you can't fathom my love, dude

W T F

2006-10-20T14:34:59Z

Things just went from real good to. . . less good. Dream job fell through; they said that though they really liked me, they decided to hire internally. Maybe they'll have something for me in January. They are idiots. After crying in Times Square for the second time this fall (!!!), I'm trying to figure out what this means. Am I supposed to find a job that makes better use of my writing skills? I recently started interning for The Feminist Press and I'm really enjoying it, though working for no money is ridiculous. I'm selecting critics' quotes to go on the back of books and writing the blurbs that publicize new releases.

I have several things on the table--interview processes pending--but what am I supposed to do now? I thought this was almost done.

holleration!

2006-10-02T01:09:41Z

Thanks to a friend who had a friend, I went to a Mary J. Blidge concert last night! Mary was so inspirational, shouting things like, "Put your hands up if you know you can follow your dreams!" And, "Ladies, I've been where you are. Hold your heads up high and know that you can't keep a good woman down." Pharrell was there too, and as adorable as ever, at this Pepsi-sponsored, radio-promoted concert in the lovely park beneath the Brooklyn Bridge.

Yesterday morning I went to Mexican and Polish grocery stores with "my host family." It felt strangely familiar to be the only white girl in the Mexican grocery. They have good snacks there! Hot pepper dried mango slices and plantain chips!

Also yesterday, for the sake of straight-up, diary-style reporting, I went to "Full Frontal Fall Fashions," a girls-only clothing exchange party; turned down an invitation to an apple orchard; was bought a tequila shot at a tiny Mexican restaurant; danced and snuck free drinks from a private party at a club on the Lower East Side (because I said I knew "Dennis"); watched a little bit of Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit; and chilled with the songwriter/producers behind Jessica Simpson's TRL hits.

mumblebee @ 2006-09-24T21:51:00

2006-09-25T01:55:27Z

I did not get that job. But it is okay. However, it was not okay on Friday or most of Saturday.

On Friday after finding out (by voicemail!!), I cried in Times Square and had to go into that huge, flashy McDonald's for napkins to pat my face.

mumblebee @ 2006-09-22T11:23:00

2006-09-22T15:24:27Z

What's up with adult men signing their emails to me with hugs and kisses?

would you please do whatever prayer you do for me and this job thing?

2006-09-21T02:22:47Z

It's cool that the Sean Paul ballad "Never Gonna Be the Same" makes me a little wistful, yeah?

I'm in New York for, like, the fifth time this summer. Or, I suppose summer is over now. I'm here on the job hustle, in international nonprofits, cultural exchange programs and publishing (in that order). In between the hours of computer staring, casting spells on my phone to get it to ring, the accompanying bleeps of despair, and the occasional interview, I have been having great fun doing things including:

going to fashion retail trade shows with Naoko in from Kalamazoo;
bringing a six-person entourage, including one Japanese tourist, with me to two parties;
staying in New Jersey with the incredibly delightful, short, Colombian family of a friend;
finally meeting an LJ friend of six years (!!) and really liking her and her pals;
chillin' at a Middle Eastern cafe in Williamsburg, sipping a soda and watching Arabic pop videos;
finishing dinner and wine with my "host family" and giggling with the father about Mexican witches who live to be 150;
working an incredibly easy temp job and making a generous amount of money;
having a middle-aged Mexican newspaper seller man with whom I was chillin' at Port Authority give me the job tip "craigslist.com" written on a sheet of Hello Kitty notepaper;
getting hit on by a white elementary school special ed teacher with a Russian accent, who wore a Sean John shirt and a huge gold Fubu pendant;
being pleased and bewildered by how many friends/acquaintances I have here, and how well I'm learning my way around despite not living here;
getting lovely new clothes from Zara;
getting handed a young modeling agent's card then seeing that his email address is "pimpzone1981@...";
walking to "Dunks" at night with Pablo, in from L.A.;
sipping a half-Diet Coke, half Dr. Pepper at a Burger King in New Jersey, writing in my journal.

Snuggles bazef!

“Oh, distance has no way of making love understandable.”

2006-07-12T15:37:58Z

I’ve incorporated real-life heartbreak into my conversational entertainment routine. I’ve made a set of funny stories out of happenings that mean something to me, even sting, if I think about them quietly.

"bismillah" at every turn

2006-06-29T00:32:05Z

Hey, y'all. I'm in New York, where livejournal works again. It hardly ever worked in Morocco. Censored? I have so much catching up to do, seeing what's been happening with all of you and telling you about some of the things that have happened for me. My last two days in Morocco were some of the strangest days of my life. Really. For starters, aside from saying good bye to my friends, neighbors and the country for who knows how long, I received a very flattering email proposition from a noted novelist, and my (ex)boyfriend type dude broke things off more meanly than I had ever imagined. Give me a week and I'll be fine, but for now, owwwwwww. Dude told me, "I'm wrecking the happy ending to your one-year Morocco experience." On the plane I could not stop crying. As in, can't eat lunch, gotta cry. I feel so much better today. Less exhaustion. I dreampt in many cities and spoke Arabic to people who didn't understand.

I got in okay, found my way to Zach's apt (which, JORDANA: He really likes. And I really like. Thank you!), asked a few friendly people if I was going the right way, and got change for the phone from a friendly bum. Zach made me a delicious chicken and vegetable din (broccoli!), and I went right to sleep. I've had a great day today, slept late and then went out on my own in Morningside Heights, around Columbia's campus. I had a coffee and strawberry tart outside at a cafe by myself (The Hungarian Pastry Shop) and NO ONE BOTHERED ME. How unusual, given what would happen in Morocco. Went to the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. Walked around Columbia. Then Zach and I headed downtown and ate lunch at a diner in the Meatpacking District after checking out many lovely shoe stores. (This low wedge heel thing looks great! It must have been something that happened while I was gone) I ate a cheddar cheese (!!) sandwich with bacon (!!) and tomato. We strolled around Chelsea, Greenwich Village, Tribeca and Soho. I walked while eating a lavender frosted cupcake. I watched tattoos, revealing clothing, awesome fashion, and obesity. I listened to many languages and many accents in English. So far, I miss Arabic, low prices, modesty and hijabs. On the subway I was grossed out to see women in skin tight pants and women sitting in skirts with their knees apart. Americans look so tasteless. On the other, not missing Morocco hand, I am relishing being alone in public comfortably.

I'm in New York for a few days, how long still TBA. Should I stay until Saturday and go to a free TV on the Radio show with a dude I met on the plane? Having to pay Delta another $50--I've already changed my ticket twice!--may be intolerable.

Does anyone in Michigan or Chicago have excellent Fourth of July plans? I'd like to join in.

mumblebee @ 2006-04-30T12:28:00

2006-04-30T12:50:03Z

Have you seen The Squid and the Whale? I have a sore throat and the old woman aches so I stayed in last night and watched it. That I stayed in is remarkable because I have been "burning the candle at both ends," as my dad would say. Which is probably why I got sick. On Friday I had to stay in one spot on my Arabic teachers' couch for over 12 hours, waking only to eat cous cous, have tea, read Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea (which is also so good!) and watch Polish MTV and ABC World News Tonight sans sweet, hot Peter Jennings. But, about the movie. I loved it so much I started it again as soon as it ended. The story is about family relationships and they ways people hurt each other without meaning to. Watch it! Or am I so behind on the times that you've all already watched it?

Some things are so cool (e.g. all things V. of Spain). We are possibly going to Spain next weekend? That feels very adult, a weekend trip with a boy. Other things are confusing and scary (e.g. what to do next with life). The exhileration of all possibilities has been replaced by a low dread. I am definitely going to be in the U.S. in July. Inch'Allah. After that do I come back to Morocco and set about writing articles and essays while teaching English for money? Do I work in New York or Chicago? There is an NYC job I am applying for that I would vom about if I got. Do I survey my possibilities in another country? France? I'm applying for a few things and suppose I will see what my best option is.

Love and snuggles across the sea. I am thinking of summer sojourns to Pittsburgh, CA, AZ, Boston?, NYC?, Baltimore?, DC? in addition to Michigan. It will be a grand tour. The funding is the thing. How do I become rich?

mumblebee @ 2006-04-13T15:07:00

2006-04-13T15:08:16Z

If you'll read any of these, go for "From the H-E-A-R-T, dude." It's hot off the press.

mumblebee @ 2006-04-13T14:50:00

2006-04-13T15:05:51Z

And to give you some evidence that I do some work here, here's most of an email I sent to family and friends following the mid-March, mid-term Fulbright conference. I've cut out the particularly catty parts and left in detailed descriptions of my clothing. If you're interested in reading my actual paper, let me know and I'll send it to you.

The three-day, 9 a.m. to 7 p.m., marathon mid-term Fulbright conference ended yesterday. All of the 25 or so grantees of different types (recent graduates, people writing their dissertations, professors) presented their work thus far. Thing was so long! I feel like I survived something, and so at noon today I was in bed with my computer, recovering from the conference and from last night's celebrations.

I felt nervous and clammy about the conf from the beginning. We had all been told, basically, that this is the one of the only things we are accountable for all year, so don't mess it up. The conference was at La Tour Hassan Hotel. I walk past it all the time and had no idea of the hidden fanciness within. Dang. The swankiness and formality added to the tension. Everyone was all gussied up professional style. My Day One fashion jam involved brown pants and a black button up shirt. Many important people and local elites were there, including prominent academics, NGO leaders, and representatives from the Embassy. We were taped for one of the national TV channels too. I had an urgent feeling, engaged, on-edge, and like I could fight someone! There was a large diversity of talk topics and styles, from
an English teacher discussing village life, to the most boring paper in the world on something very specific in 15th century Moroccan history, to a report on the women's health implications of the changes to the Moroccan family code, to a half-creative half-analytical
multimedia talk on urban planning in the Fes medina. The discussants' responses to Fulbrighter work varied in style too. (The experts we had each invited to talk about our work each had 15 minutes to present, after our 20) Some, like a charming/arrogant writer I've interviewed and hung out with, just chatted, half about the Fulbrighter's project and half about the topics at hand more generally. Other discussants had their own PowerPoint presentations. Most were in English but a few preferred to speak in French. A lot of
PowerPoint was used, for better and for worse. I got the cards of several academics who have something to do with women's writing. Good contacts. Tasty, extravagant buffet lunches all three days and dinner the last night. At the end I stumbled sleepily to Laura and Alex's
and ate a dinner they made. Finished my talk, stayed up too late.

On the morning of my talk, Day Two, my outfit and my blow-dried hair looked better than ever before! I wore "the best pants I have ever owned," blue denim-ish trousers from the Spanish store Zara, and a white, fitted, button-up shirt with faint pale blue shimmery stripes. So far so good. The day dragged, though most talks were good. An hour before mine, I declared myself "KARATE READY." One of the professors came over and told me in a fatherly way to "have fun up there." It washed over me, and for a second I was elated, giddy, gleeful to give my talk. I thought of all the people who had wished me well, from my parents to my Fulbright pals to my cleaning lady to the guy at the cybercafe who printed my paper. I looked around and saw Moroccan friends from our Moroccan American Student Association (MASA) who had come to hear me. My Arabic teachers, Raja and Bouazza, and their daughter Naziha were there too. My discussant, professor and novelist Touria Ouleheri, had arrived and she sat in the back revising her notes. And! Right before I started a good 10 people walked in! Including two prominent linguists, which made me a little nervous. Though they were probably there to see Touria anyway. I was mostly confident about my talk, but concerned about its delivery and curious to see what Touria would say about it.

It went well! Though I know I faintly trembled the whole time and squirmed in my chair, reliable reports said that I was poised and slow-speaking. That remains one of the mysteries of the universe—that you can feel terrified when public speaking but look and sound fine. I noticed as it went along that more friends from MASA had arrived. My talk was concise, as it was the last one on Day Two and that seemed wise. I was a tiny bit embarrassed that I stumbled through a quote in French, and I later called it "the worst French in the world," though people assured me it was definitely not. Touria praised my work, called me "Mademoiselle Andrea S_____" several times (gave her comments in French), said she was very happy to meet me, and talked about the status of Moroccan women's writing and its reception more generally. Several people asked questions and had comments at the end. I faltered a bit, deferred more than one to Touria, translated a question she hadn't heard, but felt comfortable. Success and relief! Went out for din at the restaurant of the Goethe Institute, a chic, always crowded pizza, salad, pasta affair, with Touria, adults, Adriana and Morgan. I often didn't quite know what I was supposed to do with Touria. Keep her company and chat? Let her mingle with her fellow Moroccan elites? Though I like her a lot, thankfully, she did a lot of the latter and I could chill with my friends.

Day Three: still tired. Had to come up with one more nice outfit. It was "the best pants I have ever owned," brown boat neck shirt and pale sea foam green V-neck cardigan, plus those little black heels with yellow detail. (How's that for detail!) Most of the Fulbrighters my
age had their talks this day. I was impressed with my friends' work, particularly Laura's and Kristen's. I felt like, "That's my girl!" At lunch I ate what seemed like the tasty kind of cheese that's in Indian food. Not true! I reached for another piece and the political
historian who had been exiled in Senegal for 12 years (!!) said, "You know that's brain, right?" I paled. The conference dragged on and on, I took a stroll with two friends, bought gummies and lounged on the couches in the courtyard, then attended the closing dinner. Us
kids were all eager to leave and start the evening. We were too sleepy to go dancing so we had a noisy party at Kristen and Adriana's apartment in the medina. Mazian! (Good)

Today I lounged for a while, made myself a scrambled egg and onion, fried potato, coffee and juice brunch, showered, and strolled downtown to have sodas with Kristen at a garden cafe before she caught a train. I got there and found three other friends and sat with them. We
chilled, exchanged conference gossip, the three left, Kristen and I chatted, then strolled to the train station, each with a hand on the handle of her rolly suitcase. Everything was sunny and windy.

Here's a vague article about the conf:
http://www.moroccotimes.com/paper/article.asp?idr=11&id=13551

love you, miss you, thank you,
Andrea

Call me George Foreman ‘cuse I’m sellin’ everybody grillz

2006-04-13T14:47:48Z

Written just a few days ago:

I just returned to Rabat from a two-day trip that seemed much longer. Arriving from little towns in the Middle Atlas Mountains, Rabat sounds deafening and from my balcony view the rooftops sprawl forever.

One of my Arabic teachers, Bouazza, took three American friends and me on this trip in order to record an audio CD to accompany the English textbook that he and his wife Raja, my other teacher, are writing. Alex, Laura, Rizzi and I piled in Bouazza’s old Benz to go to Midelt, Bouazza’s home town, we thought. We knew little about what we were doing or where we would go and were happily surprised to get a whole multi-stop tour of the center of the country.

At some point I have cultivated a soft-voice said to be suitable for radio. And so my voice is the star of the CD. We recorded crazy low-tech style, with a video camera though the CD will only be audio. We cracked up a few times, unstoppable giggles bazef, faking Canadian and Australian accents.

In a cherry blossom-filled valley in the village of Ain Leuh my sweet friends and I ran between the trees and chattered in French with toothy children, holding their hands. I told Rizzi to take a picture of me with my face behind the branches of flowers. “Take a picture of me looking this happy!”

At the Parliamentarian’s house where we stayed, off a road in Boulaajoul, my friends and I ran around giddily in the dark backyard. I wanted to roller-skate in the huge, tiled rooms of the house but settled for ballet steps in sneakers—clumsy pas de bourrés and a few low tour jetés. Bouazza told us in the car the next day that one thing we had for dinner that night, which I had assumed with kefta, herbed ground meat, was actually camel! We had mentioned never having eaten it, so he arranged for it to be served to us. Tasty! I slept heavily but apparently talked in my sleep, as usual. In the morning we all put on the same clothes, stretched in the backyard and shared breakfast with the guard before heading to another town.

We drove a crazy tangle, driving through towns Bouazza used to live in, passing schools he used to attend, waiting for him as he ran errands and had quick appointments. I scoped out the fake Dolce and Gabbana tee shirts in the villages and drank qahwa ns ns, café au lait, in the men’s cafés with my friends. We met a zillion mayors and local council members, touring ensembles artisinales and women’s weaving cooperatives.

At lunch at a small town mayor’s house in Aghbalou we ate with a dozen men who watched every move of Alex, Laura and I. Conversation with in Tamazight, so we sat and watched, as we’ve gotten so used to doing. The food was presented to us on giant silver platters the size of something to use as a sled. After an elaborate salad we were served a whole roasted lamb, then a kind of cous cous with yogurty milk. I am un-fond of this kind of dairy product. Milk—okay. Yogurt—okay. But nothing in between. Big oranges followed, and then we took a short walking tour of the village despite the dust storm.

Bouazza sped 110 kilometers an hour—whatever that is in miles—around the hills and mountains, and I marveled at the scene, washed with—I swear to God—desire. Through the sheep herds and dust, land of all purples and greens, I thought of exhilarating songs I listened to two springs ago; sex; the Spanish boy I met who looked at me with a quiet face as my eyes flashed and darted; all of the essays I’ve had in mind writing lately; taking a roadtrip to California with my father one summer and leaving my copy of Radical Feminism on the dashboard the whole trip, bleaching the cover. I thought of reading a line by Sharon Olds or Adrienne Rich on another car trip—a line about a baby violent with hunger. I dreamed a life for myself, of cathartic writing, dancing and fashion! Of wildness and drinking everything in, from the rolls of the quiet land of quiet countries to urban blare, to throwing a switched swagger to walking humbly. Possibility! So much unexpected and alarmingly, disarmingly pleasurable!

On our way back west through Azzrou this afternoon we drove down a dirt and rock road in a forest to find monkeys. We all called out “Monkeys!” like children and assigned different people to look in different places—trees, ground, left, right. We finally spotted them and piled out of the old Benz. We fed the monkeys little cups of water and watched them leap from branch to branch, taking pictures and noting their awful, exposed butts.

Swally LJ unplugged, for true fans

2006-04-13T14:46:02Z

These are the roughest notes from the trip I giddily dubbed Business Travel for One. I spent two days in Tangier completely on my own, to attend a salon du livre, book fair with writers and roundtable discussions. Then I spent another two days in Fes, with my mentor, a Moroccan professor and novelist. It could be the best time I have had in my entire life.

Meredith and Megan’s two-week stay in Morocco. We laughed often, picked up stories and jokes like a snowball or tumbleweed. Meredith described the trip as so wonderful she didn’t want to talk about it afterwards, similarly to how she still can’t talk about the movie The Hours. Guard it.

giddy to eat my chicken shwarma, fries and mango drink in my small, high ceilinged hotel room in Tangier.

Alone in a crowd at the salon du livre, drinking a coffee before the start of a discussion

I coasted around Tangier gleefully thinking of Talib Kweli rapping “I’m like Magnum P.I.” I coasted around thinking “I’ve gotta bottle this stuff!” The sentences in my head, my recounting of my world.

shaking slightly with nervousness and elation

staying in an $8 hotel room. Each time we spoke, a friendly, sleepy looking employee who studied English was on the brink of laughter. I imagine he was amused that I was staying there.

MOVED

la fête du quarantième jour

When Touria introduced me to her brother-in-law he said “domage” (too bad!) about his wife and kids. Many women kissed me on the cheeks and called me habibti before we left.

befriending so many kind women on the trains

Just the phrase “lunch in the garden” pleases me. That is what Touria, her sons Mehdi and Amine and I had yesterday afternoon in the sun, near a tree they pointed out had just flowered pink. Almost spring. We ate from a dish of meat and quince. The boys asked me if I was used to eating with my hand. I replied pridefully, “Of course I am. I’ve been here six months.” Someone noticed I hadn’t eaten any meat so Touria plopped a huge chunk onto my plate, the only individual plate on the table. I cut it with my fork and knife and put half back in the communal dish. I began to eat the meat with my utensils and the boys asked, challengingly, why I didn’t do it with my hands. I said it was easier this way. “With meat,” I qualified. They egged me on to try then watched silently as I began. I wiggled the meat hilariously between my fingers and thumb, trying to tear off a bite, and they shouted with laughter, flying back in their seats.

Touria’s wonderful family, chillin’ on the roof with one of her son’s as he smoked a discreet cigarette. I asked for a story about living in France during his studies and he told me about when les flics, the police, broke up his twentieth birthday party. I asked if his parents knew and he

Fell asleep thinking sleepily, undramatically, “I am so happy I should die now.”

Waking up to pop music in Arabic from a stereo in the kitchen, everyone laughing and yelling, fresh cornmeal cakes on the table. Breakfast in pajamas.

Reading Abdellah Taïa’s Le rouge de tarbouche, a book of stories from the life of its young author, traveling from Salé, Morocco, the city next to Rabat just across the Bou Regreg River, to Paris. gay. Met him at the salon du livre in Tangier and had him sign my book. He scrawled my name and a short note, signed it, then hesitated and added a sunshine sketch at the top of the page. I found him so delightful I didn’t know what I wanted from him—to be his best friend, girlfriend, mother, lover? When it was his turn to speak at a round table discussion of young Moroccan writers, he spoke slowly, faintly smiling and said insightful things. I craved his lack of pushiness, his steady lucidity. Reading his book on the train home to Rabat last night I shivered, the skin on my back and scalp suddenly chilly. I put the book away and looked out the window at the low green hills. A pink-cheeked young woman in hijab, across from me in the compartment, watched me with warm eyes. I think she saw how happy I was and we shared it between us.

Like, I’m gonna barf with happiness.

I described it to Touria yesterday morning in one of her salons: many unexpected and wonderful things happen to me here. She told me again it was a pleasure to have me and that she was so happy to meet me. I admire her and find her mysterious, shrewd, emotional, commanding. We chatted for a few minutes then said nothing. She got up to attend to something in the kitchen and I curled up in the big leather chair and read my book.

I have had thoughts and feelings that have thrown me. Things I cannot record. Certain grooves, fleeting flashes of understanding. Revelations. I have thought many times in these past weeks, “Yes, this is the feeling you need to guard.”

I threw a surprise birthday party for my friend Laila today, and when she read the card I gave her her eyes welled up and she told everyone she would always remember this day. Adrianna gave me a “10” for food presentation. I arranged a fruit salad—plum slices surrounding an apple-slice-well filled with oranges and strawberries, with hidden bananas on the bottom—an herb and cheese spread on crisp “toast” crackers garnished with tomato slices; and mini crêpe rolls with Nutella, arranged in a small pink bowl. Chris and Alex brought a mocha cake with one crisp layer from our favorite bakery, Majestic. The 12 or so of us grazed on all of the food and chattered happily in the salon, kitchen and terrace, enjoying the sun.

What I gather is Arab sentimentalism, romance, love talk. Touria’s daughter Ghita copy-and-pasting a lovey song in English to a male friend. I asked her twice if he was “un ami, simple” and she said of course he was. Just a close friend.

I’m finding everything I can to keep from working on my Fulbright presentation: making a poor man’s mocha, crunching on wheat crackers, remembering a deliriously happy time this summer: at Clara’s parents house with Stacie and her. We watched some bad reality TV (The Bachelorette?), read The New Yorker, and drank in the living room because her parents were away. Clara was cooking some elaborate pork roast. Then, we spread out upstairs on the floor and on Clara’s little bed, laughing insanely then looking at her old books and CDs. We climbed out a window and stood on the roof.

from the H-E-A-R-T, dude

2006-04-13T14:39:02Z

LJ was unavailable in Morocco for the longest time, so I am behind on posting, and so, so, so much has happened. This has been a season of exhilaration. Again and again I have been moved by people’s kindness, hilariously baffled by my odd life here and fucking amazed by what surprises arrive. A few of these funny times, when I have thought, “How did I get here?!”:

---Finding myself in a little room with a dozen women and girls of one family, being force-fed too many sweets aggressive hospitality-style while they plan my engagement to one of their light-skinned sons. They pointed out that his skin was light like mine. They called him up, the fashionable boy with crinkly chin length hair, and he greeted us and didn’t dare look me in the eye.

---Charming three Spanish guys—two young diplomats and an impeccably dapper man in the juice business—first over drinks and chocolate mousse at the Brazilian restaurant in front of Parliament. My game was on! Poise, soft-voice, bold gestures and funny conversation. The juice man knew just how to charm me, asking, “Do you write?” and then, “You look like someone who would write.” We searched futilely for a club that was open despite the holiday, the Prophet’s birthday, then settled for gin-tonics at the elegant apartment of one Spaniard, listening to The Pixies on the terrace, watching the moon and Cathedral.

---Walking in the medina, very late for lunch at a friend’s house, passing the good pirated CD shop, French hip-hop booming, and hesitating then spinning around to pick up the latest Sean Paul. (Have you heard “Temperature” and “Ever Blazin”?! So good!) I chatted about Moroccan hip-hop with the shopguy and left with two CDs—Bigg of Casablanca and H Kayne of Meknès—and a VCD of videos and documentary footage on break dancing etc. I had the shopguy play Bigg for me and in the beginning of one song he shouts “Atiini beat!” (Give me a beat!) in Arabic/English.

---Going to the hammam with my mom, instructing her scrub-lady not to scrub too hard, chillin’ together nearly naked (underwear) for the first time in at least ten years.

The thing now is What do I do re: V. of Spain, V. of mixed messages, of having an on/off Paris girlfriend of four years? We get along smashingly. Yesterday afternoon we sipped mineral water at a garden café, strolled through the medina, took an awesomely cliché beach walk, sat on a rock and watched an old man fish with a plastic bag on a string, and drank a bit of wine in his airy a-p-t. This all made me explain to my good friend Youssef the phrase “to get played.” A la “Me, You and Everyone We Know,” I’m writing FUCK in marker on the windshield.

mumblebee @ 2006-03-25T14:25:00

2006-03-25T13:28:49Z

Livejournal has finally returned to Morocco! For weeks I couldn't get the site.

My parents are here--arrived yesterday afternoon--and we are slowly, slowly exploring. They are very slow walkers. Stuff for the last two months has been staggeringly, wonderfully awesome. I will tell you all about it soon.

business/travel

2006-02-06T15:54:57Z

Over an extended weekend I traveled to lively Marrakech for the second time and seaside Essaouira for the first, both with my friend Kristen. In Marrakech we discovered new street sandwich stands, looked in shops in the classy Guéliz quartier, discovered the bookshop-café-restaurant of our dreams, and made a huge fish tagine for dinner. The bookshop was beautiful, sunlit, furnished with sleek white and eggplant-colored velvet cushioned chairs, filled with smart contemporary books in English. The two French women who run it spoke English well and loved our gasps upon arriving. “That’s exactly the reaction we want!” We had Earl Gray, and salads with chèvre and Moroccan-style sweet, cinnamony cooked onions (My new favorite component of Moroccan food). We stayed for hours and spent a long time debating what to buy. I decided on Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner and a Haruki Murakami reader, saving Milan Kundera for next time.

Pretty Essaouira was more tourist-filled than I had expected. Kristen and I got the best of both sides of it, I think, enjoying the foreign treats and souvenirs, and getting some sense for how locals there really live. As for the foreigner-oriented side we ate large servings of gelato twice, lounged and read at a seaside café, ate extremely fresh fish at an outdoor stand and sipped amaretto in a multi-level club.

And as for the real life, real Essaouira, we ate at the same inexpensive restaurant both nights of our stay (Creamy seven vegetable soup! Chicken tagine with almonds and the onions I love! Fish tagine with dates!), and befriended the women who worked in our hotel. One, our new friend Nadia, took us to her esthetician friend’s house away from the tourist area, where we both got our eyebrows done. She trimmed them with a straight razor and they are the best and sleekest I’ve ever had. The four of us laughed and laughed about a supposedly thinning type of massage (“It hasn’t worked yet for us!” they said, indicating to their round bodies), considered the sexual implications of bikini waxing (“I’ll get everything done before I get married”), and shared tea and sesame cookies in the little, windowless room decorated with torn out magazine pages. Nadia and a teenage girl who’s known for doing make-up well had tea with us at the restaurant the night before we left. Kristen made them laugh by saying “Rhadi nheeya!” the equivalent of “I’m gonna bring it!” Nadia called the waiter over to bring the check, staging a time for Kristen to say it to him. She couldn’t do it at first because she was laughing too hard. She did it on the second try and the waiter loved it. I laughed and smiled so much my face ached.

Kristen and I have hypothesized that there is something inherently pleasing, some sonic secret code, about the music of Sean Paul. Are there hypnotic subliminal messages in the incomprehensible lyrics? All over the world people cannot help but shake it to “Get Busy.”

Taking a bus back to Rabat was interesting too, though longer and more cramped than taking the train. We stopped in a village and ate street food and unusual squishy bread, and stared at unfamiliar flower-covered fields. For hours I did nothing but look out the window.

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

Since returning to Rabat my days have been work-filled. I’m studying Arabic, gathering books and articles I don’t spend enough time reading, and most significantly, I’ve finally lunged into conducting interviews, which I find, as my mom would say, nerve-wracking. As my ever-positive friend Alex reassured me, what I am discovering are the pitfalls of foreign fieldwork: offices are hard to find; people stand you up or behave horribly; conversation veers far from your intentions; your information about the someone’s work or affiliations is often outdated or incorrect; and jumping into anything blind, without a “this person gave me your number” is utterly disastrous. I’ve had a few very good interviews and just as many useless ones. Any allure of importance to sitting at an outdoor café table making appointments is short-lived and misleading. I feel like some yippy little dog eager for a scrap of anything.

For one failed appointment I went to meet someone and he wasn’t there. His secretary suggested I give up on him and gave me the cell phone number of someone she said would be more useful to me. In true over-caffeinated, would-be professional style one morning I stood in front of the raggedy downtown apartment/office building, planner and pen balanced in hand, shouting into my cell phone because reception seems to be worse when you most want to be heard.

« D’accord, rappelez-moi à quatre heure. » (Alright, call me back at four o’clock.)
« Quand? » (When?)
« Quatre heures. » (Four o’clock.)
“QUAND? J’AI PAS ENTENDU » (WHEN? I DIDN’T HEAR.)
« QUATRE ! » (FOUR!)

I swore under my breath, additionally gathering the attention of passers-by (since no one else, especially women, sets up office on the street), packed up my things and walked away more slowly than I’ve walked in a while, dejected with all of the delays and complications. I thought, “Be gentle,” then went home to make lunch.

I’ve been frowning a lot and hustling my rigid body down the street. Is it that this is simply what happens to most urban and professional people—becoming upright, unsmiling, unfazed, a brick, unresponsive to cat calls or pleas for money? It’s not the first time I’ve felt this but I forget from time to time and it hasn’t ceased to alarm me. I’ll do it, I’ll accept it if it’s just a mode, if as soon as I am off the street or have declared the workday over I shed all-business’s grayish skin and appear softer, more rosy-cheeked and revived.

A few afternoons ago, on an appointment-making spree, I called a Rabat publisher I’d barely heard of. The director was out and so a secretary gave me his cell phone number (cool Moroccan cell phone informality). I called him and to my surprise he said, “I’ll be in my office after four, come on in” (but in French). Friendly enough, I figured. So I raced over to a cybercafe, furiously researched him and his maision d’édition, and grande taxied to the other side of town. I announced my arrival then sat on a leather sofa for half-an-hour while an oversized Moroccan man dressed up like an English gentleman, complete with hat, ambled around dinosaur-like between offices. I thought, That must be him. I gestured at his turned back and whisper-asked a man sitting at a desk doing nothing if that was him, the director. He nodded and may have even rolled his eyes a little, smirky.

The 60-some-year-old English gentleman finally glanced in my direction and said simply, “Come on.” He sat behind his desk and said nothing. I cheerily thanked him for meeting with me and went about explaining my affiliations and my work: criticism and reception of francophone Moroccan women’s writing. I explained that because my work concerns not only books but the discourse surrounding books—not only Moroccan literature but Moroccan literary culture—I am interviewing writers, academics and editors. He told me irritatedly though with no particular interest or conviction, “I’m not going to do your work for you,” then had his secretary fetch him their catalog. Wordlessly, he proceeded to pen in an F next to each work written by a woman (femme). Baffled though still cool, I told him I was familiar with their books (which is a lie, but beside the point) and that what he was doing was not quite what I had in mind (I have no idea what I really said). Though I sat ready with my typed interview notes he told me to just give him my interview “so we don’t waste time.” I suggested I email it to him and he said dismissively, infuriatingly, as many Moroccan men do when they aren’t willing to consider what a woman is saying, “Comme vous voulez” (As you want—not even “as you wish”). I thanked him again, inquired about their current projects and even attempted joking a little. He said something vague and ushered me out. Come Monday morning Monsieur will receive the smartest, punchiest questions evs in response to his assholery.

What saved the evening was the search to find the office. At rush-hour dusk I stopped a woman to ask her which of the unmarked streets was Boulevard des Nations Unis. She said she’d take me there, and so we set out along the huge boulevard to find the address. We chatted about what we were doing just then (she was looking for a bookshop) and what we do in general, comme travail (she taught French to elementary school kids). When we thought we were almost there to the office my nice, new lady pal stopped every passerby to ask if they knew where the place was. As we asked one person usually another joined to see if they could help. No one had ever heard of the publishing house, but we found it instantly when I mentioned who runs it. In classical Moroccan style, human relationships were more noteworthy than institutions. “Oh! [so-and-so]! He works over there!” The helpful group of Moroccans who helped white girl find mean man was much comfort, a great journey to a disappointing destination.

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

I’ve been compiling my knowledge of adulthood. At 23 and one twelfth years old, I think that adulthood is, first, being—dealing with being—utterly lone, standing by yourself, singing your own praises. Selling your fine points, “doing your own PR,” as a friend put it. Increasingly believing (understanding?) that you are, in many ways, on your own. And, second, I think that adulthood is finally understanding those deodorant commercials that show someone with a really insane day and say that’s why they need a deodorant that really works. Adulthood is being too busy to have ineffective deodorant. That’s all I’ve got so far.

I’m considering getting a new personality. This one I’ve got is so sensitive! It’s self-conscious and reacts to everything, feeling terribly nervous, embarrassed, slighted all the time. I wish it were fancy-free instead of causing me so often to make worried-face, a deep line appearing between my eyebrows. Of course my ways occasionally do impress me too, for example last night when I heard myself challenging—in recklessly ungrammatical French—a declaredly anti-feminist prose poet I interviewed. I was proud of my scribbling self. I am less proud of the incessant nodding I did, like some corporate yes-man or celebrity personal assistant. C’mon fancy-free self in 2006!

Many other strange things have happened. For example, I went to a free, invitation-only concert that was filmed for 2M, the national TV channel. We had to do multiple takes because the extremely dressed up, be-gowned announcer woman kept messing up. And my friends and I quietly judged the cocky director and his flared girl jeans. The program broadcasted a few days after and I was less than pleased to see multiple shots of my bland outfit and make-up-less face. I had thought the event would be more like a huge crowd concert, not so fancy. My friends and I met a stylish Moroccan brother and sister and plan to get together with them soon.

Also strange—the woman who cleans my apartment once a week, Zora, yelled at me for sleeping in my damp, occasionally lightly flooded room. There’s a problem with rainwater collecting on the balcony, the drain stopping up and it all seeping into my bedroom through some mystery crack in the wall/floor. The rug has been damp for weeks. I talked to my landlord about it and he didn’t seem interested. The thing is that Moroccans think temperature changes, hotness, and coldness make a person sick, e.g. don’t sit too close to a heater, don’t drink water that’s too cold. So, about my room she shouted “It’s all wet! It’s all wet!” and looked completely disgusted with me (I didn’t know the Arabic word for “wet” but gathered that she said it) She asked if I’d been sleeping in there and—standing over me where I was sitting—told me to sleep in the salon. She finished up a few things then left without us exchanging the usual goodbye cheek-kisses.

Meredith and Megan are coming to Morocco a week from Monday. Not to be a hater, but in all of this busyness I haven’t considered the full loveliness of their visit, besides daydreaming about a cross-country, all-inclusive, skyscraper to squat toilet travel route. Realizing they’ll visit soon is a great surprise.

My dad’s funny. Tonight on the phone he told me, “I sent you an article about Can-ye West. I thought you were interested in him. I’ve seen some of his videos. One of them, I think it’s called ‘Golddigger’? I go on Yeah-hoo and get ‘em.”

R.I.P. Gabriel

2006-01-19T11:50:24Z

My family's cat of 13 years, Gabriel, died on Tuesday. My mom called to tell me yesterday afternoon. There was a delay in the connection. She never understands the delay and so she constantly asks me if I can still hear her and if I'm still there. She told me twice that he died and then asked, "Did you hear what I said?" It was awful. I really loved him, and he will be greatly missed.

I may be coming to the mature, dreadful understanding that the world is at once marvelous and cruel. (It is not only my cat dying that tells me)

I have boarded the scholar train for reals--after months of preliminary work toute seule (and some lazing), I have my first interview this afternoon, with a Moroccan writer of some acclaim. I'll have a second interview, with a literature professor, next week. Choo choo!

I like the idea of simultanously getting smarter, wiser, more experienced, and more articulate, and increasingly speaking like a teenager.

I wrote the rest of this a few days ago.

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

I am assimilating! Not only did I eat and like boolfaf (sheep liver wrapped in the lacy fat-layer from around the stomach), I now own a sweatsuit. Under normal circumstances, in the U.S., I would consider the wearing of excessive sweat-garb to be a clear indicator of despair. But here the sweatsuit is beloved. As far as I can tell, everyone owns one and wears it at all times while home and when running quick neighborhood errands. My oversized athletic gray jam is not the prettiest of the bunch but it does help ease the rainy winter cold. I can see my breath in my apartment. Reminds me of last winter in Kalamazoo and my hideous blue “sleeping sweater.”

I hope someone did this on purpose: last week in the medina I saw fake Von Dutch shirts for sale misspelled “Van Douche.”

Oh, and today I saw a minivan with “I LIKE TO MOVE IT” printed along the top of the windshield.

I spent my Saturday trying to make conversation with little boys. I volunteered at a daylong American Women’s Association-sponsored event for orphans, full of musical performances, celebrity appearances, chaos and clowns. Groups of orphaned children from around the country were bused in for the day. In between being impatient though familiar with and unsurprised by Moroccan organizational strategies (ex. 20 or so volunteers serving 300 people lunch from four buffet tables, carrying two plates at a time), I tended to a table of about 12 nine- and ten-year-old, mostly only Arabic-speaking, boys. They shouted their names to me, we played some got-your-hand games, I taught them the word “juice” as I served them and then they yelled it a lot, and we gave each other mischievous looks. I sat next to a small nine-year-old, Abdullah, and we chatted together quietly. He told me conspiratorially that the other boys were crazy. We kept an eye on each other all day, smiling. He sweetly kissed me goodbye on the cheeks and squeaked a little “B’saalama” when he left. And so I am adopting him.

On Sunday my new friend Adrianna and I went to mass. It was, apparently, World Day of the Migrant and Refugee. In the homily of the long service the priest named countries and had their representatives stand, then people shouted out their countries that hadn’t been named. Le Mali! (Many people) La France! (So many people that everyone laughed) Les Philippines! (A handful of people) L’Angola! (One person.) It felt important to hear the priest state the obvious, that we all in the room were foreigners to Morocco and we share that. And if being away from home hurts for me, an American kid with a cushy, temporary setup, I cannot imagine what it must feel like for any of the refugees in the cathedral.

Moroccan guys are after me! What am I doing?! Do I walk around with some look or movement or walk of openness? Something suggestive? Are my pants too tight and jackets too short? I don’t get it.

Living alone is a little too lone lately. Cooking-for-one can seem pathetic, and when I catch myself doing something absurd, like eating Nutella out of the jar or doing jumping jacks in my living room while watching part three of a documentary of the life of Natalie Wood (all three parts have inexplicably been aired on 2M, the Moroccan national TV channel, primetime), it’s not much of a stretch to imagine living my whole lame life in an apartment-for-one. I understand that it’s better to focus on the freedom of this time and the coolness of getting to have my own apartment in Morocco, but sometimes it’s just lonely, dogg, and I’d rather hang out with my parents and read magazines and watch BET in their condo. For life.

Eid Mbark Said! / Love will be the gift you give yourself.

2006-01-12T17:52:14Z

[written Wednesday, January 11, 2006]

***Be forewarned that this post is bloody and not for the faint of heart or weak of stomach***

My second Eid began with knowing goodbye nods to sheep on neighboring rooftops and balconies. I spent my first celebration of this Muslim holiday in Dakar, Senegal the year before last and knew what they would all have in store for them today. Besides all of the bahhhing and bleating, this past week I couldn’t miss seasonal goods and services of the holiday—sheep sold in spaces like Christmas tree lots at home, bales of hay piled into hay forts that shelter its vendors from the wind, huge piles of unsheathed knives for sale, and knife-sharpeners and their spinning wheels.

Yusef, a member of the Moroccan-American Student Association (MASA), invited another American, Matt, and me, to celebrate the holiday with his family. First, the three of us walked to the Hassan tower and mosque, hoping to see people assembled for the biggest prayer of the day. We missed it by minutes but took pictures of each other with the ocean and the tower. Then from the roof of Yusef’s building we watched early neighborhood sheep killings, cringing, looking away, and morbidly anticipating the spectacle of our day, the killing of his family’s own sheep. We visited it in the dark garage below the building, then sat with Yusef’s mother and sister to drink mint tea and eat malawi, a fried bread, drizzled with honey.

This Eid, unlike my last, I took many photographs, beginning with the live sheep with tied feet and ending with Yusef, Matt and me standing by the hanging carcass. Don’t get me wrong—my stomach turned the whole time, I clutched my arms around myself, I covered my mouth, I reached for the arm of a woman maid sharing one-word condolences for the sheep (“mskeen,” the poor thing). At the same time, everyone on the scene grinned nervously, perhaps to see the picture-taking Americans’ reactions as much as to see the killing itself.

Yusef’s father, dressed in white, made the first cut at the sheep’s throat and we observers stepped back to avoid the spurting blood. The animal died quickly, I think, though its body spasmed for a while. Steam poured out of the opened body in the morning chill. Like in the last sheep killings I witnessed, one of the two “freelance butchers,” as Yusef described them, punctured the sheep’s skin soon after its death and blew into the hole to loosen muscle from skin. The sheep body inflated! A sheep balloon! Vying for the position of grossest thing witnessed was the other butcher putting his long, bloody knife in his mouth lengthwise when he needed to use both of his hands. My stomach churning all the while, I was interested in the thin blood, many feet of intestines, the spongy white lungs and the rosy smoothness of the skinned animal.

I couldn’t help but consider the human body. It must look similar to this sheep body, and so I am confused by its killing in relationship to my own tenderness about the human body. I am horrified by violence committed against it. I am not casual about bodies, I have mystified the thing, and so the public destruction of them, any of them, haunts me. Is the answer that all bodies are soft but not all go unharmed? It is beyond dreamy but I wish today’s butchers had been more gentle, bracing the head while slicing the throat instead of letting it swing to the ground.

Half-an-hour later we ate. Yusef’s mother called us to the kitchen where she was preparing the meat on a tabletop grill. We tasted the first crumbly pieces of dark liver and I dreaded the rest of the day’s meals. Soon after, we all sat to eat together. I was surprised to find that bulfaf, a much discussed R’bati specialty, skewered bits of liver wrapped in fat, is not half bad. I ate two brochettes of it, a bit of “Moroccan barbequed” meat and lots of spongy bread. Plus a slice of cake and an orange. Plus, for the sake of hospitality, Yusuf’s father insisted that I drink a glass of Coke in addition to my mineral water. This was an insane amount of meat to eat. The family laughed at each other’s jokes, we talked about our pets—they had a cat named Lolita—and it all made me miss my own family, as I have truly been doing lately, even staring at their faces in pictures.

Yusef and I drove west to Temara for further festivities at the house of Mourad, a friend and Association member. Leaving Rabat we spied the flag of the American Embassy between trees. I stared at it and said it was comforting, a welcome sight, though I’d never felt too sentimental about it. We passed many spreads of burning sheep heads, too, all set to singe off their hair. During the half-hour drive we discussed Moroccan gender relations, theories on cultural identity, and something that could perhaps be boiled down to “Do Arabs in France Deserve Mistreatment, Yes or No?” I argued “No.” At points I considered that we were both summarizing ideas we had read before. And, one funny fact gleaned—Yusef told me that Moroccan weddings are The place for young people to meet each other romance-style. In fact, if someone actually met their significant other in a less socially condoned setting, like online, in a club, or on the street, the default lie would be to say they met at a wedding.

To our surprise we were welcomed not only by Mourad’s sweet family but also by many members of our Association. I was especially happy to see the Moroccan members after my holiday time away. The girls and I all gave each other many extra kisses on the second-kissed cheek. As we chatted Mourad’s mother and sister served us tea, followed by breads and sweets. After a few minutes they brought out many more plates of fancy cookies. Once we were all delirious with sugar and the glee of being together for the holiday, plus gorged from spending the entire day eating, the women brought out a huge pastilla, the wonderful Moroccan savory/sweet chicken, cinnamon and almond flake pastry with powdered sugar on top. Pastilla is my favorite Moroccan dish, and this was the best, most staggering pastilla I have ever had. Between bites C. Rizzi and I exclaimed about how this country is the best country ever: “The food is amazing and all it takes to be a good guest is to never stop eating!” Plus he told a killer Chuck Norris joke: Did you hear about how Chuck Norris went to Mars? That’s why there are no martians.” We ate and ate, tried in vain to come up with some non-dirty American jokes, and then I coaxed Leila to sing. I had heard that she sang at the Christmas party I missed while I was in France and that she had a beautiful voice. In a rich and spanning voice she sang one song each in French, Arabic and English. The skin on my back and my scalp nearly lit with happiness (everything is bodily lately). Then she sang many more songs in Arabic and anyone who could sing along did and everyone clapped in time. I thought of just the phrase for it at the time, something about rousing or warmth or fighting off the winter. It was all wonderful, we all glowed, Mourad’s brother played air violin.

For tonight there are blood spots and poo pellets on apartment building stairs everywhere; most of the country’s on holiday for the rest of the week; I hope to lift myself from my bed on the floor early tomorrow morning to get some work done; it’s cold in here without heat and so I’m wearing many layers and my peach and gold winter hat.

[As for France and Switzerland, how I’ve been describing the two weeks to people here is that it was grand to see my friends, it was very cold, and it was expensive. I have reflections on topics including race relations, dairy products, public displays of affection, fashion, lifestyle and standard of living, transportation, consumer culture, history and tradition, and beer]

this ain't from jail y'all

2005-12-21T18:55:05Z

I write to tell you that I have been eating a lot of cheese in France. In fact, cheese, butter and chocolate are about all I eat here. It is incredible. The weather is cold, and here in the north it gets dark at about four-thirty. Not good! Meredith, Megan, Kendra (Megan's sister) and I have done some, sometimes too much, holiday shopping in Valenciennes and Lille. Visiting crowded chain stores has not been my holiday jam, and it's very different from what people (can) do au Maroc. Other things about France....I'm not used to speaking only French, not mixed with another language; some French people have beautiful style; some French people tuck their pants into their shoes and wear fanny packs; France is expensive!!; I like the northern expression "Behhhhhh Ouihhhh"; seeing my friends is off the chain fantastic with glitter sparkles.

Tomorrow Meredith and I will take the train to Strasbourg to spend a day and night there, then head to Switzerland where we will spend my berfdang (the 23rd) and Christmas with Megan and Kendra's aunt and uncle in Zurich. Yee haw.

Pinecones, tadpoles, beetle shells

2005-12-13T17:03:20Z

[I wrote this yesterday and am thinking about taking back a few things already. For example, contrary to what I wrote there are things I really do not like about Rabat (street harrassment bazef, and not much night life). France tomorrow! France tomorrow! 8 am train to Casablanca, flights to Madrid and then Paris, Métro to Gare du nord, train to Valenciennes, arriving around 9 pm]

My soundtrack for the morning was Joanna Newsom’s “Peach, Plum, Pear” over and over interspersed with Jay-Z songs. Mazian! That song makes me feel funny. The first time I heard it, yesterday morning, it made me crawl under my kitchen table. [That’s not weird, right?]

The Moroccan Arabic words I’ve incorporated into my speech—learn ‘em, love ‘em—are as follows:

mazian: good
maashi: a negation, not
bazef: a lot
schwiya: a little
wakha: okay
yk: right?

While I am berserko-excited about all things France, I’m going to miss Rabat! I love mornings here, greeting people in my neighborhood, dressed business cas’ like I have a purpose, hustling to the bus stop. This morning while I ran get-ready-for-France errands the sky was a clear bright blue. I strode down the city’s main street, near the post office, the train station, Parliament, and no one bothered me. I stopped at every other newsstand to read the headlines, ducked into shops.

I’ve come to love Rabat so much I feel I will tumble backwards screaming, Mary Catherine Gallagher-style. I also feel this way with eagerness to arrive in Lille.

I’ve had MC Gallagher in my head since going to a Moroccan music-meets-jazz concert last night. A guitarist looked just like Molly Shannon, and I kept secretly wishing she would shove her hands into her armpits or fall off the stage. I told the aforementioned French boy, Alex, about this and I’m not sure if he got it. At intermission we stood outside and watched some teenage boys push a car into another car. So, naturally, at the end of the concert I asked, “What do you want to do now? Go push cars with those kids?” He smiled and said, “I am not sure.” I am positive that this is the best way to woo a French boy---telling him things that do not make sense in any language. Marvel at my powerful boy-getting skillz. He may be indifferent toward me, though I am throwing back-flips and retarded somersaults.

This foreign/expatriate life offers many privileges and free drinks!

2005-12-10T16:22:47Z

Because the owner of a club called Le Barrio Latino thinks that my friend Lauren is a Dutch ambassador, I spent Thursday night at an open-bar VIP party. Lauren made dinner reservations there once, weeks ago. The owner must have kept her phone number because since then she calls every week to tell her about their events. When Lauren went to pick up her party invitations she was given an envelope reading “Lauren, l’Ambassade du Pays-Bas +5.” We can’t figure out why on earth this woman thinks Lauren is Dutch or an ambassador. En tout cas, this party was off the fucking grid. Insane. We were ushered in and given drinks right away. The club was packed with Moroccans and foreigners, salsa and dance music boomed. We were served drinks and drinks and drinks, mostly mojitos, at our little table as we met friends of friends and ate Spanish snacks. I worked on wooing a French boy. Then we all danced until one, sloshily, I must say, taking pictures and kissing each other’s cheeks. (How I wish fetes here went into the late night like they do in Dakar. Nothing there gets started until midnight, then it goes until crazy o’clock—four or five)

Then! Yesterday, another open bar! At the Marine House with one of two Fulbright Chrises and Alex. It is an odd place, decorated with American flags and old military propaganda. Everyone there was American, drinking Budweiser, playing pool, eating Bugles and Cheetos. I met a few people, American diplomats and military officers and their families, but was above all interested in the drinks and snacks. Chris and I stopped by McDonald’s on our way home to eat Deluxe Potatoes, seasoned fries. We strolled as we used to together in Fès, talking about what we want to do with our lives and how we think Morocco will change us. I exchanged texts with the French boy, and we have plans to make plans today, though my night may already be full. It’s too bad. I’m invited to a holiday cocktail party at a Fulbright Senior Scholar’s apartment (more free drinks), then dinner at my friend Saleh’s house.

This morning I went to a holiday craft show at the American School (anglophone, American-style elementary through high school, I believe). The admission charge benefited charity, and most of the vendors were participants in rural economic development projects. I bought presents, all of which I love so much I want to keep them for myself.

Maybe I’m giving you all the wrong idea, making you think I don’t do any work here and spend most of my time drinking. I’ll have to write about my work in an upcoming post. I’ll start now by saying that I find doing independent research really hard. I struggle with these projects because I want my research questions to be the most pressing and relevant in the field. I’m studying contemporary, francophone, Moroccan women’s writing, particularly as it concerns linguistic politics of the francophonie. A mouthful. I’ve said, written and read these words so many times they’ve disintegrated into nonsense I half-believe I’ve invented.

Ordinary, street-level things have been going on too, aside from getting generous invitations because I’m American or have some money to spend. I nearly had a laughing fit at the post office; I’ve tried several types of sandwiches sold on my street; my Arabic teacher, Rjaa, and I spent about ten hilarious minutes one morning working on my “Ain”s, the retching sound; I’ve almost made friends with the blind woman who I frequently end up sitting next to on the bus; I killed a bug that turned out to be a bee and almost cried (I have a thing about bees); a new supermarket opened a few blocks from where I live; I discovered an artfully arranged fruit and vegetable stand; I read in bed and on my balcony; I “h’chouma!”-ed (shame on you!) a particularly persistent street harasser for the first time; I exchange daily greetings and what’s up nods with two beggar women; I got some books copied at a tabac with the best selection of magazines I’ve seen in Morocco; and, lastly, I think one of my doormen actually likes me, finally.

On a completely different note, I wish I weren’t missing so much at home. My mom’s enormously, desperately anticipated retirement starts on Friday. I truly wish I could be there to celebrate with her. Second, it seems more and more probable that my parents will move to Tucson by the time I return. Casually, stuck in the middle of an email, my dad mentioned that someone had looked at their condo and liked it a lot. I didn’t know it was even on the market! It’s okay, I don’t plan on living in Michigan again, I’m happy for them to finally get to do what they want, I just....it’s just....sad. I miss familiar streets and want many reasons to see them again.

seriously. +"an underwear dreamcatcher"

2005-12-08T16:12:14Z

I wrote this all two nights ago and already it seems out of date. The next big thing, that I somehow forgot to mention below is that I'm going to France in a few days! I'll fly into Paris on Wednesday the 14th, with a little layover in Madrid. Then I'll figure out how to take a train to Lille, where Meredith and Megan will meet me! I am so freakin' excited I feel like I may vom when it actually happens. Or cry? Or some version of "the happy/sad sweat-and-cry" I demonstrated at the Rocket Star once (this one won't have any sad though)? I have no idea what will happen as far as my bodily reaction to extreme happiness goes.

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I’m consistently conflicted here about my lifestyle and expenditures. I have more money than many Moroccans. My apartment is comfortable and I indulge myself with the same things I do at home: picky groceries, nice meals out, clothing, and little new things at every turn (notebooks, make-up, magazines). I don’t think I’m getting away with anything here and living imperialist-lavishly in a developing country. Except, maybe, for having a stupid-expensive lunch at the Hilton once. I’m making more money than I ever have before and spending, for most things, about what I would in the U.S. Except, I could live much more cheaply here and most people do, and continuing to think in dollars is unwise. On the other hand, in support of my oh-so-icy ways, my semi-spendy lifestyle supports local economies. And I try not to be an asshole about my privileges or flaunt them. But, instinct tells me that I am doing something wrong; I got embarrassed today walking home with my upscale shopping bag, having bought a sweater from a shop on the rallee bazef (really expensive) side of town. I felt ashamed having bought something frivolous that cost as much as someone’s daily wage, even though it was only twenty bucks for me.

Following up on questions in my last post about why Moroccans are “association-crazy,” I half-figured it out and it’s so embarrassingly obvious: they have to declare their affiliations because they don’t have the right to freedom of assembly. A few students in our to-be-official Moroccan-American Student Association (MASA) mentioned that if we don’t get governmental clearance soon they “could get in trouble.”

Another kind of rights that don’t exist in the same way as they do chez nous are intellectual property rights. Pirated CDs and DVDs are widely, cheaply available. Copy shops reproduce and spiral-bind entire books without any problem. Being able to have cheaper copies of books is great for students and scholars who can’t buy them new, especially considering that libraries aren’t always good resources (Many are poorly stocked, organized and managed). However, illegally produced media means that local musicians, filmmakers and writers cannot depend on the sales of their work to bring them much income.

--------this line separates serious from not, though you know it’s all the same dogg--------

My hair is boy-short again. This hot French woman cut it. I sat in the chair thinking of how to describe how she looked, and it is “hot.” She had dark hair with bangs, a sharp nose, slim black clothing and a steady gaze. Plus, I like that she told me my accent in French didn’t sound American. “Si!,” I insisted, and she said it wasn’t one you would immediately recognize as American.

Like with Wolof in Senegal, whenever I try to speak straight French here it comes out full of Moroccan Arabic eyah’s (yes’s) and wahha’s (okay’s).

“Tu ne crois pas que tu es belle” (You don’t believe that you are beautiful). The aforementioned Moroccan said this to me last week and it has rung in my head since then. It rattles. When he said it I protested, stammering. He repeated it and told me it was la dernière fois he would say it. The point for him was to tell me I am belle, but it backfired and made me self-conscious about whether I look self-conscious. And, P.S. on the geek tip, isn’t/why isn’t that bad grammar? A verb following croire que takes the subjunctive, n’est-ce pas?

The sweater I bought, the one I felt guilty about, is not like anything I thought I would wear, but I like it. It’s a dusky purple with a herringbone texture on the front panel and a huge cowl neck that swims around my throat.

One song I play in my head to help me front city-tough is DMX’s “Get it on the Floor.” I also think, “You go extreme when you get with me / do you know what I mean?” from Peaches’, “Bag It.”

I like the Common line, “I went from bashful to asshole to international.” From “Nag Champa (Afrodisiac for the World).” It’s how I’ve gone, too, yk (right)?

On my way to the salon I had a conversation with a cab driver that was so good it made me giggly with joyfulness at the cool random encounter. We just talked about literature and language and whether there’s such thing as an ex-colony, or if they’re all still (neo)colonies. He voted no, there’s no such thing, and I did not decide. I floated my way into the salon and had to hold my happy laughter upon getting my head massaged and then wrapped in a special head-shaped towel. Thank the Lord that today was not a quietly miserable “Pray for me Grandma” day (Heavyweights quote what!).

My friend Alex remarked that my circular, hanging laundry rack plus underpantalones (fake Spanish) looks like “an underwear dreamcatcher.”

My sister Erica called me last night to ask me if I like birds. It has something to do with a present she’s getting me. I said plainly, “Yes. I do. (pause) Do you?” and we laughed.

the longest, rambliest thing yet

2005-11-30T18:50:36Z

First, let me tell you that one of my dreams is to discover a wireless cybercafé in my neighborhood. I would save weblog pages, the news and your postings to my laptop, then read them at night in bed so I don’t miss you too much. Because I do. I’m feeling disconnected from you and our country, having not checked my email or read a newspaper in many days.

Two thoughts about furniture: First, as I rearranged my apartment a few days ago, lifting the huge red and gold foam couches, ponges, I declared to myself, “This is the largest surface area I have ever picked up.” Second, is it childish to like to sleep in a bed pushed into a corner instead of with just the head against the wall? As I moved my bed I thought, “This is not a very adult thing to do.”

One thing I’ve learned in Morocco is that after a few weeks without bathmats you don’t miss them.

I spent the weekend before last in Tangier with my sweet new friend Alex. We first entertained the idea of a weekend trip on Wednesday and left on Friday afternoon. Alex booked us a hotel room, and we took a five-hour $12 train ride. Simple as that. At the hotel, after mentioning we were considering staying another night we were upgraded from a drab room with no view to “our honeymoon suite,” outfitted in dark wood and blood-colored velvet. We treated our tired selves to a Spanish dinner. I ordered grilled shrimp and received a plate full of the best salty shrimp of my life. Which would have been great had I not received just a plate full of them. Alex kindly shared her side dishes, and I went about the clumsy work of beheading my food in the classy restaurant. Aside from the hotel, aside from this dinner, we visited a poorly maintained Musée D’Art Contemporain, talking about the art (“I like this color,” “Nice swooshes”) and noticing the stained carpet and mildew spots on some framed paintings. We were happy to see even the mess of the museum; we had spent a good part of the morning following made-up directions people gave us to it. A trend here is that if someone doesn’t know where what you’re looking for really is, they’ll just make something up. When we got there the guard flicked on the light switches in the deserted galleries for us, the only visitors. At l’Institut Français of Tangier we saw more paintings and sculptures. And we ate good falafel, visited a nice bookstore and saw possibly the most attractive, bookish, Mediterranean-looking guy either of us had ever seen. The best part, the most memorable part of the weekend for me though was visiting the seedy hotel bar where Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, Paul Bowles, and company hung out in the ‘60s. The low-ceilinged basement bar nearly rotted with cigarette smoke. A few red-shaded lamps lit photographs with Ginsberg’s handwritten captions. And a terrifying picture of Burroughs hung near the entrance! I took many pictures and kindly thanked the owner’s wife who opened the door in her bathrobe to show us the place. Then, wee scoured the médina for a certain perfume oil, Aoud. I bought a green rhinestoned fake wedding ring and fake Lacoste socks, and ate a forty cent goat cheese and hard boiled egg sandwich on the bus back to Rabat.

I’m part of a new, about-to-be Université Mohammed V recognized Moroccan-American student association. About six Moroccans and six Americans get together once every two weeks to talk culture. Last week we talked about stereotypes. One guy, who savvily peppers his English with “like,” threw in a few fake stereotypes of Moroccans about Americans, e.g. “They only brush their teeth, like, once a week!” The American reactions were, “Yeah we do! Do people really say that?!” I don’t quite understand why the Moroccans care so much about making our group official. They’re association crazy. Is it because they haven’t had the right to form them for very long, so they’re still novel? Or because nongovernmental projects can be executed more quickly, bureaucracy-free?

I thought with lucidity at some point this week, “I am going to live in New York next year.” I wonder if that’s true?

Thanksgiving was cool. I tried my hand at sauces and brought green beans with an orange cream sauce and cashews to a mostly Fulbrighter feast.

I spent a part of last weekend in Fès for a conference: The Uses of Technology to Fight Violence against Women. A friend wrangled us invitations to the small event. A Westpoint graduate Fulbrighter friend drove us to Fès in his new car, which he calls “the biggest car I have ever seen.” Before leaving we rode with seven people, comfortably. Laura and I asked David questions about the U.S. military for the entire three hour drive. We had him teach us the hierarchy of officers and recited them forwards and backwards, making him quiz us. I craned my neck to watch the heavy wash of stars out the backseat window, and listened to “Nude as the News” exactly one time before rejoining conversation.

The conference was interesting, though it was really about empowering women who have suffered male violence. A London-based non-profit called SafetyNET discussed their efforts to provide rural women with access to and education about the Internet. They create woman-friendly cybercafés and host chat rooms in which women can speak with attorneys, counselors and other domestic violence survivors. I enjoyed getting a richer sense of how violence against women is talked about here. It doesn’t differ much from that in the U.S. in that it focuses on empowering women to change their lives, rather than focusing on reconstructing masculinity or being radical and talking about why violence “happens” in the first place. At any rate, scholars and PhD students from a variety of disciplines attended and I made a few interesting, even promising, contacts, getting a few emails and cell phone numbers. (Things work differently here. It’s not too unusual for a well-known professor or NGO director to give a lowly researcher her phone number.) And a last thing about the conference: it was long. It was supposed to start at eight-thirty, really started at ten, included presentations, discussions, lunch, dinner, music, art, and a fashion show. When Laura and I left at eleven p.m. it was still going on. These people conference hard.

In Fès we stayed at our friends’ house in the médina. They live on the first floor of a traditional-style house with an open-grated roof about four stories high above their central courtyard. The ceiling in the two side rooms is much lower but must go up about two stories. These rooms are impossible to heat and it rained while we were there. We were cold and decided to share a bed the second night. Plus, we couldn’t figure out how to get the water heater to work. I washed my hair with boiled water in a huge, tiled sink. Our second night in Fès our friends’ neighbors came over to play a card game called Roonda with us until the early morning. I really love this game! Their tattered deck was bent lengthwise. The decks inexplicably come without 8’s or 9’s. New rules to the game come up as you go along. And best of all, when you play your card it is best to slam it down, shout “Hk!” (Take!), and announce the number of the card proudly.

This Fulbright thing is really very social. I never dreamt I would spend so much time at brunches, housewarming parties, and birthdays. I’m not complaining but I had no idea. Social commitments plus Arabic tutoring plus catching and taking buses takes up a lot of my time.

I attended another Catholic mass here, at a white, historical cathedral a few blocks from my house. The homily for the first day of Advent revolved around “eveillez”-ing oneself for the holiday season. Every other word was “s’eveiller” and “eveillez.” Kristen whispered, “What does that mean?” and I responded that I didn’t know the all-important word either. I looked it up afterward and it means “to awaken oneself.” Does what we did next count as awakening ourselves? Kristen and I had brunch at a downtown, Brazilian place and talked about writers. I had a beautiful quiche lorraine and a salad. For dessert we shared chocolate mousse with a crispy, orange flavored, caramelized sugar cookie in it.

I will be coy about what is up on the romance front because I am private. All I will say is that there is a Moroccan and there is an American. Also, that the Moroccan has called me Princess because “to me Princess is not only here (gestures to face) but here (gestures to heart),” and the American has called me Ma Gazelle in a throaty French accent, imitating so many street harassers, drageurs.

I bought “Athletic Training”-emblazoned sweatpants in the médina because the “Hip Hop Attack” ones were sadly too small.

I relate to a French, dairy-induced coma Meredith described to me. Last night for dinner I made mashed potatoes with crème fraiche, butter and whole milk. Less grossly, I ate bright green beans with fuchsia chopsticks and considered it pretty.

At last, I met one of my neighbors, another woman who lives alone. We chatted in the elevator and she told me to come over anytime, “avec plaisir.”

Arabic is going smashingly. After my lessons I have tea and watch tv with Rjaa, the wife of my husband-wife tutoring team. We watch one of two Moroccan shows, either Shumesha, a well-loved cooking show, or a name-this-song quiz show with a real band and several violins. Many of the songs sound laughably the same to me, beginning with warbling or crooning and lots of “hbibi,” “my darling.”

mumblebee @ 2005-11-12T18:28:00

2005-11-12T18:37:16Z

I vommed yesterday! Twice! For the first time since Sophomore year! I feel better today though still frail, and I have no appetite. That's the only news I have the energy to tell you. Let's see. I'm learning the Arabic alphabet, I really like my tutors, I take the bus now, I feel anxious about ever making money in life, I saw the movie 10 Things I Hate about You and liked it, I made a tasty apple compote, and I'm going to get my ticket to France soon, when I recover. What's up with you all, especially those I haven't heard from in a while?

for chrissake, come to rabat. my photos: flickr.com/people/andrea_in_morocco.

2005-11-01T14:46:06Z

Hey y'all. Haven't had time to post much because I've been settling into my new a-p-t, being slowly poisoned by leaking gas tanks that heat my water, realizing the problem, fixing the problem, making experimental dinners involving things that were in my kitchen when I moved in (thus mango pepper turkey), reading a bit, feeling uncomfortable around my new maid, buying booze during Ramadan, and throwing a Halloween/Housewarming party that involved Trina and Sean Paul. Love to you, sweet babies.

need a place to stay in rabat? $700 to casablanca from detroit; $500 from new york; $200 from paris

2005-10-21T11:37:26Z

Good news---after much fun, theatrical haggling, I got my apartment for my price. I met with my landlord yesterday afternoon, grilled him about the place and wouldn't budge on my price. He said he'd have to talk with his wife and get back to me. A few hours later he texted me with just "Ok." I called him and he said he'll be back in town on Tuesday to write a contract with me. That's the only bad part, that I'll be sleeping on friends' couches until then.