Showing results by author "Magdalena Wasiura" in All Categories

Magdalena Wasiura's journal of living for a year in the Berber community in Morocco.

It's far from easy to say goodbye, but before the author bids everyone farewell, she goes on a long physically and emotionally draining journey. The countless hours in the buses to Chefchaouen, then Raba, then Marrakesh are a significant component of Part 8, the last part of Les Berbères et Moi. The author meets obstacles at Raba airport that turn her back to Khénifra, to the police station. And someone dies in this part....

Daniel Graves is a man of many talents. He juggles his responsibilities of being a painter, a teacher, the director of The Florence Academy of Art, a husband, and a father remarkably well. He knew from the age of three or four who he wanted to be. His career launched when he was 11 years old. He studied with many artists including Richard Lack, Richard Serrin, and Signorina Simi, and received regular critiques from Pietro Annigoni.

New projects and new ideas along with matchmaking in Timdgrass are just a small part of part seven of Les Berbères et moi. What is all the fuss about kissing? The author explains zina and how Shari'ah punishes you for that. You feel the blisters on the author’s hands when she beats the dirt out of sheep skin as well as the discomfort and cold during her night voyage to Casablanca.

Part 6 of Les Berbères et Moi consists of author’s attempt to build her life in Morocco by accepting a certain proposal, meeting obstacles on both: the personal and professional level, living thorough a major crisis at home related to lack of money, job, deteriorating health of both grandparents and more less everyone around including the author; spending weekends in the mountains and enjoying family’s outings in the forest of Ajdir.

Love and marriage...does it really go like horse and carriage? In part five of Magdalena Wasiura's journal, one can hear a broad chapter regarding marriage and love coupling, and in the context of a strange encounter in Beni Mellal about hashish and l'eau de vie. One will travel to the plateau de Tadla and discover an amazing Bin El Ouidan barrage and one will dance to the Berber upbeat at a newborn baby party.

What about fatalism? Should women wear tight jeans? What about swimming? Our God or My God, whose then? Some of those issues are discussed in part four of Magdalena Wasiura's account of her stay in Morocco. She also describes a rather stressful Christmas time spent in Morocco, the overprotective nature of her Muslim family, and her trip to Meknes where she gets arrested.

Part three of Magdalena's journal describes broadly "the forbidden" subjects: intimacy and drinking in the context of Islam that is supported by numerous tales from the Quran, and how young people will turn the prohibited into pleasure. She depicts the growing tension between her and her Muslim family and the cultural clash, something that one will not get in package holidays. "Lasciate ogne speranca, voi ch'intrate": it's Dante's invitation to Hell; here however, it invites one to hammam.

The second part of Magdalena's journal recording her life with the Berber community in Khenifra in the Middle Atlas mountains: their homes, social gatherings and her work with their children in the Association Hannan. Get a good wash in hammam, eat boucheyar, drink shiba, meet my friends Mahamed and Ali and go with us to Arougou, wakha?