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Published: February 22nd 2006
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Muhammed and me
Muhammed and I, after tea, with one of his sisters taking the photo. A kid named Muhammad Ould Brahim has been hanging around me of late, and against my better judgment, I have let him. In Mauritania, children are raised much differently than in the states. It is not seemly for a child in Mauritania to address an adult, and adults who encourage this by responding to them are encouraging bad behavior. However, Muhammad has a history of seeing me on the street, giving useful advice, and not asking for any money in return, which is a particularly endearing quality to me these days.
One day I was hanging out with a friend of mine who sells trinkets to tourists in the market, when Muhammad invited me to have tea with his family that evening. I thought it might be fun, so I agreed. When I came over, Muhammad rushed to the door and opened it. The house was made of some mud-concrete mixture, with a roof of palm leaves. In the yard were many tents, where most of the family members slept for most of the year, because of the heat. There were 2 high school aged girls running about, a woman of about 25 lying down in the main
Sheva and Muhamed
I took a photo of Sheva and Muhamed. room, and an older woman sitting in the corner next to the old television. Mohammed’s friend from school was also in the room, making tea. The reactions to me were immediate. The high school girls started giggling, and the two older women and their young children just stared very hard, with wide eyes, looking afraid. Nassarani was right there, in the house.
Mauritania is no nation of immigrants, and if you’re not supposed to be there, you know it. The Atar citizens call Caucasians “Nassarani”. The term comes from Jesus, the Nazarene. It is assumed that every Caucasian is a Christian, and even the more educated who know this isin’t necessarily true use the term Nassarani to refer to any Caucasian. The Atar mindset with respect to us is still very much like crusade times, and there is some fear associated with Caucasians.
Keith Gaddis, a fellow PCV in Atar, once witnessed a good example of this phenomenon. Keith runs every day through some of the back streets in Atar. One day when he was coming around a corner, he heard a parent saying to a child that if the child didn’t tend to his studies, Nassarani
would get him. Right then, Keith jogged around the corner, and scared the child half to death. As he was jogging away he heard the parent say, “See, I told you so.” The parent was an acquaintance of Keith, so they both though the whole thing was pretty funny, but the child was certainly scared straight.
As I came into the main room, I said hello to everyone, and tried to learn their names. Both they and I had difficulty pronouncing each other’s names, but eventually we got it right. I also had a little conversation with the grandmother, named Sheva, translated through Mohammad, which went like this:
Sheva: “Do you have a wife here? In America?”
Me: “No, I’m still young.”
Sheva: “You should marry, you saw the girls outside, you could marry one of them.”
Me: “No, but thank you”
Sheva: (confused and a little offended that I had so quickly turned her down) “They’re pretty, aren’t they? What’s wrong with them?”
Me: (nervous laughter) “I’m just still young.”
I drank tea with the Muhammad and his young friend from school. I asked Muhammad about his studies. He proudly showed me all his workbooks, showing that he was learning both English and French, starting with numbers and common phrases. He talked about the way his classes were scheduled, in 2 hour blocks with French, English, math, and science. The whole regiment seemed much tougher than my schedule when I was his age. He turned on the TV to some Mauritanian women singing traditional Mauritanian songs from the capitol, Nouakchott. The music sounded horrible to me.
I asked what she was saying in her song. He said she was singing that Hammoud-Vall was a great leader, that he would bring democracy to Mauritania, and that he would catch all criminals. I had an instant vision of George Orwell’s big brother TV sets from 1984. It was fitting, because I always imagined that TV as being beat up, in a grungy building, which accurately described Muhammad’s house. I laughed a little and asked if he thought that was really true, worried that he would say yes. He just shrugged his shoulders. Then Sheva, who had been in the corner working on some embroidery, spoke up. She said something in Hassanya to Muhammad. He looked a little uncomfortable, and I asked him what she had said.
He said, “elle à dit : dit à Bush que il reste beaucoup des familles avec des mauvais maisons.” The phrase translates to “Tell Bush that there are still many families with awful houses.”
I thought a little, and asked Muhammad to tell her that she was right, America should help, but she should know that a lot of the money that is given to Mauritania is stolen. She listened to his translation and nodded her head in understanding. She responded, saying she knew about that, and it should stop. She was particularly upset about a food relief program, which had promised a 50lb sack of couscous and another 50lb sack of rice to every family in need. She said that instead of this, every family had received 1 sack of either couscous or rice, and the people distributing the sacks had sold the other sack, lining their pockets with the cash. Her outrage was obvious, and while I had heard of the scam before, I felt similarly outraged, finally sitting in a house that should have received that rice.
They convinced me to stay for dinner, so I did. They put a bunch of noodles on a plate and put about a half of a chicken leg in the middle. I knew they had splurged on the chicken, so I complemented them, saying how good it had tasted. Sheva took the opportunity to point out that one of her daughters had prepared it, and would thus make a good wife. I just laughed, deciding there were too many limitations to our ability to communicate to tell her why that was not something I was willing to do. After dinner Muhammad showed me the sack of rice, it was about half used, sitting under a covered outdoor place. I figured out later on that night that I could, in a way, do what Sheva had asked. While I haven’t yet secured an audience with President Bush, I can speak to his citizens through this website. So I am telling you all that this is just one example of how a normal family that is doing the right thing, and educating its children (both the boys and girls), gets screwed by corruption, and stays in the grips of poverty.
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Aunt Allison
non-member comment
Very Nice
Very nice piece of writing. You certainly got to me, and I will continue the good fight here at home.