The Educated Prostitute

On that morning, I was heading to the newspaper with no new stories or article projects in mind when my editor-in-chief called me to ask whether I’ll be interested in interviewing a very special person, and to publish her memories on a daily basis in the newspaper. This very special person was a young student who became a professional prostitute. The editor-in-chief of course was only interested in raising the sales, because the golden rule in journalism is that “When there is no news, you should create the news”. And what’s better than dealing with one of the society’s prime taboos to make the news. I only had one answer to give: I’ll do it! Morocco has the reputation of having a significant number of young prostitutes. Maybe this stereotype other Middle Eastern countries have about us is a bit exaggerated, but still, Morocco has very well structured prostitution webs, which transform innocent girls to mighty night creatures, and even export them to work outside the country. What most people ignore is that prostitution was a very prosperous activity in pre-Islamic Morocco. Native Berber tribes used to set tents on the roads after the harvest season to offer “entertainment” to peasants after a year of hard work. Prostitution then, was a social service which allowed money circulation among all the tribe’s members. Islam couldn’t change much in the anthropological habits of local people. In my opinion, the high prostitution rates among young Moroccan girls can be explained by the extreme openness to the west and the cultural predisposition to this kind of activities. For me it was very difficult to write about the subject. Should I feel pity or contempt, compassion or disgust towards this young girl with a university degree who decided to sell her body to make a living? I’ve just decided to play the role of the objective pen, which describes what it hears and sees without the interference of any subjective feelings. Though, it was hard not to make a comparison between me and her. We were both Moroccan girls, born in the same year, listening to the same music, and with university degrees. Yet, each of us chose a different path, or maybe that path chose her. Her name was Aïcha. She was very blond, very tall, and very beautiful, the kind of the 1960s American films’ beauty. Aïcha had to move after high school from her small town called Lhajeb to study English Literature in Meknes’ college. “My parents didn’t prepare me to live alone in the city. I come from a poor background where talking about sex is a taboo”, she told me while gazing at the horizon. In the girls’ dorms, Aïcha learned how to dress, to put on make-up, and to talk like a woman. It is also in the university dorms that she was tempted to make some pocket money to pay for the pretty clothes which can make her look like city girls. The first step to the abyss was going out incognito with older men who invited her to good restaurants, and make her discover her charms and feminity. The deadly stab was when she discovered that she had to pay with her body for the few bills to realize her late adolescence fantasies. Once Aïcha graduated, it was difficult to leave her well-paid night life for miserable desk work or to abandon the lights of the big city for a small house in Lhajeb. She told me with a bitter voice “When I was studying it was just to make pocket money. I didn’t realize that I am a prostitute until it became my full-time job after graduating”. Aïcha is still now living in the city and working as a prostitute to send money to her family and pay for her charges. Her education and beauty make very rich and well-known men from over the world pay for her services. After filling four, 120-minute tapes and finishing the interview, the young girl looked straight into my eyes and said “I fast every Ramadan and pray five times a day for Allah to forgive me, but when the night comes I realize that I have to go work for the money.” Today, whenever I drive across the girls’ dorms of the university, I wonder how many Aïchas are there waiting to be tempted by the big city’s illusive and misleading lights? How many would resist and how many would fall?

Sidi Ifni: The Truth

A lot of things were said about what happened in Sidi Ifni in the national media, the International one, the positions of the officials, the positions of the civil society… Here I suggest to have a look at a neutral bloger’s eye. This alternative source of news can very effective sometimes to transmit the TRUTH and nothing but the TRUTH.

The Movement Of All Opportunists

The Movement of All Democrats became the Movement of All Opportunists during the communication meeting held by Fouad Ali Hima and his team in Rabat in the 17th May 2008.

“Information is Holy, and Comment is Free”

25 Moroccan youth and 25 American youth met in the POMED and AID conference, “Find Your Voice: A Cross-Cultural Forum on Political Participation and Civic Activism”, which took place in The Moroccan Capital Rabat last Month. I was asked to share my experience as a young English-speaking blogger with the participants? So I’ve decided to tell them my story through 3 verbs: To Inform When to the Moroccan Journalism School for the first time, the first thing I saw was a banner in the entrance wall with sentence “Information is holy, and Comment is Free”. This sentence haunted me for my 4 years in that school, until it became a part of who I am. Unfortunately, in everyday’s journalistic practice all the editors-in-chief I’ve worked with were hammering on me that my opinion doesn’t matter, and only pure information matters. After some years of swallowing my voice, I started believing that “Information is free” but “Comment is not free”. Therefore, I started looking for a way to express my voice. To Express In 2004, during one of the first blogging conferences in Morocco by Rachid Jankari, the first Moroccan blogger, I finally discovered the way to express my voice. That night I came home very excited, and created my first blog. It was the kind of blogs where you write your diaries and post poems and abstract photos. In 2006, I started my official blog “Words for change”, because I believe that my only weapon is my words and that by spreading the word it may change the world. Maybe I blog out of narcissism, maybe I blog out frustration, maybe I blog because I would like to share my thoughts, and tell the rest of the world about the place I live in and the problems people of my age face. In all cases, I think that blogging gave me back my voice and completed the other half of that old sentence “Comment is Free”. We are 30 000 Moroccan bloggers today. Some blog in French, and they are stereotyped as being bourgeois blogging kids who went to French schools. And some blog in Arabic, and they are stereotyped as being Islamist radicals. In between there is some youth who blog in English, including me, who are stereotyped as being American spies. Well, the reality our diversity is a capital that make our strength, even if we aren’t organized as a community yet. Rachid Jankari described the Moroccan Blogosphere as being in its “Adolescence”, which make it unable to compete with classical Medias, and somehow unable to educate. To Educate Few months ago, I became a youth ambassador within the Middle East Youth Initiative, which gave me the chance to act as a peer-educator with my blog posts. The MEYI was initiated by the Wolfensohn Centre for Development at Brooking and the Dubai School of Government, as to promote economic and social inclusion of youth in the Middle East by creating an international alliance of academics, policymakers, youth leaders and leading thinkers from the private sector and civil society. With the MEYI, I realized how it’s difficult to educate, especially that I’m just a 23 years simple girl from the region. My work as a Youth Ambassador is about sharing my little experience as a young journalist, as a youth activist, and as a human being. And that’s the best part of it, because as human beings, my readers may reach a self-identification status, and that’s what may educate. That’s my story. The story of a blogger who believes that words may bring change, so “spread the word, it may change the world”. That’s how I’ve found my Voice. I hope you’ll find yours!

Living With AIDS: Aicha, My Hero!

I always thought that real heroes are those who invented complicated machines or those who came-out with genius theories. All that, was before I met Aicha. Aicha in Arabic means Living. Indeed, in her eyes we can see the flame of life that only true heroes have. In addition to her 8 children and husband, Aicha is living with an unpleasant guest everyday inside her weak body: AIDS. With her pink traditional dress, which they call Tub in Sudan, Aicha was standing in front of 70 strangers to tell proudly her story with AIDS, during the UNDP HARPAS workshop for Independent Artists, Bloggers, and Journalists, which was held in Cairo from the 5th to the 8th May. “I didn’t commit any crime. I was operated for appendicitis, and they transferred to me blood infected with AIDS. I had to face my family, my children, and the whole society”, she said to her curious audience. In fact in many Arab countries a huge quantity of blood is still used without being well examined. Aicha was lucky enough to have an understanding husband, who supported and encouraged her to tell her story on television and in international meetings without any fear or shame, in such a conservative society full of taboos. Undeniably, “HIV/AIDS’ power is not in the Virus itself, but in the vicious circuit of fear and stigma linked to it”, as Doctor Ihaab Al Kharat from the HARPAS team has explained during the same workshop. In fact, AIDS is just like any other illness that we can live with without any risks if we take the right medicine at the right time. Nowadays 39.5 million people worldwide are living with the Virus. In the Arab Region they are more than 460 000 people living with AIDS. Yet, I would like to question these figures given by the UNAIDS, because they are all based on government statistics. How can we imagine that a country like Syria only have 300 HIV/AIDS cases, without mentioning the whole Khalij region which doesn’t want to communicate any official figures on the issue? Another alarming figure is that only 5% of the declared AIDS cases in the region have access to treatment. Not because of luck in medicine, but because of the society taboos and of a coward suicidal discourse related to the Virus. I was so impressed by Aicha that I decided to sit with her and have a long friendly talk. I was like a little child staring at this monument-like lady strong and confident in her 30s. She told me how her husband and she are living a normal sexual life by using condoms during their intercourses. Aicha also gave birth to a little girl, who doesn’t have the Virus, after following the right treatment that reduces the quantity of HIV in the blood during the pregnancy period. However, if science found a way to cope with the situation, the reaction of the doctors, who are supposed to be the most compassionate towards people living with AIDS, was very harsh on her. Once the medical staff learned about her case, they just put her in the quarantine and left her sinking in her blood and tears, shouting until the head of the baby came out. When I’ve heard that story, I was so angry and disgusted at the same time. I cried fiercely and hugged Aicha. I could not describe that moment. I felt that she is a young woman just like me, and that all the stereotypes of the society disappeared. 48% of people living with AIDS in the Arab World are women, and Aicha is one of the few women who are coping with the Virus in a normal way. I feel I’ve found a hero made out of flesh and blood, who can inspire me in my daily life. For Aicha, and because I believe in life, I will go tomorrow morning to check my blood in one of the local centres, where I can get a free HIV/AIDS test. I hope you’ll do the same! Friends who wrote on the same subject: http://www.charkawy.blogspot.com/ http://simplyme-stairway.blogspot.com http://shokeir.blogspot.com http://justice4every1.blogspot.com http://nournour.blogspot.com http://ahmedzidan.spaces.live.com/blog/ http://basmagm.wordpress.com http://resstlesswaves.blogspot.com/2008/05/blog-post_15.html http://ana-ikhwan.blogspot.com/2008/05/blog-post_15.html http://zenzana.blogspot.com/2008/05/blog-post_15.html http://www.alisafar.com/viewpage.php?page_id=19 http://kasakiswarak.blogspot.com/2008/05/blog-post_15.html http://abujoori.wordpress.com/ http://elnaswiel3alam.blogspot.com/2008/05/blog-post_14.html http://www.hamoudstudio.com/ http://www.mshjiouij.com http://www.wanna-b-a-bride.blogspot.com/ http://www.assafir.com/weeklychannel.aspx?EditionId=937&ChannelId=5246 http://bikya.blogspot.com/ http://butterflybahrain.wordpress.com

Moroccans Don’t Read The Coran!

According the latest investigation on Moroccans and Religious values, initiated by three famous Moroccan researchers: Mohamed El Aydi, Hassan Rachik, and Mohamed Tozy 60% of the Moroccan population have never read Coran before!

I wanted to share with you the outcomes of this research because I’ve found it very interesting, and I was personally choked to notice how incoherent Moroccans can be towards their religion. In fact only 5.6% of Moroccans read Coran everyday, 28.1% read it from time to time, and 58.9% have never read Coran. Well, I can situate my self with the 28%, but I couldn’t believe that even with our strict Islamic educational manuals which impose on us to learn by heart many Sourat and the traditional religious education in the countryside, 60% of the population still have never read their holy book. Probably the statistics are the same in a county like France regarding the bible-readers. Yet, France is a secular country whereas we are an Islamic county if we believe our constitution. Moreover, religious symbols are everywhere: mosques, clothing, education, Imarat Al Muminin…

In the same investigation, 40% of Moroccans think that even if you don’t fast during Ramadan you are still considered as Muslim. 57% disapprove mixed beaches, so maybe I’d better not go swim with a bikini this summer. 83% of the interviewed Moroccans think that women should wear a veil, so I really shouldn’t go swim with a bikini this summer. However, 84% of the population disapproves Takfiir! I feel released, because even if I swim with a bikini and even if most people wouldn’t like it but I would still be seen as a proper Muslim girl!

In addition, more than 99.9% of Moroccan thinks that Islam is the best religion ever and that there is an answer for everything in the Coran, starting from the social organization to the political, economic, and even technological matters. I just wonder why don’t they read Coran so often if there is an answer to everything in its pages? Well, maybe I should go read Coran right now to find an answer to this issue!

The Communist Minister of the his Majesty

The Moroccan Minister of Social Welfare Nezha Squalli is taking off her politically-correct face and unveiling her hardcore communist face. In fact Nezha Squalli shamelessly asked for the banishment of the call for prayer of Al Fajr, because she claims that it is disturbing the wellbeing of the foreign tourists during their exotic staying in Morocco.

Well, I would just remind Madame Squalli, that she belongs to a government of an Islamic country and she is “for the moment” the Minister of Amir Al Mu’minin the Prince of the Faithful. Therefore, asking the Minister of Islamic Affairs Ahmed Ataoufik to find a legal way to ban the call of prayer not to disturb tourists is an insult to the high symbols of this nation. Furthermore, the tourists coming to Morocco are supposed to respect the local customs, as Moroccans would do for the Bell rings in Christian countries.

Maybe the Minister, who was a militant of the Moroccan Communist Party, still believes deep-inside that “Religion is the Opium of the People”. Yet, the outrageous thing about this story is that the PPS, the Party of Progress and Socialism is defending their Minister and calling the Press to stop judging Nezha Squalli. For their pat the Islamist movements inside Morocco as well as the more traditionalist streams of the Moroccan Civil Society are calling the Minister to submit her resignation as soon as possible, because she don’t represent the Moroccan population.

From My side I would kindly advice our dear Minister to look to her face in the mirror and ask herself who is she? Since, if a Minister in the government of his Majesty still struggles with her religious identity how can she be an example for the rising generations?

Diaries Of A Young Pen: I Do Not Tolerate, I Care

When I was packing my bags to go to the Catalonia, Spain to the Euro- Med training on Gender and Religion, I was wondering if it’s not just some other futile training full of theory and which never come up with any practical projects or achievements. Well I was wrong!

During the training course Jews, Christians, Muslims, and non-believers had to live, travel, work and party together for 10 days in the Comarruga Youth Hostel. We all came with our education, our religious backgrounds, our stereotypes, and methods of work. Yet, the 23 participants from all over the Meditareenian Sea were all ready to learn and to tolerate people from other confessional roots.

The fourth day we went in a field trip to Tarragona to visit the various religious communities there. Guess what, there was no Jewish community in this old Roman marvellous city because of the 15th century hatred, whereas the strong Muslim community is still struggling to build a mosque for its believers. Spain is a secular country according to its constitution. Yet, the state still supports the Church by giving 8% of the taxes’ incomes to the Catholic Christian Church. In addition, Spain still seems much occupied by its bloody past full of Judaic & Islamic phobia of the early Catholic Kings of Spain.

Michael, Paulo and I weren’t affected by this Spanish mood. A Jew, a Christian and a Muslim succeeded in becoming friends very easily during this training course. Micha is a Russian Jew who left his family in Moscow at the age of 16 to go to Israel living in a Kibbutz and serving 3 years in the Israeli Army. He is now a traditional and modern Judaic jewellery designer in Jerusalem waiting for the Devine call to become a committed Religious Jew. Paulo was born in Roma in Italy, with a balcony on the Vatican and the sounds of thousands of bells ringing all over the place. Paulo even shacked-hands with the formal Pope John Paul II when he was a child, but since he is a social sciences graduates Erasmus student, he just decided to question his given dogma and travel around the world looking for Secular answers instead of Religious ones. As regards me, I was born in a conservative Moroccan Muslim family. I discovered other religions very early, and have chosen to remain a very spiritual Muslim out of conviction. My studies of journalism, diplomacy and communication thought me how to be very politically correct with people different than me without really caring about them.

In this training we were just three human beings willing to learn and go forward. Micha was sharing with us his stories in the army when he caught a 9 years old Palestinian kamikaze. Paulo was telling us that he sees the bible as a literature book and questions the nature of the Christ. When, I was telling them how important for me to stay Virgin until marriage because of my belonging to the Prophet Mohammed’s genealogical tree. We were so different in education, faith and hopes, yet, we all enjoyed heavy metal songs, the smell of tobacco or extra olive oil on our meals.

In one of the simulations of the course, each of us has to play a role other than his real life’s role. I had to be the representative of a very conservative party. I’ve had to stand against the building of a Muslim mosque in Spain. After the simulation was over; I felt very bad because for few hours I had to be the persecutor of my own community especially that many Moroccan immigrants in Europe suffer from the same right wing discourse everyday. I discovered how hatred is easy and how tolerance and acceptance is hard to reach as far as religious issues are concerned.

By Tomorrow I’ll be back in my country, where I am surrounded of Muslims everywhere and where the Media and the different ideological discourses are the only resource to discover people from other religions. Nevertheless, this time I’ll be taking with me in my bags the souvenir of three friends from different backgrounds who learned to tolerate each other, to accept each other as we are, to coexist for 10 days in peace, and above all to care about one another. This caring is the main achievement one can get as a human being.

* This article is a MEYI property (http://www.shababinclusion.org)

The Moroccan Monkey

Everybody knows the story of the three Japanese Wise Monkeys (see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil). Well let me tell you the story of a young journalist, who feels like that monkeys. Yet, this Monkey seeks no wisdom. She just feels that her senses are being paralyzed by too much frustration in a Middle Eastern country called Morocco.

I CAN’T SEE. In my country we have only two TV channel, and both are controlled by the state. There are people I don’t like to see, like the characters they show on TV who look like living on another planet. There are people I would like to see, like the political leaders or my municipality civil servants. Unfortunately, these people sit on desks situated in very high towers which my sight can’t reach. And there are things I’m forced to see, like the thousands of doctorate holders protesting in front of the parliament, the poor youth being brain-washed trying to bomb them selves, or many others who venture on the Mediterranean Sea risking their lives to make a living.

I CAN’T HEAR. I’ve grown up in the middle of the Economic crisis of the 1980s and 1990s. We had no music of our own then. We used to listen to music made by other people to other people. I live in a place where we hear rumours all the time, because we are somehow afraid of the truth. Sometimes I hear machines and constructions around. However, even deaf; I can still understand that these houses and infrastructures are not for me, but for wealthy people who can pay for it.

I CAN’T SPEAK. My tongue is chained by three chains called: Religion, Patria, Monarchy. I can shout on strikes, on football games, or on public markets, but what can I have to say if I can’t speak about the main components of my identity, as noted in our constitution: Islam, Morocco, and the King.

The Moroccan Monkey is handicapped in his senses. Still, he has a heart full of hope, honour and ambition. With his heart he can see him self in the mirror of reality, hear the hymn of change and shout loud for glory!

Who is the Elephant and who is the Donkey?

The Moroccan people are a bit different than the rest of the Middle East in terms of International relations. For example, International news has a very small place in our Press and TV. People don’t really care about what is happening. They are becoming more like Western people who are busy making a living. Yet, Moroccans still react sometimes when there is a psychological geography feeling with some countries like Palestine or Iraq. However, the 24 hours channels hammered a lot these subjects to the point that everyone sees these conflicts now as daily routine. Even in universities, we still don’t have strong International Relations’ departments or analysts, like the Egyptians or the Palestinians. In this mix, Moroccan young public opinion is still very reactive instead of well informed.

Even if the US Elections are very crucial for Morocco, Young Moroccans don’t seem really to distinguish between Democrats and Republicans or Donkeys and Elephants, apart from some rare elite or International Studies’ students. Morocco needs the US support not only in its big battle for the Sahara issue but in all development and military affairs now on. Therefore, the modern Moroccan kingdom is still more concerned about what’s going on in France more than what’s going on in the US. I have even experienced a fever of enthusiasm among the supporters of Sarkozy and Royal during the French 2007 elections. I may suggest that the Transformational Diplomacy of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice hasn’t been well implemented in Morocco. One can just visit the US Embassy’s web site http://www.usembassy.ma/ to notice that nothing have been done to inform the average Moroccan about the US elections! The truth is, the revolutionary diplomacy of Rice about going to the normal people and explaining to them what is happening, and making diplomats like field people, is nothing but wonderful dreams.

I really think, it would be good if I can make a small opinion poll among Moroccan youth on the US elections battle. From what I know and have been discussing with my friends, Moroccans favour the Clinton family. Hilary Clinton has good ties with Morocco. She even created in my University a Centre for Women Empowerment which operates in the Atlas region http://www.aui.ma/VPAA/hrcwec/index.htm. Hilary Clinton also received an honorific Master degree for her work. Moreover, Bill Clinton has a reputation of a man of peace in the Moroccan mind after what he did in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The ex-president visited Morocco and was the architect of the free trade agreement between the two countries, whereas, President Bush just sent a letter of apology to the Moroccan king for not being able to come to Morocco in his Middle East tour.

Yet, the US has impregnated for the last years an image of a “Macho” & a “Racist” state. Therefore, I often hear my peers saying that “even if Americans look very democratic, but they are still a patriarchal conservative state, which won’t allow a woman to rule them”. Furthermore, young Moroccans also may tend to think that Americans won’t accept an afro-American president like Obama, even with Operah’s support.

From another perspective, young Moroccans are big consumers of the American film industry. Thus, American serials like “24 Hours” or “Commander in Chief” have contributed to make the idea of having a female or an afro-American president of the World’s greatest power more acceptable for the world’s mass.

Waiting for the Transformational Diplomacy’s revolution http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2006/59306.htm to gain more concern about the American political matters, the young Moroccan is still in general lost between the Elephant and the Donkey. But to be fairer with the Moroccan public opinion, let’s wait and see how the mass will react on the elections’ eve once they have more information.