A Quick Trip to Rabat

At the suggestion of my UPenn professor, I have been seeking out Moroccans who can help me read classical Arabic. Darija (Moroccan dialectical Arabic) and Fusha (standard Arabic) don't help me read millenium-old Arabic poetry from Al-Andalus.

Last week I found an essay online about the Andalusian poet Ibn Hazm written by a Moroccan scholar in Rabat. I sent her a quick email asking about Ibn Hazm and his love poetry, and she responded by asking me to join a workshop entitled "The Love Hate Enigma" that she was conducting.

Usually it wouldn't be possible. I work every day of the week but Friday. But it just so happened that Friday was the day of the workshop. So yesterday, I hopped on a train to Rabat and went to her house for the workshop.

I felt a bit out of place with a number of Moroccan scholars and one American working for an NGO, but all and all it went very well. The conversation ranged from French to Spanish to Arabic to English, but they tried to do most of it in English for us Americans.

Spending time with the NGO worker was a bit strange. I was dressed in slacks and a sweater, nothing special. I was certainly out-dressed: she wore a slick pant suit, complemented by Prada glasses and power heels. To top off the DC professional persona, she carried around a nice leather-bound planner.

She speaks excellent French, but she hasn't bothered to learn Arabic. She told me she did a cost/benefit analysis and she just couldn't see the utility of bothering to learn it. Such a sentiment utterly baffles me. Well, perhaps it doesn't baffle me. I understand that thoroughly American mentality, but I also dislike it and disagree with it. I have had amazing conversations and relationships with non-Americans thanks to the hours of language-learning I put in. And for me, there is no dollar or time value I can attach to those experiences.


Afterward we went out to the only Irish pub in Rabat (owned by an Italian of Roman extraction). In my short time there, I met a director of the Moroccan branch of AVIS and a lawyer who splits his time among Paris, Rabat, and New York City. But I couldn't stay long as I had to teach this morning, so I caught a train back to Meknes.

In the cabin where I was sitting, I noticed that the Moroccan family sitting around was dropping German words into their Darija at regular intervals. So I started talking to them in German. The man sitting next to me told me he was born in Germany, but his mother was born in Morocco. They lived there for a few decades. It isn't exactly clear to me why they came back, but they brought back a thoroughly altered Arabic. I've grown used to hearing the French content of Darija range from 10% to 40%, but German was a surprise.

Soon, we switched to Arabic. That's when I answered the standard slate of getting to know you questions that I know by heart now: Where are you from? What are you doing? Do you like Morocco? Are you Muslim?

We had a nice little conversation about Germany and Morocco, before we all turned back to our own music, books, and newspapers. It was short, but it was enjoyable. And it wouldn't have been possible if I hadn't spoken Darija or German.