Saad and volunteers at quiz night

By Suzi Lamb, International Development Manager

I found myself unusually excited about my trip to Morocco, as much as I get to travel quite regularly with work; I hadn’t visited a new country for almost two years. I also studied French at university, and have enjoyed having the chance to use my language skills in Senegal recently and I was keen to see how French in Morocco would compare.

We meet volunteers at either Rabat or Casablanca airport; however I flew into Marrakech, as I was also keen to see another Moroccan city at the weekend before I left. Marrakech was very hot, and I jumped straight onto a train for a steamy five hour journey to Rabat.

Our Morocco director, Saad, met me at the train station in Rabat. Due to its coastal location Rabat is a much more pleasant temperature, like a hot summer’s day in the UK, around 27 degrees during the middle of the day. After rainy season in Thailand and the torrential rain we’ve had in the UK this summer, a week of clear blue skies and sunshine was much appreciated. Anyway, enough typical British talk about the weather…

It was good to visit some of our teaching and care placements in Rabat. As it is currently the school holidays the teaching volunteers are working in ‘Associations’ which offer free English lessons to small groups of students from non-privileged back grounds. The volunteers I met were doing a great job of making their lessons fun and as more volunteers arrive we will be able to teach greater numbers of keen students. Any volunteers able to teach French would also be really welcomed by the associations.

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Suzi and child at care centre

The care volunteers are currently working with disabled children at a small centre, where the children are bought for the morning. The volunteers often work one-on-one with the children or in small groups as they require lots of help and stimulation. The children enjoy activities like colouring (see the photo of me and one of the children), and simple games like dominoes.

The remainder of the volunteers in Rabat were taking part in either French or Arabic Language projects. I sat in on half an hour of an Arabic lesson, and it seems so complicated, just learning the letters and the sounds is so different to learning a Latin based language like I’m used to speaking French and Spanish. I was very impressed by how much some of the volunteers had learned though, and their host families were eager to help and practice with them.

All our host families are located within the walled Medina, the oldest part of the town. This means the volunteers are all in walking distance from each other and in a great central location. The volunteers regularly meet up for a quiz night, or to go out for some mint tea and super sweet Moroccan biscuits.

The atmosphere in Rabat was very relaxed and there was much less hassle in the streets than I expected. I think this is due to it being less of a touristy town, as in Marrakech I got far more comments from men and vendors in the street, which can get frustrating and tiring. However, I’d love to go back to Morocco, particularly to spend more time in Rabat, take a trip into the Sahara and climb Morocco’s highest mountain; all activities that volunteers can take part in at the end of a project.