Wakha
It may be the shouts on the phone of the man in front of me or the very small space of this Rabat Internet Café, but I feel I won't be able to put here the complexity of today's conversations... Today I felt Morocco in a very intimate away and I was reminded the blessings of travlelling alone. Cause travelling alone, as alienating , lonely, and sometimes difficult it may be, opens so many ways that could have never existed when part of a somewhat closed system of a "travel unit"...I was asked several times why in the name of God I am going to Morocco by myself, wouldn't it be dangerous and so on, but a day like today proved to be a good answer.
I said goodbye to Gérome in the morning ( and I have to write soon about my Quebecois experiences in Morocco- Quebec kept creeping into this trip, with all the flavors it could get...) and I ran to take a taxi ( I guess this is my first taxi enthusiastic period of my life, after making the record of not using the taxi in Paris a single time) to the station. And of to Meknes, the second imperial city on the way.
In my train compartment, this 25-28 year old lady, her hair with red reflexions ( an old Moroccan habit of putting some natural substance when washing to make your hair red) comes in, heavy luggage and all. I offer to help, put my hand on the luggage, but then he comes. He looks rather nastily towards me, puts the bag. Then another she arrives. She is shy and has a veil, her hands being covered in Henné tatoos. Another Moroccan beloved fashion. The two start talking, I put my headphones on and occasionally smile back towards the first lady. When the seemingly married couple dissappears for a moment, the innate curiosity and gregarioussness that I ( unfortunately?) possess make me seize the moment and take the headphones off, curious about her life and all. In fact, i haven't talked yet to any woman in Morocco. I will be subtle. The guide book, the needed wise man of the village, says after all that there are three taboos that we, the outsiders, are not allowed to talk about: Western Sahara ( that the Moroccans occupied in 1975, a very controversial move), Israel and Palestine, and the women's position in society.
I smile, she smiles, and she asks me where am I going. I say to Meknes. And then the line that made me freeze for a second "Je prefère si tu viens à Rabat. Je suis de Rabat." ( I would prefer for you to come to Rabat. i'm from there". She launches into a praise of Rabat and saying that Fes and Meknes are so insignifiant compared to the great Rabat. And then we talk about her studies in private law ( apparently Moroccan law is French law with some Egyptian rules here and there. I wasn' able to get what these Egyptian mutations were...), as the man comes back. This is my brother Ahmed ( was it Ahmed?) and his wife Etwas.Enchanté. He still doesn't seem very enchanté. The landscape is verdant and dotted with villages and the conversation is stumbling. So how about the Moroccan economy, eh? " Oh, things are going not bad and not well". "The rich are rich and then, there are the poor". Her phrases in French are both splendid examples of Pythia and truisms as esoterical initiations into what probably is Arabic syntactic structure...
oh, you studied in France... And you got into Spain with no visa? Romanians need no visa, eh? Her eyes sparkle, she talks with her sister in law in Arabic and they all start looking at me insistently. For us, Moroccans, it is impossible to get anywhere. We need visas partout. And if we are tolerant with all races and din ( and here a 2 minute break to unveil the meaning of din- religion), there are some countries in Europe that are very racist towards Moroccans. She names three in accusatory tone and she says she was subjected too that: Germany, Italy, and Spain. What about Britain oor France, I ask. Britain stays unnoticed, but France gets " No, No, France gives very hardly a visa, but they are not racist".
America... America is the land of all dreams, and she talks about the visa lottery and how many Moroccans would be so happy to get that, everybody is hoping.
She sighs - do you know how much I tried to get out and how many obstacles I had...
And then the whole landscape changes in front of my eyes. The image of the lost youth of Tanger waiting to get illegally into a boat to Spain comes back to my mind. The image of visa restrictions, of the humiliations in lines and the blunt no-s that affected not very long time ago Romania made me sigh as well. As beautiful and complex a country may be, the feeling that you cannot leave it ever is overwhelming. Being imprisoned by visas like people lived in a prison in communist Romania, with no right to go beyond Hungary...
We arrived at Meknes and she asked if I really wanted to go. I said I have to. Then she turned her face away.
The English teacher in the bus to Asilah ( or maybe it was the guide book, I don't know...) told me that a lot of Moroccans dream to marry a foreigner and leave beyond the obstacle of the sea at Gibraltar... I have to confess this came to my mind during our conversation, as crazy as it may seem :-)
Meknes - later
I said goodbye to Gérome in the morning ( and I have to write soon about my Quebecois experiences in Morocco- Quebec kept creeping into this trip, with all the flavors it could get...) and I ran to take a taxi ( I guess this is my first taxi enthusiastic period of my life, after making the record of not using the taxi in Paris a single time) to the station. And of to Meknes, the second imperial city on the way.
In my train compartment, this 25-28 year old lady, her hair with red reflexions ( an old Moroccan habit of putting some natural substance when washing to make your hair red) comes in, heavy luggage and all. I offer to help, put my hand on the luggage, but then he comes. He looks rather nastily towards me, puts the bag. Then another she arrives. She is shy and has a veil, her hands being covered in Henné tatoos. Another Moroccan beloved fashion. The two start talking, I put my headphones on and occasionally smile back towards the first lady. When the seemingly married couple dissappears for a moment, the innate curiosity and gregarioussness that I ( unfortunately?) possess make me seize the moment and take the headphones off, curious about her life and all. In fact, i haven't talked yet to any woman in Morocco. I will be subtle. The guide book, the needed wise man of the village, says after all that there are three taboos that we, the outsiders, are not allowed to talk about: Western Sahara ( that the Moroccans occupied in 1975, a very controversial move), Israel and Palestine, and the women's position in society.
I smile, she smiles, and she asks me where am I going. I say to Meknes. And then the line that made me freeze for a second "Je prefère si tu viens à Rabat. Je suis de Rabat." ( I would prefer for you to come to Rabat. i'm from there". She launches into a praise of Rabat and saying that Fes and Meknes are so insignifiant compared to the great Rabat. And then we talk about her studies in private law ( apparently Moroccan law is French law with some Egyptian rules here and there. I wasn' able to get what these Egyptian mutations were...), as the man comes back. This is my brother Ahmed ( was it Ahmed?) and his wife Etwas.Enchanté. He still doesn't seem very enchanté. The landscape is verdant and dotted with villages and the conversation is stumbling. So how about the Moroccan economy, eh? " Oh, things are going not bad and not well". "The rich are rich and then, there are the poor". Her phrases in French are both splendid examples of Pythia and truisms as esoterical initiations into what probably is Arabic syntactic structure...
oh, you studied in France... And you got into Spain with no visa? Romanians need no visa, eh? Her eyes sparkle, she talks with her sister in law in Arabic and they all start looking at me insistently. For us, Moroccans, it is impossible to get anywhere. We need visas partout. And if we are tolerant with all races and din ( and here a 2 minute break to unveil the meaning of din- religion), there are some countries in Europe that are very racist towards Moroccans. She names three in accusatory tone and she says she was subjected too that: Germany, Italy, and Spain. What about Britain oor France, I ask. Britain stays unnoticed, but France gets " No, No, France gives very hardly a visa, but they are not racist".
America... America is the land of all dreams, and she talks about the visa lottery and how many Moroccans would be so happy to get that, everybody is hoping.
She sighs - do you know how much I tried to get out and how many obstacles I had...
And then the whole landscape changes in front of my eyes. The image of the lost youth of Tanger waiting to get illegally into a boat to Spain comes back to my mind. The image of visa restrictions, of the humiliations in lines and the blunt no-s that affected not very long time ago Romania made me sigh as well. As beautiful and complex a country may be, the feeling that you cannot leave it ever is overwhelming. Being imprisoned by visas like people lived in a prison in communist Romania, with no right to go beyond Hungary...
We arrived at Meknes and she asked if I really wanted to go. I said I have to. Then she turned her face away.
The English teacher in the bus to Asilah ( or maybe it was the guide book, I don't know...) told me that a lot of Moroccans dream to marry a foreigner and leave beyond the obstacle of the sea at Gibraltar... I have to confess this came to my mind during our conversation, as crazy as it may seem :-)
Meknes - later
posted by Gruia Badescu at 12:43 PM
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