Blog #14 Collecting argan in the forest

Team members with argan collected in the forest

I woke up at 7:30 like usual. I ate the same breakfast I eat every day in Agadir: three croissants with apricot jam and pistachios, one cup of freshly squeezed orange juice, and one cup of Moroccan tea with mint leaves and two sugar cubes. We all rolled our various bags out of the hotel in Agadir, where our driver Abderahmane magically fit them all into the trunk of the Dar Si Hmad van. The drive south along the coast to Sidi Ifni was about 4 hours.

Heading south on the road from Agadir to Sidi Ifni

On the way we stopped at the house of a woman named Zainab’s located on the way to Sidi Ifni. We met her nieces and nephews, sister-in-law, and mother. We took a small rest and ate couscous (made from barley) with veggies and homemade butter milk (laban). And for dessert we had watermelon. After lunch, we watched her make argan oil from scratch. After that we all spread out across the lounge/living room. Some people played Uno and others played a game involving rocks that reminds me of jax and some people just napped as is the custom after eating couscous.

The mud brick home of Zainab, who kindly hosted our team for lunch and argan collection on her family’s land.

Later we also had snacks to eat: homemade bread, olive oil, honey, butter, argan oil, amelou, and olives. I also was able to practice a Tashelhit phrase I learned. “Makanakulsh zitun” which means: I do not eat olives.

Friday couscous, late afternoon snacks and fruit served by our host

We stayed there about 3 hours before the sun got a little lower, we then went out into the forest to collect some argan for our host’s family. One group went up in the mountains and my group stayed down in the plains. We had a person with use hold a big stick and periodically bang it on the ground or nearby rocks to scare away any scorpions and snakes.

Exploring the argan forest

It was a really fun and informative visit. Before we went into the forest, we only had personal testimonies from the women we interviewed about how labor intensive it is to pick argan but actually doing it ourselves it really put into perspective how much effort each step of argan oil production takes.

All in a day’s work

Jakai, Jess, Kim and Salah Eddine… plus goats!

-by Jakai Wade, Senior undergraduate anthropology major at USF