First day of classes

Let me first say that last night we were eight going out to dinner.  Every other meal before this has been me and Jeremy, so it's nice to have a big group.  There are four people who are studying for an international MBA at USC.  They will be in Morocco for 3 months and then go to another country - probably Jordan.  One of them was in Peace Corps Gambia.  Another is in my class. 
There are seven students on the roster for my class, but only four were there today.  More people came in tonight, so maybe the other students will be in class tomorrow.  Right now the class is very nice - four women.  Three of us are new to Morocco, but studied Arabic in the states.  The other one has studied at the school before.  She is definitely much more able to talk than the rest of us.  We are all very rusty, but at about the same level.  I feel comfortable in the class.  I wish I hadn't forgotten so much, but I am definitely at the same level as the others.  We have only met one of our teachers, Abdelhafid.  We will see him again tomorrow morning, then have the other teacher, Sana, tomorrow afternoon.  We don't know anything about her, but we all agree that we really like Abdelhafid.  He speaks slowly in Arabic and we can understand him most of the time.  When we don't, he explains in English.  A women just came tonight - returning from winter break - and told us that Abdelhafid is her favorite teacher.  She said he can be a little tough at times, but we are all happy with that.  I feel confident that I will be much more able to speak in Arabic when I finish this course.  People keep asking if I am staying longer, but I have to get back to do WIDA testing.  (Lemore - thinking of what you said about the Peace Corps commercial.  You were right.)
Nicole, one of the students in my class studied Arabic in San Francisco.  Her bag didn't make it to Morocco.  (She flew SFO, Chicago, London, Fez).  First it was in London, then they sent it to Marrakesh and called the school and asked if she could pick it up.  The school told them that Marrakesh is several hours away and they needed to send it to Fez.  So they sent it to Paris and then Chicago.  It is on its way back to San Francisco.  She is trying to get it turned around.  It has her Arabic book in it and her warm socks.  So, tonight we sat at a table and shared my book to do our homework.  It's good to be living in the ALIF residence.  It reminds me of being in grad school.  Everyone is studying the same thing even if they are at different levels, so you can help each other. 
Tomorrow we have orientation.  I think that means filling out a lot of papers for the Moroccan government. 
I'm anxious to see what happened in the Iowa caucuses, but it is still early in the US.