{"id":2625,"date":"2014-04-28T09:02:52","date_gmt":"2014-04-28T09:02:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/?p=2625"},"modified":"2024-04-19T19:24:12","modified_gmt":"2024-04-19T19:24:12","slug":"visitors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/?p=2625","title":{"rendered":"Visitors!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Si and Dorrie were our first visitors, back at the end of October.
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\n\"P1000040\"<\/a>
\nThen Meg came for a long weekend in January, but somehow we seem not to have taken any photographs of her visit. \u00a0Hshouma!<\/p>\n

Mid February, \u00a0Martin, Sophie, Alice, Joel, and Gabriel dropped in for just shy of a week. Jeremy was predictably thrilled to have visitors!
\n\"SONY<\/a>
\nThey walked for miles to get to the giant pinecones of Michlifen, because it had rained and the car couldn’t get over the muddy pass. \u00a0Then we loaned them our car and they went off for a couple of nights in the desert before traveling on to F\u00e8s. \u00a0Snow, sand dunes, spectacle: Morocco has it all.
\n\"DSCF0173\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Then visitor season really ramped up. \u00a0Sarah PJ came for a week, and patiently shared her visit not only with Milla and Paul but also with Jim, Lilly, and Ruby.
\n\"DSC06447\"<\/a>\u00a0\"P1030178\"<\/a>
\n\"_DSC0627\"
\nBananagram skills evolved to a very high level.
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\n<\/a>The Minnesota Boltons enjoyed Michlifen…\"_DSC0631\"<\/a><\/p>\n

and F\u00e8s, especially getting to know the carpet-knotters.
\n\"SONY<\/a>And then there was the desert–but that requires its own post.<\/p>\n

A couple of days after the Minnesota Boltons flew on to Paris, James left for a conference in Detroit. \u00a0The day he returned, Anne, Martin, and William arrived for a few days visit. \u00a0They too went to see the giant pinecones at Michlifen
\n\"13886102198_fd68044d1f_o\"
\nand enjoyed the Ben Smim valley
\n\"14069570712_775e1cbce1_o\"
\nand they were here for Palm Sunday and the traditional donkey ride at Tarmilat.
\n<\/a>\"14072722805_009ac0be0f_o\"<\/a>\u00a0<\/span>\"14069529141_e36a67f4de_o\"<\/a>\"14069524381_fa2fd37578_o\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The day after they left, Rachel arrived for just under a week. \u00a0She treated me to an overnight at a very nice riad in F\u00e8s (Riad Rcif),
\n\"IMG_2202\"<\/p>\n

and we wandered the medina, even going so far as to visit a leather shop with an overview of the tanneries.\"IMG_2282\"<\/a>\"IMG_2286\"<\/p>\n

When I had to catch up on work, James and Jeremy and Rachel went and climbed a volcano near Michlifen on a very very windy afternoon:
\n\"IMG_1764\"<\/a>
\nAfter some careful persuading, Zo\u00eb agreed to skip a day of school and guide us around Wal\u00efl\u00ef; then we got seriously lost on the way to the old medina of Meknes. \u00a0Eventually, a kind taxi-driver led us practically to the gate, after which we managed to follow our noses to a restaurant.
\n\"SONY<\/a>
\nRachel is a more adventurous eater than anyone in my family.
\n\"SONY<\/a>
\n\"SONY<\/a>It was nice to get back to the Meknes Bou Inania: we like getting up onto the roof.<\/p>\n

And one of those days, perhaps the last day of the visit,\u00a0Rachel and I went to meet with Hassan the rug-seller in Azrou, where we each bought a rug. (Actually, I bought two, antiques I couldn’t resist. \u00a0Who knows where we’ll put them?)
\n<\/a>\"SONY<\/p>\n

At my request, Hassan dug out the old photo of his father posing with the American military unit he joined during World War II.\"IMG_1882\"<\/a>Such a lot of history in every fold and tear, in every knotted thread.<\/p>\n

In the fall, we had worried that no one would ever take us up on the invitation to visit. \u00a0But now, our Moroccan friends proclaim us nice people because of all our visitors. \u00a0This is Morocco: hospitality is key. \u00a0Visitors are a necessary part of street cred. \u00a0Thanks to all who have come!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Si and Dorrie were our first visitors, back at the end of October. Then Meg came for a long weekend in January, but somehow we seem not to have taken any photographs of her visit. \u00a0Hshouma! Mid February, \u00a0Martin, Sophie, Alice, Joel, and Gabriel dropped in for just shy of a week. Jeremy was predictably … Continue reading Visitors!<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[8,9],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s4JDdJ-visitors","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2625"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2625"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2625\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2896,"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2625\/revisions\/2896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2625"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2625"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2625"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}