Badr or not Badr

There are a lot of people I have met during my time in Morocco and in particular in the last six years since I have in a fashion settled here, well half settled as I spend about half my time in Morocco. In the beginning it was a nightmare to try to remember all the names, or rather attach the right name to the right face. Faces I do not forget easily but names I do, and even more so when all comes down to Mohameds, Hassans, Youssefs and so on. If you call someone Mohamed, Hassan or Ahmed your chances to be right are greater than to be wrong. However, there are names which are not so frequent, almost rare and one of those is Badr. I met Badr as he was coffee-ing at the popular haunt of Jour et Nuit all those years ago. We had coffee together several times and he saw me on the beach once or twice but that is about all. Then Badr disappeared or my interest in him waned. About two years ago I ran into him or we crossed our paths at the Abattoir bus place as I was going home from the beach. He told me he was working in Biougra, if I remember correctly, which is a farming community. I commended him for his work and that was it. Then last year he saw me by chance again, approached me and eventually asked for some money claiming to be out of work. I refuse to give any money to anyone like that because it is asking for trouble. If I give once there would be repeated requests and expectations run high. And that was all about Badr.

I did have his telephone number and ergo his name as part of my contacts but I must have erased it at some point. This is of no particular consequence except that on one occasion when I saw him I could not remember his name. Not remembering someone’s name drives me crazy and trying to resolve it with so much zeal is like trying to prove to myself that I am not quite as senile as I may be. I have the same problem often with the wife of Humphrey Bogart. And although I remember so much about her beauty, her deep voice, the films she made as soon as I think of her as the wife of Bogey I forget her name and even at this very moment I cannot remember it. I just went to the kitchen to have a bite to eat hoping that a break would help, and still cannot remember her name. At least I do remember the other two frequent conundrums, one of which is Kate Blanchett and Gwyneth Paltrow; if I remember the one I usually cannot remember the other, or I fail to recall either name. The same goes for Glen Close and Meryl Streep. Now, the Kate/Gwyneth and Glen/Meryl problems seem to be quite frequent as I discovered on the net that many people confuse the two, or rather the four but in twos. I do not have the same excuse for Bogey’s wife though.

Well my friend’s name of Badr comes into the same category of those that I often cannot remember. And this is the interesting bit that made me write about this and it happened on Thursday. But, before the Thursday, about two days, so it was Tuesday I think, for some crazy reason I remembered Badr, wondered whatever happened to him as there are so many people that were very present over the years and suddenly disappear, or so it seems. Yes I remembered him as I thought of so many people who were almost the inventory at the beach for a long time and then suddenly would sink into oblivion. Still, however much I thought about him I could not remember his name. In situation like this I have several ways or trying to jog my memory and the one I used this time was a dictionary of Muslim Names, and having narrowed it to a letter or two I picked the letter B, and lo and behold, as soon as I read the name Badr, I knew it was him. So I was quite happy to retrieve his forgotten name but of course was not any wiser as to whatever happened to Badr. Fortunately this presented no problem as my interest as to what happened to him was minimal and caused no grave concern.

Well then, what happened on Thursday you may ask? On Thursday I decided to take company of my friend Ismail and revisit Taghazout for the first time this year, as the weather this year was quite untypical and Taghazout is only at its nicest when the weather if fine. For those that don’t know, Taghazout is a half an hour bus drive or seventeen kilometres north of Agadir. When I took Ismail for the first time to Taghazout last November the weather was glorious and we had the most enjoyable swim in the pristine waters of the Taghazout bay. I was hoping we would recapture the same feeling this time but I was wrong, the whole morning was dull the tide was is in and everything turned out less than successful. As we walked to the small beach north of the town a group of young people walked towards us, some of them European and some local and one of them just shouted, Miloud, ca va? I turned round and to my surprise recognised the caller to be my long lost friend Badr, and the fact that I retrieved his name only a couple of days before made me shout in a friendlier than usual fashion, Ca va Badr, et toi?

It is just one of these coincidences that makes us think there is more to it than just a mere coincidence. And, yet I still cannot remember Mrs Bogart’s name and my internet connection is down so I cannot seek help online. I shall see what comes back first the internet connection or the name. And before you try to contact me and tell me it is Loraine Bacall, please don’t. I know it but often just cannot remember it.