November 2010 Slow Progress...is better than no progress

Hi Finn,

You looking very Jim Morrisson, anyone agree?

Things have again seemed to be moving forward this month. Have I mentioned that you have now begun school, a new school and here you are now being taught in French. If I’m honest I would love that you learn a level of fluency in at least French and Arabic (classic and/or deriga) as well as English. You seem comfortable, enjoy school, and “ma Maitress” who you have said you love….what a great incentive to go to school.

It’s a funny thing this going to school. We are very consumed by the build at tazi…oops Dar Finn and the reality is that school also acts as a means of ensuring that you ae cared for whilst we try to care for our future.

We’ve talked a lot about this, your mum and I. We feel that we should be more in contact with you, that’s also a reason for us wanting to be our own bosses, to be able to control our own time. Of course this also means that we have to work so hard trying to get this stage of our project finished.

The “downside” s that we spend less time than we wanted with you, and much of what we do, feeling very tired. I suppose that the up side is that you get to learn a language much sooner than you would otherwise. But you do like it and you are learning and you are very much loved…not too bad really!

Anyway, not to sure where that came from, but let’s move on.

813.

Our New Kitchen.

We are now well ensconced at home and the new development has been the building of the kitchen on the ground floor. This was a difficult job which found us with a floor that has a quite amazing slope…as does our kitchen. That aside tho it’s great and now means that the whole ground floor/RDC has opened up.

Party time..what a mover!

As something of a celebration we had a party for you and a few mates. It’s amazing, when we first got here, to an empty flat in the Ville and you al of 3 months old, we had no mates with kids. It was pretty lonely infact. Now, somehow we have lots of friends with kids of all ages and it’s great…so lets celebrate..it must be said I think you get your dancing style from me, lots of arms and legs in there!

Finn on the computer.

You’ve also gotten in to technology in a nascent sort of way. Of course you took all the letters and didgets off the lap top, which makes doing things like this far more difficult than it should be.

Dodgie portrait of daddy.

However you’ve also gotten in to taking the odd snap, tho how you’ve managed to make your mum look so fresh faced and me so…well rough tbh, I don’t know. Listen son, help an old man out..your old man…if you’re going to get in to taking pics, which I hope you do, learn a few beautification skills too!

Stunner of your mum looking remarkably fresh faced.

Oh and then there’s motor transporting. I shall whisper here that you’ve already had a go “driving” the car and love to be in the driving seat, changing gear, even the odd go at stearing. But as for motor bikes, you see them and you try to get on…fancy a bit of piste driving? We’ll have to wait for that, to not too long expect!

Motorcycle man…you have a thing for cars and bikes already.

Tazi/Dar Finn.

More progress here but still it feels slow. We decided to get a company to take down the ruin, just to give us a breather and let us keep healing, and as we didn’t feel too comfortable about pulling down several adjoining walls to neighbouring houses. In the end it’s seemed easier and we could have done it…oh well, but at least it’s going down!

Ruin in ruins.

The rest of the house continues to improve. We employed one of the more expensive carpenters in fez to do our work. For a town with a reputation for it’s wood work, the majority of carpenters are ..well naughty men! However Abelrahim is great and has done a god job on our doors. Abdellilah did a great job of taking off the levels of paint to uncover the original work under neath…now they are beautiful.

New old doors.

And of course we not only managed to get the broken plaster repaired on the fountain, but we decided that Arabs work was so good he should re do the rest of it..when will it end.

Elsewhere!

The month ended a bit strangely with my being offered two jobs, by Oxfam to go to Pakistan and UNDP to go to Guinea Buisseau. I chose the Un job as they would have given me leave every three weeks, so I wouldn’t have been away from you too much, but even before leaving it felt a bit of a strange job. Well for many reasons it didn’t work out.

However it gave me an insight in to how different African countries are. IN GB noone was incharge and there was no management of the country. Here, despite the relative lack of political freedom and the very real socio economic challenges, there seems to be a plan, the country is moving forward and progressing…and, even now, with the Magreb in, if not turmoil, certainly in a time of change, it feels stable.

AQueen and her prince.

Back at home you went off to your first Fancy dress party, and became the prince to your mother the queen.

Beautiful.

Sept - Oct 2010. A return to our new home and an old chantier

You looking angelic on Zalagh...there's mischief in there somewhere!

Hi Finn,

Obviously I’m writing this belatedly in to a whole new year in which there are already momentous events shaping the region of north Africa and equally Europe if Timothy Garton Ash’s analysis is anything to go by. What is interesting is that you will see these events unfold further than I will

(http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/feb/02/egypt-young-arabs-1989-europe-bold)

With so many of these things, I look at them and you and wonder what you will make of it all. These are interesting times…..mind you, are there any other?!

We return to restart Tazi..or what is it called now!

So September/October saw us return to Fez with renewed intention. The build on Tazi has been relatively quiet for the past few months but now we’ve paid off everyone necessary we can finally get on with the job, which is mostly related to knocking down the ruined neighbours…..or as Mohammed would say, Dar Finley…..Now of course this is an interesting point as we’ve been considering what to name the Bloody thing.

Knocking down the ruin.

Just as our process of naming you, we’ve had numerous ideas, all of which have changed. There have been locally inspired themes such as Dar Rouah, which links to the name of the street Zkak Rouah, which apparantly is linked to illness, malaria and influenza, which has everything to do with the proximity of Zkak ElMaa, or the street of water, the rivers that run below the house and the links to malaria that apparently pervaded al époque.

This didn’t inspire us to a haven of peace and tranquillity, equally noting that some have told us that one way of expressing Rouah means prostitute…although people do say a lot of things!

My favourite was Dar Funk, which I thought was catchy and caught what I hope will be part of the atmosphere of the place…. Your mother thought otherwise and thus finally we’re calling it Dar Finn. It’s all been about and around you and you have helped put a very difficult challenge in to perspective, so it’s a tribute to you, I hope you enjoy it…Christ I hope we finally get to enjoy it!!!!!

Anyway, Dar Fenn also translates as “where’s the house”, which works if you speak with a strong Belfast accent, so Ronan should have no problems there!

Beccie raises a smile at the destruction of another level of the ruin.

But what’s important at this stage is that we have started to look towards the fnishing line, even if that is stil a while away yet and the beginning of the knocking down of the ruin, which reflects this, made all of us very happy.

It’s not only been happening outside the house, we finally plucked up the courage to knock down the zuaked plastering over the fountain and Arab has begun reworking it. It’s an amazingly detailed job and we weren’t sure if anyone had the skills to replicate the work of past masters…we’ll see what happens later in the year!

Zuaked Plaster work being re done over the fountain.

Visiting friends….things don’t always work out as you’d want.

We had a visit from Jules this month. This was greatly expected as she’s a very dear friend of mine and at last we have somewhere and something to show people after so many months/years of struggle.

Alcantara Pool, a final dip before winter.

For us it also gave us the opportunity to make the most of the long sunny autumn and the final heat of the summer. Thus a couple of lazy days spent by the pool at Riad Alcantara we’re very welcome. It’ll be a while until we do this again. This year you’ve learnt to have confidence around water and the summer was filled with trips here to alleviate the heat. You loved it. I hope next year sees you learning to swim, maybe even in the sea.

You particularly enjoyed Julies visit as she came bearing gifts of two roaringly good reads about dinosaurs and “Julies game”, a memory challenge that you haven’t put down since. Even I, with challenges in that department, have loved playing with you. Thanks Jules.

Jules and Finn lay Julies game.

Unfortunately one of the downsides of living somewhere people come on holiday is that people forget that tho they are on time off, we aren’t. It’ll be a difficult one to manage and we are only now beginning to try to do that.

We want people to come to see us, that was ne of the reasons for moving to Morocco, instead of anywhere further afield. But we have to try to manage people’s expectations of what we will provide them, when we are either working or in need of a decent weekend break. It’ll happen, we’ll get better at it, and at explaining what people can and cannot expect…another learning curve!

Tours Around Fez.

Havens of peace not far from the madding crowds.

As winter began to creep in, I also started to think about next year and what I wanted us to be able to do in it. One of the joys of having habiby has been that we’ve been able to explore the countryside near and (not too) far.

Finn get’s in to his camping car!

As such we’ve started developing our first website for one of next years projects a sort of “tours” idea that takes people to little known spots near here, for food in fabulous locations. I’ve been wandering the hills around here and have found a fair few routes for short treks, but have also linked up with associations in the Middle Atlas that could see us organising routes out there. All very exciting and great potential.

A winter setting sun leads the way to the dawn of new ideas for next spring!

Check out the website: http://www.toursaroundfez.com/

813…….Home Sweet Home!

It’s been something of a learning curve…one amongst many, many, many….returning to 813, in a state of almost total completion. No workers, a chance to simply enjoy a beautiful space. Few decisions to make, tho noticeably attempts at placing our images and art have fallen behind a need to reduce opportunities for conflict. Thus they sit around the wall and look…pretty good actually!

Finn begins to settle in at home.

Anyway suffice to say tat we are all enjoying being in the house and slowly it is becoming our home. Any downsides? Well there are a lot of stairs and to forget anything is to travel up them…must be good for memory games!

However after an initial reticence, you certainly seem to have settled in…which is what it’s all about!

Mind you, it's not as if you are getting it al lright, or maybe I should be looking at this in a different light.....look at things like this daddy!

Umm Finn, there are times when you seem uncannilly able to represent what's really going on with me too!

Funkay! XXXX