المضارع المرفوع أو المنصوب؟

I am sitting in on Rida’s morning class. This means I will not have my homework done for my own class with him this afternoon. I am reading an article about the relationship between Obama’s election and the Middle East and North Africa. Finding out exactly what the author thinks will just have to wait ‘til this evening.
At this very moment, the students are changing sentence from active to passive. In a rather advanced sentence, they have just overcome an issue of changing long vowels in the verb beautifully, but missed a point of basic grammar when putting the sentence together. Rida praised the success of the passive, then paused opened palms to the class and said: I have a personal question: why have you put a fatha on the present tense verb? When do we put a fatha on present tense verbs???” Can any of you, dear students (above first year), recall this small, but important point?

I'm sneaking this posting in while I observe an advanced Arabic class. I have three days of class left and I probably won't be able to post anything of substance before I travel. I will still answer your questions and respond to your comments, just not while I'm in Morocco.
I have, by the way, enjoyed reading all your comments very much.

It is almost 1AM, and I am sure that I am going to be sick day after tomorrow. This is entirely my fault, and given the reason for my inevitable fall into the depths of exhaustion and illness, I wouldn’t have it any other way. That reason is, of course, that life is too full of love, wonder and adventure to sleep. And not sleeping (for any reason) does have a history of making me ill.

I just got in from a four hour “tea” with three wonderful new friends. This followed a four-hour one-on-one lesson making for a total of 8 hours of intense concentration, and eight hours of new information and fresh conversations. The second four hours were spent in a world where no one language was understood by the whole group, and thus, I spend most of the night following tones of Spanish voices, with the occasional Arabic synopses to keep me in the loop. Nonetheless, I have a very good sense of the people I was with, and they are all great!

In a very uncharacteristic move, I did not freak out and leave in order to be back before 10, but I stayed until midnight. When we finally finished our lemon cake and stepped outside, the full moon was overhead was nearly as bright as the laughter in our eyes. The decorative lights on the palm trees of the main square were no match for either.

I was worried that I would be in trouble with my host family, but the anxieties that I had suppressed all evening turned out to be for nothing. Alhumdu lilleh!

I am going to walk up a mountain tomorrow and I have to be up at 5 for my ride. I sure hope I can hold it together. In the meantime, I am hoping my dreams will take me flying up through the fast moving coastal clouds and to the moon, where I might rest for at least a few hours before morning.

Never enough

Yesterday, my conversation about 3aisha Qundisha, the mysterious man-eating beauty of Moroccan myth, was interrupted by a visit from another Arabic teacher. She came into my tutoring session because she, like me, is not a native speaker of the language she teaches and loves, and she wanted some tips from the best teacher at my institute: Muhammed Rida. The three of us chatted for a bit about classroom resources, and eventually this lovely woman declared that she aimed to study in Tetouan next summer. Saying so, she turned to me and asked: What do you think, is two weeks here enough? I smiled, caught Rida's eye and explained, you'll get so many precious moments out of two weeks, but nothing will ever be "enough." Since then, I have been coming to terms with the fact that I'll only be here for another two weeks. I have every intention of squeezing the preciousness out of every second.
In sha' allah:
I will drink more Avacado Juice.
I will climb more mountains.
I will speak more Darija (and try to work the Tetouani squeek into the music of my voice, replacing my Syrian drawl-temporarily at least).
I will take more walks on the beach.
I will read the newspaper more.
I will write more summaries of articles about Nature and Sufism.
I will eat more tagines of more varieties.
I will be so sad to leave.
And of course, it will be so good to be home.

a green world

One of my favorite things about Morocco is women's fashion. Though there's all manner of dress, the galbabs please me best. Years ago, a friend coming from Morocco to Syria commented on missing the colorful streets, filled with women's galbabs. At the time, I had no idea what he meant. Now, I walk slowly from the bus to my class so I can lose myself in a world of red silk roses that the woman walking in front of me wears. I drown in the head to tow brown with yellow flairs of the woman riding with me from the beach town Martil. I fly through the weather map clouds that swirl over oceans and continents of the old lady walking with her grandchild. I was jolted back to my childhood wedding delusions by cream colored silk and lace this morning. I never know where the rainbow of texture and shade will take me.

too long

With a world full of things to do, read, see and discover, I've been neglecting my writing. All my energy has gone into understanding a study on the famous Historian Ibn Khaldoun for the past two days. I'm taking a breath by reading a simpler article on travel accounts, but it will be back to the grindstone this weekend because my brilliant teacher has decided I should read about gender roles in Moroccan mysticism. He says I'll like it, but I just hope I'll understand.

inthewestofthenorthofafrica.blogspot.com

Despite the same old web address, my experience is no longer limited to the middleoftheeast. It's related, but not the same!

for the record

Fish guts are not a Moroccan food. I totally ate them by accident.

الضفدع في غرفتي

I woke to find a little green frog on my inner windowsill. Strange, as my room is on the second floor of the house.

I was quite glad of the adventure as I have recently felt the strain of coming up with topics to fill the two hours of دردشة chatting I have with Jemaal everyday. As I am responsible for picking the topic for each class, I'm getting a bit concerned about what we will be talking about four weeks (40 hours of chatting) from now.

The history of Moroccan literary theory, however, has blossomed before me. Two hours of looking over my latest summaries and clarifying the historical context for the Moroccan Novel passed quickly this morning. Honestly though, I'd rather read Moroccan Novels than about them. لا بأس

التعليق على التعليق (comment on comment)

شكرا على تعليقك يا جيمي!
As for my response, I have found that being a foreigner in Morocco (and Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon...) means a warm welcome. Of course, it's easy to get picked out of a crowd, but having Arabic up my sleeves is my greatest asset. When I (and you) speak in Arabic, a transition from being a guest to potential conversant takes place. But even when I botch my week-old darija, most people are willing to help me, الحمد لله.
You also asked about the role of gender in my daily life. I start by saying that gender roles, expectations, and, sadly, inequality plays into most everything I do in the US, at school, when I consume mass media, as I interact with friends, colleagues and students. Often, gender is taken for granted in Western culture, but once you start to see the ever present dominance of Patriarchy, and assumed gender boundaries in American (and other) culture(s), you can really see them everywhere. Of course, Arab culture has its own understanding of gender and gender roles, and just as naturally, that will effect the way I function in Morocco, just as a man visiting Morocco might have to adjust to a new set of expectation for his gender. For example, dominant American culture dictates that men should always maintain space between each other. Whereas in Morocco, men often walk with their arms linked, or holding hands.
You also mentioned your friends' reactions to the idea of travel in the Arab World; it's a reaction that I get from a great number of people, having lived in so many Arab countries. First of all, I like to remind those who are nervous about traveling to an Arab country that the world is rather large, and it is not so hard to avoid trouble. There are plenty of places in the US that I would avoid at certain times, or when certain events are going on. Of course, accidents happen, but they happen everywhere. In the years that I have spent happily living in Arab cultures, I have been very glad not to have stayed home.
And on the flip side, Moroccans have many ideas about Americans. For the most part though, and particularly given that I am able to express my personality, I'm processed as an individual, not as a generic, Hollywood American. الحمد لله

صباح الخير من تطوان!

I've nearly made it to the end of my first week, and boy is there a lot I want to share. First of all, the institute where I'm studying is fabulous. I'm blown away by the quality of instruction and attention to the needs of students here. True, I've only been here five days, but already I've spent many happy hours discussing the history and development of Moroccan literary theory with my ever so gentle professor, Mohammed. In addition to his ridiculously thorough knowledge of Andalusian history and his PhD in mysticism, he is just the nicest teacher I could hope for. Just yesterday, midway though one of our marathon reading sessions, he helped me grasp what التوشيح means by breaking into a quiet verse of the popular Andalusian poetry.

I spend the other half of my class time with Jemaal, struggling through the vowel-free syllables that are Moroccan dialect. والحمد لله الدارجة المغربية كتعجبني بزاف even if I stumble through and occasionally (في الحقيقة بزاف د مرات) insert a bit of Syrian to grease my sentences as they form in my mouth. But for the most part, I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the accessibility of Darija, despite all the scary stories of how different it is from other dialects.