My personal journey into the Darija language and culture
On Saturday night I was out with my friends. As most guys do when they get together we were just shooting the breeze talking about all kinds of things. One of my friends mentioned someone who had some problems and said because of these personal problems, he would never be able to marry because whoever …
Continue reading “The con man – some things to watch out for”
A long time ago when I decided that I would become fluent Arabic (and no, I’m still not fluent) I spoke to someone I knew who learned the Arabic language and was not an Arabic speaker. I asked him how many words did you have to know to be able to speak in Arabic. He …
So another month (closer to a month and a half ) has passed. I’ve looked over my progress from the previous month and I have to say, I feel I have made improvements. Expressing myself is becoming easier now. Although I can’t understand everything I listen to, I am able to pick out more …
If you ever visit Morocco, you will almost immediately see the French influence on this country. Although Morocco is an Arab country and the official language is Arabic you will see French everywhere. What I mean is that you will see signs everywhere in French. When I first visited Morocco I was surprised at how …
When I was first started travelling, especially on my own I always expected to stay in hotels. My assumption was that hotels were just better. I never thought once of using Air BnB or “Bed and Breakfast”. For some reason when I heard the term “Bed and Breakfast” I thought of staying in some creepy …
Continue reading “Apartment vs Hotel and why I choose Air BnB”
Yesterday I was involved in an accident. Fortunately, everyone involved was unharmed. Although it sucks not having my car, having to wait and pay for everything, for me this isn’t even the worst part. Before this accident I started to feel like my life was finally on track. I had a plan of where I …
Several years back when I was starting to learn Arabic, my teacher would often say, the key to success in learning the Arabic language is to think like an Arab. He said you had to see sentences as arabs see the sentences and not as you normally see sentences. Why was that? Well he further …
This year I had the very rare fortune to travel to Morocco during the beginning of Ramadan. Over the years I have met and became friends with quite a few Moroccans and for the past few years they have all told me not to come to Morocco during Ramadan. The reason they say this is …
So it’s the end of July and I thought I should share my experience so far and give myself a self assessment of my progress. Well it’s been tough to say the least. I underestimated how much time I would be able to give myself after work, not to mention the fact that I get …
When speaking with others about your goals people (sometimes who have no knowledge) seem to always want to give you their “expert” opinion. I was telling my friends about my goals of learning Darija. Instantly they started telling me that the only way to learn Darija is to live in Morocco for a year. The …
