I\’m conscious that writing this in English won\’t allow me to receive many visits from French IPs. Tant pis. Pourtant, I hope some of the ideas exposed below won\’t get me in trouble. They are just what I have understood from just watching Moroccan society. Maybe after some reading I will develop my arguments in a better way.
I\’ve always considered myself somebody quite open-minded, internationalised, trying to be a citizen of the world. I know how to be between Chinese, French, and Latin Americans without becoming insane from all the diffeent approches and attitudes that I need to adopt in a day at school. But I was wrong.
The first big cultural shock in my life was with Chinese traditional culture, which I refused to accept, and I still battle with it sometimes.
The second cultural shock was the one with Moroccans. Somehow, I feel that they are similar to the Chinese, concerning to tacit social rules, female role in family, confidence in a foreign colonizer language, civism. 4 points where they\’re not far from Chinese idiosincrasy. Of course, we can find divergent points (Chinese discriminate muslims, and the old generations are generally racist, just to mention an example). Maybe that\’s what restrained me.
1) Tacit social rules
Here, it depends if you\’re a atheist or muslim. If you\’re a tourist, you\’ll be forgiven of all your blunders in social circles. If you\’re a muslim, God will have mercy on you, but I wouldn\’t say the same from the society : you\’ll be expected to behave just like them, as if you have already made all of you research on Moroccan habits. The most caring will wait until you drift, be it intentionally or not, to politely remind you of the good ways. There is another type who will just shut it and keep it to themselves (and their Moroccan friends), which is not positive for you, because you\’ll miss a chance to change that thing that annoyed them and you\’ll lose some points in your \ »likeability\ ».
Idem for Chinese society.
2) Female role in family
A good Moroccan woman knows how to cook, how to gossip, takes care of her face, and is reserved. She doesn\’t expose the shapes of her body, nor is noisy late at night. She doesn\’t hum at 4 am during the Suhoor, knows when to talk about the latest recipe that she read on a magazine, and knows when to shut up. She can actively take part of the kitchen activities without any preparation or field recognition : any kitchen is her kitchen. Actually, she can partake any house chore. Technology is not really your field, not to mention informatics. You are not supposed to bury yourself under mountains of literature, history and philosophy, you\’d rather learn something that will be useful when you get married and have your family.
If you\’re Chinese, there will be less pressure concerning the house chores : if you\’ve got enough money thanks to your job (or your husband), you can always pay somebody else to do it. Speaking about the husband, he is crucial. Seriously. If you\’re 26 and don\’t have a prospective spouse, it will be your parents choice sooner or later, anybody, no matter how ugly/old/antipathetic. What matters is his reputation and his money. Otherwise, you\’ll be a dry woman. Which means shame on your family.
3) Confidence in a foreign language
Et ben là… its something that I can\’t change.
I know Arabic is their mothertongue, but most of the Moroccans I\’ve met have followed higher education, which is given in French. Their post signs are in French, as well as their market products. They have loads of French tourists, as well as a colonial past. So why ignoring my \ »Bonjour\ », \ »Merci beaucoup\ », \ »Au revoir\ », \ »Excusez-moi\ »? I don\’t think they would rather talk to me in English. I feel like starting a global organisation involving Tim Doner and Benny Lewis that will be in charge of flying huge flags all over the world with the motto : if you want to speak another language, just go ahead and speak. Obviously, I don\’t speak not even 50% of the languages the two polyglots above do, but I try to aim at that, because we share that love for languages. My spoken French was awful before I met a French speaking Moroccan, and became awesome friends, even now. My English was all thanks to Harry Potter. Come on, it\’s all about coming out of their comfort zone. And it\’s really selfish from their part.
Fortunately, not all Chinese are like that. Some are really obssesed with achieving a native speaker level of English for their CV (just read this). But I would say 1 out of 20 Chinese/Hongkongese in a classroom will try to approach you, just for the sake of speaking in English and getting to know you. That\’s sweet. The other 19 won\’t really approach you, either because they don\’t want to step out of their comfort zone (\ »Speaking in English, so bothersome\ »), either because they feel their English is crappy.
4) Civism
Morocco has got a king and a queen. And a Parlament, you should be glad they\’ve got a Parlament. No discussion. They are the maximum authority here, concerning politics and concerning religion as well.
_Politics: _We develop Casablanca, Rabat, Fès and Marrakesh. We export lots of products and nice beaches in Agadir. We stay good with Americans, maybe with French too, actually, better stay good with everybody. We have couscous and tagines, we don\’t look for problems.
_Religion: _Islam. Aid will be today. You\’re not married you two Moroccan citizen, you can\’t check-in in the same hotel room. You\’re a Moroccan female citizen, you can\’t get married with a non-muslim man. And then we see Moroccan girls twerking in mini-skirts in some clubs at Marrakesh. Shortly afterwards, you step into the country side and find the traditional men in their costumes driking mint tea and the covered women with their veil, taking care of their house and children.
Their only point in common, is that as long as they don\’t bother them, with their lifestyle, they won\’t bother about the government. They don\’t really care about democracy and those abstract stuff. Will they need to pay more? Will they need to change a habit? Will they need to move from where they are? And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the key to a peaceful nation. Leave the people tranquilos, and they will let you tranquilos Fix the small temporary problems with an inmediate solution, do just what is extremely necessary. The motto is \ »Why bother? Things have been like that, they work.\ »
The latter can be applied to China, its just that Morocco was more careful concerning their international image. And China is an atheist country.
Politics : WE WANT TO RULE THE WORLD. CHINE SUPREMACY. The Communist Party rocks! US accusing is rubbish. Of course we respect human rights.
Religion : Marx said \ »Religion is the opium of the people\ ». There is no such thing as a God. That is nonsense to control and manipulate the masses. Oh, sure, you can pay your offer to your ancestors. That\’s why we made the Clear Festival a holiday.
De quoi ?
Next time, I will just get a double shot of coffee and try to catch a \ »tagine\ » or \ »couscous\ » in their conversation in order to ask about food. Because that\’s the only subject where I\’m sure I won\’t offend anybody, unless I pick up food with the left hand.