Handball

Our friend has just been elected onto the committee for the Taroudant handball team. On hearing that we had never seen a game he invited us to come and watch their next match. 

Hand ball is arranged with on small national professional league and then a number of regional leagues. Taroudant plays in the first division of the regional league and are quite successful. Last year in the Moroccan Cup (a similar idea to the FA Cup) they were only eliminated in the semi-finals, meaning that they had beaten some of the professional teams to get there..They have few resources and there is no indoor stadium in Taroudant so all their matches have to be played in Agadir. There are plans to build a stadium in Taroudant which will greatly help them with both matches and practice but it is still in the planning stage.

The manager/coach is the games-master from the High School and the team seems largely to consist of staff and former students from the school. To drive to Agadir, play a match, grab some lunch and drive back takes up all of Sunday the only day off in the week so it is quite a commitment.

The rules seem quite simple. Each side has a squad of up to 14 but can only have 7 players on the pitch. Substitutions are allowed at any time. there is a small football type goal with a wide circle marked round it.and a dedicated goal-keeper. Goals are scored by throwing the ball into the goal from outside the circle. As in netball you can take only 3 steps with the ball but can take another if you bounce it; maximum 3 bounces.

The main foul is pushing for which a throw may be awarded to the other team; a penalty throw awarded; or the player sent off  for two minutes. I found this a bit confusing because it did not seem to be completely non-contact but throws penalties and send-offs were awarded for what seemed to me identical contacts and similar ones incurred no sanction.
Two halves of 30 minutes are played. The game is fast and high scoring; the sort of thing you would expect americans to like. It is not a main american game though being most popular in Scandinavian countries and Germany.

Taroudant proved to be the superior team. (They are in dark blue in the pictures). I think that they had the superior goalie who made a number of excellent saves and they were much quicker at scoring on the break after a failed Agadir attack. By half time their score was double that of Agadir. They slowed down in the final ten minutes allowing Agadir to reclaim some honour and eventually Taroudant won 24 goals to 19.

the stadium had a very sophisticated scorebaord which counted down the time, stopping for injury breaks and managers timeouts. It also counted down the seconds for each send off. I tried to take a picture but is was dark in the stadium and needed a long exposure so camera shake made it show double which is interesting as that is exactly what my cataracts make me see without my prescription glasses.

A set of Honeyman

I finished my last Raymond Honeyman tapestry, Paisley Palisades. It had taken nearly a year as I was unable to work on it much.

I took it to the sandal-maker to be made into a leather cube (450DH/£36) and to the upholsterer to be stuffed. A "melange" meaning a mixture of Kapok and foam rubber. (100Dh/£8).

 I now have a set of four pouffes made from Honeyman designs, his two based on moroccan inspiration and two of his indian paisley designs.

 We use them round the midan for guests but I don't think we need any more. My latest projects are cushions for the patio chairs.

I think they are a good mixture of anglo-moroccan style and one of our friends asked where he could but two but was fairly appalled when he realised they each cost over 1000Dh plus 6 months of my time.

Jnane Soussia

We had a lovely day yesterday. We went to a local restaurant the Jnane Soussia (the name means Sous Garden) with some friends. Really it was my turn to cook and I was feeling lazy so we just had a nice day out. Some of the guidebooks are sniffy about Jnane Soussia saying that is is built for tourists and coach parties which never come. That is a complete misunderstanding and probably shows that the reviewer went there on a winter evening. It is a restaurant for locals to be used during the day or late summer evenings when you need a breeze. There is a distinctive star shaped plunge pool and a paddling pool for toddlers 

but as we always go in the winter I've never seen it used. There are lovely gardens and it's just a pleasant place to sit. I am quite jealous of some of their plants.

There is a playground hidden away with swings and seesaws for children and a variety of places to sit. We chose to sit around midans in the tented area.

 You do not have to have a meal there are lots of places to have just a coffee or a soft drink but it is not licensed as it would lose most of its clientele were it to do so. There is a separate building used for weddings and other fetes.
We had morrrocan cooked salads (recipes to come in  later post),

 classic lamb tagoine with prunes and almonds and kofta and chicken kebabs

In the evening we skyped the Kiwi boys who we had not spoken to for ages. They were unharmed by the earthquake and one had just had a promotion so it was quite celebratary all round.