Breaking news from the front!!!

I'm so excited I can hardly stand it! We just got word from Yassir, Tarik's younger brother. Apparently, 600 trees have been planted. This is the good news. The bad news is that, it wasn't nearly enough. Yassir said that word spread really fast all over the region that there was an organization planting trees around the rivers and people from all over came asking for trees. He said that next time, we need to have at least 6000 trees! Apparently, it wasn't just people living close to the water who are concerned about flood control but people from all over.

They were also able to build something of a bridge. I don't know yet what exactly they did, but they're sending us pictures soon and I will post them as soon as I get them.

I also have to mention that I received an email and a very heartfelt phone from Tarik's sisters expressing their sincere thanks for the contributions. They repeated several times how touching it was that all these people responded in such a way. It really feels good to know that we were able to have an impact. Now my only thing is to figure out how to have more of impact. There was another devestating flood earlier in the month of February in the Gharb region in Morocco. Our trees are needed.

So it's been awhile since my last update. Let's just call it a holiday break from depressing news from abroad. However, just because I want to drink egg nog and be merry, doesn't mean that bad stops being bad. Since my last blog, Bahajj's sister died and just last weekend his brother-in-law died. I knit him a scarf and hat and I figured that it should make him feel all better, I wish.

Anyway, we are in discussions with Yassir, Tarik's younger brother, about what we will put our funds towards. Apparently, right now the most pressing issue is figuring a way to traverse the river where the bridge was knocked out. In winter the river rises rather high and of course the people live on both sides of the river. Currently, I've been told that they have managed with a chord traversing the river with an old tire attached to it. I have a hard time picturing how some of those old ladies and their goats would manage.

We've discussed several options: possibly buying supplies here and sending them over there, but we haven't yet come up with a bright idea for a compactible bridge. We will most likely send the money to Yassir and oversee whatever they see fit from abroad. Yassir told me that he also thinks that replacing some of the trees should be a priority. We have about $2,000 raised. It's not going to make everything all better. At the very least, maybe the villagers will be touched to know that we are pulling for them. Thanks to all who contributed. Happy New Year!!

Shaky video and more shocks

I wouldn't give a letter of recommendation to film school for whoever took this video but it gets the idea across. I have 38 other videos just as shaky or shakier on my computer detailing other aspects of the flood. This one was obviously taken soon after because the water was still pretty fast and high. Now it's pretty much down to a small stream.

In a little while I will be able to post the video of Bahajj's house. Currently, the file is way too large to put on blogspot. Tarik is going to edit it down. He's trying to find some time to work on it in his 15 hour a day 7 days a week current work schedule.

As for the update, we have not heard anything more about whatever kind of relief assistance the government is planning to give. Tarik says that if it does happen, it will take a long time. Officials have been out to assess the damage and this is about as far as we've gotten.

Also, Bahajj had a heart attack last week. He's doing fine now and is in stable condition. I suppose it's no wonder why. I very much hope that he hangs on tight. This generation of Berbers holds so much of the tradtions. They have seen Morocco go through so many changes.

Relief is coming - We hope.

It is, of course, unfortunate that this has been such a bad season for floods. There have been several floods since ours, displacing thousands. The positive side is that support is being mobilized according to the newspapers. I have heard that some of the authorities were out our way to assess the damage caused by our flood. They are reportedly awarding compensation to those who lost their homes and livestock in addition to repairing the damaged infrastructure. It would be absolutely wonderful if they would follow through on this, because then we could focus all our efforts on minimizing future floods by planting trees, lots and lots and lots of them. However, the pessimist in me is still close by. If in over 50 years, they never finished the bridge that was built before independence, are they really going to mobilize well enough to rebuild a relatively small bridge out in the middle of nowhere in the mountains? Tarik is hopeful. We'll see what happens. I know that Tarik's mom will be a great advocate for her village and if nothing else they should get the compensation for Bahajj's house and for the other villagers livestock. Let's all hope.

Finally, we received the promised video of the village and Bahajjs house after the flood, shot by Tariks brother. Once I get the green light, I will post it, but it's rather long and very homemade so I don't expect a lot of people to watch it. I will do my best to describe it here.

There is no mistaking the devestation this flood has had on Tariks family, exemplified by the pile of rubble that used to be Bahajjs house and his sobbing family as they sort through the remains. Many of the walls have been completely washed away. Household objects are tossed around as though the place had been looted. It is hard to recognize the magical place that holds many of my fondest memories of Morocco.

Along the banks, we can see the carved out path that the rushing water made extending several meters above the current water level. Now, there is nothing but a pacified stream hardly representative of the the destruction it caused.The video also shows what's left of the washed out bridge. As I mentioned before, the bridge was built in the colonial period but Morocco achieved independence before it was finished. What existed before was barely wide enough for one car, with only one side protected by a guard rail. It makes me wonder, if the investment in infrastructure hasn't been present in the 50 years since independence, will the bridge ever be replaced? The residents have made this their priority and plan to set up a rope bridge that would allow passage on foot. I don't know how they will do this but I wouldn't be surprised if the plan consisted of buying a bunch of rope and then looking up on the internet how to turn it into a bridge. It sounds almost comical to us, but people are amazingly resourceful in the absence of qualified assistance.

I think Americans take for granted the amount of security within which we live. When Katrina happened, we had a long list of expectations that had or had not been met. In most parts of the world, there is not even the pretense of institutional protection in hard times. The bigger catastrophes get attention from the Red Cross and other international reflief groups, rightfully so. But this particular flood has gone relatively unnoticed even by Moroccans. It makes me think, as we sit in our luxury, on any given day, how many people worldwide have watched their entire livelihoods slip away for one reason or another without any acknowledgement from the outside world? This is not to say that Americans should take on the cause of every one of the 1.2 billion people in the world living under a dollar a day. The picture is way more complex than this. But I wish that at the very least, we would somehow sensitize ourselves to the issues that the rest of the world is facing. Perhaps our new leadership will make this a more pressing task on our agenda.

More Details Via Montreal

I haven't yet received the promised photos. We're still waiting. In the meantime, Tarik and I took a trip to Montreal and spent some time with his maternal aunt who just lost her mother. She filled in some of the details that we've been trying to put together. Apparently, after Bahajj was left at the top of the hill he sensed that something was wrong and made his way down to the house. At this point the flood was relatively small and something they all had handled before. He tried to get inside the house, but the door was blocked by the water. Once he went to high ground to get help, the massive rush of water came through. I suppose we are lucky to not have lost him too. But, I hate to thinking of what must have going through his heart when this was happening.

Now Bahajj is with family. I've been told that his quite depressed. He has lost everything that he's been working on in the last 30 years, including his wife. I, personally, am not sure how a man picks up and starts over at his age. He is a wonderful person and I will do what I can to help him.

The severity of this is all so immediate and therefore is quite powerful for us. However, this is apparently very common thing in Morocco at this time of year. Tangier just experienced a massive flood. I don't know if anybody died, but the Moroccan news stations are full of people wading through the streets. Morocco just doesn't have the infrastructure to deal with it and with climate change, the floods are getting stronger and more deadly. The streets don't drain and the dams are not sufficient. It is hard to be here with no way of helping.

Tarik's aunt Aisha is here in Canada by herself. She has no family nearby and is trying to make some money to send home to her four kids in Spain. I told her she should come home with us so that at least she could be with family through this mourning period, but currently it is not feasible. Please keep her in your prayers. This is of course a very hard time.

Photos

Well, we got our first selection of pictures today. We've been promised more by the end of the weekend. We might even get a video. I'm also waiting to hear about the condition of the rest of the village.

I'm posting one of the pictures we took two summers ago as a comparison. It appears that packed dirt houses aren't intended to withstand floods.