Nostalgia for the Beyond

After 18 months in Morocco, I’ve finally set foot in a region I’ve always been curious about: the Rif mountains along Morocco’s Mediterranean coast.

I’ve left behind the now fairly routine rhythm of fieldwork in pursuit of a few days of relaxation. Unable to settle on another good yet economically modest holiday destination (and limited by the Icelandic cloud of ash that obstinately continues to paralyze airway traffic), I managed to convince Farid, my good friend and colleague, to take me north, to his native land.

And so here we are, ensconced in the heart of the legendary Rif. We’re taking day trips west to Al Hoceima, and longer ones east, to Temsamane, Anoual, Nador and Oujda. Other than that we spend most of our days in Beni Bouayach, a small village east of Al Hoceima. It was built only recently, but now serves as a business epicenter of sorts for a number of smaller villages in the surrounding hills. Their dirt roads now meet up on the new main street of this town: a busy, café-lined thoroughfare for tractors and trucks, donkey carts and regional taxis (here painted in a greenish turquoise, in reflection perhaps of the nearby Mediterranean).

The area is full of history, and family trees – centuries old, yet still blooming – are rooted deeply and firmly in its soil. It awakens in my own quite rootless existence a nostalgia for a feeling I’ve never quite had. Each hillside hides a story; each valley is the stage for a family saga. Most of these stories are colored by a theme of opposition against outside forces. The Rif Berbers have long been proud resisters of submission to centralized control, and make subtle claims to separate-ness on a daily basis. It is, first and foremost, a separateness borne by language. The people in this region understand Moroccan Arabic, but their language is Tariffit, and as a matter of principle, they prefer not to speak what they consider the language of the occupier. So as not to grate against local ears, I resort to Arabic only for the most essential communication, but otherwise rely on Farid’s expertise as interpreter.

My own communicative efforts have thereby been reduced to a minimum; as such, the mental complexity of my daily life has been dialed back to a primordial level of simplicity. With my fieldwork in Rabat being so heavily dependent on human interaction, this brief period of virtual deaf/muteness has actually been a welcome respite from my regular life, and amplifies my sense of really being ‘away’. Without that mental exertion directed outward, I’ve been able to focus on turning inward. I’ve had time to think, to process, to formulate new directions for my research. And for the first time in what feels like months, I’m finding time to write again – something other than field notes, that is.

I’ve never spent this much time in a Moroccan village this small, and I adore the snapshots that I am being given of daily life in this region. Traipsing through fields of wheat, groves of olive trees, and patches of coriander plants, making sure everything is growing as it should. Checking the level of water in the well – it’s been flowing generously ever since the earthquake of 2004. Looking in on the presses where, come December, olives will be converted into olive oil. Eating apricots straight from the tree. Bringing bread and fruit to community members in need. Taking lunch to the imam after Friday prayers. Shopping at the market, where you can pick out your own live chicken for slaughter. Whiling away evenings in plastic chairs on the sidewalk, chatting about future prospects over mint tea and sunflower seeds. And spending the occasional night hidden away on a rooftop, furtively drinking wine and whiskey.

The latter, I must qualify, are activities distinctly reserved for men. Women generally do not show themselves outside after dark. In fact, the foundational principle of Riffi social organization seems to be that the family’s women are to be protected from the gaze of strangers’ eyes. I am told that Riffi families place great value on privacy. Life in a city apartment is unacceptable: they could never share a hallway, even a front door, with strangers. All families here thus live in the Moroccan equivalent of townhouses. The entire village is made up of them: boxlike constructions, three floors high, with colorful plasterwork facades. The ground floor provides space for a garage, or even a store; the two floors above are each outfitted as fully functional apartments, including salon, kitchen, and bathroom. This is local logic: with what essentially constitutes two separate apartments for each family, men and women can entertain separately. Male and female worlds seem in fact to constitute parallel, but completely separate domains; beyond the private realm of the immediate family, there is very little informal mixing. Even weddings are single-sex affairs.

As a foreigner and outsider I am exempted from these standards of propriety, and so I get to be there for the nightly tea or wine. But being the only woman who shows herself outside after dark, I am nevertheless an anomaly. And being a blonde woman, I’m an anomaly about which people draw particular conclusions. Farid explained it to me as follows. As we drove onto the main street of Beni Bouayach, he informed me that to those who don’t know him well, the sight of us together will lead to the assumption that he has “found one” – that is, that he’s managed to find himself a European woman who will marry him for ‘papers’.

Departure is a common wish, a shared dream, a notion ever-present. There is common agreement among the people of this region that opportunity – fortune, career, a future – lies beyond. Regardless of how far the beyond on which one has set one’s sights, young adults all feel that there is little for them here among these hills. They’ve grown up with fathers, uncles, older cousins away in northern Europe, and these migrants’ stories have nourished the next generation’s dreams of leaving. Each summer, visiting emigrants’ display of European wealth and worldliness further widens the chasm between reality and desire. For the young men of this region, stunted in their masculinity and adulthood, a woman from the West can – literally – be one’s passport for departure.

For me, in turn, this region illustrates the sadness of stifled potential. The people’s stories of lack and limitation strikingly contradict the beauty of these hills, their obvious fertility. But this contradiction is born not so much of misperception; it emerges rather from the problematic relationship between the Rif and the central government. In a vicious cycle of cause and consequence, the Rif Berbers have always resisted submission to centralized power, and the government has, in subtle and not so subtle ways, consistently and systematically neglected this region. The tribes here are fiercely independent-minded, and always at the ready to fight for their autonomy. This volatile combination has helped Morocco battle for its sovereignty in the past (against the Ottomans, then the Europeans), but now poses what is perhaps the greatest threat to the power of the monarchy. A threat the government attempts to contain through isolation. This is a forgotten corner of Morocco: roads are in dangerous disrepair, there is a dire lack of schools for higher education, and no irrigation systems at all. After an earthquake devastated the region in 2004, the government failed tragically to help re-build. Internet connections are twice as slow as anywhere else, and radios receive more Spanish than domestic channels.

Apart from neglect, there is also silence. The region’s colorful and volatile past – battles, victories, independence and subjugation – has systematically been left out of the Moroccan history books. To the people themselves, stories of oppression are often too shameful to recount. This new generation of stunted young men has thus, sadly, grown up ignorant of its people’s illustrious past, of the sagas that link them to this ground. They are unaware of their rootedness – laboring under a sense of lightness, perhaps, that further nourishes their dreams of a beyond?

Without government investment, the community around Beni Bouayach has become surprisingly self-sufficient. Community funds (much of it from emigrants in Europe) have financed the installation of electricity, the construction of new housing, and the charity that cares for those who are less fortunate. Without government investment the community is, unfortunately, not (yet?) able to create long-term opportunity for its people. But their pride nevertheless refuses to be stunted. The people find subtle, daily ways of resisting subjugation. Their language is alive and vibrant; used often use to tell jokes at the expense of Arabs, or to grunt at the presence of “er makhzen,” the government.

Yet, lest we forget that even this remote and neglected corner of the country still bows under the rule of its King, the government has nevertheless managed to put its stamp on the region. Frequent displays of the Moroccan flag and portraits of Mohammed VI help to remind us that the notion of a Rif Republic remains but a mere nostalgic idea…

Things to Do in Rabat on a Saturday Night

Last Saturday night, I believe temporarily forgot that I was in Morocco.

Around seven PM, I met up with a group of NIMAR-affiliated ladies downtown. After a pleasant dinner at Le Petit Beur, a small restaurant close to the Parliament, we headed over to Théatre Mohammed V for “ABBA the Show,” a big spectacle, as the Théatre always calls it, of classic ABBA songs put on by a sizeable and very enthusiastic ABBA cover band. Complete with lighting effects, original ABBA members and 1970s costumes, the show was fabulously entertaining. The theater was packed with fans screaming and singing aloud so fervently that one would have thought the original singers were up there on stage. Had it not been for subtle references to Morocco through the lighting effects (a ‘DH’ sign lighting up on the stage backdrop amidst Euro and Dollar symbols during the song Money, Money, Money; a collection of red and green lights creating an image of the Moroccan flag at the end of the show – and sending the crowd into ecstasy), the entire ambience would have made me forget where I was.

The Théatre National Mohammed V is one of Rabat’s primary theater venues. It offers a wide variety of entertainment to the Rbati public, from plays in Moroccan dialect to Flamenco concerts and hip hop dance performances – to quote a few offers from the upcoming winter program. But those who seek to spend a soirée out on the town have more than just this theater to choose from. The various cultural institutes scattered around the city center (The German Goethe Institut, the Spanish Instituto Cervantes, and the Institut Français, for instance) each offer their own selection of music, films, and other performances around town. The result is a weekly offer of cultural activities that will certainly not leave you wanting for entertainment.

You might start your cultural evening out at one of Rabat’s many decent restaurants – in one’s choice of price range and cuisine – and end it at a swanky bar or nightclub. For contrary to what one might think about a country where alcohol is prohibited by law to 99% of the population, nightlife in Morocco’s larger cities is alive and thriving. The offer of venues runs the full gamut from dark and dingy dive bars, where the only women present are there in a professional capacity, to hip and trendy nightclubs. The latter are places to see and be seen. Dressed to the nines, groups of men and women lounge around the table they’ve reserved, making their own drinks from the bottle of alcohol they’ve purchased and the mixers – coke, sprite – they’ve been given for free. They laugh, chat, and occasionally dance – first to American hip hop, later to the techno and house that follow it. Girls wear revealing tops and skinny jeans; boys wear shiny fitted shirts and leather shoes. There is an ease of interaction between the sexes that seems to contrast with daytime social conventions.

Whenever I am out, whether it be at the theater or at a club, I cannot help but wonder about the identity of the people I see around me. Who frequents these places – from what socio-economic background do they originate? The nightclubs I have seen are a swanky affair. There seems to be an elitism to the whole experience, a suggestion of luxury; the advertisement of a certain level of wealth and a certain brand of modernity. It’s in the way people dress – the glitter, the brand names – but it’s also in the money one ostensibly spends for a night of dancing. The cover charge for Amnesia, one of Rabat’s most famous clubs, is 200 Dirhams – a small fortune, if you imagine that a large proportion of the Moroccan population lives on a salary of 1500 a month or less. Admission comes with a free drink, but any subsequent beverage runs at least 80 Dirhams.

However, my friend Hatim tells me that the real regulars never pay. The secret, he tells me, is to get to know the bouncer. To strike a deal, and get a discount. It’s not the upper classes that one will encounter at the club, he explained – those elites have their own, private, establishments. No, the trendy patrons at Amnesia are individuals just like you and me; they’ve just managed to bargain their way inside, to an evening of luxury at a discount price. Once again, the suggestion emerges that everything in Morocco is negotiable, and nothing is as simple as it seems (… but the true elite always remains out of reach).

Yet my question remains. Who, then, frequents places like Amnesia? Where do they come from, and where do they live? What kind of jobs do they hold, where do they go to school, and how does their behavior at the club fit into their daytime social roles?

When thinking about these questions I often catch myself imagining each of these nameless young individuals to be a kind of Jekyll-and-Hyde – possessors of a nighttime alter ego whose behavior is incommensurable with their daytime identity. I’m intrigued by the contrast that seems to exist between the social conventions of Moroccan society, and the vibe I encounter at these clubs. On this blog, I often write about the various ways in which ‘tradition’ is idealized and upheld by Moroccan society, and the ways in which particular interpretations of ‘modernity’ emerge and interact with old customs and conventions. I’m interested in the ways in which these two concepts seem, ostensibly, to contradict one another. And so I take note of the way in which I see girls dress and behave at Amnesia – and then contrast it with the grumpy man Fatima and I once encountered as we walked home at 3 AM, who asked my friend if her mother knew she was out so late, and then added that she must be a prostitute.

But if there is one thing I have learned about Morocco, it is that nothing is ever as simple as it seems. ‘Modernity’ and ‘tradition’ are not entities but ideas with very fluid boundaries. They are not polar opposites but rather converging and diverging ideologies about the meaning of our socio-cultural rules and conventions. We all live lives that combine elements of the modern with notions of tradition, and this need not make us Jekyll-and-Hydes, unless we ourselves allow it to. So, too, for the men and women I see at Amnesia. Because in the end, what is so strange about a girl who dances in an outfit she’d never wear to work, or a boy who purchases more alcohol than he’d ever admit to his parents? Don’t we all behave a little more freely under the cover of dimmed lighting, thumping beats, and a bit of alcohol?

Dreaming in Morocco

In lieu of a written post, I'm going to present you with a visual today. This was sent to me by Hatim, my good friend from Fes. I'm grateful to him for sharing it with me, and will now pass it along to you.

This is a short film entitled "Dreaming in Morocco." It was made in 2007 by Pamela Nice, an independent filmmaker from Minnesota. Hoping to dispel the stereotypes (and perhaps ignorance) that we in the West often hold about Arab youth, Nice interviews a set of young adults in Morocco about their dreams and aspirations. The individuals featured in this film come from all walks of life, and thus showcase some of the incredible diversity that renders Morocco such an intriguing country. The film does not delve into the societal and political issues that confront these youth as they pursue their dreams, and as such does little more than scratch the surface of the true complexity of life in Morocco - but it's an interesting, well-made, and thought provoking film nonetheless. Enjoy!

'Authentic' Moroccanness

Today’s post on The View from Fez pointed my attention toward a travel article published yesterday in The Guardian. In this piece, author Stephen Emms defends Casablanca against those who argue that the city, with its grand boulevards, 20th century architecture, fast pace, and skyscrapers, is not truly ‘Moroccan’.

In response to these critics, Emms points to the authentically ‘Moroccan’ aspects of Casablanca that lie hidden beyond this “westernized” exterior: 

“Yes, there are the tower blocks, and the five-star hotels, and the businessmen swarming around Place Des Nations-Unies, but the old medina, which dates only from the 19th century (although its ochre walls are older), spirals with timeless neighborhood life. Slip past stalls flogging teapots, watches and jewellery, all blinding in the glare of the sun, and you will discover pencil-thin alleys and tiny squares, where bleached towels cling to window sills and old men inch past in white djellabas, the shuffle of their slippers syncopating the sizzle of squid in oil. … The elegant “new medina,” called Quartier Habous, a layout of Provençal-style squares and arches built by the French as a place for Muslims to live and trade, is a clean and inviting souk selling anything from oil paintings to art deco statuettes. But even here, the “real Morocco” is nearer than you might imagine – just over the railway bridge is Rue Taroudant, from the dusty stalls of which dangle dried chameleons, hedgehogs, and live baby tortoises. “No photos!” the bearded sellers cried in unison as I whipped my camera out; these are ancient charms, after all, with their own magical powers.”

Emms here paints a stark contrast between ‘old’ and ‘new’ – between ‘western’ and ‘Moroccan’. It is precisely in the complexity of this juxtaposition that a former US Embassy worker, interviewed by Emms for this piece, finds Casablanca’s authenticity. “It’s the real deal,” she says, “like Marrakech was more than 10 years ago.” However, Emms himself seems to wonder what this mix of old and new, modern and traditional, really means for Casablanca’s status as an ‘authentic’ Moroccan city: 

“Does Casa's roving eye to the future negate its past? Its art deco and neo-Moorish heritage certainly isn't as valued as you might expect: the Hotel Lincoln, opposite the Marché Central, collapsed earlier this year, and there don't appear to be any plans to salvage it. Other buildings on and around Boulevard Mohammed V (which boasts some of the most dazzling period architecture) languish unloved, as does the Parc de la Ligue Arabe. But perhaps there's something honest about such disregard - should Casablancans have to bow to their colonial past? And anyway, isn't Morocco's "real" past more than represented, as I discovered, in the medinas and back streets?” 

I am impressed with the appreciative way in which both Emms and the people he’s interviewed speak of Casablanca. However, I don’t think I agree with the way in which Emms defends Casablanca’s status as a ‘real’ Moroccan city – and by extension, what he implies about what constitutes ‘authentic’ Moroccanness.

As much as Emms acknowledges, and even appreciates, the complexity and the dynamic juxtapositions that dominate modern Moroccan society, he ultimately concludes that what is truly ‘Moroccan’ lies in the country’s traditions – represented in this article by crowded medinas, jellaba’d men, and haggling for dried chameleon in dusty souqs. And that, I think, is dangerous. It superimposes one pair of polar opposites – old versus new – on top of another imagined polarity: Moroccanness versus Westernness. It creates a binary view of the world that may simplify matters, but ultimately blinds us from the complexities of reality, and minimizes a people’s agency in defining its own sense of authenticity.

First of all, associating ‘authentic’ Moroccanness with tradition, or with the past, brings up some logistical problems of definition. To start with, how do you really separate tradition and modernity, or distinguish foreign from native? Where do you draw the line between ‘authentic tradition’ and ‘foreign invasion’ – which historical influx of foreign peoples ended true and pure Moroccan culture and opened the door to foreign influence? Was it the French? Or was it the Andalusian Muslims who returned during the Reconquista? Was it the Arabs, perhaps, or even the Romans? If Morocco’s authenticity lies in the past, how far back do you have to go to find it, exactly?

Moreover, are ‘tradition’ and ‘modernization’ that easily separable? Is Morocco’s current development a manifestation of purely Western influence, and have Morocco’s ‘traditions’ remained completely untouched by outside influences? Can we really say that Casablanca’s skyscrapers are purely western, the likes of which you’d find in France, England, the United States, while the old medina of Fes has remained pristinely Moroccan? In other words, how ‘foreign’ is Morocco’s modernization, and how ‘authentic’ have its traditions remained? I think this simple juxtaposition of ‘modern’ versus ‘traditional’ blinds us to the complex reality of Morocco – the unique brand of development that has given a distinctively Moroccan flavor to Casablanca’s modernity, and the dynamic adaptation of old traditions to current circumstances. Imagine the distinctly Moroccan patterns of hierarchy and social organization that may structure a company housed in one of Casablanca’s high rises, or the traditional carpenter in the Fes medina whose work has reached a wider audience through the website he’s been able to create with a laptop and wireless internet.

But above all, the association of ‘authentic Moroccanness’ with traditions from the past is a dangerous one. By relegating Moroccanness to “timeless” traditions and picture-perfect scenes from the old medina, we deprive Morocco of a present – let alone of a future. It is the same process of thought that legitimated French colonial rule in the first half of the twentieth century. Our perception of authentic Moroccanness is a nostalgic image of medieval Arab life that we seek to preserve by freezing Moroccan culture in time and characterizing all development as ‘foreign’, and therefore invasive. It is an Orientalist process of thought that deprives ‘real’ Moroccan culture of any belonging in (or compatibility with) a modern, developing world.

This is not to say that Morocco’s medinas and traditions should not be preserved. They should – they are a part of ‘authentic’ Moroccanness that should not be forgotten. It is also not to say that foreign (Western) influence was not invasive. It was. What I mean to say is simply that we should not so starkly oppose tradition and modernity, or past and present, and attribute ‘authenticity’ to a single pole on that binary scale. Cultures, like human beings, are living, breathing, porous things, and change is a fundamental strategy of survival. Cultures, like human beings, adapt to their ever-changing environment. No culture has ever been static, and no society has ever developed in complete isolation from foreign influences. It may not always have been the pervasive, imperial, and certainly destructive, influence of the West – but foreign influence has always been a fact of life. 

The notion of authenticity is ultimately a difficult one that brings up more questions than it does answers. I think that a certain tension between past and present may be inherent to the state of postcoloniality, with national identity and notions of ‘authenticity’ stuck in the middle. How do you determine what is ‘real’ and what is ‘foreign’? What parts of history constitute the foundation for national identity, and which have been written by alien conquerors? To what extent should ‘foreign’ influence be resisted, and can (should?) traditions always stand the test of time? And who has the authority, anyway, to determine the answers to all these questions? Questions of what is ‘authentic’ are persistently and consciously present in the Moroccan public consciousness. There is a palpable preoccupation with the issue of how to define the relationship between ‘tradition’ and ‘modernity’, and nearly every political or social issue becomes a pretext for debates about the value of each for Moroccan society and identity. These are not debates that will be resolved any time soon, and I’m sure notions of ‘authenticity’ will be discussed for decades to come. But I don’t think this means that authenticity is lost, or under threat of extinction.

I don’t think that change, dynamism, or foreign influence have to undermine any culture’s status as ‘authentic’ or ‘real’. What makes a culture ‘authentic’ is not its resistance against foreign influence, but simply its particular way of developing, its reality and meaningfulness for the people whose lives it frames. What is authentic is every society’s particular way of making sense of change, of foreign influence; its way of processing, internalizing, mixing new elements with what’s already there to create new meanings, new realities. In its very combination of incredible modernity and development with a high premium on the preservation of tradition, Morocco is, in every sense of the word, authentic. Morocco is a living, breathing culture in the flux of constant change and development. Casablanca, in all its economic enormity and modernity, is as much an example of true Moroccanness as Fes is in its preservation of traditions. And it’s time that we all not only recognize, but celebrate this unique kind of authenticity.

Ramadan and Solidarity

“wash kat‘ajebek lkousina lmaghribia?” Lalla Ghita asked me as we stood over a steaming pot of what would, in a few hours, become harira. ‘Do you like Moroccan cuisine?’

I nodded wholeheartedly, taking in the warm smell of cilantro emanating from the pot.

“I love it,” I responded.

“mmm,” she mumbled, and nodded in agreement.

“It’s great food,” she then added, “but it’s a lot of work.”

She was right. As we stood there waiting for the harira to come to a boil, we were no more than ninety minutes into what would become a five-hour marathon of preparations for that evening’s ftour.

I had joined lalla Ghita in her kitchen that afternoon in order to learn how to make harira. After an unsuccessful attempt of my own at making this soup, which resulted in a tasty stew that nevertheless tasted nothing like the intended goal, I decided it was time to get advice from a seasoned expert. Armed with pen and paper, I followed lalla Ghita around the kitchen as she explained her process from start to finish, and meticulously documented every step.

As I had expected (based on my experiences asking my former host family about their cooking), the recipes in lalla Ghita’s mind were not written in the language of measured quantities and numbered units of weight or volume. I attempted to use my own, admittedly limited, skills at eyeball-estimations as she showed and explained to me that harira calls for “chwiya dial l-hommous” (some chick peas), “chwiya dial l-qousbour” (a little cilantro), and “chwiya dial l-basla” (a little onion). But despite the vagueness of these instructions, I gradually began to discover a method to the seeming randomness. The secret lay in her inflections: as more ingredients were added to the big pot of soup, I realized that the number of i's in her “chwiya” were directly proportional to the quantity required.

“Chwiya dial l-matesha,” she explained as she cut up six big tomatoes, puréed them in a blender and poured the mixture into the pot.

She followed with “chwiiiya dial l-‘ades,” as she added about a handful of lentils to the soup.

And finally, she told me, it was optional to include “chwiiiiiiiiiiya dial l-safran” – and she sprinkled in a small pinch of saffron, for a nice yellow glow.

With the harira comfortably settled to stew on low heat, I observed and helped as lalla Ghita turned to other preparations. We made the filling for briouat – fried triangles of filo dough filled with meat and/or vegetables – and gutted and cleaned a chicken (“for tomorrow,” lalla Ghita explained; “it needs to soften up for a night first”). We made the dough for rghaif (flaky, square pancakes), and did multiple rounds of dishes. We cut thin sheets of filo dough into long strips, and folded the briouat filling into their characteristic triangle-shaped packages. We baked the rghaif, and boiled some eggs. We did more dishes, made coffee and mint tea, heated up milk, and fried the briouat. All the while, we chatted – about the NIMAR (for whose students lalla Ghita’s family occasionally provides lodging), about my purpose in Morocco, about lalla Ghita’s family, and (inevitably, perhaps) about food. I told her about my various attempts at Moroccan cooking, and she in turn explained to me what’s customarily eaten at Ramadan meals. In a show and tell of sorts, she extracted each item – tmar (dates), chebakia, sfouf, zoumita*– from refrigerator and cupboards, provided me with a rich description of its ingredients, and gave me various serving suggestions. A modest but well-deserved sense of pride spoke from her eyes as she told me this was the first year she herself had made some of these items from scratch.

Lalla Ghita occasionally sent her husband and son out on errands: she’d ask them to bring her some fresh mint, some cheese, or a loaf of bread. But other than these brief trips, lalla Ghita’s family mostly spent the afternoon reclining on the sdader (Moroccan sofas) in front of the television – watching Prison Break on MBC Action, or a Mexican soap opera dubbed in Darija on 2M – waiting for the hours to slip away. With the curtains drawn and their half-open eyes fixed passively on the television, they whiled away their afternoon in a state of utter torpor. I couldn’t help but wonder whose fast was easier: that of this slumbering family, who expended as little energy as possible, or that of their hardworking mother, for whom time must have passed by much more quickly.

Solidarity is an important concept during Ramadan – and many people I’ve talked with include this notion in their explanation of what Ramadan means. Apart from a way to turn back to God, Ramadan is also a way to boost a sense of community togetherness, a sense of shared experience and compassion for those around you. One thing this experience of fasting has taught me, is that this sense of solidarity is real and acute (more on that below). Nevertheless, I couldn’t help but wonder how that sense of solidarity and shared experience correlates with this division of labor that had lalla Ghita single-handedly preparing several laborious dishes in a single afternoon, while her family slept on the couch. Is this division of labor seen as too much of a natural given to be the object of efforts at greater solidarity? Is the focus on solidarity more mental than anything else – is it less about action than it is about awareness? Did lalla Ghita’s husband perhaps consider his occasional errands to be an act of solidarity?

By seven PM, the table had been set, a platter of rghaif had been delivered as a gift to the neighbors, and we’d taken our seats around the knee-height table. A few minutes later, we turned down the sound of the television to listen for the cannon shot indicating sunset – our sign that we could gratefully grab that first glass of water. Lalla Ghita, the orchestrator of the meal, served everyone a bowl of harira and was herself last to sit down and break her fast.

And so the day ended with a rich and above all very satisfying ftour. A day of fasting seems to shrink my stomach, but exponentially increases my mental appetite. This leads to a bit of nightly frustration as my stomach protests at my eyes’ desire to keep feasting on the wealth of food. This evening was no different. One overly stuffed belly later, I said my goodbyes, promised to make lalla Ghita’s family a pot of harira in return for their hospitality, and headed home, utterly satisfied.

I think that what I enjoyed most about this experience wasn’t just the fact that the harira-mystery had finally been unveiled. Mostly, it felt deeply good to spend the afternoon inside a Moroccan household. I love having my own apartment, but sometimes I miss a sense of connectedness to ‘real’, daily Moroccan life – sometimes it feels as though I have permanently positioned myself on the outside of that actual lived reality, as though I’ve confined myself to expat life. I hope that this will change once my research gets under way and I interact with Moroccans again on a more regular basis, but that sense of disconnection saddens me sometimes.

And so I was grateful for this brief afternoon, in which I felt as though I had been let inside, and had been allowed to participate in the intimacy of Moroccan lived reality – allowed to share in the practice and concrete meaning of Ramadan customs. I have a feeling that my status as a participant in the fast may have helped to facilitate this inclusion. Because I, too, was sayma (fasting), the solidarity conferred by the shared experience of Ramadan seemed automatically to have been extended to me. For the first time in months, I did not feel like an inherent outsider. I felt as though I was recognized as being a part of something, even if just potentially – as though I had been let in. That afternoon, I felt as though those boundaries between me and Morocco – the ones that seem so insurmountable sometimes – might actually be crossable.

And for that alone, I’m happy I decided to participate in this experience. I had been told about the significance of solidarity during Ramadan – but I doubt I would have truly sensed its presence if I myself had not shared in the experience of fasting. Not only does my choice to fast entail that I have become a recipient of solidarity – that I have been allowed to experience what it is like to be part of an ‘inner circle’ in Morocco; it also entails that I’ve experienced first-hand what it is like to feel that sense of solidarity extend from myself to others. I’ve realized that it’s more than just an ideal that people express to me, the outsider, to teach me what Ramadan should be about. Fasting turns that sense of solidarity into a visceral and almost primal experience that cannot help but permeate your mind. The emptiness of my stomach is an inescapable and constant reminder of the fact that I am voluntarily sharing in a particular experience – and with every person I encounter during the day, I cannot help but think: does this person’s stomach feel the same way mine does?

Of course, not everyone feels the same amount of solidarity as others, and some more than others translate that visceral experience into action. But the sense of togetherness is there, much more acutely than I would have ever guessed, and being part of that has been an unforgettable experience.


* sfouf and zoumita are mixtures of ground nuts, spices, and various other ingredients; whereas sfouf is courser and stickier, zoumita is much more powdery. Both have a distinct taste of cinnamon, and remind me very much of pumpkin spices. Whereas sfouf is often pressed together into a mound and served as such, lalla Ghita mixed the zoumita with a combination of melted butter and honey. She rolled the resulting paste into small truffles, dipped them in sesame seeds, and arranged them on a plate.

Fasting and Feasting* - Two Days of Ramadan Briefly Sketched

This past Friday morning, I went to Marjane for some grocery shopping. As I discovered when I walked onto the parking lot, about half of Rabat had decided to do the same. I had never seen that many cars stationed around the lot – nor had I ever dealt with such a lack of shopping carts. After a bit of scavenging around, I literally snagged the very last one there, and entered the store.

Inside, I met with mayhem. The aisles of Marjane had become a miniature version of Moroccan urban traffic. Thousands of carts, it seemed, were busy making their way through and across aisles, past roundabouts of sale items, without care or regard for any traffic rules. There was no right of way, no yielding, no merging; no system to the direction of traffic and no regulation of speed. Abandoned carts stood parked at random, no rhyme or reason to their positioning. Pedestrians darted this way and that, weaving themselves in between moving carts. Idle cart-pushers strolled along at a leisurely pace, suddenly abandoning their cart mid-traffic to browse an item two feet up ahead – to the great frustration of all speed-devils behind them, trying to get to the tomatoes before they ran out. Maneuvering my own cart through this chaos and barely managing to avoid a few multi-cart pileups, I slightly began to re-think my desire to learn to drive a stick shift and navigate actual Moroccan traffic on my own…

All these people had come to Marjane to stock up on Ramadan-necessities: their carts were full to the brim and beyond with industrial size containers of oil, flour, dates, and sugar. Not only are excess quantities of these staples needed to fashion the copious amounts of Ramadan-delicacies that are expected by hungry fasters at each day’s sundown; but in the interest of avoiding unnecessary labor during long, hot days without food or water, people try to get their major shopping in before the start of this month. The exact start date of Ramadan had not yet been determined, but it was to be either Saturday or Sunday – and people apparently wished to be prepared for all contingencies.

I too was there to stock up on Ramadan necessities: mostly high-fiber items that I hoped would tie me over during those long days of fasting. I decided to participate in this month of fasting - because after all, I figured, as an anthropologist I am a participant-observer. I think that the only way to truly approach some kind of understanding of what this month means to Moroccans, is to engage as fully as possible in the practices and traditions.

And so I find myself, at my time of writing, counting down the last hour until I hear the cannon shot and the muezzin’s call for Maghreb (sunset) prayer – our indication that we are allowed to eat – on my second day of fasting. I am sitting by my open balcony doors, and I can already smell the harira (a Moroccan soup of chick peas, lentils, and tomatoes) being made in kitchens up and down my street. The street is quieting down; anyone still outside is there for some last minute grocery shopping and is rushing home, plastic bags in hand. In about forty-five minutes, the street will be entirely deserted, as everyone retreats to the dinner table at home, ready to pounce as soon as prayers are over.

In standard Arabic, the sunset meal is called iftar; in Morocco it’s referred to as ftour,** the same word used to denote ‘breakfast’ any other time of year. It traditionally consists of dates, chebakia (very sweet, very sticky pretzel-shaped things), harira, bread, hard-boiled eggs, milk, and a variety of other things that may vary from table to table. Ftour is a meal to eat in the company of loved ones, of course, but for those whose family ties extend beyond the city limits, restaurants put a prix-fixe ftour on their menu during Ramadan. And so it happened that yesterday, I joined Farid to break my first day of fasting at a local restaurant, where we were served a luxurious ftour for 30 dirhams. I do not think I have ever appreciated food and drink as much as I did at that moment – I remember being hyper conscious and appreciative of the taste and texture of every item on my plate: the stickiness of the dates, the sweetness of the chebakia, the softness of the bread. My stomach was filled to capacity way before my mind was done relishing the cornucopia in front of me.

Nevertheless, spending a day without food or water was less difficult than I had feared. I felt listless, my muscles seemed to have no strength, and I very consciously felt a tugging emptiness in my stomach, but I was able to hold out, and I was still able to concentrate on my work. Day two was easier than day one, and I hope day three will be easier than day two. But for now, I’m looking forward to that intense feeling of appreciation for the food I will be eating in an hour – that ultimate satisfaction of filling an entirely empty stomach. Tonight Farid joins me at my house, where we will be making instant harira from a box – I intend to make my own at some point, too, but have not yet found the time.

While we eat, we will be watching 2M, one of Morocco’s public television channels. Whereas everyone watches satellite channels from Dubai during the year, Ramadan is a time for a bit of national pride and identity. 2M will let us know when we’re allowed to eat, and will subsequently intersperse the broadcast of a new sitcom with lavish, special Ramadan-oriented commercials for food (I’m getting the sense that this month of fasting is in fact all about eating).

After dinner, we will head out for a stroll through town. Whereas the streets are deserted between sunrise and sundown – everyone avoiding the sun, and unnecessary expenditure of energy – the city comes to life again about an hour after ftour. At 8 pm, the streets are as empty as one will normally only experience long after midnight, but an hour later, stores and cafés re-open and everyone comes out in their finest clothing to see and be seen. We’ll have some coffee at a café, and then we’ll each head home. I’ll eat a small bite and then go to bed, only to wake up again at 4 am for a last light snack before the muezzin and another cannon shot lets everyone know the sun has risen.

And my third day of fasting will begin.


* I’ve stolen this title from the English version of Marjo Buitelaar’s book about Ramadan.
** ftour comes from iftar, I’m pretty sure

Cucumbers

For all of July and August, Morocco is suspended in a state of slumber. All but its most essential physiological functions have been frozen for the summer months. Parliament is on summer recess, and universities have been deserted. Libraries, institutions, and foundations have closed their doors; magazines have stopped their presses (tying us over to September with a single summer-issue), and even some stores and restaurants have boarded up their premises for a few weeks. The streets of Rabat are empty: because no one is actually from here, the city’s population spends its vacation elsewhere.

In Holland, this is called ‘komkommertijd’ – cucumber time. It is a period when the going is so slow, and so little happens, that there is nothing more interesting to discuss than this summer vegetable, itself devoid of much substance. All big decisions are suspended until fall, newspapers publish stories of petty theft, rescued dogs, small acts of charity – items that would never make the news at any other time of year – and people spend their evenings at outdoor cafés, cooling down over refreshing drinks and easy banter. I’ve always liked the word and the imagery it conjures up – though it doesn’t quite seem to grasp the essence of a Moroccan summer. The lack of substance is certainly there, but whereas cucumbers connote something juicy and refreshing, the summer months here don’t quite answer to that image…

At the NIMAR, too, we’re working at half-capacity. There are only three of us who haven’t taken the month of August off, and we work with muted strength amidst painters and cleaners busy renovating the institute.* Apart from some interviewing activity, I myself have little more than cucumbers to write about. I spend my workdays browsing online academic journals in search of literature to assign the students that we’ll be hosting here this fall. Other than that I’ve been lazily reading books, watching the occasional movie, going for runs, cooling down with refreshing cold showers… and waiting for my couch to arrive.

It was July 21st that I went to Mobilia (a Moroccan version of Ikea, if you will) and placed an order for this couch. I had wanted something small and simple: no patterned fabrics, no frills – something the average selection of Moroccan furniture seems to have difficulty meeting, sometimes. I was so excited when I found a picture of a sofa that corresponded to my wishes on the Mobilia website, that a visit to their store in Agdal was one of the first actions I took after receiving my grant money. I was helped by a friendly staff member who took my order, money, and contact information, and presented me in return with a receipt of purchase, along with an estimate for the delivery date: August 5th.

On August fourth, I received a call. The couch had only just been delivered to the depot in Casablanca, it was reported. The delivery to my apartment would have to be delayed for a few days. Was Saturday alright? Of course, I answered, mashi mushkil (no problem). I could wait another few days.

When, by Saturday afternoon, the couch still had not arrived, I myself placed a call to the store to inquire about my couch. The staff member – the same who had sold me the couch – seemed surprised. It still hadn’t arrived? That’s too bad, he lamented. He couldn’t imagine what could have happened, I was on the schedule for the day. However, deliveries were actually done for the day, so the couch would now be delivered on Monday.

Monday came and went with no more than a repeat of the same conversation I had on Saturday. The staff member now told me that the delivery people had stopped by my house and called my phone, but no one had answered. I responded that my phone reported no missed calls, and the staff member apologized once again, with the promise that my couch would, for sure, be delivered on Tuesday. I was getting frustrated. I hadn’t worried, up until this moment – all other deliveries (my fridge, my dining room table, the small side tables that I had made) had gone so smoothly that I had had faith in this delivery, too. But I found it increasingly hard to believe that I’d ever have a couch.

I took pre-emptive action on Tuesday, and called ahead in the morning to ask for a time-estimate. Told to be home at one PM, I hung around in my living room, waiting for the doorbell to ring. When, by two, I still had no couch, I called again – and was now told the couch would be there at 3.30. A few phone calls and hours (but no couch) later, I called once more and asked for an explanation. The staff member had no idea what might have happened. The delivery men should have dropped off the sofa, he said. He apologized profusely for my lack of couch, and promised he’d come and deliver the item in person, tomorrow at one.

On Wednesday afternoon, he did actually come in person, as promised – but sans couch. Highly apologetically, he explained that by some gross oversight, the couch delivered to the depot in Casablanca was the wrong color. Instead of the white I had ordered, this sofa was bright red. He was so sorry, he kept repeating; he had no idea what may have gone wrong. It clearly said ‘white’ on the order form, he lamented while showing me his copy, a finger underlining the word in question. It was going to take another ten days to order a new couch, he then anxiously announced; there was no other way.

I sighed, and couldn’t help but laugh a little. The story had become too farcical to still be frustrating, and I felt sorry for this apologetic man. “Ten days?” I declared; “mashi mushkil…”



* Despite the state of suspended animation in which the country’s public sphere finds itself, there is some buzzing activity of preparation for the coming year. Aside from the NIMAR, multiple other projects of renovation and construction seem to be going on around town.

National Pride

The workshop at the Clinic that I went to a few weeks ago – that methodological workshop organized by three psychologists from the University of Amsterdam – started off with a bit of a misunderstanding. Justifying their reasons for seeking to construct a questionnaire that was multiculturally valid, the trio recounted the problems they often encounter with young patients of Moroccan origin. Not only do Moroccan families often have a different way of dealing with problematic children than Dutch families do, they explained, but most questionnaires aiming at diagnosis are very much based on Dutch cultural assumptions that are not relevant to their context.

A psychiatric resident, clearly bothered, immediately reacted: it was incorrect to claim that youth of Moroccan origin were more susceptible to psychological problems than their Dutch peers.

It took a few minutes of apologies and explanations by the Dutch psychologists to convince the residents that they had not meant to imply any such thing – that of course, psychological problems are just as common among Dutch adolescents, and that the clinical issue is simply the fact that Dutch practitioners are not trained to deal with anyone whose cultural context is something other than purely Dutch.

Then, an hour later, the residents struck a completely different tone.

The Dutch psychologists asked the Clinic’s residents to compile a list of typical aspects of Moroccan parent behavior. The residents took 15 minutes to brainstorm over coffee and sweets, and came back with a page full of items. I’ve already described the residents’ spontaneous division of these aspects into those of ‘traditional’ parents, and those of the ‘modern’ generation; but there was something else that I thought was interesting. Nearly all items on the list of ‘traditional’ characteristics were phrased as negatives. While the question had been neutral (in asking for “typical aspects”), the responses were given as “too much of X,” and “too little of Y.”

It is not only the negativity (this freely offered, unprompted negativity) of the residents’ list that struck me, but also its seeming contrast to the offense that the resident had taken earlier on, when she was under the impression that the Dutch presenters had insulted the psychological health of the Moroccan-Dutch. It is a contradiction that I notice often.

The Moroccans we foreigners meet seem highly concerned with giving us a positive portrayal of their country. They tell us of its wealth in resources, its seamless mix of a ‘thousand-and-one-nights’ exoticism with ‘modern’ development, its rich traditions and its great openness toward the western world. We are pressed upon to take note of the multiculturalism and ethnic diversity that characterizes Moroccan society, its tolerance and its hospitality. Islam solves all problems, everyone is nobly religious, and the King is a great innovator. Correspondingly, these people are quickly offended at any suggestion that we Westerners may harbor any negative stereotypes about their part of the world, and will confront such prejudice. There seems to be a particular sensitivity about any suggestions of Orientalist stereotyping and prejudice. Rightly so, perhaps – there are enough instances of ignorant bias that throw Morocco on a single heap with all ‘Arab’ and ‘Muslim’ countries – but sometimes the sensitivity feels a bit disproportionate, and I find myself walking on egg shells trying to make sure I don’t offend.*

But theirs is not a nonstop pride. There are moments of self-expressed negativity that intersperse these exaltations, their unexpected bleakness leaving a bitter aftertaste. These are moments of self-effacing, dejected criticism at Morocco’s inefficiency, inequality, poverty, corruption, and ‘backwardness’. And it always catches me off guard.

My co-worker Choumissa likened it to a Moroccan expression her mother was wont to use: nderrbek ou ma nkhalli had yderrbek – “I’ll hit you, but I won’t let anyone else hit you.” Just as a parent will discipline her children but will not tolerate anyone else who tries to touch her offspring, Moroccans like to be self-critical, but do not accept any negativism from outsiders. This is something we all have in common, I think. We all like to gripe about what doesn’t work well in our respective societies. We all wish for change, and we’re all quick to denounce things we have issues with. But we are also sensitive to our country’s image in the eyes of foreigners. We all want the positive to prevail, and we all want visitors to come away with a sense of “wow, what a great country. When can I come back?” I remember how upset I used to get when Dutch classmates characterized the United States as a “cruel country.” How desperate I felt when I shyly mentioned to the offender that America also had a few redeeming qualities, and he responded by saying “yeah, sure. But overall, it’s still a cruel country.”

What surprises me most about Moroccan negativity, though, is not necessarily the fact that they criticize their country – we all do,** on occasion – but the fact that they do so in my presence. Perhaps I’m so used to being given an image edited to leave out the negative, that these sudden critiques stand out in stark contrast. How do you respond, when you praise Morocco’s people and natural beauty to a stranger who has been kind enough to invite you to their home, and they shoot back that “this society sucks, it’s going to hell. We’ve lost our norms and values”? Obviously, agreeing with this criticism wouldn’t be the right thing to do, but would an insistence on Morocco’s positive assets make such a person feel invalidated in their suffering?

What is this criticism ultimately about, I wonder? In the workshop at the Clinic, the negativity was directed toward characteristics of ‘traditional’ parenting. Was this a ‘performance of modernity’? An effort to downplay (through denunciation) ‘backward’ traditions and thus turn our gaze toward Morocco’s development and modernization? We were in a psychiatric facility after all – a bastion of ‘modernity’ and illustration of globalization. If this is it, if this is simply another way to edit particular things out of the image presented of Morocco, we might almost think of this as the flipside of the coin of propaganda in a country that seems to struggle with the question of how to combine tradition and modernity.

But then again, so much of that unprompted criticism doesn’t seem to be about tradition at all. It is societal – people lament the lack of efficiency, or the inequality, corruption, and other vices that halt Morocco’s development. Is it an apology, perhaps? Is it a judgment of their own country through what they think is my frame of reference? Is it an effort at translation?

Is it all, then, part of that same effort that encourages people to indulge us westerners in the façade of desert exoticism and other fantasy images of Morocco? Is it simply about catering to what they think is our frame of reference?

… and do we thus find ourselves at an impasse of images and stereotypes, in which we alternately struggle to break through them, and ultimately resort back to their familiarity in an effort to facilitate communication?


* And it makes me sad sometimes that, despite my best intentions to exude an openness, to remain aware that Morocco and every Moroccan are unique entities unto themselves, and to refrain from passing judgment, there is the occasional person who expects the worst because I am, after all, a Westerner, and something I say about Qur’anic interpretation will still be branded as ‘Orientalist’. I am aware of the fact that I may not always succeed in being as open as I’d like to be. I know that there are moments when my level of tolerance lies slightly lower than I’d like it to, and I give in to frustration. Also, I guess expressed sensitivity to prejudice helps to remind me of the importance of that openness. But still, I feel a bit defeated sometimes when I try to express an openmindedness and I am received as a ‘Westerner’ who, perhaps despite herself, will ultimately resort to generalization.
** Criticize our own country, I mean – not Morocco…

Communication Francophone

Two weeks ago, I started a month-long French class. Every Monday to Friday at four PM, I now head over to a language school across from Jour et Nuit (a coffee house and well-known landmark on this side of the medina’s Bab Chellah) for a two hour cours de communication. My teacher, monsieur Aziz, is a self-proclaimed thespian in his fifties who loves Molière and Hugo. Every afternoon he attempts to animate his weary students with larger-than-life gestures and facial expressions, walking back and forth across the front of the classroom as though it is a stage from which he attempts to enthrall a difficult audience.* Occasionally he coaxes us out of our seats for some creative play of our own, in which we awkwardly participate, as he reminds us that games are not about winning, but about sharing – and communicating, of course.

I had decided long ago that it was time for a class to ignite the francophone cells in my brain (I know they’re there! I’m just too nervous to ignite them on my own, not knowing for sure that they’ll work the way they’re supposed to), and three weeks ago I took a placement test at this school. As the consultant grading my test remarked that I seemed to have all the grammar down, I explained that I just wanted to learn how to speak sans devoir réfléchir – without having to think about it – and that it wouldn’t hurt to expand my vocabulary. The consultant seemed to know exactly what I was looking for, and enrolled me in this course.

I must admit that it is a different kind of cours de communication than I had expected. Focused less on linguistic barriers than psychological ones, we work on things like learning how to speak without getting flustered by attention from others, discerning the purpose or intent behind a communicative message (the acte illocutoire), and evaluating each other’s efficiency in getting a message across. The goal of this course is, in monsieur Aziz’s words, nothing less than a change in our sense of self, and the elimination of certains sentiments négatives.

This is not precisely what I had had in mind; this course is not so much about learning how to speak sans réfléchir, but rather about how to effectively turn what you want to say into an actual expressed message. But in the end, I figure, communication is communication – does it really matter what the nature is of the barriers that keep you from living up to your potential? What I needed is a push in the back, an environment where I was forced to speak up – and that’s essentially what I’ve gotten. And I do notice some difference. I seem less worried about just speaking, and am discovering that I can make myself perfectly understood in almost any situation. The only barrier I have left is the intimidation I feel around my very adeptly francophone co-workers…

My fellow students are, for the most part, timid high school graduates stuck in that liminal phase between puberty and adulthood, where you suddenly realize that your decisions not only matter, but can affect the entire course of your life. As we went around on day one to introduce ourselves, they all very un-timidly attested to a desire to overcome their shyness, and I imagine that, faced with the weighty decision of what-to-do-next, these young adults are perhaps attempting with this course to turn themselves into direct and fearless go-getters. Timidity is a theme they repeatedly bring up themselves. As we subjectively evaluate each others’ efforts at communication,** students constantly remark that the speaker’s main problem seems to be shyness. “Is this a problem you often encounter?” they’ll ask in therapeutic voices. “Do you have the same trouble when you speak Arabic?”

There is an intimate atmosphere, a sense of we’re-all-in-this-together, that seems to put everyone at ease and invites everyone to speak. However, this intimacy gets disturbed once in a while by my presence. I am clearly an outsider, being the only non-Moroccan in the room, the only one who seems to already be familiar with the communicative theories monsieur Aziz enlightens us on (he even gave us a basic tutorial on semiology – I had an instant déjà-vu of my days as a first-year anthropology grad student…), and the only one who seems to be here for linguistic improvement. Monsieur Aziz takes advantage of this sometimes, and uses me as a kind of stick behind the door to remind everyone to do his or her best.

“If you don’t speak up and share a story,” he will say, “what will Charlotte here think about Moroccans and their ability to communicate? Do you want to give her the impression that Moroccans cannot express themselves about this particular subject?”

The students will then smile, they’ll look at me, their timidity will re-emerge, and I’ll feel as though I’ve become part of the ‘other side’, an onlooker and observer, rather than a fellow student.

This happens at other moments here and there, too – like when we’re asked to prepare a presentation as a group, and the other members in my circle begin to speak the Arabic they’re ultimately more comfortable with. There’s always a moment where they’ll suddenly stop in their tracks, look at me, and begin apologizing. I’ll then tell them that it’s ok, mashi moushkil (no problem), that I understand what they’re saying – and they’ll smile a bit at my budding knowledge of Arabic and continue, but the intimacy is gone and I can see that their self-consciousness is back.

And I do it myself, too. There are moments, when monsieur Aziz explains a theory I’m already familiar with, for example, when I step back and transform from participant to observer. I’ll look at the ways in which our teacher interacts with the students, and the way they react to him. I’ll notice how students’ comments seem very crafted, full of buzz-words they know are important in this class (like “timide”), very catered toward what they think the teacher wants to hear. I’ll remark how very few people seem just to say what they think – very few apart from the teacher, that is, and I’ll notice how the students get a little flustered when monsieur Aziz brings up topics that are not commonly discussed in public. Like how you met your first boyfriend, or how it’s possible to be an atheist.

And so I put myself on the outside, trying to be the ethnographer, hoping to get an insider’s view of a Moroccan classroom. I will go quiet, waiting to see how others respond to a question thrown into the room by monsieur Aziz, smiling at his expectant expression. Until I realize that I am thereby thwarting my own success as a student in this class – which is ultimately the role I signed on (and paid) to play.

But I’m enjoying myself – I like the class, I observe with interest as the tone of the session shifts between ‘intimate’ and ‘performative’, and I’m even a little intrigued at how I myself morph from participant into observer, and back. It’s a new kind of hybridity that I’m feeling constantly as I set up my own life here in Rabat – as I try to figure out which parts of my experiences here are research, and which are just that, life.


* there is an argument to be made for the idea that teaching is a kind of performance, of course… and vice versa, that performance is a kind of teaching?
** it took the teacher at least twenty minutes to explain what he meant by such subjective evaluation, and how it worked. The students seemed to have a very difficult time understanding that there is not simply one correct way, and one wrong way, to communicate. That it is ok, and sometimes better, to evaluate without passing a definitive judgment. That there may be no such thing as a completely accurate and objective judgment in the first place.

Nukat* Maghribia - poking fun

As Americans have their Canadians, and the Dutch (and French?) have their Belgians, so the Moroccans have their Berkanis. Every society likes to have a neighbor to make fun of, another group they can have an innocent laugh at without concern for political correctness.

Unlike that of the US or Holland, Morocco’s butt of jokes is not a foreign neighbor; there’s nothing funny about Morocco’s relationship with Algeria, I guess… Instead, all Moroccans laugh about Berkane (pron. ber-CAN), a small town in the Northeast of Morocco.

By now it’s happened so often that I’ve found myself surrounded by Moroccans rolling on the floor in laughter at a new Berkani joke, that I’ve decided to translate and share a few of them with you. It’s often said that humor is very culture-bound, but I think we can all recognize a little of the fun-poking in these jokes. What do you think? Are these funny to you?




War

Oujda is at war with Berkane. After months of intensive fighting, the two armies have literally dug themselves into a stalemate. The soldiers spend their days laying low in parallel trenches, just hoping the enemy will emerge on the surface in an offensive attempt – so they can shoot them down.
Then, one day, an Oujdi general comes up with a plan. “I’ve got an idea,” he announces. All Berkani’s are called ‘Mimoun’, right? Well, we’re going to use that. Get ready, and wait for my instructions.”
So that morning, the Oujdi soldiers line up in their trench. They listen as the Berkanis do the same in theirs; once they hear that they’ve settled, the Oujdi general gives the signal that this is it. He rises up, and calls out: “Mimoun?” “Yes?” the Berkanis collectively respond, and rise up – upon which the Oujdi’s shoot them all down.
Obviously, the Berkani’s want revenge. The Oujdi’s cannot just get away with this. “Aren’t all Oujdi’s called Bekkay?” the Berkani general rants. “Well, we can do exactly what they did!”
And indeed, the next morning, after all soldiers line up and get ready for another day of stalemate waiting, the Berkani general raises his head out above the trenches and calls out, “Bekkay?” – and waits for the Oujdi soldiers to respond in unison. Instead, he only hears the Oujdi general’s voice: “who’s asking?”
Upon which all Berkani’s rise up, and call out, “we are!”




Accident

A guy from Berkane is driving into town. As he approaches the central square, he suddenly realizes his brakes have been severed and he cannot stop the car. Panicked, he calls a friend of his and explains the situation. “What do I do??” he cries out in utter desperation.

His friend is a bit more level headed. “OK,” he reasons. “What do you see in front of you?”

The driver scans the horizon. “I see a market on the left, a mosque on the right, and three people walking on the road in front of me.”

“OK. This is what you’re going to do. You’re going to go in the direction where you’ll hurt the least amount of people,” the friend on the phone advises. So where are you going to go?

“I’m going to head for the three people,” the driver cries.

Later that day, the driver’s friend turns on the television to watch the news. He’s shocked at the main story: a large accident at the market in town, eighty people dead, and massive destruction. On the left end of the screen, he suddenly sees his friend’s car, upside down on the ground. What on earth happened, he wonders? He calls his driver friend.

“What happened? He cries. “I thought you were going to head for the three people on the road?”

“I was,” the driver sobs. “But those three people turned left to head to the market!”




Hole in the road

A major pothole had fallen into a busy road in Berkane. People were constantly falling in, and this was becoming a problem: before anyone noticed what had happened and called an ambulance, the sad victim was already dead. This hole was racking up too many casualties, and it was time to do something about the problem.

All smart people in Berkane got together to talk about possible solutions. It took all day, and lots of bad ideas were proposed, but finally, they came up with a good idea. From now on, they’d station an ambulance next to the hole, so no time would be lost calling the emergency number and waiting for the paramedics to arrive.

The next morning, an ambulance was stationed next to the hole, and every time someone fell in, paramedics would immediately hoist the victim out, load him into the van, and rush him to the hospital.

Yet the new situation wasn’t perfect. Victims were still dying on their way to the hospital. Another solution had to be found, and so all the smarties of Berkane once again convened. They talked, and talked, and it took all day. But finally, someone proposed a real solution. It was a real smart guy, someone who’d gone to school in Europe. We’re going to close up that hole, he said…

… And then we’ll re-dig it right in front of the hospital…



Just one more non-Berkani joke, just for fun:

Once upon a time, a young couple had their first baby. This was clearly an extraordinary child with great intelligence. He spoke his first word at six months of age: “aunt,” he said. His parents found this a bit disconcerting. Shouldn’t his first word be ‘mommy’, or ‘daddy’? Why is he talking about his aunt? The next day, the phone rang. A family member on the other line informed the couple that the baby’s aunt had passed away.

The baby’s next word was “grandpa.” And the same thing happened: only hours after the baby spoke, the couple received a phone call that the baby’s grandpa had passed away.

The parents began to worry about this dark power their baby seemed to have. The pattern continued: every time the baby spoke, he’d mention a person – and a short while after, this person would suddenly and inexplicably die. It was starting to get worrisome.

Then, one day, the baby finally spoke one of the words his parents had so badly wanted to hear: “daddy.” They freaked out – this was it. The baby’s father was paralyzed with fear of his impending death. But the parents’ frantic clamoring was suddenly interrupted by the door bell.

It was their downstairs neighbor, clearly distressed. “Come quick and help!” he cried. “The janitor just dropped dead!”


* Nukat is the plural of nukta, which means 'joke'.

Men Are from Mars, Women are from Venus

Most mornings at the NIMAR start slowly. We officially open at eight, but we usually spend the first hour of the day circled around a table, chatting over tea and breakfast. We discuss our weekends, comment on what’s playing on the television in the background, and allow for the occasional preliminary discussion of work-related goings-on. It’s a pleasant way to ease into the day, and a good use of an hour at which there is little else to do. We open this early to stay on track with the Dutch institutional world, which lives an hour ahead of us. In Morocco, however, no self-respecting employee, or NIMAR student, is ready for business until at least 9 am.

This past Monday, as we did a post-game evaluation of my birthday party (which had taken place on the preceding Saturday), the conversation touched on the risks of making a late-night solo drive back home – and from there devolved quickly into thorny territory: the harassment of women on Moroccan streets.

Cynthia and Chaima opened, claiming a lonely street in the dark of night is no place for a woman alone – what with rapists, thieves, and other figures of the underworld.

“Well, what about men?” Farid retorted. “Men are the ones who get robbed, conned, and deceived. People are actually nice to women – you get your bags carried for you, a seat given away to you on the bus, and there’s always a hand ready to help you change your tire.”

Chaima dismissively shook her head. “Oh, Farid,” she chuckled, “you have no idea what it’s like for women.”

Cynthia bristled in agreement. “What?” She demanded of Farid. “How can you say that? Women are constantly treated with disrespect on the street!” Confronted by a skeptical expression on Farid’s face, she then launched into a description of the verbal and tactile varieties of unwanted attention that women suffer daily when out and about, trying to mind their own business. To add dramatic force to her illustrations, she got up from her chair and turned courtyard into stage, enlisting Chaima as co-star in her performance. The two put on their best macho faces, their eyes expressing an exaggerated form of the demeaning lust they attribute to the men they were imitating, and swaggered daringly past each other, Chaima grazing Cynthia’s posterior while the latter stage-whispered disrespectful gibberish into the former’s ear.

“Nine out of ten men,” Cynthia emphasized, shooting meaningful glances in Farid’s direction. “And by the time the tenth guy walks by, I’m about ready to punch him in the face.”

His skeptical expression unchanged, Farid shrugged and lit up a cigarette. “It’s all in your head,” he muttered.

This set off a trigger with the lot of us. Say what? Claiming that we’ve somehow conjured up this constant stream of verbal harassment in our collective mind is like saying that there is no glass ceiling for women, or that men are just naturally better at math.

We icily asked him to elaborate, our swords hanging in the sky, ready to fall with a vengeance when he gave us what could only be the wrong answer. Farid argued first that we’d be lost without the attention. He cited a survey that he personally conducted among his female students: “Nine out of ten said they’d feel depressed if they were ignored on the street,” he reported in subtle reference to Cynthia’s earlier statistic.

We protested that this is no surprise in a society where women hardly ever receive positive reinforcement on other aspects of their being. Moroccan women are raised to be demure and modest; if street comments about their appearance are the only source of compliments they have, no wonder they’d miss them in their absence! But, we assured Farid, no self-respecting, confident woman would prefer unsolicited attention to the freedom of public anonymity. Unfazed, Farid pressed on, introducing his second argument. He reminded us that women receive a lot of preferential treatment in return for the occasional offensive comment. We scoffed, but he proceeded to his concluding argument: we bring this attention upon ourselves by not talking back.

I’d been relatively quiet before, observing the back and forth with curiosity as I tried to theorize what made the various participants in this discussion say the things they said and feel the way they felt. But I felt personally addressed by this last argument, and I stepped in.

“Talking back doesn’t work!” I exclaimed, a bit of this morning’s annoyance with the appreciative soldiers I encountered on my walk to work leaking out. “All it does is make them laugh! Hearing me speak Arabic does nothing but egg them on.”

“Or it makes them mad and makes the harassment even worse,” Chaima added. Cynthia and I nodded eagerly. “Yeah,” we contributed, “and when you react by yelling, they accuse you of crossing the boundaries of propriety!”

Farid stuck to his argument, though, insisting that an angry response is the key to solving this issue. “It’s a vicious cycle,” I offered, trying to be the mediator. A theory began to develop in my head, but I wasn’t ready to put it into words yet, and so I kept it at that. “Women allow this kind of attention to happen by remaining mute, which allows men to keep it up. In turn, the sense of endlessness with men’s attention makes women feel as though there’s no use in protesting.”
We got up, cleared the table and put our dirty teacups by the sink without having reached an agreement.

It’s a truth universally acknowledged by any woman (both foreign and native) who has spent a day on Moroccan streets, that one cannot venture outside without eliciting at least a comment from at least seventy percent of the men one passes by. You learn to drown it out (though the occasional butt-graze is impossible, ever, to ignore, and some days are certainly worse than others), but the principle of the matter is offensive. This primal need that men seem to feel, to comment on any and all female figures within their sight, implies a perception of women as not-quite-real, and as not-quite-human.* It is, in all honesty, a very frustrating kind of objectification. But not only that; it is offensive, on a deeper level, that men seem so completely unashamed of their behavior – that society seems to accept this kind of uncivilized comportment.

If we are all so bothered by the fact that we cannot anonymously walk alone outside – by the fact that we will never be able to sit down on a park bench to read a book in peace, to stop outside a shop window and ogle the shoes on sale, or to wait on a street corner for a friend without eliciting a whole lot of unwanted attention – what can we do to make it stop?

In order to answer that question, I think we first need to answer another one: what makes it happen in the first place? How did this become such a commonplace public form of male-female interaction, and what motivates men to address women in this way? I’ve been walking around with these questions ever since I first visited Morocco in the spring of 2005. Despite warnings from more seasoned travelers, I spent the first two days of my stay in a state of complete agoraphobia, holed up in my hotel room in Fes without a clue as to how to deal.

After this initial shock, I became intrigued. I began to observe the attention, examining it and experimenting a little with its limits. I’d change my clothing, varying the amount of bare skin I exposed to the public to see if this correlated at all with the frequency or intensity of the comments, stares and grazing hands that came my way. I even donned a headscarf once. The effect? None whatsoever. And so I came up with a theory. I think that this attention has nothing to do with us as women. It doesn’t matter what we wear, how we behave, or how pretty we are. We could walk around covered head to toe in clothing that hasn’t been washed in weeks, flash a smile of black teeth and exude a smell of sweat across a two-meter radius, and some man would still feel the need to whisper “very niiiiiicce” as we limped by. It has nothing to do with us – and everything to do with them, with the men. My theory is that men in Morocco have so few ways in which to exercise and display their masculinity, that anonymous women on the street become the unwitting target of their frustrated need to show the world they’re male.

I’ve devoted earlier posts to the problem of Moroccan masculinity. The Moroccan masculine ideal – defined by dominance, power, and independence – is difficult, if not impossible, for a man to live up to. In a patriarchal society with a developing economy and a high rate of unemployment, very many men are stuck in a position of relative dependence – whether it be on their father, an employer, or some other figure who exercises power.** The result is that they act out their frustrated need for dominance and power in a space where they do not risk offending someone to whom they are subordinate – in the no man’s land where social norms don’t really count: the street.

Furthermore, Moroccan social norms and the gender segregation they sanctify mean that men have very little permitted access to women. There are very few acceptable ways and places for innocent flirtation (flirtation that is not meant as direct prelude to marriage, that is) – in other words, there is no sanctioned way for a Moroccan boy to parade his masculinity around and attract the most appealing female without the risk of consequences. Another frustration they act out in the space beyond social norms – by aggressively flirting with anonymous women who are not a part of their social community. Strict rules within the social fold elicit acting-out behaviors in the abject areas beyond its boundaries.

These norms also ensure that male-female interaction is beset by tension. The politic of segregation teaches children and teenagers that the opposite sex is inherently and dangerously different. It teaches them that the other gender is there for marriage and sex, not for friendship and normal human-to-human relating. It nips any potential for mutual understanding and communication in the bud.

Of course all of this is evolving. Moroccan social norms have been subject to rather rapid change – a development Moroccans themselves conceive of as ‘modernization’ and regard with a fair amount of ambivalence. Men and women can be friends – and one thing I’ve been so struck by in Rabat is the seeming informality and comfort of contact between the genders. But day-to-day attitudes and public behavior always lag a step or two behind institutional social change.

Maybe the crux of the problem hides in our inability to span the gap of understanding between genders. The thing is that Farid can’t understand what it’s like. No non-female can understand this feeling of complete and entire objectification; this denial of your freedom to be anonymous, of your private space, and of your very fellow human-ness; the insistence always to see you as a woman, and never as a person. No non-female can understand how it feels when you are expected to remain demure and modest, yet somehow must acquire a basic sense of self-respect.***

But the thing is also that no female can understand the social pressure on Moroccan men. High demands and huge limitations on one’s ability to live up to them are an impossible combination. The thing is that men are essentially as objectified as women are. In a society where social connections are everything, men are constantly sized up according to their position in the matrix of power relationships and their relative status in relation to the one doing the sizing-up. If men don’t talk down to someone in an assertion of their dominance, they risk having such subordination imposed upon themselves. Who can blame them for acting out?****

So. To make a long story short, the issue comes down to this. Can you be a respectable woman without demurely allowing yourself to be objectified, and without accepting a man’s refusal to see you as a person? Can you be a confident woman without needing positive reinforcement from random lustful machos on the street? And can you be a real man without needing to assert your male dominance by objectifying women?

One anonymous woman on a busy downtown street had her own answer to these questions. As we hunted for cabs on Monday evening after a satisfying meal at Dar Naji, we heard her screaming to some unfortunate male offender.

“Are you a real man? I don’t think you’re a real man, I think you’re a fag! Go get yourself checked out, fag!”



* I’ve had men lean in and clap in my face to see if I’d react. It leads me to conclude they might be wondering if I’m even real. I get the same sense from their laughter at my Arabic requests to be left alone. They don’t hear what I say; they seem to see a doll talking and are surprised by its lifelike appearance.
** And in a society where social connections are everything, that dependence, that subordinate position, is something you are constantly reminded of.
*** Not to mention the recent addition of new, ‘modern’ expectations: women must remain modest, quiet, and submissive, but must now also become ambitious, successful, and financially self-sufficient.
**** Let me make a disclaimer here that I know I am generalizing. The dynamics of Moroccan society are much more complex and intricate than the rough sketch I am laying out here, and the actual currents carrying along the type of male-female interaction that I am discussing here are much more subtle and multi-pronged than I suggest. I’m just trying to theorize a little.

El Clasico in Rabat

Last night, Farid and I watched a soccer game at a café on boulevard Mohammed V. Liverpool was playing Real Madrid – Farid’s team – in the first knockout round of the Champion’s League.*

In every Moroccan café, or “qahwa” (literally, ‘coffee’) one will spot one or two televisions hanging in a corner. Day and night, these televisions provide background images (though nearly never background sound) with the latest music video clips from an Arab music channel, or Al Jazeera’s latest news stories. Men will spend hours sitting quietly over their cups of qahwa, smoking a cigarette and absentmindedly glancing at these screens – or reading the newspaper that someone else left on the table. But on soccer nights, the televisions are tuned in to Aljazeera sport, the sound is turned up to maximum, and the cafés fill up to capacity with animated men, eager to cheer on their favorite team. These men come in early to get a good seat, all lining up their chairs in rows – a table interspersed here and there on which to place one’s coffee, soda, juice, and ashtrays – in order to have an optimal view of the TV screen. We arrived at a café twenty minutes before kick-off, and found no empty spaces left. It took two more fruitless attempts before we found a coffee with a few empty seats, upstairs in what is normally the ‘women’s’ – or more private – section of the place.

On these match nights, there is no such thing as a women’s section. Watching a game at a café is clearly a male activity: I was the only woman there. A bit nervously, Farid leaned over to me and asked, ‘are you comfortable?’ I smiled and nodded. Strangely enough, I was. I’m not sure if it was the comfort of being there with the protective shield of a male friend, or the comfort of being such an obvious outsider that it doesn’t always matter when I transgress certain unspoken gender barriers.

However, I’m not sure if there really is a gender barrier to speak of, here. Despite the fact that I didn’t feel uncomfortable, I was aware of my minority status in the café, but this might be no more than a kind of general feeling of otherness when one is aware of being the odd one out. When I asked him about it later, Farid surmised that there is no hard and fast rule that says women are not expected to join in on a public soccer viewing. Nevertheless, I doubt that it is entirely acceptable for a woman alone to surround herself with agitated men at a coffee. As much as any man may say it’s ok, I have a feeling that if asked, those Fassi boys with whom I discussed ‘women between tradition and modernity’, back in November, would classify that kind of behavior as evidence that women “have lost their value” – I doubt they’d want to see their sisters engage in such “untraditional” behavior. I have a feeling that a sole woman watching soccer with men falls into that vast gray zone that lies in between ‘modernity’ and ‘tradition’: it’s most definitely a non-traditional kind of behavior that is not inherently wrong – but that nevertheless comes across as not-quite-appropriate among those who are still inclined to judge others on the basis of observation.

But whatever boundaries I may or may not have crossed, I had a good time. I enjoyed watching a good soccer match again (the last one had been this past summer, with the European Cup), even if I am nowhere near as big, or as passionate, a fan as the men at this café. The men around me all sat at the edge of their seat, yelling “sir, sir!” (this is pronounced ‘seer’ and means ‘Go! Go!’) at the screen whenever a Real player approached the Liverpool goal. It wasn’t until Liverpool scored the first (and only) goal in the 82nd minute, that I realized there were fans for the other side in the room, too: a few men here and there jumped up in excitement, punching the air above them with their fist while they shouted out in jubilation.

Farid later explained to me that these were no Liverpool fans. To the contrary: English soccer means nothing to them. No: they are FC Barcelona fans, which automatically means that they hate Real Madrid enough to cheer on any team that plays against them.

I come from a family with Barça sympathies, but my preference does not make me a sworn enemy of Real. This is not the case for most Moroccan men who – overwhelmingly – obsess over Spanish soccer. This passion for Spanish football among Moroccan men means, by association, that they are also caught up in the legendary rivalry between FC Barcelona and Real Madrid (This rivalry is so notorious it now even has a name: El Clasico. Look this up on Google and you’ll find a wealth of information about the history of this enmity). This rivalry seems to have existed ever since the two teams came into existence, back in the 1890s, and constitutes a poignant illustration of the political undertones that soccer can never quite shake off. Madrid and Barcelona are the capital cities of what are seen as two rival regions of Spain – Castilia and Catalunya, respectively. The enmity became even more pronounced under general Franco’s dictatorial rule. When Franco militantly suppressed all languages other than Castiliano, Barcelona – and thus its soccer team – became symbolic of progressivism and subversion, while Madrid – the team favored by Franco – became associated with the establishment. ‘El Clasico’ has never since abated.

Domestic soccer competitions are important to Moroccan men as well, but there is a certain passion that Spanish soccer evokes in them that I find very interesting. In the north, this passion is instilled almost as though by automatic osmosis – the north picks up Spanish radio and TV channels better than Moroccan ones, and so most casual coffee shop television watchers have no choice but to watch the Spanish Liga. I wonder if there’s also an element of ideal identity involved – a wish to belong to that part of the world that seems so close yet simultaneously so far – and to grasp for any link or connection that allows them to (virtually) cross the strait of Gibraltar. Further south, the Spanish football fever has clearly caught on as well – whether it be through diffusion by migrants from the north, or the fact that Al Jazeera has started broadcasting their matches, Real and Barça are followed no less passionately than in the Rif.


* for the American not-in-the-know, the Champion’s League is the yearly championship of European club soccer in which qualifying teams from cities all over Europe compete for the Champion’s League trophy. This year’s final is on May 27th. All Dutch clubs have, unfortunately, already been eliminated.

Eid the Sequel

Eid-the-sequel – that is, day two – is apparently the day of real butchering.

Lured by a hot shower after all that sheep-handling, I spent the night on the couch in Salé next to the three carcasses – still on the floor where we had left them the day before. We were woken by the doorbell at nine: it was Khadija, with her bag full of knives, axes, and other tools, ready to get to work on the three sheep. While we were waiting for Fatima to serve breakfast, I was recruited to help Khadija. This involved pulling up a chair, holding the carcasses’ front legs while she cut away its sides, and helping to twist the carcass so that its lower body snapped off from its rib cage. Just as I was very self-consciously realizing what I was doing, I heard Alma laughing at me. This was a good learning experience for me, she said: when I married a Moroccan, I’d know how to handle a dead sheep.

I don’t think this is anything I had ever pictured myself doing. But once I forced the thought that these had been real sheep to the back of my head and retrieved a little of the anatomical interest that made me enjoy the dissection labs in medical school so much, it became interesting. I became intrigued again – as I did in medical school – by the layout of all those vessels, nerves, and other tubes that actually make the organs work. The way they are situated between all those membranes and layers of tissue, and how you can see traces of the animal’s embryotic development there.

What did bother me, though, is that no one else seemed very bothered by any issues of contamination. Maybe this is something not to get too worked up about with meat this fresh, but hadn’t those carcasses been lying there on the living room floor for about 24 hours already? Granted it’s cold in the house, but it’s no freezer. Yet I saw no one take too much pain to maintain a kind of hygiene, a kind of separation between raw meat and the rest of the world. All this meat-handling work was being done right there in the living room and sitting room, on the floor, sitting on turned-over prayer rugs. There was no hand washing between the cutting away of a flank and the taking a sip of tea, or the changing of the channel on TV. When it was time again to transport ourselves and our meat back to Rabat for lunch (it is beginning to seem as though Salé is our work room, Rabat our dining room), I was shoved into Manal’s backseat next to tens of un-sealed plastic bags full of cut-up meat, one of my two bags thrown right next to them all. Manal saw me looking a little worried and told me I had nothing to be concerned about, it was all good meat. Still though, it seems a little risky. Or am I too careful with this stuff?

It was mainly this that made me a little hesitant to try the meal of other organs that we were served for lunch today. The grilled entrails were served on the same plate as they had been placed on when raw, and there was no hand washing in between raw and cooked stages of preparation. But I did try it all – both the stew of what I think were lungs (including pieces of bronchial pipe), as well as the grilled kidneys and testicles. And again: not bad.

The streets were still deserted – though in Salé butchers had opened their doors and were clearly helping people with what we had done ourselves that morning: processing the sheep into manageable pieces. I did find an internet café in Rabat, though. A tiny one with a big lit-up sign on the busy street where I always walk. I had seen the sign for months, but had never found the actual place. Turns out, it’s 6 computers in the back of a téléboutique, all of which are occupied by little boys of Mustafa’s age, who are watching hard core porn in pairs. As I waited for a computer, the Ivorian proprietor complained to me about the clear lack of parental control here. He has these boys pay for their time in advance, he explained, and every five minutes he would get up and tell the boys it was time to go. In their most pleading voices, they would beg the proprietor for just another minute. Conflict continually ensued, usually ending with the proprietor turning off the computer to great consternation of the boys. Upon which I finally got my chance to read some emails – feeling slightly watched by the boys who were still around, still looking at things they should hardly know about at their age…