Drisse did not arrive to pick us up at the appointed time, so Keith walked up to the shop to ask Mohamed what we should do. Meanwhile he had found out that Drisse had car troubles and had organised for another driver, Wahid, to take us. We drove past the Kasbah Myriem and towards the snowy mountains.
Our first stop was to see the Barrem Gorge. We climbed down from the road to look over the edge of the cliffs to the river running in a narrow gorge below. It was fascinating but I experienced the feeling of vertigo that puts me off looking down from high places. I enjoy gorges from the bottom, looking up. Keith was in his element, prancing along the cliff top to take photos from different angles.
We were invited into the home of the sisters, and a delightful Spanish sister, whose name I unfortunately cannot recall, sat us down and talked to us about the village and her work there. Originally the Franciscans had lived in tents and moved with the nomads, providing education and health care and anything else within their power to the people. By the 1980s they became semi-settled, spending half the year in the village and half moving with the Berber nomads. A priest at that time arranged for the building of a hammam (bath house) in the village. Nowadays there are just three nuns (French, Polish and Spanish), who live all the year round in the village and the hammam has been converted into a dispensary. The nuns speak French amongst themselves and some can speak the Berber and Arabic, which are the community languages.
While progress is very slow and the community continues to live in dire poverty due to lack of employment and natural resources in the area, the sister we spoke to said that all children are now immunised, that there is immediate health care and referral to a doctor for more difficult cases, that malnutrition is not as bad as it once was and that people are clothed better. There are about 45 families living in the village, with only two flocks being able to be supported by the very sparse vegetation round about. The farms provide some work and food, but not all are owned by people in this village. Long ago people gathered wood on the mountains but it has all gone now. There is some seasonal employment coming from the government run tree planting programs. The nuns run a kindergarten, which we visited, and it provides the mothers with a chance to learn about early child hood education, and an opportunity to look for food or wood on the mountains without the children being with them, as well as educational and social opportunities for the children. In general, girls attend the primary school here until about ten years old and then stay home to work within the family. Boys may do the same or continue on with secondary education in Midelt. The teachers come out from Midelt each day, with a taxi trip to a certain point and walking the last hour, including fording the river on foot. On bad weather days it is not possible for them to come, and of course it is difficult to attract teachers to such a position.
The child care centre
The village is very poor. We think that these buildings are occupied and it's possible that one of them is the primary school.
A couple of years ago the river flooded and broke the dam wall just upstream of this village. Water and rocks surged down, and caused massive erosion and loss of some of the precious farm lands. Re-building was not immediate, and now that it is done, it is not adequate to prevent future floods or to provide hydro-electricity to the village. Sometimes the villagers feel that they are not a high priority for government projects.
After an enjoyable sit in the kindergarten with a lovely sister who was so sweet with the three little boys; the only ones of the usual twelve who were well enough to attend today. The extremely cold weather leaves the children very susceptible to many diseases. At the dispensary, we were embarrassed to be ushered in when there was clearly a greater need to attend to the line up of mothers with crying babies in the waiting room. They had all walked over from other villages. We were ushered in to meet Sister Barbara, a nursing sister and nun and a calm and gentle person who runs the medical services. She told us about her patient, a man with a heart condition who was now very ill with thyroid problems. She wrote a letter for him to take to the Kasbah Myriem at Midelt, where he would be able to see a doctor. The poor man looked so tired and unwell.
The patient travelled back in the taxi with us, so it was very handy that we had visited at just the right moment for him. Keith gave a donation towards the work that the sisters are doing. We thought of how amazing the sisters were, of how they saw everything as it was and yet were content to take a day at a time, a task at a time, to help the villagers achieve a better quality of life. There was an aura about the sisters who we met, patience, devotion and a beauty of nature that was really special.
Back in Midelt, we had lunch and then attempted to visit the museum but it was closed. We caught up with Mohamed and he took us to his father’s mineral shop. It was an absolute treasure house, with the most interesting and beautiful minerals in it. Some had been worked and made into items like clocks and others had been polished or left natural. The fossils were amazing, with some being very large indeed. Downstairs there were trays and trays of beautiful mineral specimens. The family sells minerals in many parts of the world and is opening an office in
Mohamed went home to light the fire to warm the house, ready for our trip to the hammam. We went to the museum, to find that it was not really one at all. It had morphed into a cultural and conference centre, but it did still have some interesting old items and photos in it. A delightful young man let us in and took us around the exhibits of musical instruments and cooking vessels. The photos were very interesting, particularly one that showed women at the annual marriage market. According to the guide book, the market was started by the French and was really just the time to formalise the records of births, deaths and marriages, rather than a wholesale market of women. The Berber tribes lived in remote places and so, at an annual festival, the marriage aspect was added. Our young guide said that it was actually the occasion when marriages would be arranged, with the families agreeing over the three days of the festival, and the woman going off as a wife with the man’s family at the end. The women in the photo were veiled, and we were told that the man would not have seen his bride’s face, nor would she have seen his, before they were married.
Mohamed and Keith went off to the men’s hammam and I went off alone to the women’s. Mohamed had asked a man in the street to knock on the hammam door and when a lady opened it, he had asked her to take me into her care. The lady, Meriem, spoke French and was very friendly, and was to be my assistant throughout the whole process. I started to undress and place my clothes in a cubicle, but that was not the spot for me. It turned out that my spot would be on the attendant’s table, for a charge that included the entry price. Wearing only my knickers, I was ushered in to the hottest room where some ladies were sitting on mats soaping themselves. Everyone was very helpful and friendly, and I was soon using a brown gel instead of my cake of soap which was obviously considered to be sub standard. Next I moved over to the hot water section where Meriem, completely naked, scrubbed me with a glove and more soap. It was quite rough and very thorough. I had always thought that I would be very self conscious in a hammam but, since everyone is busy washing and there are all ages, shapes and sizes, having not much on was the last thing that I was thinking of. I was hoping that it would not be so hot that I would pass out, as can happen, but really the whole experience was very relaxing and resulted in a great feeling of well being at the end.
When I finished, Keith and Mohamed had not yet emerged so I waited outside. Keith’s experience had been different to mine since it had included a massage. The masseur was so rough that Keith had shouted out at different points as his limbs were dragged about and his neck was crunched. He had not been quite sure of what he should do when, and was firmly told by the masseur to change his knickers under his towel and not to stand around naked.
After a bit of typing and reading, we had tea at the restaurant. The two women there are lovely, and have cooked us delicious meals. We went off to the internet café where we were joined by Mohamed after he finished work. We slept very well, maybe due to our visits to the hammams earlier.
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