Work, work, work..Int'l Women's Day at Mai Thai

It has been a very hectic week for me and Tracey.  We’ve had so much deliverables which should be done in 2 weeks’ time -- 2 weeks!! >.<  We had meetings almost every day with different committee heads and tackled their areas of concern and how we could improve them.  I had to produce a partnership spreadsheet which MWM could use to track all their projects and partnership / sponsorship deals; a Training Manual which would serve as a guideline for the trainers; a Membership Master File which would contain the tandems / groupings, Group Tandem Average Total Score Chart and the Members’ Details, an Overall Planned Activities Calendar for 2012 to name a few.  We also need to produce a Team Charter template which would contain their roles and responsibilities and processes, and Tracey has to do a presentation on Project Management Theory and MS Project which is a 6-day training course and she has to present this within 2 hours max. GAHHH! >.<

with Manal & Tracey

Fight the Fat via Morning Power Walk

I’ve been eating A LOT lately.  My typical breakfast back in the Philippines would consist of just the following: a glass of milk, a glass of apple shake and a glass of water --- that’s it.  For lunch, I would have wheat bread and dessert if I’m craving for sweets.  I would usually have the “real full meal” during dinner because that’s when I’m with my family.  I know it should be the other way around and that I should eat more during breakfast but I prefer to eat my complete meal with the whole family. :-)

Since I arrived here in Morocco, I’ve been eating full meals 3X a day.  Aside from that, we’ve been eating dinner late at night because that’s when most of us are already back at the hotel. I really need to cut down my food intake or else!!  It has only been two weeks now and I can feel that my jeans are getting tighter. >.< 

Marrakesh Weekend 2

We started the Sunday early on to be able to visit as much sites as possible and luckily, we were able to visit the following:

Menara

Marrakesh Weekend

It was a very tiresome week for the whole team.  We need to capture all information needed for our project/s, attend meetings, meetings and more meetings, and then submit a revised SOW by the end of the week.  Another team even experienced getting a request from the client for a totally different SOW. >.<  I thank God that we were able to get most of the information that we need for our project and that we were able to talk to most of the committee heads as scheduled.


To relax a bit, the whole team decided to go for a little roadtrip over the weekend.  We went to Marrakesh which is a 4-hour drive away from Rabat.  We hired a minibus with driver for the weekend since we are a group of 10 and it would be difficult to organize a train ride and reserve tickets, etc.

Friday is Prayer Day

In Morocco, Friday is prayer day and they only have couscous for lunch. According to Ilham, they usually have lunch for 2 hours and then prayer time until 3PM so you wouldn’t see anyone at work during these times.  Ilham, our client, brought some couscous for lunch and it was very delicious.  

Vegetarian Couscous for Tracey

Couscous with Beef

Dar Naji Experience

We are so blessed to have a very sweet client.  Ilham invited us (me, Tracy and Hafida) to have dinner at Dar Naji Restaurant tonight.  They offer traditional Moroccan meal but as with the other restaurants, they got only a few selection of food to offer.  The restaurant really looked nice with all those unique paintings, seats and they even got seats with tents. :-)

Amazing Race + Chinese Dinner

Today’s our second day at the client’s office and we had a very looong day.  We were able to speak with some of the commission heads and were also able to get more information of their areas of concern and improvement.  I really am very thankful that God has been faithful to me and Tracey.  I’ve been praying that God would guide us and that He’ll take care of everything and so far, I’ve seen these prayers being answered.  We were always provided with hot Moroccan mint tea, pastries, fruit, lunch, our own private room with white board and flip charts and of course a heater (which is the most important coz its cold!).  The other teams are a bit jealous of us because of all these plus the fact that we have the “feel good” project.  Tracey, being the playful individual that she is, even sent an email with a picture of the pastries, fruits and hot Moroccan mint tea to the whole team to tease them.