July 20, 2003 - Passion Fruit: When she and I left Peace Corps Morocco two years ago, Sara would have worn a shorter and tighter dress for a night out in Marrakech without a second thought
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July 20, 2003 - Passion Fruit: When she and I left Peace Corps Morocco two years ago, Sara would have worn a shorter and tighter dress for a night out in Marrakech without a second thought
When she and I left Morocco two years ago, Sara would have worn a shorter and tighter dress for a night out in Marrakech without a second thought by Morocco RPCV Jessie Deeter
When she and I left Morocco two years ago, Sara would have worn a shorter and tighter dress for a night out in Marrakech without a second thought by Morocco RPCV Jessie Deeter
The Evil Eye
A cursed journey to Morocco
by Jessie Deeter
Excerpts:
It was, I thought, the perfect dress for a night out in Marrakech. Hitting just above the knee, it hinted at cheekiness while retaining some mystery. Frivolous but not silly. The dress was almost exactly the same raw salmon-red of most Marrakchi buildings. It was made of nubby material that would sop up sweat without wrinkling. Practical and sporty. To wear the dress was to allow myself to be feminine in Morocco. It was a symbol of my own self-indulgence, and it was about my desire to identify with the younger women in large Moroccan cities who want the right to wear Western clothes and not be considered whores. Wearing the dress was something I thought my akht, my sister Sara, would understand.
“I don’t know why you brought that thing,” said Sara, pointing at the dress. “You’d think after all the time you lived here you would know better.” I didn’t know what to say. I was hurt, but I was equally mystified. After Peace Corps, Sara had headed to New York and I to California, but we had visited each other several times. Each time, we slipped back into the parlance of akhts, sisters. When she and I left Morocco two years ago, Sara would have worn a shorter and tighter dress for a night out in Marrakech without a second thought. More than any other city, Marrakech is where Moroccans go when they want to party, and there, short skirts and tight jeans abound. Experience had also taught us that Moroccan men would hiss at us and drive the wrong way down one-way streets for an opportunity to flirt with us whether we were covered from head to toe or dressed like go-go dancers.
Without realizing it, I had come on a weeks-long trip to a past that no longer existed. It was quite possibly my preconceptions and my dress that brought L’Ayn – the Evil Eye – upon me.
In Morocco, even non-traditional households hang a Hand of Fatima on the door to protect the inhabitants against L’Ayn. The hand of the Prophet’s daughter, also called a hamza – for five fingers – is said to ward off the curses of jealous neighbors. Nine out of ten Peace Corps volunteers begin their service as non-believers and leave with Hands of Fatima for the whole family, just in case. I, too, had carted home a supply of hamzas, but in the two years I’d spent working as a private investigator in Los Angeles and then as an assistant at a computer magazine in Berkeley, I’d managed to forget about the Evil Eye and the need to defend myself against it. . . .
Since graduating from the University of California at Santa Barbara, Jessie Deeter has spilled drinks on several minor artists, experienced varying degrees of stomach upset in several third-world countries, taught Pony Club to small children, covered the "art scene" for a small Japanese-American newspaper, been the only female taekwondo practitioner in a small town in Morocco , survived a loft community in downtown Los Angeles, done her time as an "assistant" and tried to make a living as a free-lance writer. In her current incarnation as a graduate student, she is planning an upcoming trip to the Middle East, a documentary and a career.
Jessie Deeter
Email: jddeeter@home.com
Experience
6/99-8/99 LEBANON-BASED FREE-LANCE JOURNALIST Beirut, Lebanon Reported and wrote stories for publications like Salon and The San Francisco Chronicle, researched academic thesis paper
5/97-present FREE-LANCE WRITER Berkeley, CA. Write news articles for highly technical magazines like Computer Reseller News. Write stories for local papers and weeklies, such as The East Bay Express.
12/98-1/99 INTERN The East Bay Express. Berkeley, CA. Wrote stories, fact-checked, updated Access database.
3/97-9/97 CIRCULATION ASSISTANT Computer Currents. Berkeley, CA.Oversaw five national magazine deliveries and supervised drivers. Organized start-up of delivery for Atlanta region.
9/96-3/97 INVESTIGATOR/WRITER The Agency. Venice, CA. Investigated and wrote reports on confidential Civil Rights cases.
9/94-6/96 ENGLISH DEPARTMENT HEAD/PEACE CORPS VOLUNTEER Faculte des Sciences et des Techniques. Settat, Morocco. Formulated FSTS English curriculum and ordered all texts for English program. Taught and developed four semesters of English to first-year university students.
7/95-6/96 EDITOR U.S. Peace Corps. Rabat, Morocco. Founded and edited Ragnes,a quarterly literary review. Contributed regularly to both Peaceworks and Ragnes.
9/93-6/94 TRANSLATOR/EDITOR Yves Cazaneuve, saddle designer and trainer. Los Angeles, CA. Translated and edited horse training book from French to English.
9/93-6/94 INTERN/CONTRIBUTER Rafu Shimpo (Japanese-American newspaper). Los Angeles, CA. Contributed feature and news stories to paper.
Education
University of California, Berkeley, concurrently enrolled in School of Journalism and International Area Studies, Middle East focus, planned graduation 5/2001, with M.J. and M.A.
University of California, Santa Barbara. B.A. English, With Honors, 6/92
Languages
French (fluent), Moroccan Arabic (good), Spanish (elementary)
Skills
MS Word, Access, Excel, Lexis-Nexis, Betacam operation, Avid digital editing.
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Story Source: Passion Fruit
This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; COS - Morocco; Stories - Morocco
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By Anonymous (adsl196-148-218-206-196.adsl196-7.iam.net.ma - 196.206.218.148) on Monday, September 26, 2005 - 3:05 pm: Edit Post |
if it is possible to send me more information about my county morocco because i need a lot of news in my research to take my diplomat
After over 4 years of looking for work, I am now the Job Search Advocate at Worcester Senior Center trying to help senior citizens 55 years old or older find work. I am also having my first work of poetry published during the summer of 2008. It already has a Library of Congress number and is called OUR LOVE IS FOREVER.