FULL TEXT OF THE PROLOGUE: THE LADY IN THE DJELLABA
Casablanca, early May. A busload of tourists has just rolled into town. English-speaking tourists. Some from England, others from Canada, South Africa and elsewhere. The majority from the United States.
It is lunchtime. The passengers are hungry. The bus stops at a café on the Boulevard de l’Océan overlooking the Mediterranean Sea.
Not a cloud in the sky, it’s a picture-perfect day. But these tourists are tired. This is their last day on a week-long tour of Morocco. They are tired, sick from eating too much food and driving too many miles. It is time to say goodbye to Morocco. They tumble out of the lime-green bus, looking for bathrooms and a quick lunch.
“You have one hour,” says the tour guide.
Two couples, one Canadian and the other American, find a restaurant and sit down at a table together to order their meal.
If I had to describe these two couples to you, it would be difficult, since all North American middle-aged tourists look the same, especially the men. The sunglasses. The brightly colored shirt. The neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard. The loose khaki shorts that look comfortable because there is a tag inside that says “comfort waist.”
Two white middle-aged men, one on either side of retirement, each one with their middle-aged wives.
They order their meal, and the one middle-aged man, the pre-retirement one, decides to find a restroom. Where is the restroom? Down the stairs, sir, just on your right. The man makes his way down the stairs. He has a cold. He is already thinking of his home in Canada, of sitting on his deck with a comforting beer.
In Morocco, as in many countries in this world, one finds in most public restrooms, right inside near the entrance, a traditionally dressed woman in charge of cleaning the place, and, not far from her, some kind of small container for tips. In this case, it’s a little glass dish.
Like the middle-aged man, this woman is no different from the rest of her kind. She wears a simple full-length dress – a djellaba – and on her head some kind of turban. At least that’s what it looks like. Zigzag patterns of brown henna cover the back of her hands, on the part close to the wrist. Probably when she smiles, if and when she decides to smile, there will be a gold tooth somewhere.
The middle-aged man passes her. She looks familiar, like someone he knew from long ago, but he can’t think of whom. He goes to the bathroom.
He walks out and drops a few coins – Moroccan dirhams – into the little glass dish.
“Shukran,” he says, which in Arabic means “Thank you.”
Not bad for a middle aged white Canadian man.
Actually, not that impressive. After an entire week in Morocco, the least one should be able to say is shukran.
Still, the woman smiles. And, sure enough, there’s the gold tooth.
But then, she does something that a traditionally dressed cleaning woman from Morocco seldom does to a white middle-aged male tourist. She stops him with a question.
“Wash kat ’arif al ’arabiya?” – meaning, “Do you speak Arabic?”
Something about the way he said shukran, maybe. Or maybe something else. She asked him if he speaks Arabic, so something must have made her think this.
The man, almost out the door, stops, and now she sees. His simple “thank you,” his last word to a Moroccan lady before flying out early tomorrow morning, was more than just a tourist’s perfunctory shukran.
“Wash kat ’arif al ’arabiya?” she asks.
“La, walakin…” – “No, but…” he answers.
Here the man waffles, he tries to gesture with his hands. He’s forgotten how to say “a little bit,” even though he has practiced it often in the last week.
This woman, she reminds him of another woman, a Moroccan woman from fifty years ago, a maid from Salé who, when this man was just a baby fifty years ago, cradled him in her arms. This woman did this, every day. Every day for the first two years of his life.
Zohra was her name. Zohra, fifty years ago. Right here in Casablanca.
The middle-aged man is still waffling.
“Bishwya,” says the cleaning lady, helping him out. “A little bit.” Again, she smiles.
The middle-aged man wants to tell her how he feels, what it means to him to have met her at this very moment, just before saying goodbye to Morocco. He wants to tell her that she is like a mother to him, even though she’s a complete stranger, that she is both like a home to him and a foreign land. He wants to tell her how happy he is to meet her and how sad he will be when, seconds from now, she will be gone.
‘Ummy, he wants to call her. ‘Ummy, mother mine. But he doesn’t know the words. All he can do is repeat bishwya after her.
“Bishwya,” he says with a smile. That’s what he meant to say, that he only speaks Arabic a little bit. Bishwya.
“Shukran bizyef,” he adds as he leaves. “Thank you very much.”
He would like to say more, he would like to ask this woman if she knows another woman, a woman probably no longer living by now. A woman by the name of Zohra. But there would be nothing to say.
A thousand Zohras live in Casablanca. A thousand Zohras have died in Casablanca. And, without her last name, how could he ever find her?
You may have guessed by now that the middle-aged man in this story is me, John Haines, the son of American missionaries who came to Morocco fifty years before.
And the cleaning lady?
I never did get her name. Who knows? Maybe, just maybe, her name was Zohra.
Casablanca, early May. A busload of tourists has just rolled into town. English-speaking tourists. Some from England, others from Canada, South Africa and elsewhere. The majority from the United States.
It is lunchtime. The passengers are hungry. The bus stops at a café on the Boulevard de l’Océan overlooking the Mediterranean Sea.
Not a cloud in the sky, it’s a picture-perfect day. But these tourists are tired. This is their last day on a week-long tour of Morocco. They are tired, sick from eating too much food and driving too many miles. It is time to say goodbye to Morocco. They tumble out of the lime-green bus, looking for bathrooms and a quick lunch.
“You have one hour,” says the tour guide.
Two couples, one Canadian and the other American, find a restaurant and sit down at a table together to order their meal.
If I had to describe these two couples to you, it would be difficult, since all North American middle-aged tourists look the same, especially the men. The sunglasses. The brightly colored shirt. The neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard. The loose khaki shorts that look comfortable because there is a tag inside that says “comfort waist.”
Two white middle-aged men, one on either side of retirement, each one with their middle-aged wives.
They order their meal, and the one middle-aged man, the pre-retirement one, decides to find a restroom. Where is the restroom? Down the stairs, sir, just on your right. The man makes his way down the stairs. He has a cold. He is already thinking of his home in Canada, of sitting on his deck with a comforting beer.
In Morocco, as in many countries in this world, one finds in most public restrooms, right inside near the entrance, a traditionally dressed woman in charge of cleaning the place, and, not far from her, some kind of small container for tips. In this case, it’s a little glass dish.
Like the middle-aged man, this woman is no different from the rest of her kind. She wears a simple full-length dress – a djellaba – and on her head some kind of turban. At least that’s what it looks like. Zigzag patterns of brown henna cover the back of her hands, on the part close to the wrist. Probably when she smiles, if and when she decides to smile, there will be a gold tooth somewhere.
The middle-aged man passes her. She looks familiar, like someone he knew from long ago, but he can’t think of whom. He goes to the bathroom.
He walks out and drops a few coins – Moroccan dirhams – into the little glass dish.
“Shukran,” he says, which in Arabic means “Thank you.”
Not bad for a middle aged white Canadian man.
Actually, not that impressive. After an entire week in Morocco, the least one should be able to say is shukran.
Still, the woman smiles. And, sure enough, there’s the gold tooth.
But then, she does something that a traditionally dressed cleaning woman from Morocco seldom does to a white middle-aged male tourist. She stops him with a question.
“Wash kat ’arif al ’arabiya?” – meaning, “Do you speak Arabic?”
Something about the way he said shukran, maybe. Or maybe something else. She asked him if he speaks Arabic, so something must have made her think this.
The man, almost out the door, stops, and now she sees. His simple “thank you,” his last word to a Moroccan lady before flying out early tomorrow morning, was more than just a tourist’s perfunctory shukran.
“Wash kat ’arif al ’arabiya?” she asks.
“La, walakin…” – “No, but…” he answers.
Here the man waffles, he tries to gesture with his hands. He’s forgotten how to say “a little bit,” even though he has practiced it often in the last week.
This woman, she reminds him of another woman, a Moroccan woman from fifty years ago, a maid from Salé who, when this man was just a baby fifty years ago, cradled him in her arms. This woman did this, every day. Every day for the first two years of his life.
Zohra was her name. Zohra, fifty years ago. Right here in Casablanca.
The middle-aged man is still waffling.
“Bishwya,” says the cleaning lady, helping him out. “A little bit.” Again, she smiles.
The middle-aged man wants to tell her how he feels, what it means to him to have met her at this very moment, just before saying goodbye to Morocco. He wants to tell her that she is like a mother to him, even though she’s a complete stranger, that she is both like a home to him and a foreign land. He wants to tell her how happy he is to meet her and how sad he will be when, seconds from now, she will be gone.
‘Ummy, he wants to call her. ‘Ummy, mother mine. But he doesn’t know the words. All he can do is repeat bishwya after her.
“Bishwya,” he says with a smile. That’s what he meant to say, that he only speaks Arabic a little bit. Bishwya.
“Shukran bizyef,” he adds as he leaves. “Thank you very much.”
He would like to say more, he would like to ask this woman if she knows another woman, a woman probably no longer living by now. A woman by the name of Zohra. But there would be nothing to say.
A thousand Zohras live in Casablanca. A thousand Zohras have died in Casablanca. And, without her last name, how could he ever find her?
You may have guessed by now that the middle-aged man in this story is me, John Haines, the son of American missionaries who came to Morocco fifty years before.
And the cleaning lady?
I never did get her name. Who knows? Maybe, just maybe, her name was Zohra.