Most of the rest of my first week at Al Akhawayn was occupied by orientation, and it definitely didn't include playing Stupid Ninja Games and learning the Rotisserie Chicken, just sitting in a freezing auditorium (probably the coldest place in Morocco) and learning the basics of living in Morocco (kind of...). There are so many things that you just have to experience for yourself to learn (like not taking crap from guys with horses who triple your rate during the ride).
The most controversial piece of advice we received (which will probably set my family on edge when they read this) is the topic of consent. We were informed that if a female enters a private room with a man, it is implied that anything that happens afterward was consensual. Like I said, this has been a pretty hot topic among the international students since orientation, so when my professor was lecturing on rape in my Women and Economic Development class tonight, one of the students brought it up in a round about way. When the professor didn't understand the question, another student blatantly brought up the subject asking about the validity of the information. All of the Moroccans in the class acted completely unsurprised, almost as to ask, "Yeah, what's your question?" We elaborated, asking how that could be possible, since that's just completely foreign to all of our values. What if you are just doing homework or don't want to necessarily be out in public. There answer was quite simple, "Why else would you, an unmarried woman, be alone with a man besides to have sex?" Another simply stated, "It's a cultural belief that men and women simply can't be friends, there's always something more." One student offered a religious answer, saying that it's a Muslim belief that when a man and woman are alone together, the devil will always show up.
Obviously, all of the American females in a class focused on gender became shocked and started refuting all of these explanations. Despite the fact that we all have male friends who we can hang out with by ourselves back in America still doesn't change the culture here or in other parts of the world. It's still strange for me not to be living in a co-ed dorm, not even a co-ed dorm, because Roanoke is still much less conservative about these matters than many other private (or even public) schools in America (especially the south). I'm coming from a background where it was completely acceptable to have male, next-door neighbors; the only gendered spaces in my pod were restrooms. It's even acceptable to walk to your room through the common area (that can be packed with anyone) with just a towel after a shower. Sure, you might feel kind of embarrassed, but YOLO. If you're comfortable, everyone accepts it. Thus far, this has been the hardest part of the culture to accept, because it is completely against everything I have been taught and experienced. It proves how there are cultural norms slightly more important than something like introductions to learn and analyze.
Besides learning new cultural norms, the most exciting part of orientation was going to Fez to pick up my suitcase. When I got to the airport, another girl and I had to struggle through our limited French to figure out where to go because the student ambassador had to pick up another student at the train station. As much as I like to think I will be fluent in French one day, I feel as though I just started learning yesterday, not seven years ago. Je suis horirble.
When we finally got to the luggage claims area, which would have been much more difficult in America, since it's behind security, we were taken into the same office I made my claim, and there was an employee I recognized who had been working when I arrived in Fez and was somewhat annoying me by asking questions at 1 a.m. while I was trying to file my claim as quickly as possible so I wouldn't be stranded at a foreign airport. While I was trying to get my luggage, he was doing the same thing. Many people know it's relatively hard to annoy me (besides with my mother, where I get Irritable Teenager Syndrome (although I'm twenty...)), so it wan't necessarily that he was, but I was just stressed and wanted my luggage-even after I had been told that it had arrived.
Anyway, he took me off guard, and asked if I was for Palestine or Israel-a question I'm not even sure if I could answer in America, firstly, because I don't feel well informed enough to answer, and secondly, I'm not even sure how I feel. I tend to take a very humanistic approach to everything, which can sometimes be a problem in political science classes, and maybe even for a career in IR, but the things that have brought me to this course have been primarily emotional events in history that I see and want to prevent from ever happening again. Therefore, I'm not completely able to simply take a side because this law or that law or this was ours so it should be ours. I simply hope something happens, and something good. It's a complicated situation that I'm just beginning to learn the real details.
Flustered, though, since I simply had no idea what I was talking about, I blurted out, "I'm American." Probably not my most graceful, diplomatic moment... It could actually probably mean a lot worse to someone rather than picking the wrong side in the conflict. I guess I was also taken off guard because in America, you typically aren't asked those questions for two reasons.
Although many would claim America as the global hegemon (even if you don't it's difficult to deny that the U.S. isn't a country with a great deal of influence), we as Americans are still largely unconcerned with politics (even more so with global rather than domestic). This is probably largely because we don't have to be. Out of curiosity, I've looked up statistics on American travel abroad, and I found that last year, roughly 61.5 million Americans traveled to another country (approximately 29 million of those traveling actually left the continent of North America, of which about 1.5 million went to the Middle East and only around 352,000 to Africa). That may seem like a lot, but that means that less than only one-fifth of the population traveled to a foreign country last year, which is fine. I come from a very remote area, where people are content on never leaving the state (a task I applaud considering that I live around an hour or less from four of the five bordering states of Virginia). Of course, these statistics don't mean that everyone who didn't travel abroad in 2013 never will (I even fall into that category), but the numbers show how disconnected from these regions Americans truly are.
The second reason I have for my abrupt answer is that even in America, you typically don't ask other people about their political opinions. Of course, they may be argued about, but that is when one person states their opinion, which is unsettling with another. We learned in orientation that basically, there is no topic off the table for conversation in Morocco, especially as a foreigner. Questions we may refrain from asking in America because it seems rude or prying to ask, are ways to get to know a person and their culture better: a way of enlightenment.
Luckily, my suitcase wan't held hostage for a more direct, composed, and thought-out answer to the question, and I was able to expand my wardrobe a little bit more and not forced to be an outfit repeater after three days. The rest of orientation went on, and classes began-typical school stuff, so in the next post, I promise to have something exciting! HINT: It's about history and being a tourist!
For some fact checking to keep you busy, here are the links to my figures (If you disagree, they're legitimate government resources, no Wikipedia!):
Monthly Departures from the United States
U.S. Census Population Clock
If you do believe me, I still advise just hopping over to the Population Clock, it's pretty cool.
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