Reports of Protests

Kids in New York have snow days. Kids here have political unrest days.

Mubarek has stepped down. He was a very different kind of ruler than our own king
Mohammed VI. The people that I have spoken with generally approve of the message that the protesters in Egypt were communicating, but not with the method they used to communicate it.

Saturday 19 February
All weekend, there has been a hum of rumor flying just under audible volume. Facebook has apparently published some invitation to a protest-style gathering, and everyone knows someone who's seen it, but no one has seen it themselves. I've said all along that I would be surprised if anything came of it. Firstly, the plan is such a shadow that it compeletly lacks organization. Secondly, Morocco is not Egypt or Tunisia; our King is good to our country. Of course we have some issues we are working on, but people are generally content and living well.


Sunday 20 February
At noon I was on my way to school from church, walking down the main street in the New City party of town, I saw a crowd of people in Place Florence. I thought for a moment there might be a new souk or marketplace open, but it was odd that everyone gathered was a man. Then I saw a few signs, patriotic pleas for powers to be given out more freely, complete with supportive portraits of the king in the center. There were about 200 men involved in the peaceful demonstration, including a couple with megaphones who were chanting melodically above the chatter.
The main road and a reasonable surrounding radius had been closed to motorized traffic by some impressively uniformed policemen, and the grand-taxis that went to the towns around the city were not running. Thus, I didn’t get to see Amina and her family today. Someone else told me the trains and buses between Casablanca and Rabat and Fes were closed down for the day, as well.
I didn’t witness any further turmoil, but neither did I go looking for trouble. I heard there were only a few demonstrators, perhaps only the ones I saw at midday, but that many other ragamuffins took the opportunity to piggyback on the mischief, and caused all manner of havoc. Storefronts were smashed, people were robbed, cars had accidents…
At dusk I ventured out to check the status of Place Florence, and found it empty. The protestors had gone home, leaving only discarded signs bearing the King’s face and pleas for distribution of authority.

Monday 21 February
I taught Physics this morning, and the lesson was one of those that makes you feel like a gymnast on the uneven bars who just stuck the greatest ten-point landing. Not the kind of lesson with spontaneous teachable moments, or the kind that revealed to the students the true wonders of the world, but a lesson that was solidly, to-the-letter, according to plan. We were studying changes in states of matter and the energy transfers associated with various changes, and the demonstration of regelation that was set up in the beginning of the period successfully fell through the ice block at the perfect moment, 50 minutes into the period. The room was cold enough that breathing on the individual mirrors was a perceptible display of condensation releasing energy, and the internet worked well enough to load the youtube video of the Triple-Point of water.
When the bell rang, perfectly after homework was assigned, we stepped out of the room into chaos. Let me explain: my physics class is at the back of the building. It is a fortress. During our highly structured science time, the rest of the school had apparently been going mad with panic. Someone started an unverifiable rumor that the American School of Marraksh had been attacked, and students were refusing reason. They were scared, and so they were rebelling, refusing to come to class, yelling, or leaving. Some called their parents, others just walked out. In the interest of their mental safety (and, ok, their physical safety, too, just on the off-chance that something happened) we closed school for the rest of the afternoon and the following day.

I stopped at the big grocery store on the way home to get some lab supplies, and then looked for a taxi back to my apartment. I opened the door of the first taxi who pulled over for me, and he looked back, peering at me under my hairscarf. “You are not Moroccan,” he stated. I tried to dodge the accusation by telling him that I live here, and asked him to take me to La Gare. “50 dirhams!” he cried. I tried to answer calmly. “I live there, I know it’s only 6 dirhams from here.” He would have none of it. “50 dirhams for you, because you are not Moroccan.” I got out of the taxi.

The next driver also asked where I was from, before I entered the taxi. Since he was less abrasive, I told him, but that merited me the flat-out refusal of a ride. As I was waiting on a taxi who would stoop to carrying an American, a boy ran up to me. “Look out, Madam! You are not Moroccan, and there are men with knives out who are looking for you!” I found a taxi shortly thereafter and decided not to stick around to find out if he was telling the truth.

Tuesday 22 February
No school today. The founder posted on the school closing early yesterday on her facebook status, and received about 100 comments in total, mostly from scared students, and some from concerned parents. Because of the panicked atmosphere, the administration decided it would be better to play it safe and stay home today. The founders had a barbecue at their house, which many teachers and even a few students attended. It was a beautiful, sunny day, warm and peaceful. It would have been a perfect Jersey Shore day.
We return to school tomorrow, rested and at peace.

Wednesday, 23 February
Back in school. I am glad to be back, and so are the students. Our school is a haven; for many of the students, and also for me, it is a place of comfort and refuge. It may be my workplace, but it is also a place I feel at home, my fortress.

I hear there were a few ruffians out yesterday on the outskirts of town, but I witnessed none of it myself. In other cities, there is some further unrest, but Fes, the city of tradition, returns to the way it has always been.