He Who Only Has One Door...to the Qarawiyin Library

There is a Moroccan proverb I heard months ago that says, ((He who only has one door, May God close it on him))

When I first heard it, I found it to be quite harsh, even though the person who told it to me explained that it meant, look for another way to do something. As Fes and all of Morocco has really heated up this past week, I have just recently realized that it is an exhortation to ingenuity and patience that Moroccans really live by.

I don't know how hot it is exactly. I heard a cab driver said we could be inching to somewhere between 40 and 45 degrees CELSIUS. The actual temperature is useless information, like knowing the species of the tree that fell on you. The thing about the heat here is that almost no one I know is using a fan or an air-conditioner (even if they own one!). Just deal with it, its Summer, seems to be the attitude.

And so I too will adopt this attitude, and move on to tell you about a door I went through the other day to the library of the Qarawiyin mosque-university. It is a library (khazana) open to the public located just near the actual Qarawiyin ( built in 859 C.E by a woman named Fatima al-Fihri as-Sulami) in the Seffarine area of the old city. Although the Seffarine is a noisy bustling area of the old city with craftsmen banging copper pots and the such, when you enter the library, you literally step inside of an old fashioned wooden doorway and into a green-tiled calm. Just up the stairs and you are inside of a large reading room with 10 or so large tables that can fit about 8 people comfortably.

The tables are almost always filled with college and graduate students. There are few public libraries in Morocco and few comfortable quiet study areas like the one the Qarawiyin library offers. To top it off, the library of the Qarawiyin is centuries old and contains a lot of rare books and manuscripts relevant to the Islamic Sciences and Islamic and Moroccan history.

I went there to look at a book on the history of the Qarawiyin itself that I could not find at any bookstore. The book sellers told me that it was not in large distribution anymore. After going through the card catalog,( yes an honest to God , non - computerized card catalog!) with cards hand-written in Arabic , I wrote the name, author and reference number of the book I wanted on the request form, attached it to my Moroccan ID card ( us foreigners have a different color for our ID cards so that they know instantly that we are not from these here parts), and placed it on the desk in front of the woman who eventually brings out the requested books from the closed shelves in the back.

Going to the Qarawiyin library is one of those rare-instances where I feel as if all of what was good about traditional Moroccan culture has not been lost or sold away for tourist dollars. It seems to be a place where you feel as if Moroccans themselves are directly benefiting from their cultural heritage. Tourists do occasionally stop by to admire the architecture of the building, but they are quiet and non-imposing. They generally do not take any pictures, and walk outside back into the hustle of the Seffarin Place within minutes. Generally the Moroccans sitting there reading or studying just go about whatever they were doing and barely seem to notice the passing tourists.

Spending a few hours inside of the library of the Qarawiyin is nice distraction from the heat of Fes, even though the library itself is not air-conditioned, but built in such a way as to be cool inside. After having some photocopies made and meeting a few interesting women who were there studying for their final exams, I step out the wooden door entrance of the library and am instantly plunged into the heat and the medina energy.

I take a path towards the Rcif entrance/exit of the old city. On my way I pass a man selling really good jaban, soft white cheese. I buy half a kilo from him and as I am waiting for him to cut it for me, get tempted by the vendor next to him who is selling fresh juice and ice cream. I ask the juice vendor for some orange juice which he serves to me in a tall cool glass. I drink it there on the spot as is the custom, and return the glass to him. Then I take my cheese and go quickly to find a cab to get out of the sun and go home, where yes, I must admit I do have a cooling fan that I actually use .

Memorization is Knowledge and Knowledge is Memorization

A few months ago I was in Oujda sitting in on a class on Maliki fiqh ( one of the schools of thoughts in Islamic jurisprudence, and the one that is followed by the majority of Moroccans) when the teacher, and older man from the Souss region of Morocco said something very simple but that struck me to such an extent that I wrote it down. I don't think that it was what he said so much, but the conviction by which he said it. He told the group of women there in the class who were having a hard time grasping some of the details of the text he was trying to teach them, "Memorization is Knowledge, and Knowledge is Memorization." He told them that in committing a text to memory we learn from it, while always having it available to access whenever we want.

As a child growing up in the Mid-west of America, I do not remember ever being assigned to memorize anything until my first year of high school in French class when I had to memorize a poem titled Le Facteur or, The Postman in English. I don't remember much of the french anymore, but i remember that it was about a little girl who was sad that the postman never brought her any mail.
Later in high school I began to memorize my favorite Langston Hughes poems on my own, simply because I loved them. I still remember a lot of those, especially, That Justice is a Blind Goddess.

One of the first things I did when I arrived in Morocco last September was to go and register at a place called Dar Quran. It literally means the House of the Quran and it is a place where people go to memorize and learn proper recitation of the Quran (tajweed). Moroccans are known to be great memorizers and have an amazing capacity for memorization, not just for religious texts, but poetry, songs, etc. I am always amazed when I attend certain gatherings at how many people can just join in in a poem, or praise song.

So, I have been the only American in a class of about 30 Moroccan women who go anywhere from between once to four times a week to recite to a fiqhe, a religious scholar who has memorized the Quran himself several times.
We recite to him from our memories and he corrects our mistakes, fills in a blank for us if we space out, and explains verses to us. I have in the nine months I have been there NEVER seen him consult an actual written copy of the Quran, and yet he can tell if we put a vowel in the wrong place. Masha'Allah.

So, yesterday I went to Dar Quran for my final exam. I have spent the last nine months trying to memorize Suratul Al-Baqarah, the second chapter of the Quran and the longest. I finished the actual memorization a few weeks ago and there was a big party for me and the other women who had memorized Al-Baqarah along with women who had committed the entire Quran to memory and others who had memorized half of it. There was pastries, and dates, and incense, etc.

Yesterday afternoon I went to sit for the memorization exam. There is no milk or pastries at the exam that you have to pass to get the official acknowledgement of one's memorization from the fiqhe .There is just nervousness and hope and fear. One of the women there remarked to me as we waited for the fiqhe to arrive that I should not think that I was the only one who was nervous, that they all were.

The fiqhe arrived and called us into the room with him in small groups. I was in the second group. Some women were using the waiting time to do last minute studying, and I tried a little, and then finally I told myself, hey you memorized it, its in there, just calm down so you can access it.

During the exam there were six of us. Some of them had memorized the entire Quran, others half, or a little less than that. One woman was there for her second consecutive memorization of the Quran. The fiqhe rotated between us, he would give us a verse from the relevant section of the Quran we had memorized sometimes telling us where it was, and then tell us to start reciting from there. Then he would go to a whole other section of what you had memorized.

When he got to me, I took a deep breath, said "Bismillah" and started. He went back and forth through Al-Baqarah, and not in any particular order, telling me to "read from this place, okay, now read to me from this section, okay now lets go to the end of it, read from there, okay now back to beginning read to me from the verse that starts with..."

Then finally he moved on from me to another woman and I felt as if I had made it to a solid shore after having swum from sinking boat. There was only one woman there whom he told would have to come back and retest. As for the rest of us, he signed off on us after giving us a short lecture on the importance of retention and of applying what we had memorized to make us better people. Then we exited and the next group began to enter the classroom. There were congratulations with hugs and handshakes and kisses being said all around between the women.

I know that memorization is bad word in Western societies now. People often use the word "rote" in front of it to further denigrate it. And the heavy role of memorization in Muslim societies is often criticized ( but what aspect of Muslim society isn't criticized?) But people have got it all wrong if they believe that it is about ingestion without critical thought. Memorization is always supposed to the the first step in mastering understanding of something. For Muslims traditionally, you memorized the Quran and other important texts , and then you studied them with scholars. You also mastered its pronunciation so that you could recite it correctly in your prayers and in gatherings, and as an expression of your admiration. How many people memorize the words to a song they like, what then for the Book that you use as a guide for your life?

Most of my friends from Dar Quran are imploring me to continue and memorize even more, why not the entire Quran they ask me? "Because I am lazy and worried about retaining what I already know," is my general response to which they always laugh.

Oh and That's Good that You Speak a Little English

I'm finally getting around to talking about that short trip I took to Asilah and Tanger last week. Both are places I had previously visited, but years ago and generally while in transit to Southern Spain.

So, last week, I boarded a train ( all of my stories seem to start off with this phrase) and rode for 5-ish hours towards the Northwestern part of Morocco. I noticed pretty quickly that the scenery outside the window was a bit different than what I was used to in traveling through other areas of Morocco. The farm land seemed less cultivated than what I was used to seeing in terms of fruits and vegetables. I remembered as I rode that many farmers in Northern Morocco have resorted to growing the hashish plant (Moroccan version of cannabis). I thought that some of the things I was seeing must be hashish, but fortunately, I am not worldly enough to recognize it. The fields on the way there did offer a pleasant surprise of occasional patches of fields of sunflowers. My heart really got a boost in seeing them.

I arrived into Asilah and could immediately see the Ocean before I even left the train. With the Asilah train station being a bit outside of the actual town of Asilah, my options were to either walk into town or to squeeze myself into a mini-bus with a bunch of other Moroccans and a few British?( I heard English with an accent) tourists who all seemed to be just as tired and hot as I was. To our further delight, the bus windows did not open, nor was there any air-conditioning.

I asked the bus driver when I got on if the bus went by the place in the old city of Asilah where my friend told me she would be waiting for me. He replied that there was a stop close to it, but not quite there. I asked him if he could tell me when we were at that stop. He sighed and said that he was " So tired of telling people things." I am used to seeing this type of burn-out in people whose jobs entail too much public interaction. And it was hot and sticky, and so i just kind of smirked and half-smiled at him and walked to the back of the bus without saying anymore.

So then of course I get struck with that " Am I going to miss my stop" paranoia and ask a few people on the bus if we are close to where I need to get off. Eventually the bus clears out a bit, the bus driver seems to have lightened up and he tells me when we have arrived to my stop. I get off the bus and walk straight down the street towards the old city of Asilah. I am immediately enamored by how quaint and turquoise everything is, and the smell of the Ocean air.

I see my friend waiting for me and sneak up behind her . An older woman sitting on the ground next to her , says to me in Arabic something along the lines of " Oh that's nice, she 's your friend? Oh and that's good that you speak a little English."
My friend is a White-American Catholic girl and when I walk with her in Morocco people rarely think that we are from the same country, I am either Moroccan or from Senegal or maybe the Sudan, and she is either American or Canadian or some brand of European.

And so, accordingly, we have starkly different experiences here in Morocco, and that difference of experience was something about which we spoke a lot during my short visit with her in Asilah. She meets types of Moroccans I would generally never interact with, and I hang out with other types of Moroccans she would rarely get to know. For example, one of the first things she told me when I got to Asilah was that there was high drug-use among some of the people there and about the people she had met who use heroine and cocaine or were just alcoholics. On the other hand she also meets a lot of White expats from the US and Europe, who as she told me, confide in her their disturbingly racist judgements of Moroccans. She says that they just assume that she is on the same page as them. She said that when she speaks with them she feels like she is in South Africa in the 1960s.

After depositing my stuff at her house and saying my prayers we head out for a belated lunch at an outdoor cafe which reminded me a lot of Spain. Being that we were near the Ocean I was excited about eating some super fresh fish. In the evening we took little stroll through the town and walk by the Ocean. Even after sun down we passed men selling freshly caught fish off of carts. My friend told me that a lot of unemployed men in Asilah fish to feed their families and sell a bit for some cash.

The next morning we wake up as early as we can and walk to take a bus for Tanger. As we are walking towards the bus stop we go past a cafe and a man who works there who seems to know my friend is cheerful and says "Salaam." We reply back and he extends to us his hand to shake. I put my hand on my heart instead of extending it to him and he is thrown-off. He extends it to me again. With my hand still on my heart, I slightly bow and ask his forgiveness if I do not shake his hand. But his guy is persistent, and asks my friend why I won't shake his hand. She says that she doesn't know. Generally I don't have to get this far with men here in Morocco or even in America for that matter. Even if they are not religious, they accept my position and we move on. Not satisfied with my friends response however, he turns to ask me why I will not shake his hand. I tell him that it was not the practice of the Prophet Muhammad, (God's Peace and Blessings be upon him) to touch a woman who was not his wife, and that I am following his example. The waiter then pulls out a hadith (saying) of the Prophet that he misquotes, but whose meaning is that " Actions are [judged] by intention. " For a second i try to understand his use of this saying in this situation, but honestly, in my mind I am just thinking about making the bus to Tanger so that I am not late for my appointment.

So I begin to apoligize to him profusely, (trying to allow him to "save as much face" as possible), still not shaking his hand and back away with my friend as we head for the bus. My friend thinks it was a hilariously awkward interaction and I say yeah, but you can't take it personally or anything, few people have a clear understanding of religion.

We pay our 10 dirhams and ride for an hour or so into Tanger. I go to my appointment and a few hours later meet my friend for lunch at a restaurant near the French consulate. As I approach the restaurant I get a clear view of the Mediterranean Sea that makes me want to just stop and look. It is the kind a thing a person who is not from a place does, but that a native,grown accustom to( or even tired of the beauty)just walks past.

After a good lunch Alhamdulilah, my friend and I part. I dash off to take a cab to the bus station, feeling slightly enraptured by Tanger I must admit, and as if I need to return and spend some more time here. At the bus station, I pay my 100 dirhams and board the bus to Fes. The bus trip was a few hours longer than the train,but a bit more scenic (lots of sunflowers) and I had the added bonus of having it drop me off right near my apartment when we got into Fes.

Peace

Falsehood? Shutting Down Al -Jazeera in Morocco

Just to share with you a quick news article about some Moroccan " freedom of the press" drama in relation to a protest that happened here in Morocco and the coverage it received by the al-Jazeera network.

I think it represents a larger issue than just being able to "say what you want to say," and goes towards the ability of the average Moroccan to honestly evaluate their life and their government, and ask questions about accountability.

And ofcourse, Al-Jazeera is an easy scapegoat. They are the news agency every country who is doing things they would rather not want us to know about villifies.


Keep Hope Alive

Our Culture - or the One They've Beautified and Sent Over to Us?

Thiqafah , الثقافة , it is the Arabic word for "Culture" and from what i remember from graduate school days, even in English it can be a loaded word carrying with it many assumptions and/or excuses.

Today "thiqafah," or culture was the topic of the khutbah ( Friday sermon) at the mosque I attended. Today is Friday, the Muslim "holy" day, and so many of the believers washed up, put on nice clothes and went to the mosque. And this being Morocco, the majority will most likely go home and eat a nice couscous with meat and vegetable dish after. I took a cab to a mosque in a neighborhood bordering my own instead of just walking to my neighborhood mosque because I wanted to go say goodbye to a friend who is moving to Senegal who lives in that neighborhood and because the khateeb ( person delivering the sermon) at this mosque is known to give a good talk.

In Morocco non-Muslims are not allowed to enter the mosques, this is based on an interpretation of a verse from the Quran that basically says that mosques are for believers. I think because of this there is a sort of mystery about what goes on inside of mosques for non-Muslims here, and certainly outside of Morocco, in Western countries there is a lot of anti-Muslim propaganda that wants to label mosques as places of hateful indoctrination and refuse to see them as Muslims see them - as places of worship and oasis of peace.

I am repeating the sermon here, to share with whoever is open to listen, because I was impressed by depth by which the khateeb spoke about the subject of "culture". He is well known and respected amongst religious scholars here in Fes. He began by saying that people who are against us [ 'us' being Muslims] have changed the meaning of the word "thiqafah, " or culture. So he began to speak about what he termed "original" culture, how early Muslims and even Muslims until not so long ago understood the concept of "culture."

He gave examples from the lives of the Companions of the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him. He spoke about culture being a corrective force in a society, and that the cultured person was one who used their intellect to address issues and make positive changes. He explained that this is the traditional grammatical understanding for the root th-q-f ,in the form II use of the verb. [A little something for the Arabic grammar geeks out there] And certainly he said, Islamic culture was understood as being based in the Qur'an and Traditions of the Prophet.

The khateeb at this mosque is a highly articulate man with an amazing grasp and usage of Classical Arabic that I cannot convey in my poor translation and re- articulation of his talk. As I sat there in the mosque, I kept wishing that I had brought my tape recorder but then i remembered what happened a few months ago at the very same mosque. Someone brought a video camera to tape the Friday sermon and police officers ( who just happened to be in the mosque, right?) immediately confiscated the camera and took the man away.

Okay, so back to the second part of the khutbah which he began by saying, "So now lets talk about this other idea of "culture" that has been beautified and sent over to us." [He is juxtaposing this idea of culture as being foreign and "entering Morocco" as opposed to an "original," and indigenous culture].

This idea of culture, he explained, purposefully has nothing to do with the Quran or the traditions of the Prophet Muhammad unless its a funeral or something, then we can recite from them, but not in our everyday lives. This idea of culture is about festivals and national sports competitions, and high couture clothes and music with lyrics we should find reprehensible...etc. He gave quite a laundry list of the components of this "new" culture that I cannot regurgitate now in full.

He went on to say that now anything from our "original" culture, our old mosques, zawiyas, schools (madrasas), etc. are reserved for tourism and foreigners come to admire them, but the average person is cut off from that cultural lineage.

It was a timely sermon because of all the festivals and sport events that are going on in Morocco right now. It was also an open criticism of the "powers that be" and I am always amazed when I hear this man speak that he is allowed to give the Friday sermon at such a well- attended mosque, when others who have said less than what he says have lost their positions or have been arrested. He is openly critical and often does away with the legislated formalities of praising the royal family at the end of the sermon, like so many other sermon givers [are commanded to] do.

The thing that made the speech so powerful was this clear demarcation between original vs. imported/imposed culture that speakers are easily able to make on a podium , but that is less clear-cut outside in the real world. Yes, I do honestly believe that there are people who want to disenfranchise Moroccans and other 3rd world peoples from their cultures in order to fill the place of inherited culture with material "culture" and consumerism, but maybe the reason the khateeb is allowed to give his powerful,moving speeches week after week is because the "powers that be" know that we are so far away from being able to do anything about it.

Morocco is Absoutely Breathtaking , or i've just been diagnosed with Morocco-induced asthma

There is no doubt that in traveling around the world to learn about things, one will also learn a few things about him or herself.
I have had many moments of personal realizations here in Morocco, but none quite as interesting as the one I got a few days ago. I was sitting in a friends kitchen in a house in the old city of Fes, I could feel an allergic reaction coming on, but my friend kept insisting that I go to the roof for some fresh air. I finally gave in, and by the time I got up to the roof, I realized that i was gasping for air. It was a bit off-putting and when my chest was still feeling weird the next day, i decided to go see a doctor. Only it was Sunday, no doctors open.

So on Monday, it just so happens that I remember that I promised a friend of mine who is a receptionist at a doctors office that I would drop by to visit her before I left for my trip to Tanger. I spent that morning looking up asthma symptoms and after putting a lot of "2's" and "2's" together I looked back over my life and said, I have been standing at the brink of asthma for many years but living in Morocco for such an extended period of time has really brought it on.

So I go to visit my friend and ask her if there is any chance I could actually see the doctor and I tell her about my wheezing incident. After a 45 minute wait, I get in to see him, he checks my breathing, I breathe into some contraption( but not at a rate appropriate for my age), we discuss my medical history and he decides to try me on some asthma regulating and allergy medicine to see what happens.

Then he realizes that I am not Moroccan and starts talking to me about how he has been fortunate enough to visit America, mainly Orlando,Florida and Disney world. His wife has 3 brothers who live there. He said that he was very impressed by Disney world and if all of America is like that, then for sure it is a great place. I tell him no, all of American is not like it, and that's why people go there for vacation.

Anyway, I take my prescription , and although I am the queen of homeopathy, I go and purchase my two steroid based inhalers and real deal prescription drugs for allergies. I feel like a bit of a sell out , but i tell myself that as soon as I get back to the US , I will look into the alternative medicine way of dealing with this Morocco-induced asthma. An older woman at the pharmacy sees the medication I am buying and says to the pharmacist that I must be having trouble breathing, she recognizes one of the medicines because she takes it too. The pharmacist says yes and calls me "poor thing," then hands me the medicine and says a sort of a prayer for me that I will be okay.

You might be wondering what Imean by Morocco-induced asthma. Well, like i said , i realize in hindsight that I have been prone for developing asthma for a while, but living in Morocco means having to deal on a daily basis with certain things that I have noticed making my breathing more difficult such as:

unregulated exhaust from cars and buses ( really black, choke inducing stuff), second-hand cigarette smoke EVERYWHERE. You can smoke just about everywhere in Morocco that you can't in the States. Burning piles of trash - , yes, I have become accustomed to and can even name the smell of burning trash. This is how Moroccans dispose of their trash and the burning can take place anywhere, in a trash can, in a field, inside of a defunct water fountain. I actually walked past an active pile of burning trash on my way to the doctor. And now that Fes has really heated up, it seems as if the air with all it pollutants just doesn't move.

I looked up some info on line and apparently Morocco is classified as a country with an intermediate asthma burden ranging from 10 to 15%, with the symptoms having increased within the last 5 years.

As Moroccans say when they begin discussing their health issues, " I complain to God [only]." I have truly found this to be a beneficial learning experience, and a method by which I am forced to value every breath, not taking it for granted.

So , i found out on Monday I most likely have asthma, got my prescriptions filled, had my first inhaler puff in a taxi, then got on a train heading North to Asilah. It was a short ( I am already back in Fes), but aesthetically beautiful trip that i hope to tell you all about later GOd-willing - if I'm still breathing !

Peace

A Moroccan Afternoon

I guess someone pushed the button to officially start the wedding season and to turn up the heat here in Fes. I feel as if both things have started simultaneously and almost overnight. It is as if, we went from the 70's to the 90's within days and now I feel like everywhere I walk I hear the sounds of a wedding procession and the ululations of women. I have been caught terribly off guard the last few days, I generally carry around my recorder so that I can add posts to the Sound Blog me and my other researcher friend have, but these last few days i have either left it at home or have been so clumsy in finding it at the bottom of my bag that by the time I get it ready, the good sounds have past. MashaAllah.

It has been a few days of feeling so folded into the cloth of Moroccan life, that one wonders what it will be like to one day be walking down some street in the Midwest of America, so far away from all this life.

Anyway, I decided to do something very Moroccan today and have a "leshia", an afternoon gathering of a few women with pastries and a woman who does henna designs.
Of course there was a twist, I didn't actually invite any Moroccans(just part of a strategy by which i do not have to serve as translator or cultural bridge the whole time) , just my American, mostly Muslim friends and we did radical things like drink iced-tea. Which most of my Arab friends think is a crime against nature.

But the henna design woman was Moroccan, and she is hearing impaired and mute and so i felt like this was the ultimate test of my communication abilities. But there is a Moroccan Arabic sign language, and not that I have ever studied it, but it is visual, so i could understand alot, and she can read lips, and so it was a pleasant little afternoon.

Tomorrow, God willing, I will board a train for Asilah and Tangier in the North-west of Morocco, which means gulping in views of the Atlantic Ocean. Although this is a research related trip, I am quite looking forward to seeing the Ocean and cooling down a bit.

In Peace

The Obama Post ( Because There had to be At Least One)

I must admit that most Moroccans know more about Obama than I do, and they should considering how much TV news they watch.

Whenever they "discover" that I am American generally the first word out of their mouths is "OBAMA!". It probably also has something to do with the fact that Mr. Barack and I are both brown-skinned. I must also admit that Mr. Barack has done what Michael Jordan couldn't, which is to actually open up peoples minds internationally to the presence of Black-Americans. When i first came to Morocco years ago, i realized that in exporting our TV shows and movies, we almost always showed portraits of White- American life, and people had a hard time even believing there was any significant number of Black Americans in America.

So, anyway back to "OBAMA!" When Moroccans bring him up to me,they almost always ask me if he is Muslim or they tell me that they think he is Muslim, or that they think he is a closet Muslim. I catergoricaly deny the idea of him being a Muslim. I actually have a little speech that I say, " Father was from Kenya and of Muslim heritage, but as best we know died an athiest, his mother was an American humanist, he and his wife are now committed Christians." Sometimes they insist, that no, as soon as he is in office, he will let his Islam show - "do you think he could get elected President of the United States if he was openly Muslim?" they ask me.

If the conversation gets to this point, i generally drop it, or change the subject by telling them I actually ran into him once in a bookstore in Chicago a few years ago. I mean far be it for me to deny Mr. Barack the right to be a Muslim.

Please dont take this post the wrong way, I am a commited registered non-voter and will not be casting a ballot, absentee or otherwise for any one in November God-willing. ( please no comments about this, i've heard all the pro-voting arguments)

I just thought I'd add to the chatter out there about how the Muslim world would "accept" Mr. Barack. No one here thinks he is an apostate from Islam and the reporters that perpetuate this idea are either careless or have very little understanding of Islam or both. People I have met are generally happy about Obama's
presence in the political arena and are quite shocked when i tell them that I do not believe he will win because America is not ready for a president of
color. They do not understand the depth of racism in America and how we have failed to address it collectively as a society.

Let me end this post by retelling a dream I had about a week ago( you can tell i've been in Morocco too long when I start using dreams to comment about a "real" situation). In the dream I am at home in America and the door bell rings at about 1 in the morning, I am not startled, I do not think "who could be calling at this hour," instead I open the door without even looking through the peephole. Barack Obama walks through the door , we both kind of nod at each other, I go back to what I was doing and he goes to the guest room or whatever. Apparently my apartment was like a "safe-house" where he could come and relax away from the campaign. He makes himself at home, goes to the kitchen, etc and I intentionally leave him alone, not asking him about the latest polls or anything. A little later, as I am walking past the guest room I see Mr. Obama praying like Muslims do, making prostrations, etc. I am totally floored and disappointed, not because he is Muslim, but because he lied.

I guess all this dreaming being done by Moroccans and Muslims in general is for an America that moves past incriminating and bombing Muslims, to electing one its leader. And for Black Americans, there is the dream that after hundreds of years of slavery and racial injustices we might have finally reached that promise land called Equality where someone who looks like us might actually be the President.

There are a lot of people with their hopes tied up in Mr. Barack.

------------------

Okay, so I am going to play with time, and two weeks (today is June 19, 2008)after my original post add a link to an article about the recent refusal of the Obama campaign to let two Muslim women sit behind him at a function. Someone is being extra careful to not be associted with us scarf-heads.
Oh well.

What Time is it? : Time Changing in Morocco and Nepal

So, the annoying topic of the day is how Morocco has decided to follow Daylight Savings Time starting this morning. This is not like the US where even though it is annoying, it happens every year, so we're used to it. This is kind of an "experiment." Morocco has tried it before, but that was years ago. Of course there wasn't any referendum or anything ( and if there had been, we already know what the "official" outcome would have been,) just an announcement last week or so that clocks would be moving up an hour starting this morning.

Every person with whom I have spoken with today and almost every conversation I overheard walking down the street, in the old city, or in the taxi was about the time change. Most of the conversations either started out with " So - what do you think of this time change thing?" Or you heard people saying, " So- what time is it now?" Most people just seemed to be in bewilderment as to why exactly we were moving the clock forward. It just seemed to be inconveniencing everyone and throwing off peoples rhythms. Especially with regards to prayer times around which a good number of people here still manage their lives, ALhamdulilah. So now sunset prayer will not be until around 8:35pm at night and the night prayer will begin at around 10:15 pm.
People are already trying to figure out how this is going to effect their fasting in the month of Ramadan which is about 3 months away.( This Daylight Savings is supposed to stay in effect until Sept 27th)

The official line is that this is going to save Morocco some energy (a whopping 1%) AND allow Moroccan businesses to deal better with their international partners. Here is an article with their explanation.

You know I used to always complain that Moroccans were always complaining, but it seems that I too have been bitten by the bug. I beg your pardon.

What about some inspiring news from Nepal? The Nepalese monarchy has fallen and a new republic has been declared. While I am not one who puts alot of hope in politics or politicians, it does give one a slight bit of optimism about the " will of the people" we are always hearing so much about, here is a BBC news article about changing times in Nepal.