This week was literally amazing. It's the first time I visited the High Atlas Foundation (HAF) and met Dr.Yossef Ben-Meir, HAF’s president. It was an amazing meeting where I had the chance to learn how the foundation works and have an interesting and unexpectedly deep discussion. I enjoyed hearing from Dr. Yossef about HAF’s very first project, how the foundation started, and a lot of other inspiring stories.

Talking about HAF's projects, it was also a big pleasure to meet Mr. Abderrahim at a nursery located in Akrich village just outside of Marrakech. I was happy to see all of the different trees, be able to touch them and breathe their special fresh air. I couldn't stop my smile and excitement when I planted one for the first time in my life. I also couldn't stop myself from planting several more trees.

I can say that I finally understood what women’s empowerment means when I visited the Achbaro women’s cooperative. The first thing I want to say is that I am so proud of these women, their art, and the creativity of their beautiful products. I began to love these women one by one and could barely stop my tears when they spoke about how proud they are for being financially independent and finally succeeding after a lot of challenges. Something I will always remember about this village is when one woman from the cooperative told us that she recently got her driver’s license. She explained how hard it was to get and how hard she had to work. It might be normal to some people, but she is the first woman in her whole village to get one. I can't find the words to describe how proud, confident, and optimistic about the future she was.

Let's move to first aid training, which was one of the most important workshops we had this week. From this one, I have learned how to help myself and others. It was so interesting to learn something new and get the tools and knowledge needed to help in emergencies.

For me, this week is the beginning of a new adventure. I am very excited to practice what I learned about tree planting. My team and I finally chose a plot of land where we will plant different vegetables, a new challenge that we will tackle together. I can't wait to see our plants growing.

The last thing I want to end my blog with is: "Sustainable development began with empowerment".