Wednesday, January 27, 2021

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Morocco’s Children of the Moon Suffer in the Dark of Poor Health Care

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by FRANCINE KRIEGER

This article was published by Global Health Hub on June 25, 2014.

MOROCCO – Mounir Yakdone died at 7 years old in pursuit of an education. His parents warned that the walk to school would continue to kill him, but the one-eyed boy painted with skin tumors felt he had nothing to lose.

Nozha Chkoundi and Mohammed Yakdone had taken their son Mounir to a public hospital in Casablanca when he was 3 years old. They were concerned about the freckles that multiplied on his skin with each passing day.

Alumni Update: Karis Hustad

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I am happy to say, I have been chosen as a Fellow! So I will be headed to Hyderabad in July. Really thrilled for this opportunity. When I say I would not be here without your influence, I mean it. The Morocco program really pushed me out of my comfort zone in the best way and made me realize how important it is to empower young storytellers and local journalists, which is what I’ll be doing with this fellowship. And without that clip, I wouldn’t have made it to the Monitor, which has opened up so many possibilities.

Alumni Update: Jacob Axelrad

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I’ll be working in the Innovations department for The Christian Science Monitor this summer, which means I’ll be reporting mainly on new innovations and trends in technology and how that plays out around the world. However, I plan on trying my hands at many different kinds of stories while I’m at the Monitor.

On a separate note, I’ve received a student fellowship from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting to do some more international journalism, which I’ll do in the fall after my summer internship concludes. After consulting with Maddy Crowell, I’ve decided to go to Ghana and plan on staying there as long as I can in order to sufficiently report my stories (the Pulitzer Center requires a series of articles, a photo slideshow, and a video documentary as part of the assignment).

Do Human Evolution and Islam Conflict in the Classroom?

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By SADIA KHATRI

This article was published on April 01, 2014 by Al Fanar Media, an online publication that covers higher education in the Arab world. It was presented there under an agreement with The Chronicle. 

Rabat, Morocco—Hanging outside of Professor Touria Benazzour’s office is a cut out of a magazine portrait of Charles Darwin.

Benazzour put it up when she began teaching human evolution 25 years ago, one of the first professors to introduce the sensitive and controversial topic in a Moroccan classroom. Today, Benazzour teaches in the Master’s degree program at Mohammad V University, the capital’s oldest higher-education public institution.

MOJ student doc in Film Fest

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Willing to Break, the powerful story of a veiled Moroccan break dancer, will be featured in the Minneapolis St Paul International Film Festival on April 14. American students Sutton Raphael and JP Keenan produced this doc with their Moroccan partner Loubna Fouzar. I will be present after the film to talk about our program and answer questions from the audience. With an annual attendance that exceeds 40,000, the MSP International Film Festival is known as the largest film event in the Upper Midwest. Very proud of our students!

A Kasala’s Warmth

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By FATIMA SUGAPONG

RABAT, Morocco- Fatima Bamu sits down very slowly, exhausted after an eleven hour workday. Her wrinkled, leathery brown hands, worn from 40 years of working in a public bath house known to the Rabat citizens as the hammam, rested on her lap. She closed her eyes as she kept her prayers close to the ring of her lips.

Everyone in the room respected her privacy. She rocked in a small back-and-forth motion in her tan djelleba, a piece of traditional Moroccan clothing, and her scarf.

“I do my job because I don’t have any other way to live,” Bamu said.

Snail Soup? Camel Spleen? It’s Morocco’s Fab Street Food

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By SERENITY BOLT

This story was published by Zester Daily on March 3, 2014.

FEZ, Morocco– We’ve all heard the warnings that travelers should avoid street food. But doing so means missing the real food culture — the simple, fresh delicacies prepared for locals. With a little common sense, it’s easy to leave your fear of the unknown (or of getting sick) behind and reap one of the greatest rewards of travel.

Moroccan culture buzzes in the ancient medina of Fez al-Bali, the world’s largest car-free area, where Gail Leonard, a British ex-pat, offers street food tasting tours through her company, Plan-It Fez.

Snoopy, A Graduate From Morocco’s Only Circus School

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By VICTOR MASSARI

RABAT, Morocco – A tall man clutching a handbag filled with gold fractures of an old brass instrument enters downtown Rabat. His shaggy curls cascade from the back of his baseball cap as he reaches into his bag to pull out metal rings, a voice-looping machine, an iPad, an amplifer, and an endless line of cables. This is Rabat’s own local street performer, Badr “Snoopy” Houtar, 27.

“My mother always said I give life to objects,” said Houtar. “Where some people see just a plastic bag, I see a world of fun.”

Houtar, 27, stopped pursuing a degree in architecture four years ago to enroll in the only circus school in all of Morocco.

Alumni Update: Kirsten Kortebein, Vemo Hang and Stacy Wheeler

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This past weekend MOJ Spring 2012 alumni Kirsten Kortebein, Vemo Hang and Stacy Wheeler met for drinks in Berlin to catch up and share some memories from Morocco. All three alumni are currently living in Europe.
Kirsten, whose recent projects include photographing the 2013 Marathon des Sables, has been living in Berlin for the past two months and doing freelance photography work. Vemo, who also lives in Berlin, is currently studying German and building her art portfolio while she applies to art masters programs. Stacy, who visited Berlin briefly to take the Foreign Service Officer Exam, is teaching English in a French public high school and plans to continue working internationally.

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