Write up of the bike trek in our weekly Country Director's email

PCV Project of the Week

2010 Draa Valley Bike Trek

Participating PCVs:

Jeremy - YD

Mel - HE

Rachel - YD

Eric - EN

Candace -YD

Wes - YD

Marissa - YD

Christa - YD

Ben - YD

On April 24^th – 25^th, nine Peace Corps Volunteers and five Moroccan volunteers teamed up with a local association, Association Kissane Top Horizons of Agdez, to complete a 30 km round-trip bike trek and camp. Two other associations along our trek were the venues for activities, sports, and health and environment education.

On Saturday, we met with the Moroccan volunteers and local association president in the morning. Aside from a few hiccups, such as broken bikes that had to be fixed and forgotten supplies that had to be sent for, the trek began smoothly. We biked to a douar outside of Agdez called Rabat, and stopped there for our first session.

Mel and Rachel led a women’s health discussion for 10 women on diabetes, trachoma, and conjunctivitis. The women were engaged and interested to learn about how to protect their children from disease. We found that while they understood transference of bacteria, they could not distinguish between transferable and non-transferable sicknesses (such as allergies versus pink eye). They also weren’t sure if diabetes was contagious – we explained that although it can run in families, it does not transfer between people. The women thanked us and blessed our parents! We also led them in a short exercise session, to much amusement. We taught the women how to check their pulse, and explained that just doing movement to get their heart beating faster for 20 minutes a day would help their health, and even pregnant women should do some non-strenuous activity. Though they resisted at first, they had a lot of fun and giggled the whole time!

Eric and Ben led a session for the women on community mapping, in order to depict community resources and highlight the importance of protecting the local environment. Some issues came up with the women not understanding the concept of a map or not having the confidence to draw, but ultimately, the point came across that women have the power to make a difference in terms of environmental protection.

Marissa , Christa , and Mel led a session on toothbrushing for children. The women of the association and the two female Moroccan volunteers were incredibly helpful in keeping the children under control. They were younger than we had anticipated – pre-school age instead of primary school, but we tailored the lesson accordingly and each child received a toothbrush. Afterwards, we also gave toothbrushes to the women in the association and the mothers of the children, with a lesson on why it is important to enforce regular teeth cleaning in the home.

The women of the association then served us a delicious lunch of chicken, salad, fries and oranges, and warmly invited us to return. We then set off for Tizgui. The road was rough, the sun was hot, and there was almost nothing along the way, so we ran out of water before our destination. However, we all arrived safe and exhausted at our camp site by a waterfall. We swam, cooled off, and enjoyed dinner under the stars.

The following day, we gathered almost 100 primary school aged children together on a playing field, and all the volunteers, Moroccan and American, led activities for the kids. Jeremy, Candace and Wes worked with the other teachers to do field day activities like tug of war and balloon games. When the kids were tired enough to finally sit still, Marissa, Christa, and Mel did another tooth brushing lesson. We later observed children outside with cups practicing proper tooth brushing technique!

All the female volunteers then gathered together women from the town for a health session. Approximately 30 women attended this session. We again discussed diabetes, hypertension, trachoma, and conjunctivitis, emphasizing the importance of hygiene and healthy diet in the home. Again, we distributed toothbrushes to women with a talk about plaque and heart disease, to reinforce the children’s lesson by reminding the children to brush regularly. We opened the floor for questions, and this time, the women had a lot to say. They discussed the inaccessibility of health care, the infant and maternal mortality, and other problems in the community. They explained that they wanted to do something, like build a bridge, but had no money. We learned they were trying to form an association, but had no formal papers. The rest of the session we spent discussing women’s empowerment, and how to complete the paperwork so they could formally request funds for projects and partner with other organizations. They left the session seeming excited and motivated – but not before feeding us delicious local dates!

We packed and set off for Agdez on bike. The road was mostly downhill and paved on the way back, which was a great way to end a tiring weekend. Thanks to everyone who participated – it was a great time, successful, and I hope it happens again next year!

Notes to other PCVs considering similar projects:

- get local Moroccan youth involved! We had two bac students, Loubina and Hannan, and they were invaluable with translation, watching kids, and assisting with sessions… not to mention great company!

- In kind donations of large quantities of toothbrushes are tricky. If your donor needs a tax deduction, you need to go through Gordie and PCPP Washington well in advance. This will not cover expensive postage fees. Have your donor mark the content value as under 50 dollars, or you will be taxed hundreds or thousands of dirhams of import fees. Have them ship it months in advance – the postal system can be very slow! Ultimately, it’s better to get a grant and purchase supplies like toothbrushes locally.

- Toothbrushing lessons are more effective when the lesson is given to BOTH children and parents. Children are more initially excited about toothbrushing, but quickly forget; mothers need to be informed about reminding their children to brush.

- Double check your counterpart’s facts; they may not in fact know details of prices or locations. We hired a sound system like we used a previous year, but when we saw the small space we’d be working in, it was obviously unnecessary. It’s best to make all decisions regarding the budget together.

- If a grant isn’t possible for your trek (it’s coming up too soon, or you won’t know some details until it’s too late), you can do as we did and have participants contribute 100 Dh each to cover transport and food.

- Carry more water than you think you’ll need – that’s a general rule for all outdoor activities. Make sure your Moroccan counterparts do, as well. People are used to not having to carry water, as you can ask for it and drink at any random house. However, there were no places to refill along our trek, and some of our counterparts didn’t plan for that.