Work

For the past two months, the majority of the work I’ve done has been organizing a training that will (hopefully) happen in September or October. I’ve got to get much of the work done now, ahead of time, because the grant that I will write for the project will take a while to process. Also, Ramadan is starting on August 22nd and I can’t count on being able to do any work during that month.

Last year three other volunteers and I held a Traditional Birthing Attendant (TBA) workshop. One of the other volunteers took the lead in organizing the training so I was just helping out. But that volunteer is gone, so organizing the training falls on me this year.

The focus of last year’s training was home birthing. But it became apparent as we were planning the training that there is only so much you can teach women during a three-day training. After the training we encountered another problem: just because we had trained these women didn’t mean that everyone in the village then sought them out to help with births.

These two lessons mean that the focus of this year’s training will be slightly different. Maternal and infant health is still the main community health priority so the same basic issues will be heart of the training. In addition to issues directly related to pregnancy and birthing, we will be talking about basic health issues in the home: hygiene, infant diarrhea (which killed two infants about a month ago in my village), and basic first aid. The other important change in the training will be empowering the trainees to spread what they learn during the training to their communities when they return. We will have them role-play scenarios in their communities where they can talk about the lessons of the training. We will also involve other community leaders in the training to assist in this dissemination of information. In terms of preventing maternal and infant mortality during childbirth, it’s easier to affect a change by increasing the number of pre-natal visits to the health clinic than by turning women into certified midwives. The success of the training will be judged by how well the women spread the information in their villages.

I solidified these conclusions in my mind during a meeting with the local doctors who will be running most of the training. We talked about the curriculum and we were in agreement about changing its focus. The new focus of the training means that volunteers will have a greater role in teaching during the training. Last year all the volunteers did was organize things behind the scenes. But this year we will be more involved in the classroom, which means that there will be more preparatory work. The meeting with the doctors was held on Thursday and it involved me running a meeting in French, which is my least favorite foreign language. There is something about the sounds and constructions of French that give my tongue a very difficult time.

Although the meeting in French with the doctors was the most intellectually demanding thing that I’ve done in a while, the other work for this training has been much more physically demanding: recruiting women for the training. The goal is to have two women from each village. Some of the trainees will be returnees from last year’s training and it was easy to recruit them. But the rest are from nearby villages that I am less well connected in. I spent much of my first year here making connections with people in these villages and I am now trying to use these connections.

In a village called L, I am friends with an association president and the moqadem (appointed for life, local Ministry of the Interior figure). I rode my bike 12 kilometers to L one day and told the association president about the project. I asked him to think about what women would be good for the training. I told him I would return in a week and we would go around and talk to the women. I came back in a week and he hadn’t done anything. He called the moqadem to his house and we talked about the project. The moqadem told me that he liked the project, but he had to get permission from the Caid (regional Ministry of Interior figure) before he could do anything: come back the next week. So I came back the following week and the moqadem had two names for me. One was his unmarried, 27 year old daughter (unmarried, kind of young, and well-connected is the ideal candidate). The other was a relative of the association president; she is 59 years old. I don’t like choosing women because they are connected to the people who I know, but I’m dependent on the village leaders that I’m working with to help me find women. Plus, after talking to the women I thought that they would be willing participants in the training.

In a village called T, I am friends with an association president. I walked 10 kilometers to T one day and told the association president about the project. This guy has been asking me for a long time to do a project with him in his village. He gathered another member of his association and they talked about who would be best suited for the project. They called a woman over to the house. She was 90 years old. I told them sorry, but she was too old. So they talked about the kind of woman they were looking for and I think they better understood what I wanted. They called another woman over the house and she was a good candidate. Interested, divorced, 35 years old, talkative. We talked with that woman about who else in the village would be good for the training and so we called another woman to the house, who was accompanied by her husband. We talked for a little while and the husband was unsure about letting his wife leave. I told them to think about it and I would return in a week. When I went back a week later, they told me “no.” I was talking with the association president later and it came out that the husband wanted more money (we pay the trainees a small amount for participating in the training). The association presidents couldn’t think of any more women. They had already found three and T is a very small community, so I told them that the one woman going would be enough.

In a village called T2 (28 km away), I am friends with an association president, who lives in Tounfite (market town). Last year a woman (president’s aunt) came to the training. I asked the president if his aunt would want to go again. He said yes. I told him that there was a spot for another woman and he told me that he could find another good candidate. I trust this guy enough to do the work on his own.

In a village called B, I am friends with a random guy. I rode my bike to the village and told him about the project. I told him to think about it and I would come back in a week. I came back in a week and he hadn’t done anything. He saw a woman working in a nearby field and said, “let’s go talk to her.” Not a good start. We talked to the woman for a while and she was sort of interested. Her young granddaughters were with her and they were trying to persuade her to go. They understood the idea behind the project. The woman told me she had to talk to her husband about it. I told her I would come back in a week. When I came back the next week I found the woman working in the same field. She told me she had not asked her husband. So I went to the woman’s house and talked to the husband about it. Luckily he thought the project was good, but he told me that his wife was the only woman in the household and he could not have her absent for the training. But he like the project so he went with me to the house of the moqadem and we talked about the project some. The moqadem told me he could help me, but that he needed permission from the sheikh or khaliph (Ministry of Interior figures in-between moqadem and caid) first. He told me to have the sheikh or khaliph call him. So I left and found the sheikh a couple days later. The sheikh already new about the project so he was happy to call the moqadem. I went back to B a week later and talked more to the moqadem. He told me that he would have a meeting with the men in the village on Friday morning and I should come Friday afternoon to find out what everyone had decided. When I came back Friday afternoon, nothing had been done, but everyone in the village had heard about the project and had an opinion. The moqadem gathered a few influential men and they made a list of women who they thought would be good. After the meeting, I went with the moqadem to these women’s houses and talked to them about the project. Two were interested, so I signed them up.

There are three other villages that I have recruited from (in addition to the two with women returning from last year). Another memorable recruiting trip involved the diarrhea episode explained in a previous post. That’s the bulk of my work these days. I’m glad to be finished with recruiting because it is exhausting. It’s also frustrating at times when people tell me they will do something and don’t do it. But it’s also quite rewarding because I get positive reactions from the people that I’m working with. People tell me, “Your words are good.” I’ve gotten to know many more people in the course of this work, so that’s nice as well.

One last thing: I like this project a lot because I think it is the most purely “Peace Corps” project that I can think of. I’m working with different community partners (local women, local community leaders, Ministry of Health employees) to address primary health concerns by empowering local women to become community health leaders. I am able to do this project because of the relationships that I have built up and because my language is good enough. And I am able to determine the curriculum for the training because I’ve been here for a year learning about the health concerns of the community.

Update

This past week I’ve been helping my family with their harvest. It’s long, slow, hot work. Barley and wheat are harvested with hand and sickle. I am careful to stretch before and afterwards to prevent my back from getting to tight. Lots of people here have back problems and I’d love to teach people about stretching. The harvest work done here is very marginal. Lots of work done for little reward. A wheat field must be fertilized (which involves transporting mule loads of manure from barn to field), irrigated (using irrigation canals), plowed (two mules and a wooden plow), irrigated again, and then harvested. Once harvested, the work is not finished. Then wheat is threshed; some people use machines and others use a more old-fashioned technique. The wheat is spread out on a flat surface with a pole in the middle. Four mules are attached to the pole and made to walk around in circles on the wheat, breaking off the wheat form the stalk. Then the stamped on wheat is gathered in a pile. On a windy day, people throw the broken up wheat into the air, which slowly separates the useful wheat from the less valuable hay because the wheat is heavier than the hay. Then useless chunks are sifted and separated out by hand. Then, finally, the wheat is taken to a nearby mill and ground. (Then you can make bread, by hand). Like I said, it’s a lot of work for a final product that has low value (although critical to life here). My host family’s product is even more marginal because they have to pay people to help along the way (my host dad is too old to do much of the work). They told me that they spent 650 Dhs (about $90) for last year’s wheat crop. I asked how much it would have cost them just to buy the ground wheat at market: 900 Dhs. So they’re breaking their backs over 250 Dhs ($34). Furthermore, my family has to support a mule in order to make all of this work possible, so that’s an added cost to the price tag of the wheat. Fortunately, my host dad has a pension from previous work that allows them to get by. I wonder if they think about ditching this farm work and living off the pension, but I doubt they would do that. I think that its important for their status in the community to maintain their fields, although it’s countless hours of work to save a couple dollars.

The other news is the my host dad’s sister died. I went to the “wake” and there are a couple of stories from that. People are pretty subdued. Tea and couscous are served, like any other gathering. The fkeih (religious leader) does some readings from the Koran. At one point during the wake, with everyone in the room listening, someone asked me what we say to the family of the deceased in America. I told him we express our condolences and that we say that the deceased is with God. I said that we tell the family that the deceased will not be forgotten. He said, “In Morocco, it’s important to forget the deceased. We say ‘goodbye,’ we forget them, and we don’t talk about them again.” So that was interesting. My host dad was feeling sick during the entire wake and I knew he was looking forward to it ending so he could get home. We had about a 20-minute walk home, so everyone at the host’s house offered for us to sleep there (it was late when the wake finished). He said no and we started walking. As soon as we were out of the village my host dad walked to the side of the road, dropped his drawers, and took a dump. I bring up this story to reinforce what I said in a previous post about the taboo against talking about the bathroom. My 73-year-old host dad held his bowels for several hours in the house of his sister and family rather than ask to use the bathroom. Then took a crap on the side of the road. Unbelievable.

God Phrases

God phrases are a critical part of speaking Tamazight. I know a good deal, but this is far from an exhaustive list. Most of the phrases are actually Arabic, but some of them have a Tamazight twist to them, as noted.

Humdulillah – Arabic. Thanks to God. Said when exchanging greetings with someone, when finishing a meal, any time something good has happened.
Hmmdrbbi n krats – Tamazight version.

Llayster- (a-lik) – Arabic. God protect (you). A nice thing to say to someone, especially if you are parting company from them. Also said when talking about something bad like disease or an accident. For example, “I went to the mall the other day and I saw a terrible car accident on the way, llay-ster.
Addi rbbister. Or Ad grifk I-ster rbbi. Tamazight version.

Llay-haf-tik – Arabic. God bless you. A nice thing to say to someone, especially if they have done a favor for you.

Llay-awn - Arabic. God help you. Equivalent to saying good bye.
Ak iawn rbbi – Tamazight.

Bismillah – Arabic. In the name of God. Said before starting meals. Also appropriate to say before starting journeys, meetings, etc.

Tbarkallah-a-lik – Arabic. God bless you. Said as a way of congratulating someone for a job well done.

Llaybark-fik – Arabic. God bless you. Response to above.

Inchallah – Arabic. God willing. Said any time you’re talking about future actions.

Annay ktab – Tamazight. Whatever’s written [by God]. It signifies that the author believes things are out of his/her control. For example, “When will you get married, Duncan?” Response: “Annay ktab.”

Addi rbbi lxeir – Tamazight. God will bring the good. Appropriate at almost any time, especially as a conversation filler. For example, “Duncan, what are you thinking about?” Response: “Addi rbbi lxeir.”

Rbbi salaama – Arabic. God brings peace. Said when talking about a dangerous situation.

Amen- Arabic. Belief. An appropriate response to many different God phrases.

Bsaha – Arabic. With health. Said after someone gets a haircut or buys something.

Llay-tik-saha. Arabic. God gives you health. Response to above.

Llay-sha-fee – Arabic. May God heal you. Said when someone is sick.
Ad iafu rbbi – Tamazight. God will help you.

Llay-a-tik-sim – Arabic. God give you poison. A curse.

Llay-sa-hel – Arabic. God make it easy for you. Said to beggars to let them know you won’t be giving them money.

Llay-xalf – Arabic. God replenish. Said to a host when the meal is finished.
Llay-jal-baraka – Tamazight.

Llay-rhm-lwalidin – Arabic. God bless you parents.

Adi rbbi lman – Tamazight. God will bring peace. Talking about the future, especially before a journey.

There are many more. Also people just throw God into random sentences. "God made it rain a bunch today" is a common one.

Update

I just got back from Rabat where two other volunteers and I had a preparatory meeting for our meeting with the hammam owners later this month. I think we are well prepared. We got into Rabat early the day before so after found our hotel we took a bus out to the beach. It was really nice. It also felt like a different world than my community with everyone in bathing suits.

I have been helping this girl from my village study English. She is the only one from my village who has made it to high school and she “specializes” in English, so I’m helping her. The other day she asked me if I would “be her friend, like her brother.” It was really cute.

There have been two weddings in my community recently. When there is a marriage, the wife comes from whatever village she lived in to move in with her husband’s family. One of the brides is from the same city in the South as my host mom. The other night my family invited the two newlywed couples over for dinner. The weird thing about the dinner was that the guests ate dinner separately from my family, although I ate with the guests. The most remarkable part about the dinner was the interaction between the couples. There was actual physical affection between bride and groom. They had their hands on each other’s legs. They laughed and joked with each other. Until this point, I had never seen affection between husband and wife before, so it was really good to see.

Bureaucracy

Reading about development in books, a common theme to explain some countries lack of progress is poor governance, corruption, and general bureaucratic inertia. Experiencing those things first hand has made them much more real. I’ve already written about corruption and political troubles, so I’ll stick to simple bureaucratic headaches this time. I’m sure that these frustrations exist in other countries, but Morocco is the first country that I have tried to do this kind of work so it’s all that I know.

I was inspired to write this post by a conversation that I had with the doctor at my health clinic the other day. She was complaining about bureaucratic hoops and obstacles and how they hindered her work; I was glad to know that Moroccans weren’t happy with the status quo either. I told her that Ministry obstacles have slowed my work at every step. Every project, anything I have done here has been made more difficult by needless technicalities.

The project that has best exemplified these frustrations is the hammam project. Quick summary: in order to reduce wood consumption demand, another volunteer and I are trying to convince hammam owners to convert their water heating systems to a more efficient stove with the help of a branch of the Ministry of Energy. Before the project could get started, a “national convention” had to be written up that formalized Peace Corps’ relationship with the Ministry. At first I was kind of excited by the whole deal, but it turned into a timewaster that was just a formality. Once that was done, we could move onto formal meetings with the Ministry. After the meetings, communication with the representative at the Ministry has been frustratingly difficult. We’re doing work in our province to prepare for a meeting that the representative will lead. It’s impossible for us to communicate quickly with the Ministry. We have to go through our Peace Corps staff representative, who sends a message to the Ministry, who has to get permission from higher up to release the requested information. It takes a long time, if it happens at all. For example, we requested the address of a hammam that had made the conversion in a nearby city (Ifrane) 3 weeks ago and still have not gotten an answer – I do not expect one. Another frustration came when the Ministry rescheduled the meeting that we had been planning for a month from July 7th to July 29th – after we had told the hammam owners to expect the meeting on the 7th. Finally, the Ministry has asked us to do a survey of rural wood use (repeat: they asked us). We have been trying to figure out their goals for the survey and what information they want us to collect, but it’s impossible to get an answer. If it’s to be done correctly, the survey requires information collected from all times of year; we need to start collecting data before the summer ends if we want to finish the survey before we leave Morocco. I don’t expect them to get the information to us.

Almost two months ago, another volunteer and I wrote up a proposal to the Ministry of Health for them to send doctors to Boumia to do pelvic exams on sex workers there. When the doctors came, they did not do exams, but just interviews, which was nearly useless. Their excuse was that there were too many women – not even a good excuse. I went back to the Ministry to see what could be done. They promised me that if there was a small group of women, they would come back and do the exams – but I had to write up another formal proposal. So I wrote it up and went to seek authorization. I was then informed that the delegue (head health official for the province) was on vacation for the rest of the month (July) and that I could not get permission until he came back. He had already given approval to an identical proposal that was simply not followed through on.

Several months ago, two other volunteers and I wrote up a STI HIV/AIDS curriculum that we wanted to teach in local high schools. We got permission from the Ministry of the Interior and needed permission from the Ministry of Education. I went to the Ministry of Health and asked our representative there what to do. He told me that he would take care of it. We waited at least a month and no response. I went back and asked him what the deal was. The rep told me that he had dropped off the proposal and was waiting for a response. He said it wouldn’t be more than a week. That was in April. No response.

For my water project in a nearby community, I was hassled by the person (call him Mohamed) I was working with to hurry up and get my grant approved. Well Peace Corps sped the grant through and it was approved in April. I went off with Mohamed to get the project started before I went to America in May. We went to the bank in a town 3-4 hours away and got the money out and counted it. When we finished counting the money, Mohamed told me that we could not submit the project for auction that day (the main purpose of our trip, or so I thought) because the place was closed for the day. It came out that he knew the place was closed before we left; his purpose for the trip was to accompany me to the bank and see if I had the money or not. Soon after, I left for America. When I got back from America, Mohamed told me that we could not get the project started because of the proximity of the elections. OK. Once the elections were finished, he told me that we could not get the project started because the association that I was working with had to get some of its paperwork in order: two more weeks. Before those two weeks were up, I went out to the community and was talking to the water association president about another project. I brought up our water project and the president said, “Didn’t Mohamed tell you? The project is cancelled.” A couple days later I went to the Commune and asked Mohamed what the deal with the association’s papers was, two weeks had passed. I didn’t mention what the president of the water association had told me. Mohamed said, “It will be another week before the association gets its paperwork in order.” Then I told him what the president had just told me about the project being finished. He said, “Oh, yes, the project will not happen.” How long has this guy (who had once been hurrying me to get the grant money in) known the project was dead and done, but hadn’t told me? For a reason unbeknownst to me, he hid the fact that the project was not viable behind a wall of bureaucratic excuses. How long was he going to continue to hide it?

I don’t mean to make this sound like a laundry list of complaints. I’m trying to illustrate the obstacles hindering progress that are institutionalized by government Ministries. Every volunteer has his/her own list of similar difficulties. Why do we have so many problems? Some of the “delays” are in fact the Ministry indirectly telling us no. For example, I don’t think the Ministry of Health/Education wants us to do STI HIV/AIDS education in local high schools, but rather than telling us “no,” our proposal is lost in a shuffle of papers. Many of our problems are personal rather than institutional. For example, the project with the Ministry of Energy has been met with especially egregious delays. I believe this has a lot to do with the person that we are working with simply not wanting to do work and hiding behind the cover of his Ministry. I think the project with doctors doing exams on sex workers is hindered by the same lack of interest in doing work. Finally, I think volunteers have problems with Ministries because they don’t know the right way to navigate the system. We’re mostly young kids who have no authority or prestige. Just like Moroccans from the communities that we live in, our interests and ideas can be dismissed.

Institutionalized stasis is pernicious because it provides cover for all of the illegitimate obstacles above. Instead of having to admit that they don’t want to do the exams, the doctors can hide behind the monolith that is the Ministry of Health. They know that I have to make a 6 hour trip out to get formal approval and that they can make up an excuse when I do make the trip. Government employees can collect their salaries, shuffle their papers, and go home at the end of the day without having lifted a finger. Even the most honest, hard-working Ministry official is bound by the constraints placed upon him/her.

As a Peace Corps volunteer, I’m supposed to be doing grassroots development. So why am I bothering with government agencies? Even the most “grassroots” actions require the permission of some Ministry. Visiting schools: Ministry of Education. Organizing women for a traditional birthing attendant training: Ministry of Health and Ministry of the Interior. I tried to gather people outside of their homes to talk about dental hygiene, but I needed permission from the Ministry of the Interior first.

I’m not by nature a very angry person, but this kind of thing is getting to me. I cannot get my work done. The bullshit with the water project (that I started working on maybe 9 months ago) is especially frustrating. I have recently been contemplating responding to these obstacles by raising my voice and demanding better treatment. I don’t know what kind of a response that would get; I could either get what I want or be completely shut out.

Like I said, I don’t mean to complain about my situation, but to point out the obstacles to development here. Morocco is moving forward, but problems such as these slow its progress.

Update

Things are good. The recruiting for the TBA training is nearly complete; I will be meeting soon with local doctors to finalize the curriculum for the training. There has been a wedding each of the past two weeks; those are fun.

I was riding my transit to market last week. It was early morning and the transit was crowded. Halfway to market, the transit stopped to pick up a guy along the side of the road. He had two sheep and instead of putting them on top of the transit as per usual, they got inside with us. I was thinking about going on top of the transit myself: the transit was uncomfortable and now I was worried about these sheep shitting on me. Just as I was pondering this option, one of the sheep lifted its head up and sneezed all over my pants. A large amount of snot was concentrated in the area near my right knee. The owner of the sheep grabbed the other sheep’s tail and used it to wipe the snot from my pants. This was the day after I had crapped my pants.

Several weeks ago, Morocco moved its clocks forward an hour – daylight savings time. From my experience with DST last year, I knew that my life would be easier if I didn’t change my clocks; no one in my community observes the time change. However, when I leave my community and go to a bigger town, the time moves forward an hour. Morocco has urban/rural time zones for the summer until the rest of the country changes its clocks back.

A family that I’m good friends with in my community recently bought a sofa for their living room. They are quite proud of it; most people here just sit/lay on the floor. I went to their house one day and the sofa was the most uncomfortable, hardest thing I’d ever sat on. The floor is much better. The next time I was at their house, the sofa was not to be seen. I asked them what was up and they said, “We like the floor better. We’re not used to the sofa.”

Three conversations on religion. First, I was off in another village, recruiting for the midwife training and getting a typical conversion speech from someone. They weren’t pushing me too hard. They asked if people in my community tried to get me to convert and I told them yes. They said that these people are my friends – they want me to convert because they like me and they don’t want my soul to go to hell. Second, I was helping a local girl with English (the one girl from our village that I know of who will go to University) and we were talking about religion. She asked me what religion I thought was true and I told her I thought they were all equal. She told me: no, the prophet Mohamed was the only real way to God and that other religions were inferior. I was disappointed; I was expecting higher levels of tolerance from her because she was educated. Third, I was talking to a friend about life in general. He said, if everyone takes Mohamed’s road and follows it carefully, life is boring (the word he used literally means bland). He said life is better if people take different roads, enjoy their lives, and share their experiences.

This morning I woke up at 6 am. I was out the door by 645. I was on the top of a 10000 foot mountain by 10 am. How awesome is that? I met some sheepherders from my village near the peak, hung out with them til 1230, had lunch, then hiked down the other side of the mountain in order to get to my market town.

Collection of Random Stories

First, thanks to Yasfari for your comment. My few trips to some cities (Meknes and Fes are my favorites so far) confirm what you said: the difference between urban and rural folk is great. I couldn't think of a theme for the post, so I just started writing down random things that happened to me the past week.

I was Khenifra early this week for a Ministry of Health meeting. I finished with my meeting and went to the bus station/taxi stand to find transit back to my site. It was about 9:30 or 10 am in the morning. In the bus station there are always lots of guys standing around who work for the bus companies. I asked one of them if there was a bus to Boumia, which is the hub I have to go to get to my site. He said the bus left at noon. So I walked over to the taxi stand. Although taxis are just big Mercedes that would normally only fit 5 people, they take 6 passengers, plus the driver in Morocco. The taxi will not leave until there are 6 paying passengers. So I asked if there was a taxi for Boumia, I was told that yes there was and that I was the third person to ask about it. Not bad, I hoped to be leaving within a half an hour. But waiting and waiting and the number of people kept hovering around three. Sometimes less, sometimes more. And meanwhile it is hot. Khenifra sits in this bowl between some big mountains and it gets heated. Some people would get impatient waiting for the taxi to fill and leave. Around 11:30 the taxi got up to 5 people, but then 2 walked over to the bus station to take the noon bus (about two dollars cheaper). Five minutes to noon, I gave up too and walked to the bus. There was one seat left, which I took. But then this guy came up to me and said that he had saved the seat and everyone around him was in agreement (Stealing a saved seat is a crime worthy of death here). Shit. So I asked the bus driver if I could stand – sometimes buses will let people stand and other times they will get kicked off the bus. I had a moment of panic when I thought about walking back to the taxi stand and waiting for the unfillable taxi to fill. But then the guy actually found me a stool to sit on and he shoved it in the aisle in the back row. I sat on the stool, pressed between two sweaty, hot men (very sweaty myself) and was grateful. Luckily, hot transits normally cause me to fall asleep, which I did while leaning on my neighbor. Two and a half hours later, we roll into Boumia.

A guy playing a guitar/banjo and walking alongside a donkey comes into my town the other day. The donkey is loaded down with lots of sacks. I am standing next to one of my friends and I ask him what this banjo-donkey guy is doing. My friend says that they guy goes around from house to house with his banjo, playing and begging for wheat. There is a pause in the conversation. Then my friend says: “The guy is an idiot. We’re harvesting wheat in two weeks. He won’t get anything now. If he waited two weeks everyone would have wheat to give him.”

A girl that I went to middle school with is in Peace Corps Morocco. It’s been at least ten years since I’ve seen her. Her site in Morocco is on the other side of the country. We happened to be in the same city last week so we met up and hung out for a while. It’s a small crazy world.

There was a wedding this past week that was a little different from other weddings I’ve been to. The family is a little wealthier than most due to some of the sons working in the army. They hired some musicians to come play, which was cool. The boys/men in the family were all drinking in public, which was weird, to say the least. People are sometimes drunk at weddings here, but I’ve never seen someone walking around with a bottle of vodka in their pocket. Finally, a girl (20 years old?) from another village was there who had different ideas about what was socially acceptable. She danced much more provocatively than other girls. She took off her headscarf and swung her head around quickly, with her hair flying all around. It’s the kind of thing that I’ve only seen on TV Berber weddings. Everyone in the village was talking shit about her the next day.

I’ve recently had two more religion conversations that were more interesting and in depth than the normal “convert” conversations. One was with a nurse in a nearby douar. We were speaking in French, which allowed us to have a bit more nuanced of a conversation. He quoted the Karl Marx “Religion is the opiate of the people” line to me as an example of Western hedonism. He is going through a tough time in the village (lonely, lack of support from the Ministry) and he says that prayer and God helps him get through the difficult times. I pointed out to him how similar what he was telling me was to the Karl Marx line, and he agreed. The other conversation was with this guy from out of town who is from a very religious family. This guy takes his prayers very seriously. He is intense. Unfortunately his Tamazight is not great, so he slips into Arabic a lot. He read the Koran for me and explained parts of it to me. Other than these two men’s devotion to God, the common theme of the conversations was that they both were explaining the wonderfulness of Islam to me. The implication (sometimes more explicit than implied) as they are exalting praise on Islam is that I would be foolish not to convert.

Two of my host mom’s sisters are visiting. They will stay at my host family’s house for a couple of weeks. They are both quiet, but smart and educated. It’s clear that they have more money than other people in our village. The story of my host mom is a mystery to me; everyone in her family is well-educated and living fairly comfortable lives in a city. Her youngest sister is fluent in English and starting her doctorate studies this fall. Somehow my host mom got married to a man 34 years her senior in a poor mountain village 300 kilometers away.

The last story requires some explaining before I dive in. The culture of rural Morocco forbids talk of anything related to the toilet. People don’t go to the bathroom at each other’s houses. There is a word “hashek,” that you use whenever you talk about anything dirty as a way of apologizing for the dirty talk. You say hashek if you wash your hands in front of someone, if you talk about a donkey, and especially if you talk about the toilet.

With that explanation as context for the final story, I’ve been feeling kind of sick for the last week. A little diarrhea, but not much. Mostly just uncomfortable stomach cramps and maybe I’m feeling a little tired. My work this week (and for the past month) has been traveling to my outer villages to recruit women for our upcoming traditional birthing attendant (TBA) training. I was scheduled to go out to a very isolated village 18km from mine to recruit on Saturday. Although I was feeling a little sick in the morning, I got on my bike and headed out.

The whole ride I was feeling pretty good. I had a couple of cramps, but nothing bad. I got to the village and to the house of the guy (Mimoon) who was going to help me. He wasn’t there so the family put me in the guest room with the family patriarch. He started giving me the usual quiz on America, inevitably leading to demands for my immediate conversion to Islam. I wasn’t really listening; my stomach had started cramping pretty bad. Mimoon returned to his house and came into talk to me. He told me that he had spoken to a couple women about the training, but that the women wanted to speak to me about it. Good – I wanted to talk to them as well. But Mimoon said that we ought to have lunch first and go talk to the women when we finished. If there is a guest, tea must precede lunch, so we waited for that to be prepared. And my stomach is getting worse and worse. Unlike the cramps that I’d had previously in the week, these feel like they will require a bathroom. Oh no. The tea is made and I sip on it a little bit. I really don’t want to ask about the bathroom; I’m doing a mental risk calculation. If I ask for the bathroom, it’s certainly a little inappropriate and everyone would feel uncomfortable. On the other hand, if I don’t ask, then 90% of the time, no one knows differently. However, 10% of the time I can’t hold it and there is a drastically more embarrassing event. Added to this calculation is the near certainty that this family does not have a bathroom – the village that I’m in is quite poor. A little time passes and it seems more and more likely that I do not have control over my bowels. I decide to embrace my privilege as a Westerner and ask for the bathroom. There isn’t one, of course, but I’m directed to a spot outside. The spot is not very secluded; just on the edge of the village and easily in view of fields and some other houses. (The cultural taboo against speaking about the bathroom and the fact that the lack of toilets turns going to the bathroom into a very public event makes for an interesting combination.) I do my business as quickly as possible and go back inside. We sit around for a little bit, drinking our tea, (no mention of the bathroom is made) and then lunch is brought out. I tell them that I don’t want to eat very much because I’m sick. Unfortunately Morocco has another cultural taboo against guests refusing food. They tell me to eat, eat, eat, eat. I eat as little and as slowly as possible. As they’re telling me to eat more, I’m developing bigger worries. My cramps are pretty bad; should I go back outside? I’m embarrassed to leave in the middle of lunch to go to the bathroom again. Suddenly my choice on the matter is taken away: I crap my pants. Feeling a little diarrhea escape, then realizing that there is nothing I can do to stop myself from emptying my intestines in my pants during lunch is a unique feeling that I have never felt before. There is a sense of resolution to the dilemma about whether or not to go to the bathroom and a resignation to the inevitable humiliation. And a bit of panic. I say, “Excuse me, I’m returning there.” On my way out I grab my backpack and my 1 liter water bottle. Back outside I am feeling at a loss. I take my pants and underwear off and finish my bowel movement. I can see a woman and her child in a field. They probably don’t notice me, but who knows. However, half naked with bigger problems on my hands, I’ve thrown caution to the wind. I’m glad that I’m embarrassing myself in a village that I don’t live in, but at the same time it sucks that this is happening where I don’t know anyone that can help me and is so far from my house (and bathroom). Thankfully Mimoon has always been nice to me. What to do? Can I wash my pants (and myself) with my half-full water bottle? I use most of the water, but it quickly becomes obvious that this will not nearly be enough. The pants are pretty well ruined. Should I put the pants back on and go inside the house to ask for another pair? No, that seems to be a terrible idea. I put the pants back on (sans underwear) and sit the side of the hill to collect my thoughts. I write a text message to a couple of Peace Corps friends telling them what happened and seeing the story in written form lets me laugh at it. I decide to sit on the side of the hill until someone comes looking for me and then ask them to get Mimoon. Well 5 or 10 minutes later (although it feels much longer) a little kid walks behind the house and I tell him to go get his Dad. Mimoon comes walking out. I ask him if he has some pants he can give me. When he comes back with the pants (two pairs, actually. Moroccans I live with almost always wear two pairs of pants regardless of season) I say, “I’m very sorry and thank you.” He says, “It’s no problem. You’re like us. We all have problems with our bodies/health. It’s no problem” A time that could be totally humiliating turns into a recognition of our common humanness. How wonderful. I just wish it didn’t take me crapping my pants for someone to recognize the human need to use the bathroom. He goes back inside. I use the rest of the water and clean myself as best as I can. I put his pants on and my stomach actually feels OK. Hopefully this is my last trip behind the house. Back in the house, Mimoon and Mimoon’s dad are feeling a little uncomfortable, but that doesn’t last long. I no longer feel embarrassed about it and I think that makes it easier for them to relax as well. They have finished eating, but pour me another glass of tea and try to get me to eat some more. Luckily, the whole “crapping my pants” thing makes it easier (although just a little easier) for me to turn down food. I end up with a little piece of bread (which I kind of want to eat) and a glass of tea (which I don’t want to drink). I finish them both. Alright. I turn to Mimoon and ask him if we can go see the women. He asks, “are you better?” I say “a little.” We go outside and walk to a nearby house. A man whom I’ve met before and another anonymous man are finishing their lunch. The first man’s wife is serving them. We get into the conversation and the woman is having a hard time believing that I speak Tamazight, so Mimoon is translating for me. She is youngish, kind of smart, talkative, and interested: an ideal candidate. The husband (who gives permission about whether or not she can go) is flip-flopping. When I tell him that we did a training like this last year, he is sold. I get the woman’s information and we go to the next house. Another good candidate who is interested (and widowed, allowing her to decide for herself). All the while my stomach is feeling pretty good. A few cramps, but nothing to scare me. We get back to Mimoon’s house, I gather my things and say goodbye. I tell Mimoon that I will meet him in Tounfite the next day (market day) to give him the pants back. He says, “llay-ha-nik.” Which normally means “goodbye,” but in this context means, “forget about it.” I don’t know if he’s telling me he never wants to see his soiled pants again or if he just means “don’t worry about it” in a polite way. My mom calls on my bike ride home, allowing me to laugh about the incident some more. I get home, excited for a bucket bath. Of course, my water is out (it happens about once a week). I have just enough water stored up to take a bucket bath and put the offending pants in a tub with soap and water to soak.

Islam and Me in Morocco

This is a sensitive topic (again) so I’m going to apologize ahead of time for the offensive things I write and the errors that I make. Also, as regular readers of my blog would know, my perspective on Morocco is no way representative of the country; someone living in Fes for two years would have a different perspective on religion in Morocco. What I’ve written here is by no means exhaustive.

99+% of Moroccans are Muslim. I believe that it is illegal to renounce Islam or convert to another religion. So there isn’t much religious freedom here. If a non-Muslim man wants to marry a Moroccan woman, he must convert (since lineage is patriarchal, a non-Muslim woman is not obligated to convert). The closest thing I’ve had to a girlfriend here (which consisted of some conversations and a few late night text messages with a girl from Fes – quite scandalous) ended when the girl asked me if I would convert to Islam.

Islam came to Morocco in the 8th century when Arabs invaded the country. The history books I have say that the Amazigh people (also known as Berbers, the natives) accepted Islam without coercion. Islam’s message of egalitarianism and respect for one’s parents were jived well with Amazigh values. Since that time, Islam has been a huge force in shaping Moroccan history. The best monuments in the country are religious ones. Beautiful mosques, schools, and entire towns were built with religious money. Fes and Meknes stand out in my mind as having the greatest religious monuments.

There are five “pillars” of Islam that a Muslim must follow (there is an order to these, which I am ignorant of). First, witnessing that there is one God and his prophet is Mohamed, Second, prayer: The observant Muslim (and most people that I meet are observant) prays five times a day: sunrise, midday, afternoon, dusk, and after nightfall. There is no freedom in prayer: you say the same thing every time with the same routine of bows and kneels. Third, fasting: one lunar month a year (Ramadan) Muslims abstain from eating, drinking, smoking, bad words, sex… from sunup to sundown. Fourth, pilgrimage: every Muslim who is financially able must make a pilgrimage to Mecca (Saudi Arabia). Fifth, alms to the poor.

Enough about Islam that you could read in a book. The thing that makes the biggest impression on me is the way that Islam and God are always on people’s minds. God is ubiquitous. It is difficult/impossible to have a conversation with someone here without mentioning God. There is a “God phrase” for just about every feeling and situation. I plan to do a post at some point listing all the God phrases I know. Here is a quick taste: Bismillah (in the name of God) precedes every meal, journey, meeting, etc. Inchallah (God willing) follows any discussion of future action. Humdulillah (Thanks to God) can follow any expression of a positive feeling or outcome. People in my village like to say “kulshi rbbi” (everything is God) to explain most anything. When I say it people tell me that I’m smart and wise. I used to think that the frequency with which people used God phrases cheapened them into platitudes, but I’ve recently changed my opinion. God really is on people’s minds all the times and these “God phrases” are not platitudes, but expressions of people’s worldview.

Conversion: people in Morocco try to convert me to Islam frequently. It happens less often now in my village (been here for over a year), but it still happens. I react to it differently depending on my mood, the person trying to convert me, and how polite and respectful they are about it. The worst conversion attempt I had was with an employee of the local government who I generally don’t like. He told me to say the “shHada” (the phrase that you say to become a Muslim) in front of a group of people. I went through my typical defenses (my religion and my prophet are God’s too, it’s important to follow the religion of your parents, would you convert to Christianity if you went to America?) but he wasn’t really listening. He just kept saying, “Say it.” I stopped with the polite responses and started saying “no.” This exchange repeated itself maybe 8 times before I walked away.

This sort of conversion attempt is very frustrating. The person isn’t interested in having a conversation about beliefs; they just want me to say the shHada. After the first time that I say “no,” shouldn’t it be obvious that, even if I did say the shHada, that it wouldn’t be sincere? I’ve found that this sort of attempt comes more often from non-observant Muslims. Guys that tell me about how they drink alcohol, see prostitutes, don’t pray, smoke, etc etc tend to be the most likely to demand conversions like this. I’ve started telling them that they should worry about saving their own soul rather than mine (which always gets laughs from bystanders).

The strange part about deflecting conversion attempts is that it makes me pretend to be something that I’m not. To everyone in my community, I am a God-fearing Christian. I would never tell someone my true beliefs here: I would be ostracized. During a recent, more nuanced conversion attempt a couple days ago, I found myself passionately arguing that Jesus is the Son of God. The person I was conversing with kept saying that Muslims don’t believe that Jesus is the Son of God (they do believe he is a prophet) because God is not like humans and cannot interact with them like that – only a mortal can have progeny. I totally agreed with what he was saying, but there I was, confusing myself. And I don’t have the language skills to express the idea that the “Son of God” may not be literal, but metaphorical.

One more thing about the conversion attempts: most people in my village have not tried to convert me. It’s really just a minority of annoying people while the rest are more respectful.

I can’t have a “Islam” post without discussing religious festivities in my community. I’ve already done posts on Ramadan, a sadaqa, and L3id Kabeer (the big holiday), so I won’t rehash those. Just Friday afternoon there was another event. We’ve been getting a lot of big rainstorms recently, which means the river overflows its banks and floods fields. So my entire community slaughtered some sheep and goats in order to ask God for better weather. Although I find such requests ridiculous, the nice part of the event was that everyone in the village ate as a result of this ceremony. All the men in the village gathered near the mosque (which happens to be next to my house). Couscous was brought out and we all ate outside. Then we ate the meat of the animals that were slaughtered. Women ate in small groups in their houses. So it was a nice community event. A transit overflowing with people from another village drove through as the event was beginning. They were all invited to eat with us and lots of nice words were exchanged. The expression “sharing couscous” is used in Tamazight to signify your intimacy with someone.

Despite the illegality of renouncing Islam, there are Moroccan non-believers. A few of them have “come out of the closet” to me. It’s always a big deal for them to reveal this big secret to me. They mostly tend to be educated professionals – I imagine there are more of them in cities. There are also some people who are openly atheist. There is an Amazigh (Berber) pride movement that is anti-Islam because of its Arab roots. Arabs are seen as colonizers, thus their religion is rejected as well (this is a very small minority).

People here like to ask about how I pray. I tell them that we pray on our knees and we say things like, “In the name of God, God is great, God knows all, thanks to God for everything, God have mercy, God forgive my faults, forgive my parents, etc.” People really like that – it is similar to their prayers and their beliefs. Muslims must pray facing Mecca (to the East for Moroccans). I used to get a lot of shit for saying that Christians do not have to pray facing any particular direction until I started telling people that God is everywhere and that He hears you no matter what.

I’m getting better at saying that sort of thing. I tell people that the different prophets (Mohamed, Jesus, and Moses are the Big 3) are all God’s. I say that our prayers and your prayers are all for God. That God is in everything. I like saying stuff like that because it is closer to my own beliefs that demanding that Jesus is the Son of God. I also like to say things like that because it minimizes the differences between me and people here – we’re all God’s.

Unfortunately, as close as I get to winning people over with my “everything is God” attitude, it’s not quite enough. The fact of the matter is that there are many factors (speaking Tamazight, living here, having kids here, spending time with people) that determine whether or not someone is Oumoussa (a citizen of our tribe). One of those factors is saying the shHada, being a Muslim. There will always be a divide.

Update

Most of my work lately has been recruiting women for the traditional birthing attendant training that I’ll be coordinating this fall. I like the recruiting process (most of the time) because I meet new people in different villages. The other day I rode my bike out to this very isolated village and met with a man there who had agreed to help me find women. When I got there he was not in his house so one of his small sons accompanied me to his field where he was plowing. I sat and waited for him to finish. It was a beautiful day, we had lunch, and the field was up on the mountain. Right as he was finishing the field it started pouring rain and we took shelter under a tree. I was sitting there with two farmers and their three little kids on the side of a mountain waiting for a rainstorm to end. I felt 100% comfortable. It was definitely a Peace Corps moment. The rainstorm delayed our recruiting, so the guy invited me to stay at his house rather than riding back to my village. If I hadn’t had other work to do the next day I would have stayed.

Another project that I’ve been trying to wrap up for months now is a story of frustration. I was going to do toothbrush/paste education and distribution in a nearby school. Rather than speak to the teachers to organize the event (what I normally do) I decided to involve a guy from the village who had been asking me to work with him for a while. My guiding principle for work here is: involve local people whenever possible. This was in April, right before I went to America. I asked him how many toothbrushes I needed to bring and he told me 70. He told me to come back to his house the next Wednesday and we would go to the school together. I got to his house at the scheduled time, but he wasn’t there. I went back to my house (1.5 km walk). A couple hours later he shows up at my house on his motorcycle and we drive to the school. I do my routine with the kids there, but it turns out we are 30 toothbrushes short (because he told me the wrong number). So we skip half the school. I promise to buy some more brushes and that we’ll finish distribution when I come back from America. I get back from America with my brushes and I set a date with him. I show up on that date and the guy is, again, not there. I leave the brushes at his house and walk back to my house. He does not show up on his motorcycle later that day. I show up at his house a couple other times over the next few weeks, but he is never around. When I finally find him, school is out for summer, so we cannot distribute the brushes there. I ask him what the solution to our problem is. He tells me that he will get all the names of the kids that need brushes and he will organize the event. OK. Well I go to his house on the scheduled day and he is asleep. His daughter wakes him up. He bullshits me for a while. I ask him about the project; he says, “I forgot you.” Then two kids come in. He starts asking them the names of the kids in grades four, five and six (the grades that need the toothbrushes). The kids have a (understandably) difficult time remembering all the kids who are in these grades. The list that they come up with is obviously missing a significant number of names. So the guy looks at me and says, “What do you want to do? It will be difficult to get all the kids together; many are out in the fields or somewhere else.” I tell him to forget about it. I’ll do the whole school again in the fall. If I had just done my normal routine of speaking directly with the teachers, the project would have been finished months ago.

Unfortunately, these sort of delays and frustrations are typical with my work here. Off the top of my head, I cannot think of a big project, regardless of the status of the person that I’m working with, that I have worked on here that has not had a problem like this. For our hammam project another volunteer and I are working with an agency within the Ministry of Energy – government officials working out of the capital. They set a date for a big meeting with hammam owners then pushed back the date of the meeting three weeks later after we had told all the owners about it. Strangely, they had been pressuring us to have the meeting at the earlier date (in order to meet a funding deadline) even though we were unsure if we could be prepared in time.

That’s it. All is well. I’m trying very hard not to get sick this summer in order to prove to my host mom that heat does not cause illness.

Patriotism

“Patriotism: Pride in or devotion to the country somebody was born in or is a citizen of.”

I am a patriot. Living in another country for a year has only made that belief stronger.

Over the years, patriotism has gotten a bad name; it has come to be associated with fanatical devotion to one’s country. Fanatical patriotism demands unquestioning uniformity and smothers dissent. Under the tenets of fanatical patriotism, to question the decisions of one’s government is to undermine their authority. Additionally, fanatical patriotism has taken on many of the characteristics of xenophobia. National identity is valued to the point of distrust of other nations and cultures. Both of these aspects of fanatical patriotism: unquestioned uniformity and xenophobia, are not the qualities of a patriot.

Fanatical patriotism has always been present in American culture. The past century provides many examples. In the name of national security, American citizens of Japanese origin were imprisoned in internment camps during World War II. The end of WW II brought an even more pernicious form of fanatical patriotism: McCarthyism. Suspicion of Communist activity suppressed any form of dissent. Furthermore, capitalist, Western ideals were put on a pedestal and Communist, egalitarian ones were demonized.

Under the Bush Jr. administration, fanatical patriotism has further sullied the name of the American patriot. The contemporary fanatical patriot is epitomized by the bumper sticker that proclaims: “These Colors Don’t Run.” The contemporary fanatical patriot has grown distrustful of other cultures, particularly Islamic ones. This has not been helped by the administration’s slogans, such as“ the War on Terror” and “you’re either with us or against us.” I’ll never forget the story my best friend, a Pakistani, told me several weeks after 9/11. His sister’s tires had been slashed and she had been tormented for wearing her headscarf. Both my friend and his sister have lived their entire lives in America and their success in the country embodies the American Dream. The contemporary fanatical patriot has also discouraged dissent within America. Those against the Iraq/Afghanistan wars were cast as being anti-soldier. Administration policies were not to be questioned; even those that were counter to American values such as wiretapping and terrorism were to be accepted without dissent.

So I am writing now to reclaim the good name of patriotism for patriots across the world. Patriotism is simply love for one’s country. This is not the extreme nationalism popping up throughout Europe. And this is not the unconditional love demanded by the fanatical patriot, but a critical, demanding one. I protested the Bush’s administration choice to go to war in Iraq not just because I feared the loss of innocent Iraqi lives, but also because I did not want to see my country tarnish its name and reputation. My identity and self-image is influenced by many factors: my family, my beliefs, my hometown, my education, etc. Amongst other factors is my identity as an American. I am ashamed when my country does something shameful and proud when it does good in the world. I demand the best from my country in its treatment of its own citizens and its actions in the international community. Even someone who has only shame for America is expressing a kind of patriotism: his/her identity is tied up in America.

How am I still an American Patriot when my formative years were a time of shameful actions on the part of my government? When disgraceful events litter our history?

Before I express my American pride, I want to be clear: the line between patriotism and xenophobia is a thin one. I do not wish to cross it. My patriotism means that I generally prefer American culture to others, but it represents a positive feeling to America rather than a negative one towards other cultures. My patriotism derives from my being habituated to American culture, not from a belief that American culture is objectively better. I am biased and I know it.

I love American food for what it is and for what it steals from other countries. American food means many things to many people, but my favorite is grilled meat in the summer, beer, and fresh fruit.

I love American freedom (I know that sounds corny). But experiencing the lack of freedom in other countries gives me an appreciation for what our government grants us in America. Journalism in America is incredible. This country is founded on dissent and protest. American democracy is not without its fault, but I am thankful for what we have.

I love American culture (mostly). Since World War II, no other country rivals the variety and creativity shown by American musicians. We are fortunate to be blessed with people from all over the world that bring new and different influences. Wow. I love American sports (although I love soccer the best). I love American literature and art. Steinbeck, Hemmingway, Salinger, Irving, Vonnegut, are my favorites, but that is just a start.

I love American individualism. While living in a collectivist society has been good, I prefer the recognition of the individual.

I love American gender relations and the freedom that American women have. It’s not perfect but it’s something.

I am proud that America has elected Barack Hussein Obama as its president. I will be proud of his successes and ashamed of his failures.

I love these things because I am habituated to them; I love them because I grew up with them. I would have different biases if I had grown up somewhere else. I am proud that America represents these things and more.

I do not overlook or attempt to hide America’s shortcomings. They define what it means to be an American as much as the positive things. I believe that by exposing our shortcomings and having an honest discussion about them we can move forward. I see a nation that has progressed and has been a world leader in many important areas. I have hope that this will continue and that further progress will be made.

Update

Not to be a broken record, but: everything is good here in Morocco. Since coming back from America, I have a new level of comfort in my community. It is partly because I have passed so much time here, but also due to witnessing new volunteers struggle in this culture. It reminds me of how far I have come.

Work is good. I’ve been recruiting women in several different villages for the midwife training this fall. With the help of a nearby volunteer I’m able to reach out to a greater number of villages, some of which are very isolated. Recruiting is difficult and takes time, but we’re making progress.

Other work: STI education with sex workers is going slower. When doctors came to do physical exams a couple weeks ago, they were overwhelmed by demand so decided to just conduct verbal interviews, which were not sufficient and nearly worthless. So we are hoping to identify a smaller group of interested women and get the doctors back.

Our hammam project has hit a slight road bump. The Moroccan agency that we’re working with has pushed back the meeting for hammam owners from July 7th to late July.

About a week ago there were nationwide exams for high school students finishing their studies. The exams are very important for a student’s future studies. There is one girl from my village who attends high school in a nearby city (Midelt) who had to take the exam. She was home the week before the exams to study and her dad asked me to help her as she studies English. Helping her was a lot of fun as her English was pretty good and the topics she was studying were interesting. One of the questions was on sustainable development, one on international organizations, and another on globalization. So they were right up my alley. Yesterday I talked to the girl’s father and she got very good scores on her exams; he was grateful. It was satisfying for me because her father had told me that girls weren’t smart, that only his boys would do well in school. I kept telling the dad that his daughter was smart and knew English well. When the father told me how well his daughter did, he told me: you were right, she’s smart! So that was satisfying. She’ll probably continue her studies this fall in a university in Meknes.

This past week I helped my family out some more with farm work. Having harvested a field the previous week, this week we fertilized and irrigated the field in preparation for plowing. Irrigation of fields here is interesting. Using irrigation canals, people here flood their fields. But the unevenness of the land requires them to carefully direct the water to certain parts of the field with strategically placed, temporary canals. Another complication of irrigation is that water is a precious commodity. So a family only has rights to the water canal for a limited amount of time before it is someone else’s turn. These rights and the schedule are legislated by a local group of men. The fact that the community is able to successfully organize a very complicated community situation gives me hope for future collective action. The social structure for distribution of a public good exists.

Elections

After my post a couple weeks ago that was critical of both Moroccan and American cultures, I resolved to only have positive posts for a while. However, elections in Morocco have just happened. And, like anywhere else in the world, politics brings out the worst in people in my community. Talking about local politics has been interesting and I’ve learned a lot about the community over the past few weeks.

The current elections are nationwide, but they are local elections, not national ones. People are electing representatives for the commune. In rural areas, a commune consists of several villages. My commune, for example, contains eight villages and around 4,500 people. In urban areas, a commune consists of the city and the surrounding area. The commune is responsible for administrative issues and development.

In my commune of eight villages, there are 11 elected leaders. The name for this position is mulsheih. Most villages elect one mulsheih, but the three biggest villages in the commune elect two mulsheihen. The mulsheihen serve five-year terms. After the election, the mulsheihen of the commune meet and, from that group of eleven, elect a president for the commune. The election of the president of the commune is significant as he has much more power than the mulsheihen. As far as I can tell, the president is pretty much all-powerful. He has control over the budget for the commune and over hiring and firing at the local administration building.

Everyone over 18 years old has a vote, man and woman. Unlike America, convicted felons do not lose their right to vote.

Now the post will turn negative. Politics here are completely Machiavellian. Corruption is pervasive. People have little faith in the current candidates. When I ask my host dad about who he will vote for, he says that he will throw his ballot in the fire (not actually true). He says all the candidates are the same – worthless and greedy. People often ask me if I know what politics in Morocco are. I say no. They say: politics is just another word for lies. There are unfortunate norms here about what the role of elected officials is. Here in my community, the ideal of politicians being public servants has not taken hold. The power that comes with the elected positions of mulsheihen and president is to be bought and sold.

People talk openly about candidates selling votes. My friend told me that he sold his vote for 50 dirhams (about 6-7 dollars). However, family connections tend to play a larger role in election decisions. I ask lots of people around town whom they will vote for. Mostly people dodge my question and don’t answer. Those who do answer invariably say they are voting for someone because he is the son of their uncle or their brother or their father in law. I have heard one person make an argument for a candidate based upon his/her qualifications. My host mom told me she was voting for someone because he is literate – but the candidate also happens to be related to her. Many people have told me they will not reelect our current representative because he is corrupt. Although it is too bad that we currently have a corrupt mulsheih, at least people recognize that and unwilling to reelect him.

Considering that candidates do not have platforms for their candidacy, it could be no other way. I have not heard a candidate say anything about what he promises to do if elected. Thus money and connections decide people’s votes.

The greatest power that the president of the commune has is hiring and firing administrators at the one government building in the commune, which happens to be in my village. There are maybe 10-15 employees at this building. There is probably enough work at the building for one or two full-time employees. Since most of the employees do nothing all day long, filling the posts with competent people is not a priority. Instead the power that the president has of hiring and firing is used to a) make money and b) further entrench his power. Jobs at the commune building often go to the highest bidder, with the president collecting the money. The one person who works at the commune who has the power to expose the corruption is afraid to do so for fear of losing his job.

Roughly speaking, my commune is made up of two tribes: Ait Sliman and Ait Moussa. My village and two nearby villages make up Ait Moussa. Ait Sliman, however, has more people and thus has a little more power in the government. Most of the commune employees are from Ait Sliman. This angers people in my village and they say that the president of the commune just gives the jobs away to his family and his connections so they will keep voting for him.

Many of the commune employees are illiterate. Considering that the jobs at the commune mostly involve paperwork, this makes these employees nearly useless. They make tea. During the winter, they cut wood for the stoves in the commune building. Other than that, they sit around outside, talking. I am friends with many of the employees. I asked one of them (who is illiterate) how he got his job. He told me that his father is connected (he is from Ait Sliman). Another illiterate employee told me that he bought his job from the president. I can’t really blame the employees for exploiting their connections to get a job: they tend to be the people in town who can afford to send their kids away to better schools.

Everyone is completely aware of the corruption. It is accepted as a fact of life. Most are complicit. Honestly, it’s a depressing subject to talk about with people. Talking about politics inevitably leads to people slandering their neighbors. I had a conversation with a friend on election day and he told me, “We’re bad. The people in this village are bad. Seventy percent of people here are bad. Thirty percent are good.” These generalizations about how bad people are often turn into generalizations about Moroccans on a national scale. Someone else told me that America should not let Moroccans into America because they would corrupt people there until we were all corrupt.

There is one new development that lets me put a positive spin on a generally negative situation. A new law was just passed in Morocco that creates special posts for women in the commune government. Each commune is obligated to elect two women to the posts of mulsheihen. These women have their own elections for new posts. So instead of 11 mulsheihen in the commune, there will be 13 this year. It’s great that the Moroccan central government is mandating the inclusion of women in politics. I wonder what role the female mulsheihen will have in government once the elections are over; I fear they will be marginalized. The marginalization of women in politics is taken for granted. Obviously, it is a major obstacle to women achieving equal status in the community and household.

Although they are mostly excluded from elected government, women are able to vote. I have limited access to the politics that go on in the household, but what I have seen is interesting. My sense is that husband and wife (and their children of voting age) vote for the same candidate. I believe that political interests are conceived of in terms of a collective family unit, rather than individually. The way this decision is made varies from household to household. In my host family (which is exceptional, given the advanced age of my host dad), I witnessed my host mom explaining how to fill out his ballot to my host dad and making sure that he knows how to vote for the right person.

As someone who is working for the development of this community, witnessing its political process is disheartening. My ideal of a public servant is that he/she should govern with the interest of his/her constituency in mind rather than personal interests. An elected official in my community and I should be working together on projects, but our interests do not often overlap. I see the political sphere as a great opportunity for a community’s advancement, but that is nearly impossible in this environment.

I’ve recently read two books on development theory that were very critical of the west’s efforts to aid the third world, especially Africa. Government corruption and the failure of public institutions are often cited as obstacles to development. Witnessing this election drives that point home for me. Promoting “good governance” as a part of development has been popular for decades now. How an outside force can reverse a culture of corruption, I have no idea. I am interested to see how that works. One of the programs that I’m looking at for graduate school has a specific concentration that focuses on training development workers to promote good governance. I’d love to take some of these classes. It seems ridiculous to me that you could train someone promote good governance. Here in my community I tell people what politics is like in America and hold it up as an ideal. They agree that that is a good way of politicking, but do not change their ways.

Sadly, I do not think this is simply a failure of the elected officials to uphold high standards. Like I said above, people here are complicit in the corruption. The election is seen as an opportunity to further the interests’ of one’s household by voting for a relative or selling one’s vote. If a community collectively decided that its votes could not be bought or dictated by relationships and connections, it could hold its public servants to a higher standard, judged by their performance in office.

….I’m tempted to write a brief description of the corruption in American politics as a comparison. But I don’t think I should be making such comparisons for fear of idealizing the American political situation and condemning the Moroccan one more than I already have. Suffice it to say, my little community in rural Morocco does not have a monopoly on corruption or poor governance. The ability of politics to corrupt otherwise good people is unaffected by cultural differences.

Elections Part II – After the Vote

The votes have been tallied and some people are happy with the result and some people aren’t. Having taken a couple days to reflect on what I wrote earlier, I want to add on to what I said.

Things aren’t as bad as I wrote. Despite the ugliness of the elections, the people in my village really are good people. And although people make their election decisions differently than I would, that doesn’t make them invalid. The election did reveal a vibrant political scene that everyone in the community was involved in.

The other important thing to add on is that I have a very limited view of the political process; I rely mostly on what people tell me. Speech here tends to be absolutist. People used to say that I did not know any Tamazight, even though I could have basic conversations. Now they say that I know everything, although my vocabulary is limited, my listening comprehension could be vastly improved, and I generally speak like a bumbling idiot. When describing a person, he/she is either good or bad. Everything is well or the very sky is falling down upon us. Since I am dependent upon these absolutist judgments for what I pass on to you all, my conclusions about elections are bound to lack the subtly that would accurately describe the circumstances.

Update

On a positive note, there are non-political institutions that do some good here in Morocco. The past week I’ve been recruiting women for a traditional birthing attendant training happening this fall. I rely on local associations to help me identify good candidates for the training and they have been very helpful. The people that I’m working with do not directly benefit from the help that they give me, but are nonetheless very willing to help me out.

In addition to recruiting women for the training, I’ve been helping my host family with their annual barley harvest. It’s hot work. The most enjoyable part of the work is listening to the songs that people sing while they work. They are very soulful and express the difficulties of life in the mountains. I hope to get hold of a microphone and recorder before the wheat harvest so I can capture the sound.

There is one funny story from harvest. Having loaded up our mule with a relatively small load of grass, my host dad and I started walking back to our barn. My host dad was walking very slowly and told me to go ahead. I told him I didn’t know right way to take the mule. He told me to go ahead anyways. When I came to a fork in the road, I tried to go right, but the mule refused to budge. I assumed the mule knew better than I, so I went left. This led me to a precarious road, upsetting the mule and causing him to shake his load free. As I was trying to calm the mule and reload the grass (a difficult task for one normal person, impossible for me), my least favorite person in my community came walking down the road from the other direction. For those of you who have been following my posts from the start, there was a guy who threatened me in my first few weeks in my community and was subsequently sent to prison for six months. Ever since his release from prison, he completely ignores me and will do a 180 degree turn if we are walking towards each other. Well he saw me struggling with the mule and stopped in his tracks. He stood there awkwardly, trying to hide behind a tree for about a minute, watching me fail to get the grass back on my mule’s back. He couldn’t turn around, however, because he had come to fetch a carpet that was laid out to dry only 10 feet from where my load of grass was dropped. I couldn’t help but laugh at the situation. He eventually got the courage to pick up his carpet. Once he walked away, a couple kids spotted me struggling to reload my mule and came to help me. They took me back to the fork in the road and pointed me on my way (I had been right. Lesson: never trust a mule’s brain over your own).

Things are well. I had been in site for about 10 days before coming into my market town today. I’m feeling comfortable here. I’m glad to be busy with work and helping my family with their harvest. People are good to me.