Dar Lamine

After arriving in Marrakech on Thursday I spent the evening eating couscous, drinking mint tea and strolling around Djema al Fna watching the usual snake charmers, fire dancers and musicians with a group of Canadians and Italians. Back at the hostel, which was really more of a palace converted into a hostel, sleep evaded me due to a beastly snorer located in the bed next to me. Despite sharing a room with the giant from Jack and the Beanstalk, I was in good spirits the next morning after my crepe and orange juice breakfast.
In the early afternoon I left Marrakech and headed for the argan oil cooperative located near the beach town of Essaouria. Mohamed, the cooperative founder picked me up at the bus station and my arrival at the cooperative was greeted with mint tea, as is every occasion here, and cookies.
I have now spent 4 days at the cooperative and I believe that my charade skills may be improving more than my Arabic. Only one of the women speaks a little French but we all get along well despite the language barrier. The women talk while they work and because I understand virtually nothing of what they say amuse myself by making up little dialogues or in some case monologues. I have observed that Moroccans love to talk....and drink mint tea, the activities are best done together.
I am tending a little herd of sheep and several unruly but adorable goats. And then there's the horse Elfoulki which means the Beautiful One in Berber. This horse takes his name deadly serious and prances around at every opportunity. He's very beautiful but also such a show-off it's hard to take him out to graze some mornings. I have yet to milk the goats myself but this morning Minna, the property tender and treasurer of the cooperative, presented me with a warm glass of verbena scented sweetened goat milk at breakfast. It was divine.
That's about all the news I have for now. I may attempt to upload a few pictures, though I've been too busy carrying buckets of water for toilet flushing and minimal bathing to take many photos.