Bismillah: Language and Culture in a Moroccan Café

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Though not a conventional blog post, I nevertheless wanted to share my final project for my intensive Darija course. Despite having written it in my first week in Morocco, the observations on culture and language still ring true to my experiences after five months in the country. I originally wrote the following poem in English while sitting in a Moroccan café, later translating the work into a combination of Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) and Darija, Morocco’s regional Arabic dialect. I memorized and recited the work for the Intensive Darija final presentation. The subject matter was in response to the project’s prompt: “Discuss, in Darija, your first impressions, experiences, or thoughts on an aspect of Moroccan culture.” In the poem, the café culture, with heavy French influences, is obvious. Less evident to non-Arabic readers, though, is the mixture of MSA, Darija, and English loanwords, meant to evoke the complexity and humor of the Moroccan linguistic landscape.

بسم الله

السمية ديال الله¹

الأول شي هنا

ممكن الأول شي ف أي بلاصة

كنفكر ملي

نقلب على الجواب

 

كنهز الكاس إل فمي

وبزربة

كنحرّق لساني

ممكن هاد الجواب

ممكن هادي السمية

صعيب تمييز

 ف الكلمات الغريبة

وصوت الجرّان دالكراسى

 

²"نص نص،"كنضحك

"هاف هاف"

ولكن كلها ساخنة

إدن كنشرب الما

الما

سميته بحال "مه"³

ولكن عمرني ما

كنقولش "مه"

 

،وملّي كنشرب

الحروف الساكنة

كتقطع حدايا

وأنا مدكدك

باللغة السندويشية⁴

بلا توقف

بلا حركات

 

مقهى هي قهوة

والقهوة ف القهوة⁵

وجوج بهم كيخواو

قاع ديال كاسي

قاع ديال كينونتي

ولكن أنا التخت

إدن كنشرب بشوية

وكنتسنى الجواب

وحتى السمية

مرّة تانية

بسم الله... بسم الله

⁶الحمد الله... الحمد الله

 

Notes:

[1] Here, I translate Bismillah, a phrase in classical Arabic meaning, into Darija, though no Moroccan would ever use the Darija translation.

[2] “Nus nus” directly translates to “Half-half” (transliterated from English in the next line of the poem), and is a common drink in Moroccan cafes, mixing half coffee and half milk, hence the drink’s name.

[3] The specific pronunciation of water (something close to “muh”) in Darija always makes me laugh, as my requests for water, in my mind, always sound like a supreme indifference toward hydration.

[4] Here, I refer to Darija as a “sandwhichy” language, given Moroccans’ frequent observation that their dialect lacks much of Modern Standard Arabic’s harakat, or short vowels, due to the influences of local Tamazight dialects. The effect sounds as though Moroccans are eating the words, always a funny piece of imagery.

[5] In this line, I show how the Modern Standard Arabic term for café is replaced by the word for coffee, like in French, which creates a frequent source of ambiguity for outsiders learning the dialect for the first time.

[6] Bismillah, "In the name of God," can be used to precede most any action, invoking God's name to bless that action. Similiarly, alhamdulillah, "Praise be to God," often marks an end to a meal, as well as a response to "How are you?" Given my limited Darija abilities when I wrote the poem, the two phrases were easiest to discern from the conversations at the café.

 

English Translation:

Bismillah

In the name of God

The first thing here

Maybe the first thing anywhere

I think

As I search for the answer

 

I lift the cup to my mouth

And immediately burn my tongue

Maybe this is the answer

Maybe this is the name

Difficult to discern

Through the foreign words

And scraping of chairs

 

Nus nus, I chuckle,

“Half half”

But all heat

So I drink the water

“Muh”

A name like “meh”

But I am not indifferent

 

And as I drink,

The consonants cut around me

And I am exhausted

Of the sandwiched language

All pauses consumed

 

Café is coffee

And the two blend together

Simultaneously draining

The bottom of my cup

The bottom of my presence

But that makes me the dregs

So I sip more slowly

And wait for the answer

And also the name

One more time

Bismillah… bismillah

Alhamdulillah… alhamdulillah

Author: Charlie Johnson