Peace

The current non-spring in Minnesota has had me thinking of prior springs in warmer locales.  Most notably, of Morocco.

Morocco has been on my mind more often of late due to the recent bombing in Marrakech.  And that news, coupled with my perpetual chill up North, has made me lonely for a specific rooftop years ago.  I'd be curled up on a thin, floral mattress ( ponj) with a well-scribbled journal, listening to drums, eating sugared peanuts (cowcow hlloah).  I'd fall asleep that evening listening to a nearly-defunct CD player try to play Beck's Sea Change album and I'd awaken the next morning to meet friends for eggs (beeda), fried onions and tomatoes (bsla oo matesha), and hot, crusty bread (khobz).  It's strange the words that stay with you.  Loved foods, greetings, blessings, goodbyes, "does the taxi meter work?", "poor thing," God, family, thirsty.

When I first saw the photos from the bombing site, my thoughts were self-serving. I hope it's not Cafe Toubkal.  I loved that Cafe.  As if the specificity of my love should grant a certain handful of human beings grace over another handful.  Toubkal is safe, so I've learned.  The cafe that was bombed was a second story restaurant, Cafe Argana, which overlooked D'Jemaa al F'na.  I ate there once or twice when Cafe Toubkal was too busy (Toubkal was cheaper so it got the bulk of my Peace Corps "salary").  I have no endearing recollection of Argana, other than a particularly spicy mustard for the pommes frites, but I have memories of that square, the hubbub of all those cafes and that market and those taxis and those drums, that make Argana feel like a particular blow to my psyche.

At least 16 people are dead, courtesy of a supposed suicide bomber, perhaps Al Qaeda.  The cafe was targeted, I'm sure, due to its penchant for attracting tourists.  At any given time the likelihood of killing an American or a Nationality-friendly-to-Americans would be high.

I never thought the purpose of Peace Corps was to bring about any sort of enduring change in a volunteer's village/locale.  Build a well, maybe. Draw a world map. Teach some kids the lyrics to a lot of Cat Stevens songs. What exactly does that do? Essentially nothing.  But the "Peace" part of it, in my mind, has a lot more to do with forging friendships, telling jokes, breaking bread, helping and being helped. Especially in countries like Morocco, where the anti-American sentiment can run very high, I think the most peaceful thing I might have done involved simply convincing a few dozen people (more?) that I was, in fact, nice. Nice. Kind. With parents who worried about me. Aversion to dried goat meat. Disaster in the kitchen. Altogether harmless and normal.

It continues to break my heart that the part of the world I so fell in love with, that northwestern corner of Africa, must be torn apart by violence.  I say "must" because it does seem to be a foregone conclusion.  Morocco is the most westernized of the Arab countries, the country in the region with the strongest ties to Europe.  It struggles to balance that embrace of Europe (to the point of discussing EU membership every once in awhile) with a deeply-rooted, deeply felt pan-Arab brotherhood. In the midst of seeking to provide more rights to women, more freedoms to all in some minor contexts, it has also voiced disapproval of terrorism and Al Qaeda more vocally than other Arab regimes.  It has supported American efforts to pursue terrorists abroad and, for that, Morocco is punished.  The bombs in Casablanca in 2003, now the bombs in my favorite square in my favorite foreign city, they all seem to be a warning to a country desperately trying to move forward while maintaining cultural and religious authenticity. 

Because I believe in God, a good, just, loving, full-of-Grace God, I have to also believe that the areas of the world rocked by religious and political violence can somehow, someday, move toward peace.  While it is impossible for me to picture a Morocco at this point that is immune from such attacks (is any country immune?) due to its precarious positioning between Allah, Peace, and Progress, I have to believe that my inability to imagine it does not make it truly impossible. 

I also have to believe if the world were simply more connected, not by facebook or iPhones or email or texting, but by physical connection, that the world would be capable of greater peace.  Hate comes so much easier when you can shape an enemy in your mind without any regard for truth.  But if you walked their roads, sat in their cafes and ordered their foods, watched their Mamas play with their babies, listened to their prayer calls or their hymns or the sound of their children skipping rocks in their rivers...

I just have to believe that bombs would be harder to throw. 

One of my favorite sayings in Moroccan Arabic was an exchange of "thank yous" that occurred fairly often.  Like any language, different types of "thank you" required different responses.  But there was one that particularly moved me.  After saying, "shukran" (thank you) for some good deed or help or assistance, sometimes the response I'd receive was "la shukran allah wajeeb."  I'm not sure how to directly translate it.  But it's essentially, "no, do not thank me, it is what Allah expects/requires."  I think God requires that response to all images of human suffering.  I think for every bomb, every flood, every tornado, every war, every rape, every murder, our ache for another human being, no less a child of God than ourselves, should require no thanks nor interpretation.  My hope is that over time, in tiny human-sized increments, we might connect with one another enough, Christian and Muslim, to recognize that God expects love of us.  Not bombs.