Week Four

Hello readers,

Well, I am now completing my fourth week in Morocco, and things are going pretty well.  My Darija is getting much better, and I am making more conversations with the locals.  Last Sunday, I jogged out of my town for about seven miles, and enjoyed every minute of it.  The road that I was jogging on was no wider than the Burk Gillman trail in Washington, so it felt like I was running on a regular trail.  The scenery was amazing.  Unfortunately, I had to turn around due to a bunch of dogs.  Luckily the dogs were afraid of fake rocks, or at least some of them were.

My group and I began performing some business and operations analyses on a local association in our town, to prepare for future business analysis procedures at our final sites.  The Artisans here are very talented.  The association even taught a little bit of web technologies.

Once I get to my final site, I will be meeting with a local Artisan association to determine their organizational needs, and institute a project or projects to meet their needs, and hopefully transform the project into a sustainable program.  This is no small feet given the language and cultural barriers.  To imagine, in the states, even in an organization where everyone speaks the same language, projects seem to never come to fruition.  If I can execute a worthwhile program here in Morocco, I guess this will be a great accomplishment.  I have to applaud the current and past PCV's who have successfully implemented worthwhile projects and programs for the Artisan's here in Morocco.

Anyway, as time goes by I will continue to comment on my business development activities.  I am here for two years so time is really just a frame of mind.  That is about it for new news, just lots of training and cultural immersion with a few crazy dogs on the side - ha ha.

Thanks,