Category: all things moroccan

For some time now, I’ve been looking for an English-language edition of Mohammed Choukri’s For Bread Alone, translated by Paul Bowles, but the book is out of print and used copies are very hard to find. First editions are ridiculously expensive. Given the state of fiction in translation in the U.S., I am not holding my breath for an American edition sometime in the future, either.

Luckily for those of you who would like to finally get your hands on this seminal Moroccan novel, Telegram Books in the UK is re-issuing it this month, so I’ll be sure to pick up a copy when I’m in London in July. You can also get it on Amazon.co.uk. You’d better get a copy and read it, or you are dead to me.

There’s a very interesting article in Le journal Hebdo about a round-table that took place in Rabat about the use of Darija, the vernacular language of Morocco. Writers, poets, linguists, artists, and rappers took part in the debate, i.e. all those for whom language is an essential means of creation or scholarship. I was quite pleased to see a few misconceptions discussed and cleared up during the debate (e.g. the ridiculous idea that somehow Darija is not a proper language because it is not written. Piffle.) So hopefully this is the precursor to a wider national debate about the issue. I’m fully in favor of using Darija, because of the huge impact it would have on the creation of a reading culture. Imagine: All children’s books right now are in Modern Standard Arabic, which is a language no one learns until first grade (i.e. age 6 or 7), by which time reading habits are already in place for many kids.

A Moroccan man who was trying to migrate to Australia through Asia has been lying in a hospital bed for nine years, after having contracted Japanese encephalitis, which resulted in near complete paralysis. The man, 39-year-old Lahcen Ould Lhaj, has lost his passport, and now lives in the Port Moresby hospital in Papua New Guinea. Moroccan internet forums have picked up on the story, and, thanks to them, it appears that Lahcen’s family–who believed him dead–has now been notified. There is also a brief notice in Tel Quel, but as yet no official word from the Ministry in charge of Moroccan immigrants.

The World Cup is in a mere four days, and neither of the two main Moroccan channels (RTM and 2M) has secured transmission rights for the event. Le Monde reports that the Saudi channel ART is asking for 110 million dirhams for the rights to the event, a fee which Moroccan stations cannot afford. As everyone knows: It is not wise to come between Moroccans and their football.

Now that Morocco has considerably hardened its stance toward African immigrants trying to pass through on their way to Europe, alternative routes have appeared. Ships leave from Nouadhibou in Mauritania, heading toward the Canary Islands, or even from as far as Senegal. The distances they cross are much larger now, and tragic headlines have quickly followed. The latest one comes from The Guardian, which reports that a small yacht appeared on the coast of Barbados this past weekend. Inside were the petrified bodies of eleven young men. They appear to have left from somewhere in Africa, most likely Senegal, and were en route to the Canaries when their ship was lost at sea. In Senegal, all efforts to warn young people of the dangers that lie ahead seem to fall on deaf ears:

But during a radio talk show last week, young Senegalese callers such as Mass were unmoved by tales of death. “Even if it means ending up dead, I’ll leave, I’ll never give up trying, there’s nothing to do here,” he said. “It’s Barsa or Barsakh,” quipped a 22-year-old girl in Woloff, meaning “It’s Barcelona or the hereafter.”

There are a host of reasons for leaving, including high youth unemployment and the reputed success of Senegal’s “Modou, Modou” traders in Europe. “But the biggest problem,” radio manager Oumar Seck Ndiaye told IRIN, “is that people have lost all hope of ever bettering themselves here. So between never and maybe, they choose to take a chance.”

Even the mosque preachers have been telling youngsters not to take a risk, but to no avail.

AP writer Scheherezade Faramarzi files a report about Western Sahara, specifically the case of one woman who has changed camps, from Polisario to Morocco, and the reaction of those she left behind. The article is largely favorable to the Moroccan point of view.