“This is the most rain we’ve had since 1974,” says a Moroccan woman confidently to me.
I joke in response. “Maybe we brought it with us from Oregon.” After all, these days of scudding grey clouds and cold slanting rain remind me of my Northwest home, even though the land here is more like California, with its palm trees and groves of olive, citrus and eucalyptus. But the joke does not go over. People just look at me. I know that the rain is considered a blessing; I wasn’t trying to claim to be the author of it.
Storms wake me in the night. Wind howls, rain gusts; it shatters against the glass windows, it soaks the laundry I forgot to bring in. During sunbreaks, as I gaze up into the deep deep blue framed by flashes of fuchsia bougainvillea, I can feel the southern latitude in the strength of the sun.
One thing I did not expect to worry about in Africa was keeping warm. My first foray onto the continent only enforced this for me. We landed in Nouakchott, Mauritania, in April 2001. We were met by a man we’d known in Oregon. “We’re planning a tourist trip into the interior for you, to the historic city of Chinguetti,” he told us, “But we’ll see if it cools down first. It’s been so hot that some people have died.” Oh.
The airline lost all our luggage so I washed what we were wearing that first night, and hung it out to dry at about 1 a.m. Our clothes were dry as bones the following morning. That was a clue. We were in the desert now, a place where even the air is thirsty, and rain evaporates before it hits the ground. I wore sandals and cotton skirts year round.
We knew that Morocco’s climate would be different. We studied maps, checked the weather.com statistics showing yearly averages. Rabat, our new home, is the same latitude as Los Angeles, and we assumed things would be similar, much cooler than Mauritania, where it got up to 125 degrees that first summer, but not cold.
But although the plant life is similar, with palm trees raking the sky with their spiky fronds, the weather here is far colder than Southern California. The houses are built for the hot summers, with no thought taken for cold damp winters. I was talking to a friend about this, and she showed me how she was wearing 4 layers of turtlenecks and sweaters, plus a scarf. “You have to wear a lot of clothes,” she told me. “This is how the Moroccans do it.”
In the meantime, we’re all sick. The cement-block house echoes with our coughs. It might not snow here on the coast, but it does in Morocco’s Atlas Mountains, where apparently you can ski. “I was sick a lot my first year too,” soothes a Korean friend. “But then I learned to do as the Moroccans do–I don’t use the space heaters.” We’re not convinced, until she explains that she used to run hers all day and all night. I still don’t know why that would make you sick, but given that these run off large bottles of butane gas, I suppose the fumes wouldn’t help.
On Saturday morning, Ilsa and I walked a couple of blocks to a major road to catch a taxi. Her clean jeans were soon soaked to the knee as we dodged puddles and tried to keep the umbrella from blowing inside out. In the meantime the rain poured down, bucketed down, incessant. We drove in and out of enormous puddles, straining to see through the condensation that fogs the windows of all taxis in the rain.
This morning, I woke to soft rain, a silver whisper on the pane. I reluctantly put my bare feet on the icy tiles that make up Moroccan floors. When I opened the front door to send the kids off to school, my breath fogged out around me. Our shower is, literally, scalding hot, with the fun addition that when you turn on the cold water, the hot water heater shuts off, so you can alternate scalding/freezing/scalding/freezing. Or you can take a bath. We turned on our space heater, huddled round, gratefully drank hot coffee. We’re keeping warm here in Africa, but it’s a lot harder than I thought it would be.
This post is an entry for Scribbit’s December Write-Away contest. I found the topic fit right in with what I’d been thinking about anyway.
16 comments
December 4, 2008 at 11:01 pm
Kelly @ Love Well
I was cold before I started reading this.
Now I’m positively freezing.
That’s how you know you’re a good writer.
December 5, 2008 at 12:19 am
js
Well, I hope for your sakes, that all this wetness and cold is a temporary, seasonal thing. I loved your description of the desert, where even the air is thirsty. And palm trees raking the sky. Lovely.
Yes, layers. We’re all about layers here. And of course you know that cotton is the enemy, right? At least that’s what I’m hearing for cold weather gear here. Gotta have dry-fit (poly) or something like that for your base layer. Really, it seems pretty complicated, just knowing what to wear, when and that isn’t even taking style into consideration!
December 5, 2008 at 1:20 am
Kim
I feel for you! We arrived in Argentina mid-August, still winter here, but I’d expected much milder weather. Boy was I wrong. On Sept. 21st, the first day of spring, it snowed! And this is normally an area that only gets snow every few years. I spent the first month and a half freezing. Our co-workers blessed us with extra sweaters and a little electric heater for our apartment. I haven’t seen a home yet with central heat. Layer, layer, layer is definitely the key!
Are you able to get cough syrup and medicine okay? I’m pretty impressed with the things we can get here; the antibiotics actually work better than what I’ve used in the U.S.
December 5, 2008 at 2:44 am
jolyn
So random, but do they put rugs down there? What do they wear on their feet while inside? (I’m assuming they take off their shoes at the door?)
I bet you end up getting rid of your space heaters, too. Hope you blog long enough to let us all know the reason. (Do they think the temp flux between warm/cold weakens the immunity?)
December 5, 2008 at 5:59 am
LIB
My friend, who lives in a part of China that has no central heating, says the kids FIGHT over the PRIVILEGE of doing the dishes. They each want to have their hands in warm water!
December 5, 2008 at 6:49 am
Linda
My husband and I made a quick trip to Marrakech last December and I almost froze to death. Thank goodness I had brought a light winter coat. The rooms were all cold where we stayed and we used up the gas on the heater which didn’t seem to work that well unless you were sitting right next to it.
December 5, 2008 at 7:24 am
Robin
I can relate. Our very first winter here in Israel after we got married we were living in a crappy little third floor walk up – no heat, and only giant glass sliding doors (an entire wall’s worth) between both the living and dining rooms and a gigantic porch closed in with nothing but flimsy plastic shutters. We had one tiny space heater and no money to buy any more. It was the worst winter in recorded history. Our neighborhood flooded almost daily. I couldn’t get to the bus stop to go to work without being in water literally up to my knees. It’s been 17 years since then and I still dread the coming of winter, and I still give thanks when I come home and turn on the central heating!
FYI, I also spent a very long cold winter living in a hotel in Ankara which turned off the heat at 8pm! I found that taking a very long, very HOT bath enables you to basically parboil yourself into a stupor, making it a lot easier to then get into bed and fall asleep. Only catch is if you stay up to read or something you cool off all over again and lose all benefit LOL. (Thankfully by the next winter my company finally moved me to a normal hotel with decent heating!)
December 5, 2008 at 12:19 pm
MaryWitzl
You poor thing! I felt guilty in that I enjoyed reading this — we continue to suffer our own weather- and water-related traumas here — and I tried not to feel too envious that you can, if you want, actually have HOT showers. (I’m assuming our mixing valves work; we seem to be able to adjust the heat — what there is of it.) As I write this, we have no water (or so I’m told — I’m at work and I just got a message from my daughters who claim that they cannot wash dishes). My husband and I have managed two hot showers each over the past two months, and that is it. On several occasions we’ve had no water for showers, or only a dribble of cold.
Do you have a hot water bottle and leg warmers? I found that these got me through Scotland’s six-month winter!
December 5, 2008 at 12:25 pm
Jeanne A
I know how many times I’ve tried to tell people that it gets cold in Addis Ababa—-and how often people just can’t believe it. No heat in any buildings there either.
Back when polyester was in style,when trying to warm up next to a space heater and I soon realized my pants were about to melt!
Now that I have kids that do winter sports I’ve learned the value of Under Armor. IF someone wants to send you something for Christmas I recommend asking for it. It doesn’t have to be brand–although that is coveted by our snow borders! (And know this mom who grew up in Africa does not do winter sports!)
December 5, 2008 at 4:40 pm
LG
My coldest winter was not the one in Dawson Creek, mile zero of the Alaska Highway, though it was minus 50 outside… but my year in Japan. I learned to wear 4 layers, and no winter coat… you just wanted a wind breaker so that when you arrived somewhere and took off your coat, you still had your longsleeved waffle underwear shirt, you two sweaters and wool vest or jacket…. I also bought bloomers to wear under my long skirts as we could not wear pants to teach in those days…. I also gained a lot of weight filling up on corn soup and mizo soup every hour or so. In the spring, everyone commented on how much weight I lost, and I did lose weight, but mostly it was ditching all the layers of underwear.
My roommate had her mom send her out sleepers with feet, like for babies. Someone in our language school knit us little throat warmers to wear around our necks at night.
But even here in the desert it is cold now in the mandatory skirt. I have socks on my feet, but am wondering where my slippers are. And I am going to have to start wearing jeans around the house. Brrr. and it is only 70! What will I do in January?
December 5, 2008 at 4:45 pm
suz
I feel so very spoiled with my heat,dishwasher,W&D,water when I want it..etc…you cause me to GIVE thanks for the things we take for granted~
if I could I would send you some fun gloves and a HAT and a blanket…and more..BOOKS!
December 5, 2008 at 7:40 pm
js
Ummm . . . what about global warming? From these comments, it sounds pretty chilly everywhere. Brrrrrr . . .
December 5, 2008 at 10:08 pm
Nan
Sean says Mauritania is freezing too, at night, and even cool in the day these days.
We’re hot and steamy here in Trinidad though. Floods and steam and heat. And floods.
December 6, 2008 at 6:13 am
Michelle at Scribbit
Have I told you lately how much I love your writing? I was just telling Andrew that I so admire your skill with the words.
December 6, 2008 at 5:52 pm
suz
I admire your writing too..hope you can work on that book!
December 7, 2008 at 5:03 pm
Pieces
I never would have thought you would be cold there. Goes to show how much I know.