As Pierre said in a comment on the post “Vivre son histoire d’amour avec un Marocain” (“Living your love story with a Moroccan”),
as a man, the problems don’t arise in the same way
… and I agree so much that I’d started to prepare this post, to talk about mixed couples when the man is a foreigner.
I refer you to the post I published yesterday for the ‘preambles and explanations’, but I remind you once again that I’m talking more about mixed couples with a Moroccan woman ‘from Morocco’, who has lived little or not at all or even travelled abroad. Not a Leïla Slimani or a friend of mine who spent 15 years living on her own in Belgium and had a successful medical career before returning to Morocco. And that ‘the Moroccan woman’ as a cliché doesn’t exist any more than ‘the Moroccan man’ and that each person is a special case.
A single woman in Morocco is frowned upon
The social and family pressure on girls to fulfil their destiny as wives and mothers is mind-boggling. The result is that a Moroccan woman is even more obsessed with putting a ring on her finger than Carrie Bradshaw and her girlfriends. While the average age of marriage is rising, especially in the big cities and especially for men, for girls, when they are over 25 and still single, it starts to feel like hachouma (shame), for her and for the family.
And why isn’t your daughter married? Is there something wrong with her? Didn’t you know how to bring her up? Are her little sisters the same?
When it’s the mother who takes the pressure from her own mother, her husband, and passes it on…
What’s more, the life of a single woman is rather complicated. Supposedly “free”, she is seen as a potential competitor by other women, and therefore shunned from the circle of friends of married women. Meeting up with anxious single women is not a happy occasion.
Finally, Moroccan women from good families do not live alone. They stay with their parents until they are married. All the more reason for her to want to conquer her “freedom” as quickly as possible.
The risks of relationships outside marriage
Sexual relations outside marriage are prohibited in Morocco. It is much, much more forbidden between a Moroccan woman and a foreigner than between a Moroccan man and a foreigner.
I met a man at the consulate who had been arrested at the request of his partner’s family. The judge had confiscated his passport, and he had been given the choice between prison and marriage. He was clearly in love, his partner had a child who could well be his, so he filled out his application to get married.
Material relationships
I’ve witnessed enough sordid stories, of women abandoned, children not cared for, alimony not paid, to understand that Moroccan women are interested.
Don’t forget, if you’re outraged, that many marriages are still arranged by families, that the ‘new moudawana’ (family code), which banned repudiation, only dates from 2004, and that many men still don’t respect it. Don’t forget either that if separation of property is the rule in Islam, the woman must have property, which is rarely the case. Only educated women can have a job, and the unemployment rate for women is much higher than for men.
And don’t forget that the dowry is compulsory in Islam. In Morocco, it does not reach the insane proportions seen in other countries like India, for example, but it is still important. It is both a sign of the fiancé’s consideration for his future wife and an assurance for the future, since it was all that was left to him in the event of separation, before the new Moudawana.
This need to get as much money as possible out of the man is therefore part of a “software” that has been passed down from mother to daughter for generations. And it is not incompatible with married love.
Even Moroccans make fun of it, with a great deal of self-mockery:
You have to convert to marry a Moroccan woman
It is impossible to legally marry a Muslim woman in Morocco without being a Muslim yourself. Quite simply because the concept of civil marriage does not exist. Conversion is therefore a necessary step (but not circumcision, which can be avoided if you convert as an adult).
Conversion is not a trivial act. Even if you do it purely for practical reasons (being able to get married), it will have an impact on your status in Morocco. You will have to practise Ramadan in public, you will no longer be able to leave your property to non-Muslim children from your first marriage and, generally speaking, those around you will expect you to behave like a good convert. We tolerate things from foreigners that we don’t tolerate from Muslims…
You marry the mother at the same time as the daughter
Theoretically, in traditional society, a young girl leaves her family for that of her husband. When you marry a Moroccan, you are clearly marrying his entire family. But in your case, your wife’s ties with her family, particularly her mother, will remain all the stronger because there is nothing to compensate on your side.
Relationships with in-laws can be a problem for any couple, but in this case, be prepared for a presence that is all the more invasive because, out of respect, your wife will do nothing to limit it.
This is nice and practical, but it also means that your wife will be regularly coached by her mother, and that you will find it very difficult to impose your views on the children’s upbringing, if by chance they are not in phase. At least as long as you stay in Morocco.
Potential red flags
As in the case of a relationship with a Moroccan man, if she left school early, lives in a small town, doesn’t speak French nor English very well and you don’t want to turn yourself into a Pygmalion, you need to ask yourself the right questions quickly.
She’ll give you her number straight away
… her Whatsapp, her Facebook, she’s even offered them to you.
In short, she’s hitting on you. If it’s within two hours of your first contact, beware. Morocco is not a modern country where girls are expected to hit on boys.
She’s showing off with you in public
In public, or with your family, without you being married or even officially engaged. I’m talking about showing off. Holding hands discreetly when you’re a bit isolated isn’t a problem. Hugging and kissing is something else. It’s even dangerous – you risk being stopped by the police.
Maybe that’s what she’s after.
She shows off for you in front of her parents
Perhaps you’re already living together, you’ve been invited to the parents’ house, she’s made no secret of it, the parents even let you sleep together?
Triple warning.
I’ve known girls where the family managed the relationship with the stranger, even took direct advantage of it. I’m thinking in particular of a case where the man gave his girlfriend a 4×4 and a villa in Marrakesh. When they split up, because he didn’t want to marry her, she kept everything, and the family explained to the spurned lover that he could be happy that they weren’t pressing charges against him.
There’s a word for that. And yes, the family can practise low profile pimping.
Basically, in red, a “traditional” Moroccan girl will never invite her boyfriend home unless marriage plans are underway, and she will never share a room with him unless she is married, nor will she tell her parents openly about it.
If you’re in this situation, at best, you’re expected to marry very quickly. At worst…
She asks you for money
It’s totally normal for her, that’s how it is. And you want so much to please her, and she’s “so poor” compared to you, it’s normal, you want to spoil her, protect her.
It’s all a question of limits. Beyond the limit, it’s no longer called love. Normally, the fiancée doesn’t ask for anything, she just accepts the gifts with pleasure, that’s all.
It’s up to her father or legal guardian to negotiate the dowry with you.
You have to pay the dowry
The dowry must be included in the marriage contract, but it is perfectly possible not to pay it immediately (this is also mentioned in the contract). If the amount is significant, this is even the usual practice. The dowry will have to be paid later, perhaps never, or at worst, in the event of divorce (payment is obligatory at that time). Asking you to pay right away is contrary to Moroccan custom.
The family has some great deals for you
We’re (soon to be) a family, so we’re offering you some exceptional deals, getting you involved in associations to buy land and houses. We’re not going to draw up any papers in front of a notary, we’re a family, no you don’t have the right to buy farmland, but it doesn’t matter, between you and me we’ll know that you were involved in the purchase…
Do I really need to explain?
She agrees not to have children
She’s lying to you.
I don’t know a single Moroccan woman who really doesn’t want to have children.
If you don’t want to have any, and you manage not to have any “by surprise”, you can be sure that your relationship is not going to last. This is a case of divorce.
So if, in pre-marital discussions, she tells you that “it doesn’t matter, neither do I”, you can be sure that she’s not sincere, at best to bait you into changing your mind, at worst because she doesn’t plan to stay with you for too long.
She’s very, very jealous
It’s only natural. Moroccan men and women are jealous and possessive. Jealousy is a quality. In the case of the Moroccan wife, it goes quite far, with constant surveillance, questions, mobile phone inspections and remote control to ensure that her husband is never left with another woman, unsupervised.
And I understand her…
It’s just up to you to see if this type of relationship suits you.
There are happy marriages, of course
And I believe that between two honest people, with respectful in-laws, the relationship between a gay man and a Moroccan woman is easier than between a Moroccan man and a foreign woman.
If you have paid close attention to the warning signs, your marriage will be what a traditional, old-fashioned marriage can be, where the woman reigns over the house and the family sphere, and the man earns the house’s money.
Many Moroccan women seek to marry foreigners because they find them better husbands, nicer, less macho in short, than Moroccans. This is the paradox of this country, where many people want to marry a foreigner to escape from a relationship that they no longer appreciate, but which they find difficult to change by staying between themselves, because each expects the other to behave in a specific way.
A typo or syntax error? You can select the text and hit Ctrl+Enter to send us a message. Thank you! If this post interested you, maybe you can also leave a comment. We'd love to exchange with you !
