Literary Supplement to Al Maghrib Journal, Thursday, June 2, 1938

We know of no nation, amongst all who populate the globes surface, which finds itself in the 20th century while continuing to live to rhythms of centuries long gone, centuries of darkness from the point of view of organization, tradition, myth and all that these entail to such an (exaggerated) extent that in the eyes of strangers, the (whole) nation passes off as a museum. A museum where tourists can go to observe the flow of time, the evolution of successive generations and that of different stages of backward living. They are amused, deriding the expositions of this immense museum which they traverse up and down. It was as if they were in a cinema viewing strange and bizarre scenes. We hardly recognize (our) Morocco as the nation bearing the title of this film, a country which until recently could count itself amongst the great states along the shores of the Mediterranean. After having been one of the most important cradles of civilization and culture, it has become these days a center of amusement for other people. It finds itself at the mercy of world travel agencies who advertise in their bulletin boards that this is a land where the vestiges of times past are still intact, that its inhabitants live in the 20th century despite themselves and that nothing binds them to the progress of modern life.

These travel agencies compete with (much) ingenuity in the choice of promotional campaigns designed to persuade their European clientele to visit our country. Sometimes they even publish imagery that have nothing to do with Morocco such as these posters which depict Moroccans as black Africans dressed in skirts made with plants bearing exotic ornaments. Sometimes they attribute to our country customs and traditions whose origins are unknown to us. All this to arouse in the potential tourist a desire to have an experience unlike any other so he can describe upon his return home the extraordinary one thousand and one night adventures suggested to him by so called tourist guides who (invariably) add fictional color to the sights he would have seen during his Moroccan voyage.

We believe that these travel agencies bring harm to our country by exploiting this colonial bias which they spread about Morocco exclusively for their commercial gain. Meanwhile one is forced to acknowledge that they have had a huge success with the advertising slogan they chose to brand the Moroccan touristy product. This slogan has touched the heart of the matter even though (for us) therein lies nothing to be proud of. The agencies owe this success to the diffusion of the slogan through the use of huge mural billboards bearing print with vibrant colors to attract attention with the slogan according to which a tourist who visits Morocco can see parading before his eyes,  20 Centuries in 20 Days.

In fact when we examine scenes from our daily lives, we realize there is little relation between (our current) Moroccan society and the 20th century. There is an enormous gap between our lives and those of modern times. The latter are based on true understanding of all aspects of living while we lead lives driven by pervasive laziness and ignorance. Modern living relies on power and a fighting spirit while we lend proof to weakness each time we are confronted by any difficulty, no matter how small. Modern civilization teaches man to live for the community. Meanwhile we only look after our personal interests and declare at each opportunity that we dont care what happens after we are gone.

All these abstruse dispositions have led to a lack of (proper) upbringing and to a degenerate environment at a time when the roots of our past civilization have begun to wither and die. While centuries (helped) brew our languor, we turned our backs against basic principles paying attention only to means of making fortunes, to the possession of property and to show off some superficial ornament, object of our pride.

And so we stumbled and perished against adversity in the journey of life until the moment when we were ambushed by modern times. We were left stunned and we knelt before it without knowing how to reach for it. It inspired us with great admiration.

But the secrets of its superiority always eluded us. This is how we became the objects of ridicule and wonder to foreigners for whom we represented the centuries past and for whom we reassembled all that was chased away by progress and left behind by the development of science. And that is how 20 centuries managed to squeeze themselves into our lives.

It would be commendable to preserve traditions and customs that are neither shocking nor harmful to the reputation of our nation but we must first of all live in our (current) century and we must adapt to the living requirements of our era. Only in this manner can we distance ourselves from the charge of apathy that is leveled so well by the travel agency slogan 20 Centuries in 20 Days.