The real work starts...on a beach, in Southern Spain

It’s finally over. The intensive “review” month seems like a distant memory now, and with that means a new timetable which, consisting of three half days, it really doesn’t help settle my mind that this is what is being addressed as ‘intensive’ (fingers crossed I don’t get a JCB pouring work onto me tomorrow). Along with having finished the review month, it also means that we no longer have Moroccan Arabic classes, and whilst that’s all well and good, the only way we’d be seeing off that module is by taking a final exam. The shock horror in having an exam that counts towards the final mark for the year this early on was enough to get to the best of us, but thankfully the majority of said test was reading comprehension. The elation when leaving that room wasn’t quite the “schools out for summer” type which after years of taking external exams has become almost a right of way as soon as you leave the humdrum atmosphere of an exam.

The “special relationship” (get your political thinking caps on for that one) was once again at the foray over the weekend, since we had our fellow Trans-Atlantic cousins over for dinner, who we’d met whilst traversing the fringes of the Moroccan desert. Although no politics were mentioned, things such as the sheer crudity of British English were discussed at length, and made me realise how awful my language had gotten since I graced the doors of Leeds Uni last year. It was nice to actually sit and chat with them like civilised human beings instead of simply going for the old antiquated arguments about the Empire and other typically annoying ‘yarth’ as one of my housemates calls it.

With Eid drawing closer (in a matter of days in fact), the sheer thrill of not having to study for a week is enough to make even the most studious pupil happy. It has to be said as well, you can certainly feel the sense of celebration in the Medina. Unfortunately we had to decline celebrating the day at our neighbours’ house due to travelling, but the streets have been increasingly busy in the past few days, with not only humans, but sheep, cows, all being taken to their respective homes in time for the big day. The worst case of congestion as it were appears to be in the local Carrefour, where queues are getting out of hand as people ‘Hail Mary’ various groceries from one end of the supermarket to the other in order to keep their space in the long, winding queues which are reminiscent of the pre-Christmas rush back home.

Finally, everything is planned for our big crossing back into Europe for the week via the Spanish town of Tarifa, where I await to indulge in some of Spain’s finest gastronomical offerings, since the sights of tagines and mint tea is starting to grate a little, despite the fact that if someone offered me either I’d still happily accept them, but they come nowhere near some churros con chocolate or boquerones fritos. Oh and there's a beach, where I intend to sleep. A LOT.

The One Month Wall

Today I'm subject to that strange feeling all year abroad students get, the “one month wall”. Having survived the past four weeks is quite a big milestone, especially for someone like me who jumped (or more realistically, skydived) from the no inhibitions partying of first year into a more study-intensive second year, without actually feeling like a second year student, more like an in-transit Fresher who hasn't quite made it yet.

A lot of things have happened over the past month, from sorting out our housing, trying to become fluent in the local dialect, or travelling to the desert. And studying A LOT. University here has slowly started to take its toll thanks to the abnormally early starts on a Thursday and Friday, having to wake up even before the cockerel-shaped alarm clocks that are in the Medina here sound for the crack of dawn. Thankfully, we get a new timetable next week for the rest of the year, which we're hoping is a lot less strenuous.

Another event which is fast approaching is the Islamic New Year which happens in about a fortnight, and consequentially means HOLIDAYS. One huge advantage of following typical university semester dates whilst in a country observing Islamic traditions is that you get an extra little holiday that wouldn't exist in the normal academic calendar. We've all worked out that there's practically a reading week's worth of days off, so travelling is the priority for when the times comes. The majority of the students have decided to head to the Catalonian dream city of Barcelona, whilst others have gone with a return to Leeds, which leads onto the next topic of being “university sick”.

The pictures bombarding social media sites from the past two weeks of the drunken antics of the student masses, or put more basically, the sheer end of summer carnage on campus is enough to make anyone miss university life, especially when you’re not even in the same country, making even the slightest attempt to get back there for one night impossible. But in typical “the glass is always half full” mentality that has to be taken in this situation, there is always something to do here to get one up over all those people who are suffering from “Fresher’s flu” including the weather which is still in the 30’s, and the ridiculously inexpensive train tickets that take you from one side of the country to another, making Morocco a travellers paradise.

A final thing to cover is last week’s desert trip. Despite being cooped up in a minibus with other students for seven hours (and in the process driving them absolutely insane) the weekend definitely felt like a once in a lifetime opportunity. Hopes were almost dashed when we were told there was a sandstorm, but no one backed out and went on with the first part of our journey, a camel trek. It took three hours to get to the oasis against the constant battering from flying sand, and by the time we arrived, I couldn't feel the lower half of my body, but the night was incredible. There was traditional Berber dancing, a dinner, then we spent the rest of the night stargazing, which is much better than the many attempts tried back at home since each star that we could physically see was clear, uninterrupted by the light pollution that’s graced modern day society. Something which topped even that was the sunrise in the morning, which I happily woke up at five o’ clock for. All in all, it was easily one of the best trips that I've taken in my time as a student. Just to leave you with something, here are a few pictures taken by myself and my house mate of said sunrise.