On Diversity

Last weekend I visited the town of Ifrane, the location of my Community Based Training. This was the town where, after only five days in country, I was place in a host family to begin my total emersion in Morocco. Having now spent three months in my final site, I realize Ifrane, despite being no more then five hours drive from my final site, is very different. This brought home the idea that Morocco is diverse. From the languages spoken to the traditions observed no town is the same. Even the volunteers nearest to my final site are in towns that emphasize different languages, such as Tamazight instead of Darija, and expect different social norms to be observed amongst the locals. Variety is the spice of life, but who knew there would be so much variety that I would have to learn two different words for bread (hobs, agraum) and water (lma, amen) to communicate in different towns, seven miles apart.

On Musical Themes

The American traveler in Morocco will notice some significant differences in the themes that make up the majority Morocco’s musical traditions respective to those that comprise America’s.

For an example, if one listens closely, it is impressive how many references to cars and driving are to be found in the music coming from America’s mixing studios. It seems almost every song in the rap genre has a line about a Chevy impala or shiny cars or something along those lines. And it is not just limited to that genre. What would country music be if one were to remove all the vehicular references, particularly those about a man’s truck being destroyed as part of a lover’s tiff?

Morocco enjoys no such automobile related lyrics. Instead it has its own, often-referenced themes, namely those of tea and bread. All the most ingrained and popular songs coming out of Morocco tend to have a line about baking bread early in the morning or having a wife whose duty it is to make the tea.

Different strokes…

On Werewolves

A while back I mentioned that werewolf references were a routine part of my experience here.  That bears explaining. The PCVs in the province I work in have chosen as their anthem the song ‘Shewolf’ by Shakira. Through her awkward dance moves and in front of a San Francisco skyline, she sings about how she suffers through her lycanthropic life. Secondly, there is a town in our province whose name is archaic French for werewolf, a name, no doubt given when Morocco was a French protectorate, used to warn away French visitors from its untended mud streets and crumbling mud houses. I routinely go to ‘werewolf’ to visit the PCVs there or see the Gendarmes. Lastly, there was recently a wolf moon, a full moon that occurs in January, named for the hungry wolves who howl to it in the bitter cold of night. Having noticed all these werewolf references, it has become a routine joke to mention the werewolf threat in our province. We joined Peace Corps to help humanity, but there is always the danger that we might, while in Peace Corps, join werewolfkind.  

Super Bowl Monday

In the wee hours of Monday morning seventeen Peace Corps Volunteers in Morocco gathered together at a café, especially open for them, to watch Super Bowl XLIV live, in Italian.  Upon the tables, strewn with empty coffee cups and backgammon and Connect Four sets, the flickering lights of the stadium in Miami shown as the Indianapolis Colts fell to the New Orleans Saints. The five-second lag between audio and video, not noticeable when the commentary was in Italian became perturbing as ‘The Who’ took the stage, their mouths moving to words they hadn’t sung yet.

The game ended at 3am, and the PCVs walked back through the deserted streets, having shared one of the unique facets of their culture with the few groggy regulars of the café, who stayed to see what all the fuss was about. However, those regulars missed out on one of the best traditions of the Super Bowl. The whole game was shown commercial free. 

On Intentional Misunderstanding

One of the rare benefits of being new to a language is that you can get a way with a lot of intentional misunderstandings. It is easy to brush aside comments that you would rather not respond to with an, ‘I am new to this language, I don’t understand.’ In a lot of ways it is an empowering technique. For instance, when the Town Crazy or the Town Glue Snifter tries to engage you in conversation in the café, it is a simple matter to act as if you don’t understand their demands for money or to know your American name. In general, whenever anyone tries to pressure you to do something that you would rather not do (such as giving them money or personal information) it is so much easier to fall back on the, ‘mafimtsh (I don’t understand)’ card. That way you don’t have to be rude and contentious by saying ‘no’. People generally lose interest in you faster if they think that they will have to work really hard to try to communicate. Of course, on the other hand, being new to a language, sometimes you don’t have to fake misunderstanding, because you generally are clueless. Just goes to prove ignorance is bliss…

On Windows

I have been to visit a total of five volunteer’s houses. And what strikes me as interesting is the almost universal attitude towards windows. They are, it seems, eternally closed and shuttered. Its as though they are there as a barrier, blocking out the light of a foreign land so that within the internal glow of a more familiar land can reign. It is a reminder, that no matter how long we are here, we will always be foreign, different, the others.

On Dancing

Most Americans are unable to dance in front of other people while sober. This tragic condition can be seen everywhere from college campuses to weddings, where the sober stand against walls, resigned to watch their alcohol encouraged cohorts bust-a-move, potentially embarrassing themselves in the process. So the question should be asked, for how many months must you remove a party-hearty boozey boogier from being able to imbibe before they are willing to attempt dancing while unimpaired?

The answer is six.

The evidence: yesterday new PCVs at a conference finally let go of their self-conscious selves and went wild on the dance floor, dancing to the sounds of studio 54 and more, all without alcohol.