Recently, however, two Gulf countries - Kuwait and Saudi Arabia - have provoked Morocco's ire. The Kuwaiti channel, al-Watan, has apologised to Moroccans for the animated comedy series Bu Qatada and Bu Nabeel, which sparked outrage for its improper depiction of Moroccan women as scheming witches plotting to ensnare rich Kuwaiti husbands by casting spells on them.Last month, in another, rather under-reported incident, Saudi Arabia banned Moroccan women "of a certain age" from umra (the lesser pilgrimage), for fear they would abuse theirs visas "for other purposes" even when they are accompanied by male relatives.This is a reference to an underground sex industry that is believed to be staffed by Arab women smuggled in from the Maghreb and north Africa. Short of calling all Moroccan women prostitutes and their men pimps, there is little more that could have been done to summarily insult the nation. The implication that Moroccans will exploit a visa for a sacred religious ritual to trade and facilitate sexual favours only serves to rub more salt into the wound.
Recently, however, two Gulf countries - Kuwait and Saudi Arabia - have provoked Morocco's ire. The Kuwaiti channel, al-Watan, has apologised to Moroccans for the animated comedy series Bu Qatada and Bu Nabeel, which sparked outrage for its improper depiction of Moroccan women as scheming witches plotting to ensnare rich Kuwaiti husbands by casting spells on them.
Last month, in another, rather under-reported incident, Saudi Arabia banned Moroccan women "of a certain age" from umra (the lesser pilgrimage), for fear they would abuse theirs visas "for other purposes" even when they are accompanied by male relatives.
This is a reference to an underground sex industry that is believed to be staffed by Arab women smuggled in from the Maghreb and north Africa. Short of calling all Moroccan women prostitutes and their men pimps, there is little more that could have been done to summarily insult the nation. The implication that Moroccans will exploit a visa for a sacred religious ritual to trade and facilitate sexual favours only serves to rub more salt into the wound.
That was an education.
We've recently got a group of Eastern European students starting their degree in my department, and the little cultural things are sort of endearing.
Trying to be a good guy I got everybody together for drinks. They had all sorts of questions. For the Russian and the Ukrainian girls it was more on the lines of, "Why did Fulbright stick me here?"
It's actually a great school as far as Eastern European studies. We've got the #2 center for the area in the United States, which is surprising, because it's not a big school.
So I got them into the local German style rathskeller and we're throwing down liter steins. Somehow the conversation steers to this thing about stereotypes, and I thinking about how to explain what a gold digger is, and the stereotype about Slavic women.
Both of the new students, super nice. Intelligent. The Russian used to be a correspondent for Ria Novosti in the US.
So about this time, one of the new American has a bout of what I'll call racist Tourette's dropping the word which shall not be repeated like 6 times in a row, loud, in a bar. So I'm thinking to myself, should I even try to explain to the new foreign students what was just said, and why it's bad. Before I can even get anything out but, "Dude, not ok." This jerkoff starts in with the steroetypes about black folks in America.
Remember how I said some cultural things are endearing? This wasn't so much. So I'm still wondering to myself.
When you are with people from another culture that may not fully understand what's being said when someone has a bout of racist Tourette's how much should you try to explain?
Is it better to understand the horrible stuff being said? Or is ignorance bliss in this case? And I'll give my consent to any government that does not deny a man a living wage-Billy Bragg
Been there, done that. It was, ummmmm, awkward. Now where are we going and what's with the handbasket?
