Chasing Rainbows in Ait Khlef
Our visit to Ait Khlef, a small village nestled deep within the Atlas Mountains and barely accessible by any motorized vehicle, was one of the biggest highlights of the program. Moroccan villages are often arranged in duars, small clusters of houses located at a distance from one another, with each cluster making up the residence of an extended family. The village we visited was arranged in this manner, with the school at least another 2-3 km (1.24-1.86 miles) away from the first residence where we spent the night.
We had to hike to the school over loose rocks, something that the children must do every day if they are to get an education. When it snows, school is off. If it rains too heavily, the children skip school. As we were climbing, one of my companions exclaimed, “If I had to wake up at 6 am every morning and hike for two miles to get to school, I would never go!”
And that was a big part of the problem for these children. When school is so hard to access, you need to be really motivated to go to it. Also, education at this school ended with the sixth grade. To continue, children must leave their homes and go live in a distant village. Education there would be free but living expenses would not. Add that to the difficulties of transportation and you can understand why parents are so reluctant to have their children continue with their education, especially their girls.
Even if you do get through school and, by some grace, college, there is absolutely nothing in the village to come back to. All farming here is for subsistence and there are no other viable sources of employment. The locals are eager to develop some kind of tourism in the region; perhaps allowing tourists to come in and experience the authentic Moroccan village life may be a good way to package it.
To continue with the story, however, as we got closer to the school we started hearing snatches of music. Curious, we trudged onwards and were well rewarded for our efforts! All the beautiful little children from the school stood in a circle dressed in their best clothes. Some of the elder boys stood in the center with some kind of drums. They were all singing at the top of their lungs, welcoming us to their school! It was one of the most touching sites I saw in Morocco.
Later as we walked around the school I realized that these children, tucked away in a corner of the world, cut off from the ‘development’ that the rest of us had and denied a holistic education, were happy! It was the strangest feeling but helped me put things into perspective. The elders in the village had notions of what it meant to live as they did and to preserve their culture. But for the children this was life as they knew it!
After a long and elaborate three course meal, we painted one of the school rooms. We smoothed the walls using sandpaper, then filled in multiple cracks with putty. Once we were satisfied, we began to paint the room in blue, white and yellow – bright, cheery colors that would hopefully fill the minds of the children with dreams of chasing their own rainbows, whatever those might be.