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![\"IMG_0167\"](\"https:\/\/maghrebi-voices.swarthmore.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/IMG_0167.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nIn many ways, Youssef seems more traditionally Moroccan than many of the people we meet here in Ifrane. Most Ifranis have at least moderately good French, for instance, even people who only made it through 3rd<\/sup> grade.\u00a0 Youssef has some words of French, but not enough to communicate clearly.\u00a0 (He doesn\u2019t speak much English either, which makes it hard to ask about new words or concepts.\u00a0 And occasionally, the translations he offers head in the wrong direction: \u201cGod needs you\u201d instead of \u201cMay God help you.\u201d)\u00a0 Like \u201cthe country people\u201d Ifranis describe, Youssef doesn\u2019t change his watch with the official changes in time.\u00a0 (Morocco follows daylight savings time, but goes off DST during Ramadan, and then returns to DST at the end of Ramadan.\u00a0 We changed our clocks with the official time, but Youssef didn\u2019t, with the result that for about a week he turned up an hour before we expected him.) \u00a0Less traditional, I imagine, is Youssef\u2019s passion for linguistics: he just finished a master\u2019s degree on using technology to teach modern standard Arabic to foreigners; he\u2019s hoping to start a new degree in Fez come the fall\u2014perhaps a national doctorate (as opposed to an internationally recognized PhD).<\/p>\n In practicing vocabulary, Youssef and I talk about families and where we come from.\u00a0 Youssef was born in Errachidia; he lives with his two brothers in Azrou. \u00a0 Family vocabulary is very important in Darija, so it\u2019s interesting to see what the structure of the language allows and emphasizes, and what it obscures.\u00a0 There\u2019s no simple word for cousin, for instance: instead, one specifies the relationship through the older generation.\u00a0 A cousin is \u201cson-of-a-paternal-aunt\u201d or \u201cdaughter-of-a-maternal-uncle.\u201d\u00a0 An American \u201cblended\u201d family is hard to describe in Darija.\u00a0 To talk about my much-loved stepmother, for instance, I have to refer to her as my father\u2019s second wife, which has rather different overtones.\u00a0 Talking about my stepfather is a little more shady: \u201cYour mother\u2019s second husband?\u201d (Really?)<\/p>\n Youssef and I work on an imaginary family tree. \u201cNo, I want to know how to describe the relationship between Ismaa and Nizha.\u201d Ah, the light dawns.\u00a0 Brothers share the family house, and their wives are structurally in conflict with one another, struggling for dominance, disagreeing over how family resources and space should be managed.<\/p>\n Youssef isn\u2019t done.\u00a0 \u201cBut the worst is this one.\u201d\u00a0 He points to Fatima, the matriarch.\u00a0 \u201cBoth of these women (Nizha and Ismaa) hate her and she hates them.\u00a0 They must work for her, and she may be terrible to them, making trouble for them with each other and with their husbands.\u00a0 The older women are especially bad: no education, nothing in their life but the power to make their daughters-in-law miserable.\u201d<\/p>\n Wow.\u00a0 I make a face at Youssef to show I\u2019m a little taken aback. Talk about names within the family leads to a discussion of how affection is expressed. \u00a0Parents are called by their titles: El Haj (marking those who have been on hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca, but the title is used more generally to indicate respect); a Lalla. \u00a0Children kiss their parents’ hands; parents kiss their children’s (bent) heads. \u00a0On the street, of course, there is the double kiss–cheeks pressed together on both sides of the face–and often an embrace, mostly between people of the same sex. \u00a0Youssef imagines I want to know how to say ‘I love you,’ though I don’t think I’ve asked this. \u00a0“The young people use ‘bgheet’ (the same as ‘to want’) but the old people don’t say this word. \u00a0They show love by helping each other with burdens or giving a hand down a steep path, but they don’t say the word. \u00a0The young people–it’s the opposite. \u00a0They say the word, but they don’t show it!”<\/p>\n Youssef and I are very different from one another, and Youssef works, often visibly, to overcome the strangeness our family represents.\u00a0 When we invite him into a different part of the house, beyond the public area of the Moroccan salon, he pauses and then physically pushes himself forward into this inappropriate interior.\u00a0 When I bring up one of the famous secret prisons from Morocco\u2019s \u201cyears of lead,\u201d he startles, but again pushes on: \u201cIn this context\u201d of tutoring, he states explicitly, \u201cwe can say anything.\u201d\u00a0 The statement demonstrates openness and tolerance even as it marks a political gulf between us.<\/p>\n He\u2019s happier to talking about the Green March, celebrated each November 4-6 in Morocco. \u00a0During the Green March, some 350,000 Moroccans (escorted by 20,000 army troops) marched into the disputed territory of the (then Spanish) Western Sahara: they marched singing, carrying Qurans and Moroccan flags.<\/p>\n “My uncle was a part of the Green March,” Youssef tells me, exultantly. \u00a0“He was so happy: they were all so happy! \u00a0Marching, singing! \u00a0It was a wonderful time!” \u00a0The Western Sahara, cannily annexed without bloodshed during this Green March, continues to be a vexed political issue, underscored by a 16-year war and ongoing conflict with the Polisario front, but it’s clearly important to Moroccan patriotic feeling.<\/p>\n When my tutoring sessions with Youssef come to an end, we take some photos to help us remember our time together. When you spend two hours a day with someone, that person starts to feel a little like a friend or a family member. Youssef finds this easiest in relation to Jeremy.\u00a0 \u201cAji!\u201d he calls to Jeremy.\u00a0 \u201cGliss!\u201d (Come here! Sit down!)\u00a0 He pats the chair next to him emphatically.\u00a0 Jeremy looks at me sideway and … Continue reading Learning (in) Darija<\/span>
\nOne brother is a greengrocer; the other sells furniture like Moroccan banquettes.\u00a0 Youssef occasionally drives a truck for this second brother, picking up furnishings from El Hoceima, for instance, on the Mediterranean coast, and grabbing a few hours on the beach in the process.\u00a0 Back in Errachidia, his father used to sell vegetables in the suq; he\u2019s now retired. Another brother brings truckloads of produce from Agadir (on the southern Atlantic coast) to sell in Errachidia.
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\nIf I recall correctly, there are four brothers and three sisters in total.\u00a0 One of the sisters lives in Rabat; I lost track of the other two. \u00a0But I’m struck by the geographical distribution of the family, given the importance of family within Moroccan culture. \u00a0Still, one of Youssef\u2019s nephews is going to marry one of Youssef\u2019s nieces\u2014Darija makes it clear that this is cousin rather than sibling marriage\u2014a practice still quite common in Morocco.<\/p>\n
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\nFatima and Hamid are the grandparents; they have four children, two girls (Ouam and Amina) and two boys (Khalid and Mohamed).\u00a0 All four are married: Ouam to Abdellah; Amina to Qasm; Khalid to Nizha; Mohamed to Ismaa.\u00a0 I read the family tree from the wrong direction, left to right, taking the women ahead of the men. When I ask about terms like sister-in-law, Youssef points me to the mother-in-law relationship.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cThere is no relationship there.\u00a0 No word to describe it.\u201d
\n\u201cReally?\u201d
\n\u201cReally.\u00a0 Besides, they hate each other.\u201d
\n\u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d
\n\u201cThis woman (pointing to Nizha) always hates this woman (pointing to Ismaa).\u00a0 At least if the brothers share a house.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nHe nods and grins. \u00a0\u201cYou won\u2019t find this in any books, but this is what I say.\u00a0 This is what I see.\u00a0 It\u2019s not so bad now, but in the old days it was very hard.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/a>
\nimage from Morocco World News \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 image from dynamicafrica.tumblr.com<\/a><\/p>\n
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\n<\/a>Youssef wants photos with Jeremy and James; James insists on taking a photo of Youssef with me.\u00a0 I can feel Youssef\u2019s discomfort despite Jeremy’s presence between us.
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\n<\/a>Once the photo has been taken, Youssef leaps away and then steps back to tell me I am like a mother to him.\u00a0 I would have chosen younger brother rather than son (is this vanity on my part or immaturity?), but I take his point. \u00a0He has coped so well with this strange family, has worked diligently at this odd relationship with an uncovered, inappropriately dressed older woman. \u00a0A lalla Betsy: Ms. Betsy. \u00a0How do we resolve this odd, uncanny friendship? \u00a0Through the model of family. \u00a0Khuya: my brother. \u00a0Umi: my mother.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"