Parent's Visit, Pt. 2: Errachidia

I arrived at the hotel at nine fifty, and told the taxi driver that my parents would be out quickly, and that they promised that they would be fine this morning. After all, they had only arrived at two o'clock that morning, and who wouldn't want to wake up less than eight hours later after spending thirty-six hours on a series of planes and in a series of airport terminals? I walked through the lobby and into the main courtyard, where the pool greeted me. I looked into the pool for a moment; it was lined with blue tiles and the rippled reflected in them, sending waves of bright yellow cutting across the bottom of the pool.

At the back of the pool was a small cabana lined with drinks that I promised myself I would utilize at some point during my parents' stay. I left the main courtyard and walked down the small walkways covered not with buiding but with roses that had been trained to form an arch overhead. The bushes that lined the walkways were rosemary, and I immediately thought of the year's worth of dinners I had missed from David. The rosemary combines with the roses to form a pungent aroma of sugary and savory. The combination was very successful at keeping flies away, it seemed.

I arrived at my parents' door and knocked. And then I waited.

and waited.

and waited.

Finally, I pulled open my phone after a few minutes of waiting and called some volunteers to ask if they wanted to hang out with my parents at all. The door opened after a few minutes of me standing out there. My mom was disheveled from just waking up. It was the first morning in Paris all over again.

"We haven't even taken a shower yet." My mom said.
"Just put on the same clothes you had on yesterday."
"What?"

It was at this point that I realized the main difference between me, a volunteer, and my mom, a tourist. Fortunately, they agreed, and within a few minutes we were in the taxi with me to get into the town center. Later that afternoon, we met up with D_____, who invited us to his house for snacks and to see the casbah with his family was from. In an hour, we were in another taxi, on our way to the small village outside of Errachidia. We walked through the remains of the casbah. Then, my mom spoke of a dream that she had.

"You know, I had a dream that one of us came across a snake. It was a cobra. So we need to watch out."
"All of the snakes in Morocco are poisonous," D_____ said, "So we may not want to find them."
"Oh." Mom replied.

I had walked over to the edge of the casbah at this point, and looked out an old window at the fields that stretched beyond the horizon. D_____'s family has tilled the soil of this land for generations. I thought. I still find it so amazing at how deep the roots of families in Morocco go. Moroccans can trace their lineages all of the way back to time immemorial. Technically, with the advances of genealogical sciences, anyone can trace their families back to whenever they want. but it's not the same. Yes, my family's roots have been traced back to include Cherokee, Hungarian, Irish, Welsh, and even Roma ancestry, but it's only on a piece of paper; they're names, only names, apparitions of people who once existed and whose commonality I share only by DNA, not by any true family history or true connection.

It is this that I envy with Moroccans, and most other countries, as well. Most other countries are a monolith of one ethnicity or identity, making the search for a family history much easier. America is a combination of races and ethnicities. Don't get me wrong; I'm happy to be American; I'm happy that I live in America, and that I have access to all of the benefits that entails. But America's roots are fibrous; we are spread out thinly and shallowly. The roots of Moroccan identity are like the tap root; they dive deep into the darkness of the earth, making it immovable, sturdy, dependable. It was at this point that I realized that I want that. I want roots. I want to be able to tell my children who we are, where we come from. I want to pass along my granny's quilts, my grandmother's afghans, my mom's chinaware. I want them to have the tangibility of their existence in any object possible.

It was also at this point that I realized that I was being watched.

Technically, it is called the Macrovipera deserti, but most people simply call it the desert adder. I know that this is the species because I was one foot away from its body. Two things surprised the group, which consisted of me, D_____, M_______, my mother, and Joe. One, if jumping backwards were an Olympic sport, I'm now certain that I could at least make some sort of qualifying round. Two, my parents realized that whenever they hear the high pitched shriek of a girl, they can include me in the list of possible sources. In the distance, dogs began to bark in response to the high frequency sound waves emitting from my lips. The snake remained motionless.

"I knew it!" My mom yelled, "My dreams are prophetic."

My grandmother once talked about us being part of the medicine man tradition of the Cherokee. That, combined with the druids of the Celts of Wales, and the gypsy Roma, made me support my mom's hypothesis. However, at this juncture, I felt it more important to simply back away. D_____'s reaction at this juncture, however, was to throw rocks at it to make it go away. Fortunately, I was able to back away from it without it even acknowledging my existence. At that point, I was willing to embrace fully the Irish part of my heritage.

Parent's Visit, Pt. 1: Airport

I arrived at the airport at one o'clock in the morning and ran a mental checklist to make sure I hadn't forgotten anything. Hotel reservations? Check. Camel Trek Reservations? Check. Things to do for the two days before the Camel Trek? Hmm... In Morocco, I have learned that there isn't really a need to make plans; nothing is ever set in stone, so things will change and either won't happen or will happen later. One of those things that happened later was the arrival of my parents' plant. Would my parents be able to accept that fact here when it took me a few weeks to get used to it? In all honesty, there are still times when I think to myself Why can't there be actual hours on these stores? Besides, my parents' hotel had a pool, AND a bar AND a hot shower. What else would they need?

I felt the airport building shake as the double-propellor plane began to touch down in Errachidia. The airport in Errachidia works two days out of the week. On Friday early morning, a flight comes on from Casablanca, and on Monday early morning, a flight leaves to Casablanca. One would think that with two flights to handle per week, that would leave a decent amount of time to work on having those two flights arrive and leave at decent hours. I waited at the entrance to the tarmac and noticed that there were two metal detectors, and that one of those metal detectors was pushed to the side. I imagined a conversation that I could have had with security about this.

"Should that be at this small hallway so people have to go through it?"
"Yes, but that would probably take more time for them to get through."
"And this other one, I'm guessing it's not plugged in, is it?"
"It is, but why would they go through that when there's more room on the side without it?"

The dialogue that I created in my mind was probably far from the truth, but there is still a part of me that yearns to recognize that carefree attitude that marked so many images to the small town airports pre-9/11. I remembered an old Jeff Foxworthy joke about small town airport security and the image of an old sheriff leaning in a chair, saying, "You got any guns or bombs in that bag? You ain't a terrorist, are ya?"

I heard voices on the tarmac. In a few moments, I would be face to face with my parents, whom I haven't seen in fourteen months. Have I changed at all while I was here? What will they think? Have my mannerisms or body positions changed during these months? My hands were sweaty. I couldn't wipe my huge smile off of my face. I was tired when I got into the airport, but now, I was wired.

The door opened, and my mom appeared, her once brown hair a much brighter blonde; she had begun getting highlights. She seemed so much more radiant than I remembered. She dragged a little suitcase behind her and had her camera strapped around her neck. She was followed by Joe, whose hair and mustache were still the same brilliant grey. It was strange to see such radiant skin on people. After a year of seeing mainly olive skin tones, focusing on such white faces stood out. The passengers walked past the metal detector an into the lobby.

"Where is our taxi?" Mom asked. I pointed to a small taxi that I had spoken with someone about using beforehand. We made it to the vehicle, and at that moment, the driver with whom I spoken to told me that he forget that he was already there to pick up other people, and that we wouldn't be able to use it after all. Sounds about right, I thought to myself. Fortunately, there was another person staying at the hotel that my parents were staying at, and there was a large van there to pick her up, and he said that we could come, too. IT would just be a few minutes.

"How long will it take?" Mom asked.
"A few minutes. Maybe five, ten, fifteen, twenty, or thirty." Joe looked at me with a blank stare for a moment.
"What?" I asked

We got into the van and drove off after only fifteen minutes, and I was amazed at how on top of their game they were. Only fifteen minutes of waiting? That's unheard of. My mom looked out the window of the van at the kids who were walking the streets at about two o'clock in the morning.

"What are these kids doing?"
"Hanging out."
"Isn't there school tomorrow."
"Yes, and they might go. There is a big graduation test happening." Mom gave the blank stare this time.
"What?" I asked.

Morocco, as I have said before, is a nocturnal town. Stores are shuttered through the day, but once eight o'clock rolls around, it comes alive. The streets are filled with so many sounds, so many footsteps, that it becomes a beautiful cacophony of different lives. My parents, however, were more interested in getting to the hotel. We arrived there a little after two o'clock, and I asked my parents when they wanted me to pick them up for the day in Errachidia. I wanted to show them a souk and some other volunteers that I have gotten to know and eat at one of our favorite places.

"It's really late. I can just come at noon or maybe one in the afternoon." I said.
"No, we'll be fine," Mom replied, "You just come to pick us up at ten."
"Are you sure?" I asked.

My trip with David, whose trip from Pensacola left him quite tired, as I painfully recalled, came quickly to mind.

"No, come on. We'll be fine."

Rose Festival and Women

I recently attended the Rose Festival in Kelaat Mgouna, a town just outside of Ouarzazate. Similar to the Wedding Festival, The Rose Festival is like a very large souk. Unlike the Wedding Festival, where the focus is on wedding supplies and other items, the Rose Festival is, obviously, focused on the rose products of the Dades Valley Region. The roses here are particularly pungent; a delightful experience for most people, but an exercise in masochism for those with allergies to everything. I, of course, fall into the latter category.

Nonetheless, I did take some time to browse some of the wares of the local artisans to buy a necklace for Mother's Day.

I went there as a Peace Corps volunteer, and my job was to help the local organization teach about AIDS to the local men. According to recent evaluations by AMSED:

An estimated 25,500 people were living with HIV in Morocco in 2009, or 0.11% of adults. Among vulnerable groups in some regions the rate exceeds 5%. 46.2% of all new cases in the past five years were in two regions alone - Sous Massa Draa and Marrakech Tensift Al Haouz. HIV is mainly transmitted through sex (92.3%), of which 87% is heterosexual transmission and 5.3% sex between men. Morocco’s HIV epidemic appears to be growing, especially among young people and women. Women now account for 47.9% of infections.

Morocco is a very peculiarly positioned country; it is not quite a Middle Eastern country, due to it's Amazigh population and comparatively liberal policies, nor is it quite Europe, due to its Islamic influence, nor even African, due to the Sahara and the Atlas Mountains. It is its own combination of all three. We are fortunate that the country is willing to admit that there is an emerging problem with AIDS and STI issues, but we are also at a disadvantage with our freedom to speak openly about the main transmission of these infections, namely, intercourse. I remember sitting in the tent, listening to our peer educator speak to the men. He usually spoke in Arabic, but occasionally, he would break into the Tamazight language. This gave me an opportunity to catch some of the things he was saying. Every once in a while, he would turn to me and ask me a question about how easy it is to transfer AIDS through exchanging needles and sharing razor blades. I explained to him that the virus that causes HIV does not live outside of the body for long, and that there are other modes of transmission that are more likely to causes infection, like sex. He then began to talk about condoms. He explained some parts of the process, but then I finally grabbed a condom that was hidden behind a board and actually demonstrated the process of putting on a condom.

I felt happy that I was able to explain this very important tool in keeping safe, but I was also a little disappointed that the main topics that everyone is willing to talk about is sharing needles and razors. The topic of sex finally came up in the discussion, and I remembered a poster made by some boys for the SIDA Competition we held last year. The picture was of a man chasing after a women. The woman was dressed provocatively. Her shadow, however, was a depiction of a demon. The poster then went to the man later, very sick in a wheelchair, and then an image of a tombstone. The first thought that came to my mind was that the image portrayed women not as people, but as temptations for men, as though their only purpose in life was to make men stray from a holy life. I continued to listen to the conversation, and I wondered why they portrayed the women in such a manner. I understand that these kind of societies place emphasis on traditional gender roles, but I never understood why there seemed to be such an antagonism towards the sexes. In America, we have the so-called "Battle of the Sexes", consisting of politicians who want to control the bodies of women through legislation, but in comparison, America looks like a child's kickball game; here, it's an all out war. Men and women are separated for so much of their developmental years. I can't even imagine what life would be like if I had only male peers with whom to associate. My life was already difficult enough in the south; to be completely isolated from women, the only people with whom I really identified, would have killed me.

Another aspect of our job was to help guide men and women to get tested. Testing in Morocco is very low and sporadic, so the numbers, in my opinion, are not very reliable. It is similar to using interviews from people in Los Angeles and New York and then saying that all of America is like that. Any instance where testing can be encouraged is welcome, and we guided both men and women to it. I found out two things at the testing; of the sixty people tested, five showed positive results, a statistic of approximately 8%. That knowledge terrified me, and it still does. I thought of how often the men here go to prostitutes, and with how many men each prostitute has had sex. There are so many times that I wish I could just stand on a corner and tell that to every man who passes by without having him walk away from me. I also found out that there were police waiting at the testing center arresting some of the women for being sex workers. I can only assume that they were women, because, of course, only women can be found guilty of sex work.

I felt used, I felt betrayed, and I was awake all night for many nights, thinking to myself, "Did I encourage one of those women to get tested? Did I just unwittingly ruin the life of a woman?" All I wanted to do was help empower women, and now, if I played a part in the elimination of any freedom that they had, I don't know if I cold live with myself. It makes me feel dirty to know that I could have played a role in reconfirming the patriarchal structure of this country. It is wrong to use people for your own political and selfish benefit. They had no right to use me like that.

The sad thing is that I wish I could say that this sort of inequality is limited to developing nations. But I know it isn't true. Everywhere around the world, there are men who blame women for the violence perpetrated against them. Even in Canada, there is a notion that women who want to take control of their own sexuality deserve violence.

"I'm not supposed to say this," he told a group of students at an Osgoode Hall Law School safety forum on January 24, but to prevent being sexually assaulted, “Avoid dressing like sl

What I don't understand is how a sex that claims traits like "taking responsibility" and "strength" can both take advantage of women and then have the gall to shift the blame to the victim. This takes place everywhere, not just here. I don't understand men. I don't understand their psychology, and I don't understand the way they speak to each other. I can only hope that one day, we will be able to consistently hold an enlightened view of women and of men. Because the encouragement of these characteristics in boys not only does violence to women, but also to men. When you create barriers between the sexes, you create barriers inside of each group, as well. All people are individual creations. All people have their own unique qualities that should be encouraged. By respecting each person for who they are, they, in turn, will learn to respect others for who they are, also. With self respect comes respect for others. When you respect others for who they are, you no longer fear them, but can appreciate them for what they are.

Yes, I still feel frustrated over what happened, but I should know by now that this fear of women is universal. I only hope that one day, they will lose that fear.