It's been a good week and has flown by all too quickly though it will be lovely to see David and the children again, (and the food, although delicious when it's a tajine, does seem to be dominated by mountains of pasta - on its own - and potatoes!) I've had some lovely sessions with the girls, teaching English, out on walks or just chatting in the garden. It is fascinating to hear more about their backgrounds as some are definitely better off than others. There is Amira whose family own a small gite where they have people to stay and her brother is also a mountain guide; Khadija, who in fact spends a lot of time in Agadir with her brother and his family; and then Nadia who lives a 3 hour journey away from Asni which involves two separate buses and then a 3 km walk to her remote village. She is definitely one of the first girls in her village to have a secondary education and her father is a farmer and she described her grandmother as loving her sheep and goats!

We also had another interesting discussion session with all the girls about discrimination against women in Morocco. They mostly agreed that it is largely confined to the mountains where the role of women is seen primarily to look after their children and care for their husbands. Apparently the father's opinion always comes first and unmarried women in their twenties and thirties are pretty much at the bottom of the heap. However, several of them pointed out that in the cities it is quite different and they reckon that women have an equal chance of getting a good job in business, education or administration. Interestingly one factor which must help with that is that most families, even in the city, will have grandparents living with them which must help hugely with childcare.

And as a lovely surprise for my last lunch of Friday couscous a group of former EFA girls who have now moved on to university came to visit. It was just wonderful to see these confident (beautifully dressed!) young women come back to see their old friends. Khadija got them all to talk to the girls about what they were studying and how they were finding the whole university experience. It was interesting to see how after that, each one was surrounded by girls asking them questions. There are certainly no university open days here in Morocco but actually this seemed just as effective.

So although it is so sad to leave I feel that I am leaving on a real high. This is just such a great project and it is a real privilege to be working for it and to have had the chance to meet so many wonderful and impressive women. I can't wait to come back!