salaamu xalaykum

Salaamu xalaykum literally means "peace be with you" but is the Arabic way of saying "Hello". One of the many words I learned in my language lesson yesterday afternoon. Arabic is such a fascinating language!

Today was my first day in the Children's Hospital. There are four volunteers including myself at the hospital but we split into twos. I was with David, Sarah and Katie were in the play center in the ward. David and I were in a play center in the new wing which was built by the foundation that works with CCS a few years ago. It was a very nice facility and the nurses were very kind.

We started out with two boys, Abdulhamid and Yunis (those are my own spellings). Then Mohammed entered...Mohammed was awesome! He was only there for 10 minutes sadly but he spoke a little English so he helped teach me words. He liked to draw and play basketball...we were a perfect match, but alas he quickly left as he doesn't have to stay overnight in the hospital and came only for X-rays. But as the day went on a few more kids came, and at most we only had about 6. Some were very shy but others were quite outgoing. Abdulhamid and I did a Ratatouille puzzle and boy was he excited when he finished. No one was allowed to put it away, he was so impressed with himself.

Yunis was a crazy child! But so so kind. He spoke no English but taught me Arabic words like dog, lion, fork, donkey, etc. I wrote most of them down so I can study them later. We played some basketball, did a lot of coloring and puzzles, and Yunis and I created battles between giraffes, a lion, and a man barbie doll. He really enjoyed taking down my lion and barbie man with his giraffes. The nurses spoke no English but were very kind and helped discipline the children. However, one kept coming in yelling and cleaning insisting that the room was a mess. I wanted to tell her that I was of course going to clean when we were done but we had no way of communicating so I helped her every time she came in.

In all it was an incredibly rewarding experience and I really look forward to these next two weeks. It was definitely tiring and I only had 6 kids...the other room had around 20! Whew...

We're now waiting for lunch to be served. Everyday at one the wonderful ladies, Fatiha and Aisha prepare our meals. The Moroccan food is unbelievably delicious! I never know what I'm eating but I try everything (everything meatless that is) and am almost always pleasantly surprised. Yesterday we had the most delicious lentil soup! They usually prepare around 6 dishes, all vegetarian friendly with the exception of one, plus fruit and bread. My favorite thing so far was some kind of chickpea + potato dish that was covered with some kind of orange sauce. We have cooking lessons on Wednesday or Thursday so I hope we learn to make that, haha. All of the volunteers that have been here for a while have said that hands down the best Moroccan food in the area is what our wonderful house cooks make. How lucky is that!

At some point I'll try to take some pictures so you can see how wonderful the food is and hopefully see the beautiful children I play with. There are different children each day so I probably won't be able to develop many relationships with the children that allow a comfort level for them to welcome pictures. We'll see though.