Nadia and my new Sunday routine

Today (Sunday) was the first day that Nadia came to help me clean house. Nadia is a lovely young woman, the cousin of a friend of a friend. Nadia works all week and has part time work on Saturday. Sunday is her day off, and it was the only time that she could find free time in her regular schedule to start coming to my apartment to clean. I’d hoped that she could stay for an hour or two (the amount of time that 200 Dh could buy me), and help with the kitchen and bathroom/WC. She ended up staying for four hours, refusing things like drinks and pain au chocolat, and displaying a pretty amazing work ethic. She also didn't ask for more money, and identified work (like cleaning rugs) that she wants to do next time.

Today, not only did she scour the rooms where I really needed help, she also cleaned the huge salon marocain, the TV room, and the dining room. All on her "day off"!

I’m lucky as well, because Nadia is also a very good cook and she’s offered to make fried Moroccan pastries and even chicken for me next time. Ok, the chicken’s not for me (I’m vegetarian), but the pastries quite frankly don’t stand a chance!

I will mention that Nadia came today with another cousin who acted as our interpreter. Next week, though, we’re on our own. Nadia now represents just one more reason I need to stick with my Derija classes. It’s nice to have such good excuses to try learning Moroccan Arabic.

After about 30 hours and the equivalent of $46, I've just returned from a lovely trip to the town of Ifrane in the Middle Atlas Mountains of Morocco. While there, I visited Jane (another Fulbrighter) who is teaching at Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane (AUI) .

I also, of course, visited the university library (the third of the four OCLC member libraries in Morocco on my itinerary).

The trip began Tuesday morning in the rain, and by the time the CTM bus made it into the mountains that afternoon, there was a full-fledged snow storm all around us. The bus was safe (and by this time, warm, although there had been no heat for the first two hours of the journey).

Jane was happy to show me around last evening, and then this morning, I met with the library's director. Mr. Lotfi and I had such a riveting conversation that I never actually got to visit the staff areas or take photos of the building.

I tell myself that those will be among my goals for my NEXT visit to AUI...

Coffee and culture in Rabat

The Institute Français de Rabat (IFR) is a great resource in downtown Rabat, and is the local equivalent of the Alliance Française we seem to have in big cities in the United States. Not only do they have a series of cultural offerings such as expositions and films, but they also have a lending library and media center.

I checked out a book a few weeks ago, and thought that I was returning it one week late. Whatever the fee would have been, I assumed that it was less than taking a taxi there and back just to return the book.

The book was actually 2 weeks overdue. The fine? I can’t check out another book for the next two weeks!

Luckily, I my excuse to return the book doubled as a reason to have coffee with a friend that I met on the train a few weeks prior (a teacher by trade, who is willing to exchange French lessons for English lessons) so the whole trip wasn’t a complete disappointment. Mostly, Jallall and I sat and talked and drank coffee at their café instead of working, which was fine too. Jallal wanted me to take this photo so that I could include him in my blog, and I’m more than happy to oblige.

And today, Amina and I met at the other IFR location for coffee and a film: Des poupées et des anges. It’s nice to have cultural offerings in French in the heart of Rabat, but it’s especially nice to meet for coffee and conversation with Moroccan friends around the experience, too.

Digital library initiatives

The Réseau francophone des bibliothèques numériques nationales (RFBNN) (officially unveiled in late October) and Europeana (online since Thursday) are both drawing a lot of attention in these parts. Or, at least by librarians with the same interests as me.

Europeana is drawing criticism (see blog post from the 19^th) for its content and navigability. As much as I wish I could comment on it myself, I continue to be among those who are shut out. The Web site for Europeana states that it will be back online in mid-December, although it seems that some folks in the United States were able to get on since the announcement.

I did have the chance to look through the RFBNN project – this project is mostly headed up by the Bibliothèque et Archives Nationales de Québec (where I visited this past August for the conference of the Association internationale francophone des bibliothécaires et documentalistes (AIFBD) and I must say, they do impressive work. The RFBNN project seems to be easy enough to use, but some Francophone countries like Morocco don’t have much of any content. Apparently the BnF is going to try digitizing more, but in the mean time, it’s all just a little anticlimactic.

It’s great that so many new initiatives are out there, especially with the news that was released about the Google Books projects and their new library policy. Libraries are wise to take digitization seriously. However, it’s disappointing when projects are only at best half-finished or in such a beta format that they’re unusable at their time of release. A few years back, I learned in Web design class not to post a Web page if there was no content for it (an “under construction” banner wasn’t good enough) – the idea being that users don’t like to be turned away for any reason. I would think that the same is true of a project as huge as a digital library. I for one, at any rate, am very disappointed.

The importance of good neighbors

Today I spent about three hours with my neighbor talking about MARC21 (library data mark-up language) and my dissertation ideas. My neighbor works as a cataloger of rare manuscripts at the Moroccan national library (the BNRM) and is a lovely person. She came and talked to my students yesterday on her day off about their experiences with UNIMARC, so when she asked me to stop by today and start teaching her MARC21, it was easy to agree.

At one point, she actually offered to pay me. I politely refused. After all, this is between librarians! She pointed out that, more than that, this is between neighbors.

When Moroccans whom I've just met offer to bargain on my behalf, they fib and say that we are neighbors and have known each other for a long time. It lends credibility to the transaction. Of course, being family is worth more than being neighbors. My landlady likes to tell people that I'm married to her brother. She actually does have a brother, but of course, I'm not married.

Being a member of a professional group isn't how people self-identify here -- the clan is based on its members and its physical location. I'm not used to identifying with a physical location -- I've moved at least once a year (save one year) for the past 17 years. No, I don't identify with location or even with family, per se.

American that I am, I identify with the traits of the individual -- profession (what I've made of myself) and perhaps a certain set of ideals. I come from a "do" culture -- "What do you do?" and in Morocco, the people are part of a "be" culture -- "Where are you from? Are you married?" One of the speakers at the Fulbright orientation spoke brilliantly about the DOers and the BEers; I'm lucky he put me on guard to this, or the subtleties might have escaped me.

I must admit, this is the first place I've lived where I've known and eaten with inhabitants from THREE apartments in my building. There are benefits to having good neighbors, and I've got a box full of cookies that she insisted I take home to prove it.

The Saudi library in Casablanca

On Saturday, I went to Casablanca to visit the Bibliothèque de la Fondation du Roi Abdul Aziz, the Saudi king. This research library specializes in humanities and social sciences pertaining to Muslim Arab peoples of the Maghreb countries. Hanan had orchestrated the visit since neither of us had visited the library, but both had heard such good things about their work and were interested in seeing their operation firsthand.

The library itself is a work of art, having recently been expanded, and the staff are both serious and motivated. I remarked a willingness to innovate that is not always present in libraries, and the fruits of their work were evident in the number of dedicated users. Hanan and I arrived 20 minutes after the library opened, and we still had to wait ten minutes, nearly missing our appointment, because of the mob of users waiting to gain entrance.

Our guide was invovled in Tech. Services -- not a librarian by training, he had gone to workshops in France and Egypt and was in charge of all things Dewey-related. The library is an OCLC member library (one of only 4 in Morocco); they maintain their own tri-lingual thesaurus of descriptors, apply an adapted (read: expanded) DDC in their cataloging, and are currently using Horizon as the ILS since Horizon is Arab character-friendly and has an office in Egypt.

I have not yet had a chance to tour operations at the national library in Morocco, but from what I've seen and heard, the Saudi library is in many ways carrying out some of the roles typically associated with a national institution. Innovation, access, bibliography, mission, focus, and professionalism are all abundantly evident in their work. I salute the librarians at the Saudi library. They should be very pleased with their work and with the service they are providing.

Conference: the Bibliothèque nationale du Royaume du Maroc

On Thursday and Friday, November 13 and 14, 2008, the Moroccan national library (the Bibliothèque nationale du Royaume du Maroc or BNRM) sponsorsed a colloquium on national libraries entitled

« Les bibliothèques nationales : enjeux et perspectives »

Because the building was recently inaugerated by His Majesty the King of Morocco on October 15, 2008, it was exciting that so many librarians from foreign countries came to participate and to see the new facilities.

Third year students in the "Librarian" option at the Ecole des Sciences de l'Information take a class with me that covers national libraries. We were fortunate to have been invited to attend the second day of the conference. Yet again, students came to the conference instead of going home to their families, even though we'd already had class that week on Monday as usual. Four students from the 2nd year also snuck in (with permission from yours truly). It was a great experience for all concerned, and one that is absolutely unique. One of the third-year ESI students even asked a question of one of the presenters during the question-and-answer session (and the question was a good one!)

Derija, or Moroccan Arabic: مرحب

My Arabic course at CCCL meets twice a week (Wednesday and Friday) for 1.5 hours. I've been trying for about a month to learn to both speak and read. It's not easy, and I genuinely wish that I had a lot more time to spend learning the language.

Moroccan Arabic is different from Classical Arabic in the way that Spanish is different from (a derivative of) Latin. When university (or high school, etc.) classes are taught in Arabic in Morocco, they are taught in Classical Arabic. Moroccans can understand Egyptians speaking Egyptian Arabic, for example, but communication isn't easy.

Standard (spoken) Moroccan Arabic is unique, and I have a suspicion that some of the differences have to do with the French Protectorate that lasted until 1956. The Classical Arabic that I learned at Rutgers uses an alphabet with /TH/ and /th/ sounds. The Moroccan alphabet does not have these letters, and coincidently, the French pronunciation system does not produce them either.

All of this leads to the problem of explaining to Moroccans my first name, since neither language that Moroccans know has prepared them for pronouncing it. « Heather » has the /th/ in the middle and the /r/ at the end that poses problems for the French, but that is also unpronounceable in Moroccan Arabic, as it turns out. I've decided, for the second time while in Morocco, to introduce myself as Léa (my middle name). It just leaves more time for having more interesting exchanges, either in very limited Arabic, or in French.

بسلامَ (Goodbye)

Conquering a head-cold

With the current rainy and cold weather, I managed to catch a bit of a head cold the other day. I've heard Fulbrighters from cold-weather areas state that they'd never been as cold as they had during winters in Morocco. It's as cold outside as it is inside, often, because the houses have to be vented for the Butagaz tanks (to avoid explosions) and because there is no indoor heating system. I understand parts of California are similar, but don't think that it gets quite as humid and cold there....

The things I've learned from this experience are the following:

The pharmacies are like the ones in Europe. All one has to do is go in, and if the symptoms are obvious, the pharmacist will give something to the client immediately. The pharmacist I saw was French. She gave me a powder to take three times a day. I have no idea what it is; she only told me that it's NOT and antibiotic. It's working like a charm.

Warm liquids help. I've been drinking lots of tea, and if there's water from my electric kettle left over, I use it to wash dishes instead of only using cold water from the tap. I've also been drinking juice and making soup. A friend taught me to tie a scarf around my head and ears too. That and neck scarves are helping immensely with keeping me warm.

Space heaters are essential. The heater that I found in the closet of my apartment is doing wonders for staving off the cold in my office. I've got it on one of the small wooden tables that had been in the living room (see photo below). It's right next to my desk and computer so that now my hands are warm enough to type again! It's a huge improvement. Huge.

Election history

Last night, the American Embassy hosted the "Nuit des élections" at the TGI Friday's restaurant opposite the Lycée Descartes. I arrived to the restaurant early with a fellow Fulbrighter to have dinner before the event, but discovered that the Embassy had rented the entire restaurant for the entire evening. Police were everywhere, and security for entry was tight.


Guests who arrived closer to the appointed time received buttons. Apparently, the Embassy wanted to be impartial, and handed out buttons at random. See photo for Fulbrighters who had voted for the same candidate, but who received different buttons.

The election has been big news recently here. The Palin prank call was picked up by French network news and televised here. Below is the YouTube version that someone digg'd a few days back (how I found out about it), and that aired on Moroccan TV less than 24 hours later.

This morning felt like the Christmases of my childhood, almost, as I woke up in a chilly apartment and was immediately anxious to run and see ... the results. I'd actually left my computer by my bed so that I wouldn't have to go too far.

Indeed, this is the first time in the past eight years that I've been "proud" in the truest sense of the word to be American. It's difficult to be abroad when one disagrees vehemently with the politics at home. In summer 2001, friends in France told me that GW was unable to explain to French reporters the meaning of Memorial Day during a late-May European tour. That was just a very mild beginning, of course, to my discomfort with the regime that has been in power for the past 8 years.

But today, I got to wake up and hope for change along with the rest of America, and indeed, the world. I'm proud that my country was able to see past race and to elect the better candidate.

And I'm prouder than ever to be an American.

« Summer back » and autumn in Morocco

Yesterday night, folks in most of the United States changed their clocks, setting them back one hour to return to Normal Time. We here in Morocco had no such inconvenience. Perhaps your assumption is that Morocco doesn't participate in Daylight Savings. Well, actually it does, it's just that Morocco *already* "fell back" ... in September. We've been at GMT for two full months now, in fact.

Because in Ramadan it's necessary to wait until sundown to eat, and since Ramadan began in September, the Moroccans decided to move their clocks to Normal Time several months early, thereby making the sun set "earlier". F-tour (or "Iftar" -- breakfast) during Ramadan began at 6:45 p.m. instead of 7:45 p.m. under this plan. Apparently the official decision to change the time was made at the last minute, leaving airlines and other time-dependent international operations scrambling to update schedules.

The lack of time change doesn't mean, though, that autumn isn't in the air. It's been cold and rainy for days now, with no end in sight. Some of the major highways in the country have been closed because of flooding. The BBC Rabat weather site says that the average (a.m.) relative humidity in November is 89% ... which makes for a soggy chill that cuts right through a person. Since there's no heat in the houses, it's especially challenging to stay warm at night. It's also a long wait for one's clothes to dry on the line.

And of course, another sign of autumn is the switch to cold-weather clothes. Yesterday I packed up all the warm-weather clothes I'd brought and stored them away for next spring. I then went out and bought a couple of sweaters, partly to celebrate the change in seasons, and partly because I don't have a space heater yet. I guess that'll be my next big purchase!

Moroccan cafés

This has been the week of cafés for me. For the first time since I've been here, I ventured out into the world of cafés, both times with foreign women, to sample the delicious strong coffee and marzipan cookies. It seems to be acknowledged in Moroccan society that the cafés are the domain of men, and that women "rule the roost" at home, but as a foreigner in the capital city, I'm able to do cross some boundaries that local women aren't.

That's not to say that in big international cities like Rabat, it's impossible to find women in cafés. That's absolutely not true. If the woman is Moroccan, she's generally with a man, and they're seated indoors. Foreign women are afforded, from what I can tell, many of the same luxuries as the men of Morocco, and are able to go to cafés by themselves. Outside of Rabat, though, I don't know that folks would be quite as indulgent with a Western woman's transgression of Moroccan social norms.

Until this point, I haven’t ventured into a café by myself, but other than the occasional trip to Panera to break the monotony, I wouldn’t be likely to go to a café alone in the U.S. either. I’m thrilled, however, that this week I had the chance to go out for coffee twice, and am pleased to report that both times it was divine. Good coffee, good food, and good conversation -- what more can one want?