A FEW LAUGHS FROM NORTH AFRICA

Lady Macleod here from North Africa. Here are a couple of vignettes from life in Fez, Morocco.


I was getting nothing done in my room, I think I have the "I finished four stories and sent them in to the contest and I am having a bit of a let down, and empty emotionally" thing, like you do. So I decided to eat cereal.

I walked into the dining room and 'cute girl from downstairs just moved in haven't met her yet' was at the table. Tilley, who is so sweet we may box her and sell her in the confections aisle, was rummaging in the cupboard. Kristof was just inside the doorway to the kitchen, leaning on the frame eating cereal.

As I opened the refrigerator I heard Tilley's voice but not what she was saying. Kristof said, "Lady Mac," and motioned with his head that Tilley was speaking to me.

"What's that then?" I asked.

"Do you know whose nuts are roasting in the oven?" she asked in her upper crust British accent. I swear to you, straight face, as sincere as if she had been asking after my health.

I stood, looked at her sweet face, then turned to Kristof. I put my hand against his cheek in a gesture of affection and said, "Kristof, darlin', should she not be making this inquiry of you?"

As his face turned an impressive shade of scarlet and he choked a little on his cereal, Tilley realized what she had said.

"Tilley I have no idea whose nuts are in the oven," I said with great conviction, "but no matter what you have heard from those Marines, I didn't do it." I turned and marched with great dignity back to my apartment with the sound of joyful laughter following me.

Shortly after this incident Q returned from class. She walked in the door with that look of someone who has just had the creme from the cat's dish (if you are not British, that is "smug").
"Whatever have you been up to?" I ask. Being her mother, I know that look when I see it.

"W-e-el-l, I felt a bit bitchy during class so I wrote dirty sentences. I made myself write them in grammatically correct Arabic, so it came out: "Fatima would you like to penetrate my dog?", and "Dear Karim would you like to surrender to me?"

"The funny part," she said, "was that my Moroccan teacher just assumed no one would be proficient enough to make up the sentences on purpose; so he thought I had made a mistake. It was great."

Parental advice from Fez: rear your children so that when they are grown they will amuse you.