Just before Moroccan Independence, some geologists were working near the border between the Spanish and French zones. According to regulations, they checked in with the local French officer for local affairs and asked if that was all right with him.

“No problem at all,” he said, “It’s quiet here, go right ahead you won’t run into any trouble.”

He gave them a dozen mochazni just in case and they went off to do a couple of weeks’ field work, camping each night.

Then Independence was declared, and there were no field missions for some time.

Two years later, field trips began again: and the same geologists found themselves in the same area. Local administration had changed and now they had to check in with the local Qa’id, as regulations demanded. He welcomed them and asked lots of questions about their work.

“I remember you well,” he said finally, “You were up in ____ two years ago. You camped at night, you had some mochazni with you.”

They agreed this was so. The Qa’id explained that he had led one of the groups that were fighting for independence in the region.

“Do you know something?” said the new Qa’id, “We spent days deciding whether we’d kill you all or not.”

“But how can they control a crowd or keep order — they haven’t even got a baton, let alone a gun,” she said.

“Even when they have a gun, it may not be loaded.” He laughed. “Ah, but you’ve never seen them in action! Did you not see one man put the crowd in a line at the opening of the cinema last year, or keep children from under the horses’ hooves at the fantasia in honour of the Fête du Trône?” She shook her head.

“One man can do it, alone: one mochazni in a uniform. He just whips off his belt and goes to work. Pure magic, a mochazni with his belt off.” He smiled.

It was Ramadan. It was summer Ramadan. It was lunchtime. Saïd worked in a garage with four other men; they worked hard changing and repairing stubborn truck and tractor wheels with sometimes just a crowbar and brute strength. Even their shoes were not strong enough to protect their feet. Saïd wore short rubber boots really made for sloshing around in the countryside in the muck of winter. One boot had a split up the side, and when they got to the trickiest bit of levering a truck tire off its metal wheel, he had to be careful.

The Café of the Swallows, 1868
(Watercolor on paper, 49.4 × 39.5 cm)
BY Mariano Fortuny
Private Collection

When they stopped work, Saïd took his coat from a hanger on the garage wall and went around the back of the garage. The others would be snoozing indoors for the break, they wouldn’t be eating or drinking anyway, and besides, the Ramadan night life left them exhausted during the day.

When he got outside, Saïd looked around him and put his hand in the pocket of his jacket. He brought out a triangular carton of milk. Tearing off a corner of the carton, he put it to his head and drank deeply. Milk was a good idea, he reflected, because it eased both thirst and hunger in one go. He didn’t mind that it had gone sour.

Suddenly he heard footsteps. One of his coworkers had come around the back and was looking at Saïd in horror. Saïd did not attempt to hide the now empty carton. A half litre of milk. It wasn’t much anyway.

“You should be ashamed of yourself!” the other exploded.

Then for a moment he was speechless, but soon he found the words, words he had heard, words he had read or even some that he felt, about fasting for Ramadan. He mentioned informing the police. Saïd knew he wouldn’t, but it was at that point that he lost his temper. He lashed out with his fist and knocked the other man out cold. Then he went back to changing tires.

He was a Superqa’id, and it was a lonely life for a man with a bit of education and city habits, way out there in the mountains. So he brought what he could from the city to pass the time, videos of belly dancers that played in the otherwise bare room, and when visitors came — even foreigners — he entertained them thus, while his wife and daughters looked the other way as they served the tea, or sat with their backs to the screen, listening to the idle chatter of the men, or giggling among themselves.