The Golden Christmas Ornament

I remember when I saw my first Christmas ornament last year. I don't even know if the person who had this dirty little golden bulb dangling by a single red string actually realized what it was. At first I thought my eyes had deceived me. I had been sitting on the roof of a restaurant sipping on freshly squeezed orange juice, watching the people bustle through the narrow streets below when I saw it. This strange little reminder that on the other side of the world my family would be preparing for Christmas, and here I was in Northern Africa watching hundreds of people prepare for a different kind of holiday season.

The old medina had been particularly busy because it was close to Aid Kabir (or big feast). Instead of trying to find a suitable Christmas tree, everyone was busy trying to find a suitable sacrificial ram. At the few large stores in the city, tents had been erected in the parking lots. Each tent was jammed full of first-born rams, ready to be sacrificed. Big signs were posted advertising the quality of the rams and their various prices per a kilo in Arabic Script. It almost reminded me of the stands selling Christmas trees advertising the oh-so-sought after Douglas firs.

Although I had already lived in this Muslim country for a few months, it still often surprised me when I went to the old medina and was greeted with the frenzy of people bustling about. The holiday season made things even more chaotic.

The old medina already consisted of literally millions of people, over 600 hundred mosques, thousands of shops, donkeys, mules, camels, and now, there was also thousands and thousands of rams added to the madness. It was always a bee's hive of activities, smells, tastes and sounds, making the 'Black Friday' in the U.S. seem like a walk in the park. My favorite event in the medina was the sound of the 'Call to pray' being broadcasted from the mosques. One mosque would start, then another, then another, slowly gaining momentum till the whole medina was humming with a solemn and eerie wale. Often times men would close up their shops and filter to the nearest mosque to pray.

Another thing that always surprised me was seeing the women dressed in traditional garb. I lived in the 'new medina' where women were more western looking, often only covering their hair with a scarf, but here in the 'old medina' it was not uncommon for women to be dressed head to toe in black, sometimes covering their hands with black gloves and sometimes even walling-up the narrow slit for there eyes with netting. I always wondered how the women felt floating through the bustling crowd like a dark shadow, nearly invisible. More and more women were coming out this 'holiday season' to do shopping, so it was a rare opportunity for me to observe them. Typically about 80% of the population in the streets were men, so I was anxious to finally see women.

The same day I saw the Christmas Ornament, I also observed two women on a far away roof top socializing. I could tell that they did not expect anyone to be watching them because they had literally let their hair down. Even me, as a Christian gal from the U.S., often times wore a Jalapa (a long over-coat robe with a hood) to blend in with the crowd in the old medina.

Typically, women who came to the old medina would dress even more modesty than usual just for the fact that it was a more fundamental and old-rooted part of the city. The old medina is one of the oldest cities in the world, heavily filled with tradition, held firmly in place by the people's own peer-pressure.  Pressures on women that probably could never be explained, only felt.

Even now as I sit here, wearing jeans and a t-shirt, brain storming where I am going to purchase my Christmas tree this year, I can not help but wonder if that lonely golden Christmas ornament is being admired by some other adventurous homesick gal. One thing that is for certain, I know I will never take for granted my liberties as a Christian, western woman again.

Marissa L. Lopez