Memories from Morocco

Published 10/06/2022 in Scholar Travel Stipend

Written by Caroline Chiu | 10/06/2022

Before the COVID-19 pandemic placed global travel on pause, I had the privilege of spending two weeks in Morocco with fellow NYC Milken Scholar Soniya Gurung (MS ’13) and my cousins, Sara and Christine. We were a group of four curious and young Asian- American women excited to explore a new country. It was also each of our first times on the continent of Africa, as well as our first times traveling in a predominantly Muslim country. It was this latter characteristic that had me most excited about the trip. Through the generosity of the Milken Scholars Travel Stipend, in 2018 I had the privilege of spending two weeks in Myanmar, a predominantly Buddhist country. During that trip, it was clear that Myanmar’s religious backdrop permeated every aspect of Burmese life, even if subtly. I was curious to see if I would come away with a similar perspective of Morocco.

We began our trip in Tangier, a Northern port city that has experienced a large, but unequally distributed, economic boom over the last few decades. As a result, our introduction to Morocco started in what was the most openly impoverished city we saw on our trip: we witnessed the highest density of beggars and experienced more aggressive and explicit catcalling on our first night than we had in our collective 85+ years spent in New York City. As a result, we felt as if we could immediately feel the dichotomy between the status of men and women in Morocco. After all, in addition to the catcalling, we quickly realized that we were the only women walking on the streets of Tangier after dark, and we decided to head home sooner rather than later.

Despite our surprising and uncomfortable realization that night, we had a lovely experience earlier that day meeting our Airbnb host, who personally walked us to the local bus stop to buy tickets to our next destination, and then introduced us to his favorite nearby restaurant to make sure we had an authentic first meal. We had chosen to stay with locals whenever we could in order to truly experience Morocco and make meaningful connections across cultural borders. Our host in Tangier was a Moroccan native who had received a scholarship to attend university in Canada, but returned to Tangier after graduation to support his family by using his proficiency in English to run a small business of Airbnbs. He explained to us that despite loving Canada, he was devoted to his family here in Morocco, and wanted to make sure they were well supported. He also shared that as tourism grew concurrently with Morocco’s  expanding economy, it was easily one of the more lucrative industries to be working in. I could  relate with our host’s “Moroccan Dream,” which paralleled my own “American Dream.” Our  mutual love of family was what kept us going. 

Our next stop was Chefchaouen, a town whose rich history and Instagram-friendly blue buildings has made it a must-go destination for young travelers everywhere. There, we stayed with another local family that had lived in Chefchaouen for generations. Keeping with the incredible hospitality we experienced with our host in Tangier, our Chefchaouen host insisted on picking us up from the bus stop to make sure we had no issues finding our home amongst the many meandering and confusing streets that were built several hundred years ago.

After settling in, we wandered around the city and encountered many friendly locals who wanted nothing more than to chat in English to practice their skills. Our sour memories of earlier encounters with locals in Tangier were quickly replaced by pleasant conversations with young Moroccans. I wondered if our conversation partners, like our Tangier Airbnb host, had recognized that a lot of money could be earned in tourism, and that by strengthening their English language abilities, they could generate the most income to support their families and realize their personal dreams.

 After two days of wandering through Chefchaouen, we traveled next to Fez, a UNESCO  World Heritage Site. Here, we stayed with another family that owned their riad for generations.  (Riads are traditional Moroccan homes built around an open courtyard.) Our host was a father of  two young daughters studying at a nearby University, and he offered to facilitate a meetup with  them. Of course we said yes! 

We traveled a couple hours to the city of Meknes to meet with Salma and Safaa* (*names changed to protect privacy) at a local coffee shop. Meknes was the quintessential college town — in many ways indistinguishable from similar American college towns like Berkeley in California and Ann Arbor in Michigan. The city bustled with the energy of young intellectuals, and the coffee shop we agreed to meet at could have easily been found in Brooklyn. The gender disparity in the streets we witnessed in Tangier felt like another era compared to the vibrant streets of Meknes.

As we swapped stories and asked questions about each other’s lives, I was struck by both the commonalities and differences. First the similarities: we had shared tastes in music and fashion. Like some of my Muslim friends in the U.S., Salma and Safaa embodied the multifaceted nuances of Muslim identity by practicing their faith, choosing not to wear the hijab, and cutting their hair short.

But there were also differences: Salma was at the coffee shop to spend some time with a male classmate, but it was socially taboo for a woman and man to be seen in public together unless they were married. As a result, Safaa accompanied them as a female chaperone. Salma and Safaa also shared that it was illegal to be a member of the LGBTQ community. After a few hours spent together, we left the coffee shop smiling at the universal experience of being a young woman anywhere in the world, but also humbled by the significant differences shaped by our respective countries’ histories.

From Fez, we moved on to spend a night in Casablanca and a night in the Sahara Desert  before landing in our final destination of Marrakech. Soniya, Sara, and Christine were all leaving Marrakech a few days ahead of me, which meant I would be solo for a couple days. Had you checked-in with me after my first night in Tangier, I would have expressed a lot of apprehension at being alone in Morocco as a woman who clearly stood out as a foreigner. But as we traveled from city to city over the two weeks, it was clear that our night in Tangier was an isolated experience. While we could always expect more men in the streets, especially in the evening, we were never again the only women out in the evening. It was actually alone in Marrakech that I discovered one of my favorite sites: Amal Women’s Training Center & Restaurant. Founded by Norah Belahcen Fitzgerald, a Moroccan native born to American parents, Amal is a non-profit organization that empowers impoverished Moroccans through culinary training. The organization operates a restaurant for its beneficiaries to practice their skills.

The cuisine and hospitality I experienced at Amal was easily one of my favorite meals, and the knowledge that the organization was founded by and for locals made the experience that much more meaningful. Moreover, the organization so thoughtfully encapsulates the missions of both the Milken Family Foundation and Milken Institute by helping local Moroccans develop skills that help them lead meaningful, satisfying, and productive lives. It was the perfect capstone to my trip.

 All in all, my two weeks in Morocco was an incredible experience that allowed me to  immerse myself in yet another culture—one that has a religious history that has often been pitted  at odds with American values. Even though there were clear examples of where Morocco’s  religious background has played a role in the more blatantly unequal social positions of men and  women, and the complete lack of rights for anyone in the LGBTQ+ community, my experiences,  while brief, showed me that there are many commonalities between Moroccans and Americans.  Moroccans and Americans share common human experiences and dreams, including the desire  to build better lives for themselves and their families.