A day trip to Rocamadour

Ok so here are the last of the photos from our vacation in France! I ended up with a full 7 gigs of photos and videos from the trip, so you can understand why it took so long to wade through them and put together coherent posts. 

The car ride featured in the previous post was on our way to Rocamadour,  one of France's most famous historical sites. I had never heard of it, but apparently it's a famous pilgrimage site as well. It's built on a pretty impressive cliff above a river, and is made up of a town at the bottom, and a series of churches/chapels as you go up. We went with Jessika, Leny and the girls, parked at the bottom and climbed the steps up to the top. It was a bit of a climb but I was actually expecting there to be more stairs by the looks of it!

The view from the road-- pretty impressive.
 The basilica at the top isn't accessible from
the bottom part, so we didn't see it.

Cute family

Us 

In the town below. I love moss-covered
French roofs-- pretty!

It really is medieval.

This was above a tunnel (pictured in the last
photo) but wasn't somewhere we had access to.

The reason for all the pilgrimages-- a small
and unassuming wooden Black Madonna.

I liked this little side chapel cut into the rock, and thought 
the statue was interesting.

Sweet sweet sisters! As you can see even the stairs are
 made from old cut stone... falling down would hurt. 

This is apparently the fragment of a famous sword
Durendal which according to legend was presented
 to none other than Charlemagne by an angel. He
then gave it to his nephew Roland. Check out
Wikipedia for some more info.

On our way back down, in front of the
aforementioned tunnel.

Hopefully we'll be back to visit soon!!

_____

In other news, after a lengthy legal process (don't get either of us started...) Othman and I finally officialized our marriage here in Morocco last week, yay! We went out for dinner to celebrate and had a lovely time and some delicious sushi.

Scenes from a 20-minute drive through the French countryside,

on December 29th, 2013.

Fish fish fish

I went back to work this week, and though I've been to busy to post, last Sunday I took some pictures with this post in mind of a wonderful dinner Othman and I made together.

Although Casablanca is on the coast we eat far too little seafood from day to day, and this meal was an attempt to keep up the fish intake! We got this beautiful fish from a shop that specializes in fresh seafood, owned by a favorite of Othman's uncles. For those of you in Casa, Poissonnerie Marisco is around the corner from the Velodrome Carrefour Market. Their fish is super fresh, the shop is very clean and it all comes at an affordable price-- cheaper than any of the grocery stores. They'll even deliver! We've never been disappointed with the food or the service, and I would definitely recommend checking it out.

Ready to go in the oven, rubbed with olive oil and
stuffed with lemon slices, fresh mushrooms and
herbs (dill, parsley and cilantro). 

Boiled new potatoes with butter and herbs. Yummm.

Polish miseria salad, an absolute favorite of mine since rediscovering
 it this summer when our Polish pseudo-relatives came for the wedding.
 I was convinced I found the recipe on this blog and just spent many more
 minutes than I should have rereading Nichole's posts (like this one, a favorite
 of mine coincidentally posted on my birthday last year). While apparently
 she didn't supply the recipe, I grew up with her mother in law's version,
and while mine isn't quite up to par, it's still delish.

Fresh mushrooms sauteed with butter and red wine.

Ready to eat! Not quite as pretty now, but much more tasty.

Homemade, easy, delicious and GAPS-friendly dinner, along
with some fancy french mustard. Doesn't get much better than this.

From a French chateau...

Remember the chateau overlooking St. Céré‎? Well Leny and the girls took Othman and I on a walk around it one afternoon. In the wintertime it's not open for visitors to see inside... so yet another reason for us to visit in the summer.

Looking up...

Still looking up... but craning our necks this time!

Makes me think of Beauty and the Beast
crossed with Middle Earth. 

Admiring the view! 

Othman with the scarf my mom made him
for Christmas.

There has been some recent renovation work on the castle,
but much of the original still stands!

Emma was a cute tour guide!

The opposite of the first picture-- looking down onto St. Céré‎.

Emma was really excited about the little
cave, but then was anxious to get out as
soon as she went in!

The outskirts of St. Céré‎.

Two messengers telling the slowpoke photographer to hurry up.

There were some men doing maintenance work around,
so we were able to get a peek inside.

One happy hiker.

Brave guy!

The tree the maintenance guys had just
 cut down was beautiful, even in pieces. 

Farmhouses and woods.

Such a beautiful place!

 As an added bonus Leny took us driving to see another castle close by. This one we couldn't get near to, as it's private property and apparently people actually live there. This one is more Beauty and the Beast crossed with Downton Abbey!! 

Right in front of this one was a big golf
course. Lucky golfers if you ask me!

Portraits

There were so many beautiful French children to take pictures of!!

With maman

Siblings

A welcome to 2014

Othman and I are back in Morocco after a much-too-short trip to France. Both of us are really missing the little girls today, as well as the not-so-little cousins! At least that means we really did have a wonderful time. It was decided we need to visit again in the summertime, when days are longer and warmer, and the castles/caves etc. are open to viewing! I'll continue posting some pictures from the trip, but am interrupting today with a post focusing on the year 2014 that has just begun.

To be perfectly honest, I've never been one for New Year's Resolutions. Making any amount of promises to myself while knowing full well I'd break them (and sooner than later) never seemed the best way to start a new year to me. But after having a few conversations recently, reading some other people's New Year's thoughts, and thinking a bit, I realized there were two resolutions I could make this year that were 1) realistic and 2) would enhance my life. Having figured them out, I decided this was a good of a year as any to join in the resolution hype!  

My first one goes back to the topic of thankfulness. Reflecting on the good things that happen each day and giving thanks for the blessings in life is something so important, yet I so often forget to do it. Beginning this year, at dinner each night I will name two or three things I'm happy happened that day. It'll be easy enough to do, Othman can remind me if I forget, and I think it'll help me keep things in perspective. Even the worst days have highlights, and focusing on them will be good for me. I've heard of quite a few families doing this with their children... but if it's good for kids then why not adults?

Thankful everyday that this man is in my life!

Yesterday I read a post that a friend from college wrote about things she learned in 2013, and really identified with one. She realized doing activities that brought her joy earlier in life had the same effect on her now. I found that to be true this year when I joined a choir and started singing again. Something else that was a big part of my life in high school and college was doing volunteer work, but since graduating from Notre Dame I really haven't gotten involved with any sort of community service. Considering I live in a country where a large percentage of the population is impoverished, it's really a pity that I haven't created the opportunity or the time for that. Othman and I have participated in a couple of things here and there, but nothing at all significant.

After arriving at the airport at 6pm yesterday and battling traffic jams until 8pm, Othman and I went to spend a quiet New Year's with 5 other people at a friend's house. One of the people I met works with an NGO called SOS Children's Villages. She told me all about her work and the positive and not-so-great aspects of the organization, and I told her about some of the different work I've done, including the summer I spend in São Paulo working with an NGO that helps foreign women caught working as drug mules and trapped in the Brazilian prison system. It was a kind of conversation that I hadn't had in quite a while. Then I told her how I haven't done much volunteering here, partly because of the language barrier, and asked if she knew about any French-only opportunities available. She said she has many contacts in Moroccan non-profit circles and that she can help me find something. 

Giving my time to help people that are less fortunate than me has brought me great joy and peace in the past. Knowing that I'm doing something, however small, makes me feel less selfish, which is interesting because most people, myself included, volunteer for selfish reasons. Any of you who have done extensive volunteer work have experienced that feeling of lightness and pride you get from helping others. It makes you feel selfless, but in a way seeking that feeling through volunteering is an act of selfishness. This circle is necessary though, to keep us going back to helping others, and it's a circle I want to jump into again. So that's my second resolution for 2014-- to go back to volunteering in some capacity.

Highlights of 2013

2013 was a good year for me. Got married, got two turtles, got an apartment, was in Morocco, the US and France, had some good career development opportunities, started a blog, pushed myself to be more creative with poetry, photography, painting and singing, and continued to learn about life, love and the world. I can't ask for much more from 2014 but to continue the trends that have already been developing in my life, and that during this year I never stop loving, learning and growing!