it manually from the format it is in to the format we need it to be in.

If ever there was a need for a data manipulation script, this was it. Luckily, data manipulation scripts are my jam. So rather than spending the afternoon manually switching the data over, I spent a few hours writing a code. And voila! Time saved. I do love programming!

February 18 - Yesterday was a full day too - we had a few bumps in the morning (flat tire, road closures, snowed in road), but eventually found the monkeys around 11. Unfortunately, we had to hike into the site (~30mins) before even beginning to look for the monkeys. Let's just say that my legs are going to be iron by the time I'm through here. Because daaaaaang. Hiking. For hours. Every day. It's starting to have it's impact.

On a completely different note, watching monkeys really distorts what feels normal. Wading through mud looking for a poop? No problem. Intently watching copulations and writing down specific notes? Perfectly fine. Dry socks after a shower? World-changing experience. In fact, just yesterday, as I was watching a male monkey masturbate up in a tree, I had a sudden lucid moment. To my readers: try not to have lucid moments while watching monkeys masturbate. It is psychologically jarring and left me shattered for a good 3 seconds. At least!

I'm sure given enough therapy, I'll muster enough strength to regain some normality. But until then, assume I've lost my marbles.

Reflections on my first week

So, the first week is over!

You've already heard about the first two days of work, and because the others are pretty similar I'll briefly describe them before commencing the soul-shattering deep philosophical dissection. 

Feb 13 (day 3):
Not too much to report here! Spent my first day with the Green group, made a few favourite friends (there's an older male named George who is just a darling. If I could, I'd kiss his nose - however, because there are a lot of pointy things on the front of his face that would like to kiss my nose, I'll hold back).

I spent the day ghosting Paddy, practising ID'ing and getting a better feel for the behaviours I'll be collecting later on. Other than this, we ran our first successful experiment! Our audio experiment consists of playing an alarm call to the group from a hidden speaker and seeing how the group responds to a foreign aggressive noise.

Although I wish I could report fantastic findings, turns out the male we were focussing on may have been deaf. In fact, he fell asleep halfway through the trial. Silly old Ozz...

Feb 14 (day 4):
Ugh. Bad day. Although the weather was beautiful and we managed to run a successful experiment on the Blue group, it ended on a sour note. At around 9am, Liz and I were sent out into the wide yonder to seek out and study the Green group. We arrived at the Amphitheatre, where they were sleeping the night before, to find them. Lo and behold, they aren't there.

No problem, that just means we have to look in their usual haunts. Feeding bushes? Nope. Other sleeping site? Nope. Valleys in between? Nope. Back to the Amphitheatre? Nope. Back through different valleys? Nope.

Daily totals:
Hours spend searching: 8
Monkeys seen: 0
Trips between the two sleeping sites: 5
Valleys surveyed: 4
Distance walked: 20km, all through the snow and under the hot sun (yes, a contradiction I know, but trust me on this - deep snow that sucks in the feet combined with a blazing sun is possible!)

We ended up giving up and submitting to the monkey's deceit, knowing full well that someone was going to have to head up there and try again the next day. What a feeling of frustration! At least we got to spend an extra hour with the Blue group, where I tried my first practice focal on the computers of doom (remember the non-QWERTY keyboard? Yes, that.)

RETURN TO HELL FROM WHENCE YOU CAME, WINDOWS 98 RUNNING FIEND!

On the bright side, I cooked a super-rad dinner of Chinese dumplings and spicy cabbage soup. Woot woot!

Feb 15 (day 5):
Because of the special occasion of Liz's birthday and since we had walked our legs off yesterday, we were given the Blue group today. Sounds easy enough, right?

Wrong. We get to their sleeping site and they aren't there. What monkey in their right mind would get out of bed before 7:30am in the freezing cold dark?*

To cut a long story short, we searched again. Another good hike for the two of us. Fortunately, it was a quicker find that ended in success - after only 4 hours of searching, we found them by the roadside. Unfortunately, this site came at a cost.

Tourists.

It was a crack in a dam: first a trickle, then a deluge of madness. Like zombies, they stumbled out of their cars, falling over themselves as they attempted to cross the barricade of the snow bank in order to throw bits of human food at the monkeys. Meanwhile, their shrieks of either fear, cold, or fascination mingled with the honking of cars as they attempted to traverse the barricade left by the abandoned vehicles. Of course, this hubub caused the monkeys to behave erratically and jump all over the place, screaming, fighting, and generally behaving nastily.

All to the dismay of Liz and I who were attempting to track them.

Fortunately, the monkeys soon scattered, finished with the bombardment of human attention. They quickly scooted up into some trees and headed to sleep. Not before I spend a half hour waiting for one to defecate...silly thing! She was too busy copulating (five times in one hour - very impressive, although I just wanted the poop. Even my attempts to persuade her with song failed. I guess I'm not a good Poopsmith...)

Replace the shovel with a tiny plastic tube, and that's me. Yes, my hair has fallen out and I was stung by 12 bees, right on the lip.

By the end of the day, we had collected all of the data we needed for the week, minus my failed faecal sample.

Because it was Liz's birthday, dinner consisted of couscous cooked by Hadija, our fantastic landlady; cakes; and chips from a local shop. Delicious, and the perfect end to a hectic week.

Feb. 16 (day off wooot!):
Today was fantastic! I got a lot done, but will note bore you with the details. Time for my favourite information communication method: bullet points!

• Slept in until 8 (!!!) and read a book for about an hour before getting up and having a shower
• Lovely breakfast accompanied by "Wait Wait, Don't Tell Me"
• Did laundry in the bathroom (which consists of a shower head, a tap, and a hole in the ground for all of the water and various...bathroom activities that one may require - upon special request, I'll be adding a photo, but for now, imagine this with the addition of a shower head:

  

  I'm getting the hang of it, too! Sort of...as the bathroom floor is always wet from showers, you get used to soggy socks

• Wandered Azrou with Jamie while Paddy drove Liz to the airport in Fes for her week off
• Didn't get lost in Azrou! 
• Bought baking (yes, colonialism is a terrible smear on any country's history, but dang, I do love the French influence in Morocco - 10c croissants, pastries, and baguettes are a wonderful thing!), plus delicious fruits, veg, dates, figs, and Moroccan thick breads
• Managed to buy contact lens solution for Jamie despite not knowing any of the French for it...poor Moroccan shop owners must live in fear of our visits
• More importantly, DIDN'T GET LOST!!!

•  Helped J make some ravioli, had silly Skypes with the mother unit, and generally relaxed. Amazing. 

Now for the moment you've all been waiting for: the soulful and utterly tear wrenching dissection:

I am one with the monkeys now. It is too late for me. Save yourselves!

But seriously, wet and cold aside, I'm having a fantastic time. Don't let my bitterness above convince you otherwise - when the monkeys are around sans tourists, something clicks inside. We'll see if the feeling sticks, but for now, I'm thrilled to be here.

I should mention, this blog probably isn't going to be terribly active for the remainder of the trip, except for when there are crazy things happening (fires, bear attacks, tattoos, really nifty rocks, stuff like that).

*Biologists not included**
**some doofus goaded me about humans not being monkeys, so, for the record, humans == apes, humans != monkeys. Happy now, dweeb?

Work work work

Today was a hoot and a half. Even...a pant-hoot and a half! Tee hee!

Last night went something like this:

Body: Hey, you should be awake. All of you. Let's go. This is important. You should not be sleeping so early in the afternoon.

Brain: Yes, but consider that you are in a different time zone and need to prepare yourself for work in 7 hours. 

Body: Details, details. Hey, you remember that cold you think you may have caught ? It's coming hard and strong...right NOW!

 Blam - Sinus pain, clogged nose, and throat drowning in slimy slime. This results in next to no sleep.

In spite of my brain's inability to coerce the body into behaving, at 6am I am ready to go!

My first day in the field was a colour wheel of new experiences - blue, green, and police.

Let me explain. We are studying two groups of monkeys that are named after colours. While the blue group is located near a prime tourist spot, and is therefore well fed, generally fat, rather lazy, and often ill-tempered, the green group is further from the road and is unhabituated to humans.

And yes, police is now a colour.

Perhaps I should start from the beginning. In the AM, we bulked up in our long-johns, gloves, hats, boots, and socks in preparation for the day. The mountains we work in are very snowy, with some patches knee-height. Perfect.

I actually wasn't working with the monkeys today per se. I was mostly orienting myself with the field site, starting to get my ID's sorted out, and generally getting a sense of what the next 3 months are going to look like. It was crazy! Getting to know the monkeys one at a time is a daunting task, and I'm learning to recognize them more slowly than I would have liked. On top of learning all of the monkeys' faces, I also have to be able to recognize and record over 80 different behaviours, and the corresponding codes, to input into handheld personal computers.

For some unknown reason, these computers are old, laggy as a laggard, and have a keyboard arranged in alphabetical order. All this practice with QWERTY for naught!

\endrant

So, after 3 hours with the green group, watching them slowly wake up, climb down from their warm trees onto the snowy ground, and grumpily try to gather up as much food as remains on the surrounding bushes, P. and I went down into Azrou to get my papers filled out with the police (they need to know where I'm staying if I am going to be allowed to do research). The landlady came with, turning what might have been a 2+ hour process into a mere 30 minute scamper about town. It's amazing what you can do if you have no fear simply striding in to the minister's office...through the gates of the police office...without waiting for permission. Ai heyena, my Canadian sensitivities!

After sorting out the paperwork, P. and I returned to the mountain and went to the blue group. Lucky day for us, it was a balmy 5 degrees, sunny, and we had doggie companions!

But back to the monkeys. This group is very flamboyant, as they are provisioned by tourists who come by and can afford to spend more energy, well, monkeying around. Needless to say, it was a fun day. But wait! There was a purpose! ID time. Essentially, I just ghosted P. while he did actual work. I also got to collect some faeces! Biology is truly the most glamorous of sciences.

Yesterday finished up around 6:00pm, a full 11 hour day. And I was exhausted (thus the reason for this post being a day late). My evening passed in a blur of dinner, touching base with those back home, putting out socks to dry, and them bam - unconscious.

But wait, there's more!

Because I waited an extra day, you get to hear about what TODAY was like! Incroyable!! (Did I mention that my French is improving? I might even be able to confidently conjugate an irregular verb without having to go through all of the pronouns by the end of this trip!)

Today was another early one - up at 6 and out by 7 is the name of the game. By the time we had driven up the mountain, it was raining. I say raining. I mean it was hailing-snowing-slushing. Just awful stuff! While L. and J. wandered off to find the green group, P. and I stuck to the good ol' boys (and girls) in blue.

Two days with them and I can identify (with at least 50% certainty, that is) the 12 adults that live in the group. Unfortunately, 3 of the males look exceptionally similar to me, and unless they are side-by-side I can't seem to get it right. I have plenty of time to learn, at least! That's what the first week or so is for anyway - learning. Who'd-a-thunk it?

Because of the weather, we finished up early. The reason that we stay so long in the field on typical days is because we need to know where the monkeys are going to sleep that night so we know where to find them the following day. When the weather is bad, however, there are a few spots they tend to stick to which are more sheltered.

I was very glad for the break, to be honest. Mainly because I'm lazy, but also because it was supa-supa-chilly cold (and no, Mum, this doesn't translate into "send Mairin more sweaters" - only the toes and fingertips were feeling it today). Still, 7 hours standing outside in the snow and rain is enough for me to be content.

Tonight, because of the reduced hours, I'm going to be studying my monkey stuff, heading to the local market, and planning some meals. The research group does shared meals, and J. really knocked it out of the park last night with home-made gnocci and lentil sauce. I'm not sure I can compete! And I know that my bad attitude and terrible social skills aren't going to be enough to garner my acceptance into the research clan...time will tell!

Day 1 (kind of sorta) - Trains, trains, and automobiles.

Although technically my second day in Morocco, I think that lying around in pajamas trying to get your internet to work hardly merits a blog entry.

And by that I mean, of course I meant to write one, I just couldn't get the internet to work! *Ahem*

It is worth mentioning, however, the absolute chaos that preceded my trip so far. For those of you unfamiliar with Vancouver Island's geography, it is an island (go figure). As such, you need to take a ferry off of the island to get to Vancouver airport. The ferry ride was probably single-handedly the most stressful 1.5 hours I've yet encountered. You might be asking yourself Why is that, Mairin? What could possibly be aggravating about a simple boat float through the Pacific?

Imagine this scenario and you might understand: on the boat, you realize that your last flight, the one that takes you from Casablanca to Fes where you are meeting the rest of the research team, is impossible to catch. Due to a scheduling mishap, there was a profound struggle on the ferry to figure out an alternative plan, all using the mobile internet provided by my dad's phone.

No problem, right? Get a hotel and take the train the next day. What's the problem with that?

The problem is this, dear readers. Hotels require confirmation that you can pay any unseen fees. This requires a credit card. This in turn requires that you have your credit card on you. You can see how it might be a problem if, say, you didn't have your wallet. Cut to Vancouver airport. Why is Mairin's wallet not in her backpack? Or in her pocket? Or in the car?

Why? Because it is sitting on the floor of the pub that she ate at the previous night. Hurrah hurrah for birthday dinners! Luckily, my mum is the best, and let her borrow her Visa card for the hotel. Double that luck - my boyfriend is also the best, and managed to track down and collect my wallet and is sending it to the mail. Thank goodness for social nets!

So then plane. And layover. And plane. And layover. And plane. BLAM CASABLANCA! Simple 22 hour manoeuvre, no problem.

Stay the night in a hotel, lovely jubbly, no problems.

Then trains. And I only missed one stop! 6 hours and one stop passed is no problem. Casablanca --> Fez complete. There I met up with the research team (Liz, Paddy, and Jamie), ate some ice cream, went shopping at the supermarket, then off to Azrou.

First impressions: cold. There is snow on the ground (does Morocco know that it is, in fact, located in Africa?). Although the apartment is cold, the landlady and her husband are super warm and friendly. Hadija (this name may be amended in the future - I am not sure if this is correct) speaks a bunch of English, but her French is great. She's also trying hard to both fatten me up and teach me Moroccan Arabic, although given my brain's current state of nearly oatmeal, I'm not sure if her second plan will succeed.

Now to bed for me - have to get up in 7.5 hours for my first field day! Woot woot!!

Finally, closure.

It has been over 5 months since I've returned from my trip, and I still don't want to admit that it is over. For this reason I have been avoiding this post, as if avoidance of admission would send me back.

The day spent at the orangutan sanctuary was the last biological work completed during the trip. What a marvellous finish! Followed closely by a horrible end. It was so gut wrenching to leave the orangutans, knowing that I might never see another again. Of course, regret is no way to leave a place! I'll just have to run off to Borneo one day and live with the orange cousins!

Note: I wrote this ages ago, and only published it now. So it's not complete, but I don't remember what else I intended to say. *shrugs*