My brother Yassine

6:30pm
My brother Yassine...

...is hilarious. Man of little words and little acknowledgment, he never looks at me or talks to me when we’re in the house, and has only, until recently, acknowledged my existence when we’re in the street and I say, “Salaam, Yassine.” When we’re outside the house he’ll look at me and speak. Today I passed him as I walked home and I said, “Salaam, Yassine.” He responded, “Hi, how are you?” “Fine,” I said. “And you?” “Fine,” and he jogged past.
I sat inside the parlor/my bedroom with the door open while Yassine, Zeinab, Fati, and cousin Salima talked in the hallway/dining room. All of a sudden the talking ceases, and I look up from my book and to the doorway.
Yassine is standing there, smiling. “What?” I ask, and smile back, because he looks mischievous. “I am beautiful,” he declares, touching his left hand to his chest. “Yes, Yassine,” I say, “You are beautiful.” Then I laugh.
The best thing he’s done since I’ve been here, and so much like my Kentucky brothers.

8:30pm
My brother Yassine...

...is loud, and angry. Fati had to translate for me everything that was going on in the argument, but after I knew its content, it sounded familiar. Yassine was set to go to university, and now has decided that he’d rather go to school for Computer Science. Universities are free in Morocco, while the school which he’d attend for CS costs a considerable amount of money—money which his family doesn’t have. Yassine won’t go to university; he refuses.
I sat in the hallway and observed the argument between Yassine and his mother and Fati. There was a lot of yelling from all three of them, and the argument seemed to go the way so many of my American family’s arguments have gone. Michael will get in trouble and Mom will get mad and Michael will yell with a booming, hurt and angry voice, with tears flowing down his face, “Allison never gets in trouble You’re always comparing me to her ”, and he will slam his bedroom door.
The Ayad family argument seemed to go in a similar way. Yassine would yell and his mother would respond in a soft voice, trying to calm him. In an effort to be reasonable— to feign reason —, his voice would become quiet. He would speak in soft tones, at a slower rate of speech, seem kind and understanding. His mother wouldn’t go along with whatever his proposed plan was, and this would send him into another fierce fit of yelling. I looked up at his face once, and it seemed he was fighting back tears. (I can imagine the feeling of yelling and fighting back tears. It hasn’t happened to me much in my short life, but I know well the feeling of an oppressive tightness in the throat, an uncontrollable anger, or disgust, or hurt, the yelling while trying not to cry, and the tears unfortunately coming anyway. Hamdull’ah, thank God, that it hasn’t happened recently. Insha’allah it never will again).
Yassine yelled a few final words and stormed out of the apartment, throwing a few more words back at his mother and sister before slamming the door as loudly as possible. I’m sure it reverberated in the apartment of Suleiman’s family below. (Suleiman being my favorite two year old boy in the world).
Fati continued cleaning up the hallway, where we had previously been peeling potatoes and carrots on the ground. Mama vented her frustration and anger, and several times throughout her soliloquy, I caught the word hemaaq, which means “crazy”.
With Fati remaining silent towards the tail end of the fight with Yassine, and her immediate reaction after his angry departure being to clean quietly, I figure that she was the subject of some, if not most, of his words and anger. I imagine, “Fati is the perfect one. Fati never gets in trouble. Fati always makes the right decisions Fati, Fati, Fati ”
I don’t know if that’s what happened, but I don’t think I’m too far off.

Regardless of country, religion, culture, language...
...one would be hard pressed to convince me that human beings are all that different from one another.