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Tamda and the last supper

Ait M'hamed Day 19

river fields in Tamda

Tamda and part of Igourdan

Finally got a glimpse of the agdal I’ve been learning about and trying to visit- Igourdan! It is a communal grazing area for Ait M’hamed and other adjacent communes. Touda went with us in a rickety transit van to visit Tamda- a douar right next to Igourdan. Was a beautiful drive towards the snow capped mountains passing through a rocky carved landscape. The rocks here and sedimentary layers have so much colour, especially in the canyons in the mountains where homes and small douars are perched on the mountainsides. It became sunnier and we had a beautiful view of the snowy higher peaks on the way, wish I had taken more pictures before it got cloudy. The fields created a beautiful green valley around a very rapid river. The crops and flowers here are in peak growth and bloom so bright green dominates all the valleys. The houses are very spread out there so we had a lot of time to examine the flowers and other plants walking down the road, field paths, and along the canal in the valley. We first visited a house- very similar in feel to the ones in Amslane in the traditional construction and style. The rest of our interviews and rankings were outside in the fields and grazing lands with different men. And surprisingly two of the men were collecting field touga- households here seem to share more activities around animals between genders. On the drive back I noticed that there were so many more people grazing, most of whom were women, overall it seems that I grazing is done equally by men and women. I also noticed large numbers of Tasaft trees so there seems to be no shortage of them and they are fairly easy access unlike Amslane. Apparently there is no limit to harvesting them on public lands, but since there are a lot and grazing and feeding timzine seems to be more popular fodder then maybe overharvest is not as much of an issue here.

I have never been in a country so full of ants, there are ants emerging from the soil everywhere! And quite large ones at that. I find the insects here fascinating, there are so many kinds and so abundant, Only got one bug bite so far, but there are bugs around and crawling on me at some point each day. Even when I tried to sleep there was a moth that kept landing on my face when I was in bed.


Last iftor meal with Malika

Had my last iftar meal with Malika and Fatima. I started preparing a tagine for myself, but Fatima finished and spices it- she has been so kind while I’ve been here despite not living with Malika. We had three types of bread made by some neighbours and Njama. The meals for iftar have been getting simpler by the day, which has been nice- simple Moroccan cuisine. Sad to be departing so soon, glad I’ll have a little time tomorrow before leaving the High Atlas and community here.

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