I was just coming back from a walk with Sandy, the dog, by my side. As I approached the Berber Cultural Center where I was staying just outside Imintanout in Morocco, I could see one of the girls who had tried to teach me to dance in the kitchen the night before. She was standing on the hill that connected the Center with the rest of the village and was waving for me to come with her. We didn’t share a language so I wasn’t sure where I was going or what was going on but I went with her anyway.
She lead me through a door and a series of rooms before we entered a small courtyard and another room where we sat and had tea and bread with the family. After tea, we scurried through the village picking up more people as we went along. As we approached the edge of the village we came to a road with a large field across the way. I could see several women walking towards the field, they were all carrying large pots and dishes and blankets. I still had no idea what was going on but I had the feeling it would be something I wouldn’t soon forget.
We made our way through the field until we met with the other women. It appeared that the whole village was there, minus the men. We greeted everyone and took our seats on the ground. I could tell that most were curious about who I was. An older woman approached the girl I came with, she pointed in my direction and started saying something I couldn’t understand but I imagine she was saying “who the hell is she?”. Once satisfied with the answer she promptly adopted me and motioned for me to come and sit with her. Several of the women were busy preparing tea and placing large pots of food onto a propane burner.
Then the singing and clapping began! I sat there listening and became teary eyed, I couldn’t believe I was being allowed to share in this moment with all these women. After a couple of songs tea was served followed by a stew of some sort (I still don’t know what I ate), coffee and then dessert, all in the middle of a field! Once everything was cleaned up, the singing started again. The older woman whom I was sitting with got up and started dancing, she teased me with her moves as if to say “get up and dance with me”! And so I did and I didn’t want it to end.
As I walked back to the Center, I was beyond happy to have this experience. At one point in the evening I had reached for my phone to take a picture or video but I didn’t have it with me. There were no photos, no recording, no videos, only my memories OR so I thought. The next day one of the men at the Center told me that he saw the video of me dancing with the older woman. Turns out someone else had taken a video. I share it with you here…