Firefighters enjoying a break in Exchange Street, Portland, Maine, on the first day of June. The weather was splendid. Click on the photo for a better view.
The University of New England hosted a special dinner for donors and supporters. The theme was Morocco, and my friend, Aziz Mekouar, former ambassador to the United States, flew in from Paris to make a few remarks on US-Moroccan relations. It was a delightful evening, with a hint of the exotic, very much in the spirit of our venture into the land of the setting sun, or al-maghrib, as Moroccans call their nation.
Last Monday, a prominent Moroccan politician and intellectual, Dr. Hassan Aourid, introduced me and my new book, Islam and America, to a small audience of Moroccan and American scholars at the University Mohamed V of Rabat. I enjoyed the experience, if only because it allowed me to have my views presented in an Arabic-speaking milieu. (I did reach out to the Americans in the audience with brief summary translations.)
Morocco’s National Railway Office (l’Office National des Chemins de Fer, or ONCF) has embarked on a progressive project of bolstering the country’s well-established train culture. They have purchased France’s high-speed train (Train à Grande Vitesse, or TGV—a model of which is on the conference table above) to link the cities of Tangier and Casablanca before it expands to other axes around the country. The cost of such a project is less than two percent of the state’s annual budget for investment, yet there is a vocal movement to stop the project. The protesters claim that the investment is taking away from other more vital priorities, such as education, and that fixing already existing train systems is cheaper and better. After listening to Mr. Rabie Khlie, the director of ONCF, I now understand better why high-speed trains are the only option for distances that exceed 100 kilometers. For trains to be viable as a transportation system, they need to compete with driving on highways and flying— practices that didn’t exist at the birth of train. Mr. Khlie gave an interview recently that reflects much of what he told me this morning in his office. I am convinced that Morocco’s railway strategy is in solid hands. All aboard!
My son and his new friend Borhan ran into one of the world’s most prominent music producers, RedOne, in Rabat. Last night we were surprised to see Michael Jackson come back to life (in the guise of a Spaniard); today it is the Moroccan-Swedish man associated with the rise of Lady Gaga. And it was the real deal this time—not an impersonator!
My son and I attended a charity event at the splendid Moulay Hafid palace to benefit the Spanish-Moroccan orphanage in Tangier, Ningun nino sin techo (No child without a roof). Flags of Spain and Morocco were waved by the children, hostesses presented in three languages, and musical entertainment was in Spanish and Moroccan, punctuated by a look-alike Michael Jackson performance. The first half of the show started with the kids (dressed in black) doing acrobatics, followed by a variety of flamenco pieces, and ended with Francisco “Jackson” bringing hope and cheer to both the children and the audience. The event was oversubscribed, from what I understood, as some people couldn’t find seats. But it was heartwarming to see cultures come together for the sake of a good deed. As the organizers said throughout the night, there is no progress if one child remains homeless. We were too tired to stay for the second half of the show, featuring three Moroccan singers.
You can’t do business in Morocco without using stamps. In one instance, while I was in a municipal building in Tangier, I was sent to an office to register my signature. The lady in charge and I laughed about the demands of bureaucracy after I took a photo of the stamp holder on her desk.
Two women, two cities. The first ones were in the cafe of a train station in Rabat; the second ones are jballa—peasant women from northern Morocco—on a doorstep in Tangier, where they were selling fresh produce. Tradition in Morocco is expressed in more than one way. It’s a country of persistent diversities despite the steady advances of modernity.
Here is (through the lens of my iPhone) U. S. Representative Chellie Pingree addressing the University of New England’s graduating class at the Civic Center in Portland, Maine and sharing with them some island wisdom. For if one lives—as she has most of her life—in an island that is an hour or so away from the mainland, one can’t afford to hold grudges or alienate people forever. Resources are scarce in small islands like North Haven and all hands—plumbers as well as physicians—are needed to maintain an adequate standard of living. It is from this tiny place that Pingree branched out into state and national politics. The local is, in the end, always global—and our world is nothing but another island. North Haven politics might carry us a long way toward a better world if only we knew that we, too, are island people.
A day in Manhattan could be exhilarating. Breakfast with my friend Aziz, the longtime Moroccan ambassador to the United States, at the Tick Tock Diner on 34th Street, my first neighborhood in America in the early 1980s. I emerged from the subway at Columbus Circle to find myself under a globe and a tower rising to the skies—a fitting expression of the explorer’s legacy. And how could I resist taking a photo of a car that so openly displays New York pride? Manhattan remains magical.
