Monday, March 8, 2021

Women

Hamid’s Bride

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By HANNAH NORMAN

SBAA ROUADI, Morocco – Zwiina? Is she beautiful? The question ricocheted through the mass of wedding-goers, each pressing to get a glimpse of the veiled figure as she emerged from a large white van. Through a break in the crowd, a parade of men made their way into the house, laden with bulky plastic containers overflowing with the bride’s belongings. Last in the procession, 16-year-old Fatima Zahra el Rhioui arrived at her husband’s house for the first time.

“He’s very nice,” el Rhioui commented, grinning nervously at the mention of her husband and exposing symmetrical buckteeth.

Reporter’s Notebook: Cracking shells, breaking barriers

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ESSAOUIRA, Morocco – We pushed into the red-plastered room 10 at a time, pens poised on paper and cameras clicking. We chattered and gawked, because what else can a group of almost forty people do but chatter and gawk?

“Come this way,” called the tour guide from somewhere in the crowd. I hung back, embarrassed by the commotion we were causing. This pattern of point-and-stare felt like window-shopping, and I craved real human interaction. I searched the faces below for forgiveness.

Forgiveness came in the form of a sky-blue glass eye.

Village Stay: Inside the Singing Walls

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BY: ELISE CAMPBELL

BIRTA, MOROCCO – Dunia Chamoun sat in the warmth of the sun that cast a hazy glow through the dirty window. Her notebooks, worn by her fingers tracing the corners and words, sat on her lap. Since she dropped out of school seven years ago, at age 11, she’s spent the majority of her days inside the family’s small, clay-walled house.

After Chamoun’s father passed away, her older brothers decided to keep her at home in order to preserve her body, her beauty, and ultimately her reputation as a “good girl.” Despite her domestic isolation, she finds ways to express herself through writing. 

Zineb Belmkaddem – Connecting the Battles for Human Rights

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By: SUSAN SKAZA

RABAT, Morocco – Zineb Belmkaddem, 29, cynically credits the government for her newest job as an English teacher at Euromediterranean University of Fez, a recently established university in Morocco.

“I know the government has something to do with this job,” she said. “They want me off the street. I mean, off everything. My boss told me.”

Due to her outspoken criticism of the local regime, Belmkaddem says the government is trying to restrain her by keeping her busy at the university. In a country where freedom of expression is limited, this Muslim feminist is one of the last prominent human rights activists left in Morocco.

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.

Shattering Stereotypes By Breaking Waves

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By ELISE CAMPBELL

RABAT, Morocco – “My favorite color is black, like my eyes,” Oumaima Erhali, 17, said with a smile as she drew in the sand with her untied, muddy skate shoes. As the ocean breeze tickled her face, she tightened the strings that held a black hood over her head and slid a shell into the cargo pocket of her Hawaiian-printed board shorts.

Erhali doesn’t cook with her family, because she’s too busy spicing up her shoes with sand. She also doesn’t wear a hijab, even though she’s a dedicated Muslim.

Women Provide “Spiritual Security” In Morocco

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By SAMANTHA HARRINGTON

This story was published by Reuters on Dec. 12, 2013.

Boots on the ground, drones in the skies, and government surveillance of electronic communications have become standard American tools for warding off extremist violence. The Kingdom of Morocco has armed itself with a dramatically different weapon: using the soft power of religious women to quell violence before it happens. They call it “spiritual security.”

After 9/11 shook the world, Moroccan leaders began to think, “It could happen here,” and it did. In 2003, a dozen suicide bombers with ties to al-Qaida blew themselves up in Casablanca, Morocco’s economic center.

RasLma- An Unlikely Paradise

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By MICHELLE DUTRO

(Ambient sounds of water sloshing, clothes being raked over washboards and women chatting)

The public laundry is bustling.

This isn’t at all like your local, fluorescent-lit Laundromat where you pop in a few quarters and wait while the suds get to work. RasLma rests across a small river in Chefchaouen, Morocco. Complete with waterfalls, sparkling clarity and lush green vegetation, this place is a paradise.

The river is flanked by two open-air structures, each containing a handful of washing tubs. The water from the river flows into a channel that runs between 12 tubs, feeding into each one.

Moroccan Women Fight for Property Rights

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By MICHELLE DUTRO

Letting her thin, metal door clatter closed behind her, Turia Darif left her home alone for the first time in 18 years. She cried the whole way to the courthouse, crushed with an overwhelming feeling of hopelessness.

When her husband died, Darif was left with five children and no way to feed them. The family’s main source of income came from a coffee shop and two small convenience stores. The three shops had been rented by a man for many years, but after her Mr. Darif’s death, the tenant refused to pay rent.

Empowering women locally: Sabah Lazaar

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By SADIA KHATRI

Photographs by MARK MINTON

Sabah Lazaar watches women pile into the white building of Annajan Cooperative: 16 and 17-year-olds trek from distances of several kilometers away, for a morning spent with sewing machines and computers. The vocational center wasn’t a sight in Lazaar’svillage while growing up—which is exactly why she founded it.

“I never wanted to work in a place where everything had already been provided,” she insists, “That would be an easy way out.”

In Sbaa Rouadi—Lazaar’s dry, humid village—sunset marks the end of activity. Men head home from farming, and women wrap up the day’s cooking.

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