Morocco Blogs

Eat Bees Blog
Eat Bees Blog

Eat Bees is partly political, partly reflective, and entirely provocative. Posts range from reflections on Obama to searching for the roles of women in Moroccan society. It’s a long running blog with frequent updates and a lively community of commentators. Here is a blurb from a post called “Seeing Morocco”

…a few details I noticed today on my way to the café. In the steep spiral staircase that leads from my friend’s apartment to the street (the stairs, made of concrete, are of uneven height), a child was screaming. Last month this same child, or another, screamed for hours on end, piteously and implacably; but lately he’s been much calmer, so today was a reversion to the bad old days. At the bottom of the stairs I greeted a large-waisted matron, wrapped in a bundle of assorted fabrics, who was leaving her apartment with a tray of freshly kneaded dough on her way to the public oven. On the sidewalk outside I saw a tiny boy with a backpack one third his size, on his way home from school; a knot of customers outside a shop that sells basic staples (eggs, flour, oil, soap, bottled gas) and nothing more; and grains of wheat spread on a metal tray, left in a doorway to dry in the sun. Turning the corner I passed the same dusty yellow buildings I pass every morning (in Fez most buildings are a shade of ochre, just as in Marrakech they are a shade of rose) through a neighborhood that has nothing special about it, being neither a shantytown nor a district of villas—except that it’s home to an unusual number of car mechanics, most of them teenagers, working in primitive garages not one of which is equipped with a hydraulic lift, or any device more sophisticated than a welding torch. As I turned the last corner on my way to the café, threading my way up the alley past cars in various states of repair, an apprentice mechanic ran past me on an errand, taller than his age, gangly limbs flailing.

and then another about how Morocco is changing:

What needs to follow is a frank discussion among Moroccans about the right balance between traditional identity and a “new Morocco” of individual rights and responsibilities. This conversation, however primitively begun, is already taking place.
One sign of this is the debate between editors Rachid Nini and Ahmed Reza Benchemsi. Nini is the editor of Al Masae, an independent journal which, in the short time it has existed, has leapt ahead of the pack to become Morocco’s most widely read newspaper by far. His opponents call him a populist demagogue, and even most of his supporters would call him a conservative force, a defender of Morocco’s traditional Arab, Islamic identity. Yet he is also known for exposing corruption and abuse of power, and as an advocate for transparent, rational government. From all evidence I would call him a democrat, not an apologist for the way things are. His role is to give Morocco’s “silent majority” a voice in the public forum, and that’s already a plus. Benchemsi is the editor of Nichane and Tel Quel, sister magazines that delight in stirring up controversy, usually by attacking some aspect of Moroccan social conservatism. He is a defender of individual liberty and secularism against the traditional social contract, which is based on Islamic values. He has defended gay rights, prostitution and the legalization of hashish, and has criticized the compulsory nature of the Ramadan fast. At times he seems to take his positions to extremes, as if seeking attention though the most controversial stance. Like Nini, he criticizes the monopolistic nature of the Moroccan state, its arbitrariness and lack of transparency. However, his critics say that he speaks mainly to a small, Westernized elite, since the liberties he defends mean little to Morocco’s impoverished majority, still mired in economic necessity.