Living with a Local Family in a Moroccan Village (Amazigh People)

Hey guys Ava, here I am in the mountains of Morocco. I am slipping down a very narrow path and for the next few days I will be staying with a

local

Berber

family

in that

village

over there so I can get to the town. actually you have to do a little hike and I have Ismail here who is 14 years old and he is my

local

boy. He will take me to town. I will stay with some of his

family

and friends there, I am very excited. Completely unique experience. I've been to Morocco a couple of times before, but never somewhere as remote and as local as this.

This was going to be my home for the next three days. Nice on the net. Hey? I was in Morocco, the most popular place in Africa. tourist destination, but I was the only tourist here. I had just arrived in a small town in the Atlas Mountains, a town that isn't even named on Google Maps. A friend of a friend had arranged for me to stay with her family there and that's how I found myself making the seven hour drive from Marrakech to Well, I'm still not sure what it's called, we drove through small towns and beautiful mountains and finally found myself following a teenager across a dry river bed to my new home. they stay in Khadijah's house, they are an amazing family, although the world knows them better as Berbers and as soon as the guests come to visit, the tea starts to flow, let me show you this beautiful traditional

village

house, this is the El Patio is structured like a traditional Moroccan riad with a central space in the middle where

people

can gather there, which is the hospitality room, so you have to climb these very, very narrow stairs until you reach a small balcony with a view. the central patio and the town out there and this is where we enter the guest room this room is dedicated to receiving guests there are rugs along the walls and there are two tables right here in the middle this is where the food is served tea and meals and this one here this is the traditional thatch and wood roof absolutely beautiful some of these roofs are over a hundred years old so that was the guest room, the hospitality room now I'm going to close this beautiful blue door behind from me and I'm going to show you this part of the house and to get there we have to go down the stairs better be careful with your head these ceilings here are quite low quite dark it's difficult to see and here we are on the other side of the patio there is a room storage where the family stores all their food, vegetables and supplies.

You enter through a small door like this, if you can get through, I barely can, these are some of the utensils that the family stores for general cleaning and cooking, for example. these are branches for the fire this is one of the ovens they use for bread and this one here is another one and there is one more here and another here each of these ovens makes a slightly different type of bread that's why there are so many and trust To me, the art of bread making in North African and Middle Eastern cultures is a real thing, there is a single window, well, if you can call it that, right above the ceiling, a small window like this ensures that the entire room stays cool throughout the day. families

living

here during the hot Moroccan summers, a room like this would have been an absolute blessing, completely indispensable because it would have allowed them to store their food in the cold, in a cool and cool place for much longer and here apparently this is the section of the house chicken hello sorry, sorry, sorry, okay, sorry for bothering you, there is one more place I need to show you and that is the kitchen.

I wouldn't want to upset Hadija, trust me, Hadija just called me to show me how. The traditional bread is made here, it's called hubs, right, Ismael always helps me with the local language and here we are, this is Hadija making the traditional hoops, this is very hard work, guys, honestly, I'm just doing this one completely clumsy way. It means okay, okay, Hadija decided to take away my power from the tool because he clearly he wasn't doing a very good job. Adija just entered the oven room with all our bread dough, so I'll follow her. Ah, there it is.

This is our tan door, our oven, and we're about to stop baking bread. It's super amazing to see Hadija literally take the bread dough, put some water in it, and then stick it to the walls of the oven with her bare hands. It's really hot there, believe me, the first loaf of bread is already ready. Hadija, you literally just peeled it off the oven wall with a wooden stick. Here we go. This room has become extremely smoky. It's hard to breathe. You better get out. We will go and then what we will do is accompany that bread with this beautiful Moroccan tea right there that is the school at the top of the hill and there is the neighboring town this is the house it is quite simple and quite modest they are a very modest family and without However, they decided to welcome me a foreign guest, someone they simply do not know and welcomed me with truly open arms.

I was told that the Amazigh are proud of his hospitality. They confirmed that they invited us to visit a neighbor soon, so I'm sitting here from their house, you can see the rooftops of the village and the valley around it, the sun is about to set and we will return home before it gets dark and It's too cold, it's very cold here, very fresh air. from the mountains, but it's winter, so it's cold. Just before sunset, we all crossed the wadi again to Kadija's cousin's house. She would spend the night there with the women of the family.

You should know that this is a fairly traditional and conservative area. In Morocco and in the local culture it is simply inappropriate for me to stay at their house because at the moment it is mostly men and boys staying there, so a girl alone would not be appropriate, let's put it that way, so they had the kindness of They put me up at one of his cousins' house, which is right here, next to town, across the road, and this is where I'm staying for the night, morning guys, it's been a very cold night and I spent it under about four layers of blankets it is very cold here in these mountains and there is nothing like central heating these things do not exist here so blankets are all you have I hear sounds coming from the kitchen so it will be better Let him go and check the breakfast situation, come on.

We are about to have breakfast here in this room where the ladies of the house slept and this is our breakfast table right here we have gera and we ate, that is coffee and tea is the local name for bread and it is usually a thick and spongy bread . a little crunchy on the outside and soft on the inside and you dip it here in this oil and this is the perfect breakfast. We have an unexpected guest. I think our baby is fine here. She's a little hungry. Never say no to refills. I just decided to take a little walk in the beautiful mountains here, so we leave the town behind and I'm here with abdul karim and of course ismail from there, and we're going to go for a little hike in the mountains. my guides because they know these parts like the back of their hand after all this is their home there is something super amazing about this place I'm not sure if you can feel it or feel it but we are walking on a road there are no cars here there is no car noise no There is noise pollution the only thing I can hear is the wind and the roosters and our own footsteps and this man here is building a canal the reason he is building these canals is to water this land I am not doing this I don't know if you believe it or no, it's actually a small field right here on the side of the mountain.

Here you can grow all kinds of vegetables. He just suggested that we have a small cup of tea, delicious Moroccan tea, perfect. The mountains are so beautiful here and this cup of tea makes it even better. This is the sweetest thing in the world. We just got back and the father of the family brought me some gawa coffee as well as locally picked walnuts and almonds. mountains we were walking on, this is incredible, I fell in love with this landscape and this family, they don't have it easy here, there are not many jobs, there is no infrastructure, it is very difficult here and yet they welcomed me into their home Without a doubt, we are about to sit down to prepare a tagine.

A tagine is a traditional Moroccan dish that contains many vegetables, often meat, and is often served with rice or couscous. I've seen both versions, so hadija here, I'm sure. tajin master she's just chopping the vegetables to make it now the chicken is finished she finally got what she wanted she ran away with a piece of carrot it's a little cold here so we're having an adventure that's the fire over there matisha Jesus Yvonne it's how did I get these guys to remember my name, it's one of those green vegetables, they're like peas or something and it sounds almost like my name is Eva, basically the same thing, right, and now we wait and our beautiful tagine later. two hours of cooking finally ready here in Morocco we eat with bread we dip it in tagine in the vegetables we pick up some pieces and that's how we all eat together from the same plate, each one using our own individual pieces absolutely delicious, very good excellent, it's very juicy, really, very fresh, perfectly aromatic, perfect homemade tagine.

Finally, after three days and two nights, my stay with this Amazigh family came to an end. I don't want to romanticize how they live because it's a very hard and modest life, but I feel like I have to point out one thing about them in how they interact with the world around them. You know, the important thing to keep in mind is that this hospitality goes beyond simply welcoming a guest. This is for me. I think true kindness imagines that one day you wake up. until there is a knock on the door, you open it and see a stranger a stranger who doesn't look like you who doesn't speak your language who doesn't necessarily share your values ​​doesn't dress like you what do you do?

Do they welcome them or say goodbye? These guys didn't fire me. In fact, they made me feel like part of their family. I guess that's probably all I have to say. Now, six months later, I stayed with this family in January. That is to say, in the days before the covert era, many things have changed since then, but what has not changed are the other principles of hospitality, so if in the future you stay in someone's house, find a way to thank or contribute to reciprocate. hospitality as a guest before I sign out, I just want to let you know that I have launched a new channel on patreon.

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