Northward, ho!

Between Seattle and Vermont, the northern roots just wouldn’t leave me alone, so once my language grant ended in Fez at the end of February, I migrated to Tetouan – a smaller city about an hour east of Tangier, ten some kilometers from the Mediterranean and surrounded on all sides by the Rif Mountains.


Tetouan is the ideal place for me to embark on the research part of the Fulbright grant, which for me (if you recall) has to do with the rhetoric surrounding the employment of Moroccan troops in the Nationalist army during the Spanish Civil War. The present-day town was founded in 1484 by Muslims and Jews fleeing the Christian offensive to overtake the Iberian Peninsula, now Spain.

Since then, the city has twice undergone occupation by the Spanish. The first period of control was relatively brief, from 1859 to 1862, and motivated by a perception of the locale as a threat to the nearby Spanish city of Ceuta. As for the second occupation, it was rather longer: around 1912, the Spanish moved in to use Tetouan as a seat from which to subdue the Rif and eventually the city became the capital of the Spanish Protectorate Zone, remaining so until independence in 1956. At the outset of the Spanish Civil War in 1936, Franco briefly set up headquarters in Tetouan before flying to Spain.

This Spanish-infused history means that the city has a markedly different architecture than the Frenchified majority of urban Morocco. Here, we find white-washed walls, cobble-stoned streets, a plethora of balconies and several art-noveau light towers designed by a student of Gaudí. As for the old medina, it remained intact during the colonial occupation and currently stands as a smaller, mellower example of traditional architecture than, say, the hustle-y, bustle-y medina in Fez.

I was initially interested in renting a place in these old quarters, but time constraints and the general lack of available real estate re-focused my efforts on the new part of town. Now, you may be asking yourself, how does one go about finding a place to live in Morocco? The usual approach involves hiring a samsaar, that is, a man with his finger on the property pulse who takes you around to see various options and, should you accept one, collects the equivalent of first-month’s rent as a commission. I, however, was in the company of Rod “Good Karma” Solaimani.

Before engaging a samsaar, we had decided to conduct a sweep of the foreign-run cultural centers in town, and it was at the Institut Francais where his ability to magnetically attract positive phenomena kicked in. I had signed up for French classes and broached the housing question just as a small woman and her twelve-year-old daughter walked in the door. “Ask her,” the secretary suggested.

It turned out that this woman and her husband own an apartment that they were looking to rent out. Actually, they don’t own it; their daughters do. The Chaaros had purchased this place under the names of their twelve-year-old and twenty-one-year-old girls so as to outsmart the Moroccan inheritance laws, which bequeath to female children only half of the parents’ property. With the daughters as the official proprietors, however, they would be assured of more financial security should anything happen to their parents. Pretty neat, I thought. One thumb up already.

Two thumbs up upon seeing the place. (Um, gorgeous.)

Three thumbs up upon finding out that Rasheed speaks great Spanish.

I slept on the decision a single night and the next day went over to put down a security deposit and sign a contract.

No regrets.

After all, this apartment is pretty unbelievable: well lit and decently furnished, with a balcony overlooking probably the best view of the Rif mountains in the city and an extra – ahem – guest bedroom. The location is central. The neighbors are friendly, both within the building and without. Already I’ve made friends with Mohammed the newspaper man, Mohammed the bread man, Mohammed the library man and Ahmed the snack man (who says hello to President Obama).

As for the ex-pat community, what it lacks in quantity, it more than makes up for in quality. Eric, an artist Fulbrighter, has been living here since September with his Swedish wife, Maria, and their impressively large-cheeked baby, Al. Mary and Alaina are my age and teaching at the American Language Center. Carolina is an artist from Spain, here on a grant that has her branching out from her usual Japanese influences. While I’m excited at the prospect of a smaller city and my research facilitating more interactions with locals, it’s cheering to know that I will have a strong ex-pat support network here, at least for the next couple months.

So, shweea bi shweea (little by little), I’m learning my way around Tetouan – its people and places. The downtown area is contained enough that it already feels familiar, but it’s apparent on my morning runs that there is plenty more city to be explored beyond the center. Plus there are the Mediterranean towns ten kilometers away. Plus the Rif right in my backyard.

North: go!