Isabel goes to Peru

Remember this post in which I begged you for money on behalf of my lil sis Isabel? Remember how she wanted to go to Peru? Well a big thank you if you were able to pitch in, because she ended up with enough funds to go! Actually, by now she has gone and come back, and this late big sister is only reporting on it now! 

(This picture post courtesy of all of Isabel's friends who tagged her on Facebook!)

As mentioned in the fundraising post, she went with a group from her university made up totally of choir students! They mixed tourism in with a few concerts, because the music education program she's studying with is so demanding that none of the students following it will be able to have a semester abroad.

This group picture hints a bit at being staged for tourists, but at least it proves what country she indeed was in!

She had an amazing time doing some surprising things, like sliding down rocks... (I'm jealous of that one, not gonna lie.)

And some unsurprising things, like drinking legally at age 19! Oh  the beauty of being abroad between the ages of 18 and 20. 

Her group got to climb Macchu Picchu! My envy is boundless.

Dizzy much?

But in the midst of all this fun they did indeed do some singing, including joining up with a Peruvian children's choir!

But then of course they also took a break to frolic next to the Pacific Ocean. Her university is in Minnesota and the vast majority of the students come from  the Midwest, so I'm sure the ocean was a treat!

Between sightseeing, travelling, singing, drinking, eating, being typical American 20 year olds abroad, and I'm sure plenty of other things that I haven't heard about yet, the trip was a total blur!

But she said it was an amazing experience, and I believe her! I mean just look at that town square, how could going there not be amazing??

I'm so happy for Isa that she got to go, and I can't wait to hear more details about it when I'm home this summer! She's actually staying in the Twin Cities for the summer, and just reported yesterday that she had just had training for her FOURTH summer job. So I would despair, thinking I wouldn't see her at all, but luckily we have a brother getting married. She can't skip that!

Choir concert 2015

Last Sunday, May 24th, was my choir concert! I was so happy to have so many friends there supporting me, including many people from work who came to see both me and my college Youness.

The church was packed, and we were so excited to sing in front of such a large audience.

I spotted where Othman and his mom were sitting, saw he had the camera, and smiled for it! Most of the pictures were extremely blurry due to the lighting, but this one came out all right.

We opened the show with a very long, 5 movement piece in Latin called Te Deum by Karl Jenkins. Our repertoire this year also included some favorites from last year— Les Djinns by Fauré and Zahrat al-Madain, alongside a few more songs by Jenkins written in non-existent "African" languages.

We had another song by Fauré— Madrigal. I absolutely loved it and it was one of my two favorites, the other being Puncha Puncha, a Jewish love poem sung in Spanish. They were both absolutely beautiful pieces.

We also sang a traditional Sufi song in Arabic which morphed into a collective improvisation at the end. When our director Marie-Claire first told us about that idea a few months ago I have to say I wasn't sold on it, but in the end it was actually quite cool.

We closed out the night with Siyahamba, a traditional South African song that has a distinct gospel vibe to it. The song itself was just two refrains over and over, so we had fun changing it up with solos, "corporal percussion", and more. 

Overall the night went by very quickly, and the whole show was exhilarating. We were all very proud of ourselves afterwards, and happy with the show. I'm so happy to be a part of this choir and to have the opportunity to make beautiful music every Monday night of the school year. We'll get back together in September and I already can't wait! I'll miss my fellow alto choir buddies Madeleine and Marie in the meantime! 

Pages— Chapter 6

It was 8 pm on a Thursday evening, and the basement of Le Vertigo, a small bar in Casablanca's old colonial downtown, was slowly filling up. Moroccans and foreigners alike made their way down the steep stone staircase, greeted by loud Pop art posters, background music, and chattering voices. They may have noticed the photographers from Rapax studio setting up—one being a conspicuously jovial Canadian—or they might have noticed the blonde Pole from Bewildered in Morocco who seemed to be everywhere at once, making sure that this event she had planned for so long was coming together. They might not have noticed a smiley Egyptian-Moroccan from Xmore who was just as invested, being the co-organizer, but who only showed his happy anxiety through chuckles. As the attendees sat at the bar or low tables and looked around the retro-feeling basement they would have admired and discussed Mouad Abou Lhana's artwork strung up all over the walls: art that mixes tradition with novelty, pop art with technique. The bar was filling up and hummed with anticipation, waiting for Chapter 6 of Pages to begin. 

Just after 9 pm my duty as presenter began, and I grabbed the microphone to call everyone to attention, thanking them for being there and giving them the outline of the storytellers for the night. Then as an introduction to Pages for those new to the event, we played the newly-released trailer for Pages: 

(Do you recognize the voice??)

After some well-merited applause directed at Rapax Studio, it was time to introduce the night's first speaker—none other than the Pop artist himself. Mouad Abou Lhana made his way to the front, took the microphone, and gave some information about his life and how he had gotten to where he is today—a full time art teacher of high school students in the small city of Taza and a part time artist. The floor was opened up for questions, and he answered many: whether the paintings and prints were for sale (Yes!), whether he was able to make a living off of his art (Nope.), and even what happens if the cops come when he's creating giant street art murals! (He tries to get a permit first.) Stepping off, he was warmly applauded, and proved to be the perfect opener for what would be a great night.

The next speaker contrasted sharply with Mouad's laid-back demeanor and quiet voice. As soon as Reda Chahoud, co-founder of the company Startupia, began speaking in his rapid English and even faster French he energized the entire room. His talk outlined his journey from Morocco to France, then back to Morocco, and his tireless pursuit of passion. He spoke about his company which gives young entrepreneurs guidance and capital while they work together to create start-ups here in Morocco. This work is so important to him, he explained, because it proves that there is not just one path we all must follow—go to school, graduate, get a job, get married, have kids—but there are a huge number of different ways of going about life. In Morocco, he said, this message is an important one, and not one that is often heard or promoted here. “On doit suivre une piste qui nous rend heureux—" he said. "We should follow the path that makes us happy—" our own path, not someone else's.

photo credit: Walid Bendra

Reda also gave a beautiful tribute to Pages, explaining his love for this fantastic event:

What I love about Pages is here there are a lot of people with different backgrounds, different experiences. We're gathered here to share our lifestyles and our experiences. Pages is a cultural gathering, and is all about connections. I believe in connections, and that we must create value behind connections. Anyone we meet is someone who can have an impact on our lives!

I can attest to the truth of his statements, as Othman and I have both made wonderful friends through the event, who most certainly have impacted our lives!

A break followed Reda's talk as the next presented prepared. Khalil Mounji, from the organization Gnaoua Culture, would not only tell us a story, but do it through the music his association seeks to preserve. From their Facebook page—Gnaoua Culture est une association ayant pour but de développer, enrichir et préserver le patrimoine culturel marocain gnaoui. (Translation: Gnaoua Culture is an association whose goal is to develop, enrich and preserve the cultural Moroccan tradition of Gnaoua.) Khalil spoke only briefly about himself and role in the organization before transitioning into a legend from this Western part of Africa about the boy who founded Gnaoua. Accompanied by his traditional guembri, he told the story in a way that kept all of us hooked, and at the end he was asked for an encore over and over again!

photo credit: Walid Bendra

While there was no encore from Khalil, not long after he was done he introduced the last of the night's presenters—the band Bnat Timbouktou. They are associated with Gnaoua Culture and are an inspiring group of young women who are keeping the tradition of Gnaoua alive in Morocco's economic capital. They played, sang, and danced that kind of music that can only be truly appreciated live, and the audience was captivated.

As their set went on the crowd of listeners became less passive and more a part of the music making—clapping along, dancing along, even singing along with some songs! The atmosphere was electric. It was beautiful that this many-centuries old musical tradition, that is essentially religious at its core, could provoke such a reaction in such a place at such a time. That serves as a testament to both its power and the talent and passion of the musicians!

There was also a special guest performer who was on stage both with Khalil and Bnat Timbouktou. He had boundless energy and enthusiasm and really made everyone feel the music's life and energy!

Finally, the time came to close the night, and the raffle drawings were held (with prizes from sponsors Ligne 7 and Riad Qara, and even a surprise prize from Mouad), the obligatory group photo was taken, and those who worked early the next morning left. For everyone who could stay later, however, there was a bonus concert by French/Moroccan band One of Us!

Ligne 7!

Being able to be involved in Pages has been a wonderful gift, and I count myself extremely lucky to have gotten in with the crowd of amazing people who put it together time and again. Some big changes are coming in Chapter 7, changes that we are all very excited about, and we hope to have a record number of attendees on May 31st!

Thank you Monika and Amr!

My lil sis singing Swift

Remember how in my first post I reserved the right to brag about my sisters whenever and wherever? I know it's not an uncommon occurence on the blog, and here I am doing it again.

My sister Isabel is part of an acappella group at her college, the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota's Twin Cities. Recently the group, Cadenza, recorded their very first music video!

Isa's solo is the shortest of the featured ones, but very unbiasedly I'm certain you'll agree it's the best. Just in case you have a hard time recognizing her (though why would you, given how often she appears here??) she's the gorgeous one in the scarf.

Here is our first ever music video!! We are so honored to have worked with Jack Hiniker and Michael Gaytko, as well as BAARD audio productions on this awesome project! We hope you like it :)
Posted by Cadenza on Thursday, March 26, 2015

Choir practice

Yesterday on the seventh of December my choir had an out-the-the-ordinary extra-long Sunday rehearsal. It was the first Sunday practice we've had this year, and it was great. As often happens during Sunday rehearsals when the natural light comes in, our director asked me to bring my camera and document the day so they can use the pictures for promotion on the choir's official Facebook page.

 

We worked a lot on a song that was written specifically for our choir by a contemporary Moroccan composer, and he came and joined us to see our progress and give us tips. It's an extremely challenging and not very rewarding song, so getting a bit of recognition for our hard work was very motivating. Once we get to the end it'll surely sound very different, and we got a glimpse of that yesterday. We'd been just muddling through, but it seemed to finally start coming together with its creator watching us, which had us all breathing a small sigh of relief.

Our director also had everyone do some breathing exercises with balloons! It was a great photo-op and a way to practice limiting our exhalation, which leaves us with more breath for the challenging songs we're doing.

Also, a subgroup of the choir will be doing a song called Rain Dance by Karl Jenkins (unfortunately the extra rehearsals conflict with my schedule otherwise I'd be part of it) and we practiced making rain for them. It sounded much more like rain than I'd have anticipated!

At the end of the rehearsal which lasted most of the afternoon we had a mini potluck, for which I brought a coconut flour carrot cake that was a big hit. It's actually a recipe for carrot muffins which I baked in a loaf pan with plenty of walnuts and raisins, so not really cake-like. It was very funny trying to highlight the difference between cake/cupcakes and muffins while explaining why it wasn't very sweet. I'm not 100% sure I succeeded, but I tried! Oh and no picture of the cake, it was gobbled down too quickly!

Choir YouTubes and more

Between work-work-working nonstop at 100mph, not sleeping enough and the weather changing (it's crazy how it so suddenly goes from summer heat to oooh-it's-chilly here) I unsurprisingly got sick. Along with quite a few kiddos at school too, so I guess flu season has officially begun. Luckily it hasn't been a horrible illness, but I've been totally exhausted.

I also got really lucky that my being sick coincided with Eid al-Adha, which is "the sheep Eid" I posted about last year. We have Monday-Wednesday off this week which seems like it'll be enough time for me to recover, so yay for that! I was too sick on Sunday to celebrate the Eid with Othman's family, which was a bit of a bummer not to be with everyone, but at the same time it's not my favorite holiday seeing as its focal point is the family meal where we eat sheep insides— liver, kidney, heart etc. Not really my thing.

In other news I've started up with my choir again, and we're diving in headfirst with some lovely songs. Many of the songs we did at our concert last year are up online now, and I wanted to share some with you!

This is an extract of "Te Deum" by Karl Jenkins. This is all we did last year but this year we've already begun working on the other two parts in order to preform the entire song this year. (Forgive my silly faces throughout these videos please— rare is the person who looks nice while singing in a choir!)

It was during the choir's performance of this song in 2013 that I realized I absolutely had to join! It's a mixture of languages and religions— Aramaic, Greek, Syriac, Arabic, even Latin. It is a prayer for peace for Jerusalem, and is an incredibly moving piece.

I'll leave you with another I loved— Les Djinns by Gabriel Fauré. It's a poem of Victor Hugo's which Fauré set to music, and it's very haunting and beautiful. I think we had sung it much better in rehersals than we did in this performance, but a big factor is the place where we practice has beautiful acoustics— a theatre stage with microphones just can't compare. Also the way the speakers were set up made it so that we heard ourselves very differently from usual, so it created a bit of weirdness. But anyway, here's the song:

If you want to check out more of what the choir has done, both this past year and in years previous, type our director's name, Marie Claire Agoumi, into YouTube and you'll find all the videos she has put up. She doesn't put all the songs from each year up, but a nice selection. 

May smorgasboard

 Aaaaand now onto other happenings of May which I failed to mention thus far:

1) Dad and I have always shared a love of carrot cake, and mom and the girls treated him to this lovely one on the 13th, which I'm definitely jealous of!

2) Little brother Gus graduated with a BA in Classical Philology... pretty impressive. Congrats!!

With Grandma, Tom and 4 of 6 siblings present.

3) His college was down in Texas, so when the fam traveled down for the graduation they also stopped by Uncle Dave aka Critterman's house where animal-loving littlest sis had some fun with his menagerie!

I have many similar pics, though
I never got one with the albino
 snake! Lucky Tess!

2014, with Thomas...

...and 2006, also with Thomas, but with a different turtle I think.

4) They also attended our cousin's highschool graduation. Congrats Brenna!!

  

5) Bia got confirmed and took this beautiful picture with her best friends. She has some really lovely friends!

6) On May 4th it was my mother-in-law's birthday and on the last Sunday of May it was French mother's day, so May is a generally good month for her! Felicitations belle-mere!!

Not a super recent photo, but a nice one I took and edited.

7) French mother's day was also the day of my choir concert. Othman and his sister Sarah took their mom to the concert, as a nice mom+adult kids outing. It worked out that although I know many people that went (including colleagues and students), no one ended up taking a nice picture, or any pictures! This one snapped on Othman's phone was the best I could get my hands on. But it's ok because when YouTubes go up I'l be sure to post them here!

8) My cousin John-Michael, pictured here with his lovely girlfriend, graduated as well this month down in Phoenix, and is now officially a Doctor of Pharmacy! A huge congrats to him for all his hard work!  

With our Albuquerque relatives!

9) Little sis Isabel finished up her first year of college! With super-mom and super-Thomas' help she went from this:

to this:

in the space of a few hours, then headed home for the summer!

10) Last but not least my little sisters celebrated getting their passports, so they can visit Morocco in August!! A super exciting event, definitely worthy of celebratory milkshakes.