Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Proud and Prejudiced

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man, possessing fortune or no, must be in need of a wife. 

Those literary people among you will notice I have slightly altered the above quote, mostly because I think mine is better and I never liked Jane Austen anyway. Sorry.

I try to keep my posts related to things which happen in my day to day life here in Fes. Today for the first time I decided to walk home. The sun was out and the birds were singing and it's only about half an hour's walk, so I thought 'why not'. And really it was lovely, except it came to me that I am both proud and prejudiced. Tell me ladies and gentlemen. Is this a good thing or not? Let me explain.

When you are English, small and female, you get a lot of attention in these parts, even in the more modern Ville Nouvelle, where I live. Consequently though I wasn't actually bothered on the way home, I got curb crawled several times, and had a lot of shouting and wolf whistling. Incidentally, there is something just a little pathetic about curb crawling while on a scooter. Don't ask me why, but somehow, it just seems so much sadder than the others.

I realised I'm proud because I refused to look at any of these guys. And really, though I'm probably right, and anyway I don't want a Moroccan boyfriend (not while I have the Boy hanging around in the UK) maybe it is a little pretentious of me to automatically assume I won't like, or have anything in common with these people. Secondly I'm prejudiced because since they're Moroccan, I automatically decide they are creeps - although in fairness if you curb crawl or whistle a girl down in the street, you probably are a creep - does that make me a bad person? Or just acceptably selective?

Equally, I've banished the idea of meeting someone at school. At ALIF there are a mix of Americans, Canadians, Brits, and a whole variety of other nationalities. I'm prejudiced against them because I assume they will go their ways and I'll never see them again after this year. But as I said before, Men are in want of Wives. That's why we get attention, sometimes from the least expected sources, sometimes from the most.

This post has now gone on too long. Later, once I've done my work, I might discuss different ways I have been propositioned out here. It might be interesting, so you should definitely come back and have a read.

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