<p>For me, in my second year of admissions work, it's looking like another great year. Last year I met so many wonderful students, guidance counselors, and parents. The experience of connecting with people in so many different places, with so many different stories to tell, and from so many walks of life is fulfilling to me in an important way. Some of that happens meeting with people in person over the summer and during the fall, but I learn and connect more when I'm reading applications.</p>
<p>And the applications are already coming in. The admissions process for those of us in Bendetson Hall is underway, with ED complete and decisions ready to go. I'm in a position to know that we also had to turn away some great people - people for whom I gained a great affection. At the same time, so many great kids will be joining us next fall, and I'm already excited to meet them face to face.</p>
<p>You guys are great, and I'm looking forward to 2008 here on CC. Tomorrow, I leave for a trip in Morocco with my housemate, Zac. I promise to return to the boards with tales of goats, spices, and mountains. In the meantime, enjoy your winter breaks, and happy holidays!</p>
<p>Special love if you're from my areas in CT, NJ, MD, ID, MY, and WY!!</p>
<p>Enjoy your trip to Morocco. That was the destination of our family vacation during June, 2006. It was fantastic! We traveled to Marrakech, Fes, High Atlas Mountains and even made it out to Merzouga to sleep under the stars in the Sahara!</p>
<p>If you have any questions, PM me. I love to trade travel tips.</p>
<p>(My daugher is a Tufts freshman. Loves it.....having a great year!)</p>
<p>You are back, but no tales of goats, spices, or eating with fingers from a communal dish. The latter does not sound particularly appetizing :-). At least you missed the snowy mess Casablanca</a> Weather Forecasts on Yahoo! Weather</p>
<p>Last Friday was Aid El Kabir, and I awoke to the sound of bleating sheep all throughout the city. The Aid (or festival) remembers when Abraham did not kill his son Isaac (but totally would have ) and instead killed a ram. And how does Morocco celebrate this story? Everyone who can afford to, and some people who can't, buy a ram, bring it home, sharpen some knives, then slit the ram's throat in the comfort of the own home. Throughout the week, I skirted past rams in carts, rams on donkeys, rams being carried by guys on motorbikes. Everywhere I went, I could hear sheep moored on the roofs of the city. Sometime during breakfast on that Friday, however, the tone of the bleating changed, and the citywide slaughter commenced.</p>
<p>Zac and I exited our place of stay, and wandered around the nearly vacant streets. After so many days of consecutive urban pandemonium, the contrast between Thursday and Friday was intense. The only activity were the bonfires set up all throughout Marrakech, staffed by the neighborhood kids. On the fires sat old metal mattress springs, and on those sat the heads of the rams. Many many heads, roasting away, charring black in the flames. Occasionally, someone would pull a head out of the fire, and wail away at it with an ax to either split it in twain (and eat the brains) or render the horns clear of the skull. Mixed in with the smell of cooking mutton was a palpable feeling of jubilation. Everyone smiled at me all day long.</p>
<p>Among the many distinct things I saw, the Aid was someone REALLY different.</p>