StupidJourney

I'm sorry about what you two are going through. I wish I could be the one to tell you it will soon get easier, but quite frankly, I can't. All I can say is hang in there.

I was wondering about this too. But according to the website, to get a family book AND register birth of child, you must submit proof of Islamic/Moroccan Marriage. But according to the registering a marriage section, a marriage is considered valid as long as it is witnessed in the presence of two Muslims, which thankfully we did, but we don't have proof of this. Has anyone had experience with this? Because we want to register our marriage (which apparently we should have done months ago), get a family book, and eventually register our child.

ETA: My husband said that he thought there was a consulate/embassy or something in Houston. But from what I can see, it's just in NYC. Does anyone know of a Moroccan government office or representaive in Houston?

Hello all.

I am bursting with questions - but I'll start with these two.

1) I was asked for proof of employment while filling out papers at the adoul's office: I told them, I am self-employed. They said I would need something - but I have to say, what is it they need?

2) When I was younger and easily stupider, to help my teacher get a work and residence visa years and years ago (just about 10), I filled out a marriage certificate in Morocco. And then, I never saw my teacher again. Ever. Now, today, I want to be married to another for love. But I am seriously concerned this old 'good deed' of mine is going to come back to haunt me. For example, I distinctly remember in the proceedings something that said 'You must never marry another Moroccan" I hope someone can relieve me of my concerns on this account.

(Additional info: The first Moroccan marriage never resulted in my teacher traveling to America, since I would have had to be part of that process - which I wasn't)

Anyway, I post these things somewhat anxiously and look forward to replies - thank you in advance!

Hi,

for your first question, I would say income tax forms would probably suffice. If you don't keep your copies, you can request it from the IRS.

As far as your second question, I would think that you would need to track this person down and get a divorce, because you are technically married.

well I cant really say anything... cause In egypt i DID dye one of his underwears Pink... I swear he will never let me forget it!

Ok good, I'm not the only one! (except it was only pink in one "prominent" area)...

I think there's a form you can file to request a removal of the I-130 petition. But I would suggest posting this on the K-3 or K-1 forum and see what they say.

I'm confused. Why are you worried about your I-130, if you're already here on an I-129f?

Are you talking about why it's taking so long to to get approved for the I-485? When did you file the I-485? Just this year? I'm not sure how it works for those on a K-3 visa, but I think you were supposed to file your I-485 within a certain period of time after coming to the U.S. Maybe someone else on that type of visa can help though.

Good luck! JUst a qustion, according to the timeline his interview is on a Sunday?

Every time I say something positive, like "We're so lucky" or "Thank goodness we're healthy" my husband says "hamza" (five) and puts his open hand over my face. He says that saying positive things like that invite the evil eye. Kind of drives me a little nuts sometimes.

That's funny. If I say something like that, my husband just makes me say "lhamdullilah"

I didn't learn until my MIL was in the U.S. that they leave food out overnight too. (I guess it was due to my being kicked out of the kitchen in Morocco!) Every time I saw it happen here, I was suddenly not hungry, or had an intense pregnancy craving for something else! Oh, and I am left wondering about maybe my GI problems in Morocco stemming from this issue.

Oh and my husband has the green goop stuff too. His has a picture of a ginger root on it!

i bet your gi problems definitely came from that. did you also always drink bottled water? i decided to drink tap water once and had problems in the toilet after that.

that green goop also tastes unbelievably disgusting. he gagged everytime he took a spoonful. claims it helped his pain though!

You actually had the guts to try it? I'm proud of you!

I didn't learn until my MIL was in the U.S. that they leave food out overnight too. (I guess it was due to my being kicked out of the kitchen in Morocco!) Every time I saw it happen here, I was suddenly not hungry, or had an intense pregnancy craving for something else! Oh, and I am left wondering about maybe my GI problems in Morocco stemming from this issue.

Oh and my husband has the green goop stuff too. His has a picture of a ginger root on it!

It's so funny that this thread was started today, and my husband's little brother saw me drinking some water that I had put into the freezer and he told me "No!Nicole, dah wawa!" Translation: in his Arabic, wawa= wag3ak= hurt you!!!

Also, my MIL blames every sickness, sneeze, cough, etc. on the cold air. If you sleep under the window, if you use the fan, if you sleep with the A/C on, if you don't tuck your shirt into your pants while you sleep, if you kick the covers off during the night, if you walk around without shibshib you will be sick!

Along those same lines, she believes that drinking cinnamon in milk will aleviate menstrual cramps. It might, I don't know. I drank it, but didn't notice a difference. She thinks that dogs' saliva causes trouble during pregnancy. Going outside with wet hair (even in 100 degree weather) or sleeping with wet hair will make you sick.

There are a lot of those health related beliefs in MENA countries. I know there are more, but I can't think of any.

I can't believe I forgot about the wet hair thing! I've been scolded countless times for walking around with wet hair after showering! And the no a/c while sleeping thing is driving me crazy! We live in Texas, and I'm pregnant! That's just torture! (except since he's been out of town, I've cranked that bad boy up!!)

Congratulations!!!

oh and a spoonful of cumin fixes everything! LOL

Or a spoonful of curry! (he won't touch the stuff in prepared dishes, but eats it like candy otherwise!)

I just started cracking up by reading the subject of this post - I didn't even have to read on to know what you were gonna say! Yes, I've encountered this theory many times. According to a Moroccan doctor, it was also the cause of my allergies while there!

The main thing I've heard though is you shouldn't drink cold water when you're very hot, like you've been outside in the sun or something like that.

But don't get me started on Moroccans and their obsession with avoiding coldness of any sort (cold feet, taking too many baths, sleeping with two thick blankets in the summer, cold bones, etc.). It's basically the cause of every known human illness!

Luckily I haven't had too much from my family, except my mother is constantly trying to get me to eat pork (I was never a big fan in the past- aside from pepperoni). One time, when I said I didn't want pork, she blurted, "you're not converting, are you?" And she mentioned that my dad said he worried I was converting. So the main issue has been religion. But I'm lucky to work in a school with a teaching staff of about 50% muslims, so I have that support there. It helps.

Edited to add: But who knows what they say behind my back? If they have any, they wouldn't tell me, because they know it would just push me away.

Yup, a very narrow line to walk, IMO. At what point does a person stop being a big-hearted, self-sacrificing person and turn into a doormat? I think there must be a point where too much sacrifice leads to a lack of respect, which is counterintuitive to some degree. I find that kind of sad, but it happens to people every day - at work, in relationships - romantic and otherwise. I would like to think that I'm not the type of person who would fail to recognize the sacrifices and even the small gestures of others, but I think everyone is guilty of this to some extent.

And sometimes the sacrifices lead to a lost of your sense of identity so much that you become a cricature of the other culture. It is a very fine line to walk between embracing a new culture and yet remaining true to your own self.

As i mentioned in my OP, this phenomenon is not unique to MENA/US marriages, but when you add in a bi-cultural dimension to the marriage, how do you walk this line?

I think you're righ tthat the bi-cultural dimension makes things more sticky. I think growing up, seeing other marriages, we all started getting ideas about what's "normal" to give up after marriage. Like maybe late nights with friends or spending money on whatever you want. But or SOs also grew up with ideas about what's normal to give up in marriage, and while some of these things are the same, not all of them are. And that's when it gets hard, when you have to give up something you didn't dream of giving up before. Like someone else said, swimming in public. Or an example for me, my husband becomes jealous when I am too direct in my eye contact with men I don't know (I'm talking about the little nods or smiles you might do as you pass a stranger on the street). This is something I never thought would be an issue before - just trying to be friendly. I'm sure he didn't think he would be cooking meals as often as he does either. We're both having to change our attitudes about what husbands and wives should do in marriage. And I think it definitely has to be a too way street. We have to give up some things, especially because they are giving up so much to live with us here.

I was reading this article in a magazine while waiting at the doctor's office. It was called the fish test. It was given to both men and women. It gives you a scenario. Say you're at home, making some fish on the stove for you and your SO. When you go to take the fish out of the pan, one of filets starts to crumble apart, so that it's broken into several unattractive pieces. You proceed to put the fish on the plates, as well as the rice and vegetables. When you go to the dinner table to set out the plates, which fish piece to you give to your SO, the nice looking one, or the unattractive one?

Well, during the study (and this happened to me too), most of the women already knew where the scenario was going by the time it said "one of the filets starts to crumble apart" However, most of the men did not. And the men in the study also were shown to not realize that their wives were making such daily "sacrifices." The article also talked about how women tend to look for these little ways to scarfice, as a way to show their love, but men tend to see their scarifice in other terms, such as working to support the family.

I'm sure every single one of us would give the good fish to our husbands. And is there anything wrong with that? I don't think so; it's nice to do something for the other person. But the problem is when the other person doesn't even recognize it as a sacrifice. And pretty soon, we're left with nothing of ourselves because we've given it all away.

I've made lots of sacrifices that I didn't think I would have done. And the majority of them are small things that weren't important to me anyway. But I think we should never sacrifice on the big issues. If our SOs can understand the importance of these big issues to our sense of self, then maybe there is something wrong with the relationship.

Thanks for the great post. This is where my mind was even if I couldnt get the words out right n the first post. I think not only should our SOs understand the importance of the big issues, we have to understand what are the big issues for ourselves as well.

I am not so sure we always know when we are allowing ourselves to slip away.

BTW My husbands gives me the nice fish and i always insist I take the broken one. Wonder what that says about me LOL

I think you're definitely right about that, and that gets to the heart of the problem. I've seen it happen to people I know, who finally realize they're miserable and don't know who they are anymore, because they had to put aside their dreams and the things that would make them happy-the dreams of that writing career they put aside, not going to the community school to learn pottery in order to pick up the kids from soccer, that vacation to Costa Rica they put off, their desire to volunteer at the food bank that just couldn't be fit into that busy schedule with the family.

My parents both are nurses. They both finished school while they had infant children. My mom finished first, while my dad worked to support the family. Then my dad finished up while my mom worked. They both had dreams, and they came up with a plan so they could both achieve them. Both partners have to support each other in the things that are important. That's the only way the relationship can work, and the only way to prevent one (or both) of the partners to wake up one day and say "what the hell happened to my life?"

I was reading this article in a magazine while waiting at the doctor's office. It was called the fish test. It was given to both men and women. It gives you a scenario. Say you're at home, making some fish on the stove for you and your SO. When you go to take the fish out of the pan, one of filets starts to crumble apart, so that it's broken into several unattractive pieces. You proceed to put the fish on the plates, as well as the rice and vegetables. When you go to the dinner table to set out the plates, which fish piece to you give to your SO, the nice looking one, or the unattractive one?

Well, during the study (and this happened to me too), most of the women already knew where the scenario was going by the time it said "one of the filets starts to crumble apart" However, most of the men did not. And the men in the study also were shown to not realize that their wives were making such daily "sacrifices." The article also talked about how women tend to look for these little ways to scarfice, as a way to show their love, but men tend to see their scarifice in other terms, such as working to support the family.

I'm sure every single one of us would give the good fish to our husbands. And is there anything wrong with that? I don't think so; it's nice to do something for the other person. But the problem is when the other person doesn't even recognize it as a sacrifice. And pretty soon, we're left with nothing of ourselves because we've given it all away.

I've made lots of sacrifices that I didn't think I would have done. And the majority of them are small things that weren't important to me anyway. But I think we should never sacrifice on the big issues. If our SOs can understand the importance of these big issues to our sense of self, then maybe there is something wrong with the relationship.

Good post. And I think that's totally spot on about the fish. The thing is though that if one is truly doing it out of love, then recognition shouldn't matter. That is a hard pill to swallow, for me at least.

I think you're right that (in principal) the recognition shouldn't matter. And something small like the fist, who cares if they noticed or not? The point is that I noticed that it's the good thing to do, which means I should do it, and who cares if the other person sees that? But I think the problem is when we start to sacrifice one thing after another over the years and none of it registers to the other person. And at least for me, the more that I sacrifice that goes unnoticed, the more I sacrifice again so that it does get noticed. And this isn't even in just my relationship with my husband. It's not so much that I want the other person to notice it and give me medal or soemthing; I want them to see that I care. It's just a matter of not giving up too much to show people this.

I was reading this article in a magazine while waiting at the doctor's office. It was called the fish test. It was given to both men and women. It gives you a scenario. Say you're at home, making some fish on the stove for you and your SO. When you go to take the fish out of the pan, one of filets starts to crumble apart, so that it's broken into several unattractive pieces. You proceed to put the fish on the plates, as well as the rice and vegetables. When you go to the dinner table to set out the plates, which fish piece to you give to your SO, the nice looking one, or the unattractive one?

Well, during the study (and this happened to me too), most of the women already knew where the scenario was going by the time it said "one of the filets starts to crumble apart" However, most of the men did not. And the men in the study also were shown to not realize that their wives were making such daily "sacrifices." The article also talked about how women tend to look for these little ways to scarfice, as a way to show their love, but men tend to see their scarifice in other terms, such as working to support the family.

I'm sure every single one of us would give the good fish to our husbands. And is there anything wrong with that? I don't think so; it's nice to do something for the other person. But the problem is when the other person doesn't even recognize it as a sacrifice. And pretty soon, we're left with nothing of ourselves because we've given it all away.

I've made lots of sacrifices that I didn't think I would have done. And the majority of them are small things that weren't important to me anyway. But I think we should never sacrifice on the big issues. If our SOs can understand the importance of these big issues to our sense of self, then maybe there is something wrong with the relationship.

Oh, speaking of, did anyone watch America's Got Talent last night? I can't BELIEVE they let Boy Shakira and that bad Indian dancer through... They must intentionally pick some people who aren't as good so that you can keep laughing at them.

I'm pretty sure all those shows do that. That was my sister's idea to get on American Idol. Apparently during the auditions, you first try out with the real judge's assistants, who decide who gets to see the three "real" judges. She said, all you have to do is sing so horribly that the assistants will put you in the next round, so they can record you with the real judges to have something to laugh at. But instead of singly horribly that time, you just sing the way you normally would.

The main American show he likes is Family Guy. He's not much of a channel surfer, and likes to watch Cartoon Network, regardless of what's on (I tend to make him change it when they play anything Japanese!) He also likes Trick my truck on CMT. He's gotten to be a little country music fan!

Le merdre, hehe that's too funny:)

Yes not just with Moroccan men, but with all arab men, jealousy is a form of affection and the fact that they care bout you. In arabic, the word is "gherrah" which does not have a direct term in English so we native english speakers use the term jealousy. Unfortunately to those that do not understand (or who are ignorant), jealousy in english means different things. And of course many use that to their advantage when spreading stereotypes of arab men (which I have found to be untrue, at least in my case).

I think the msot form of jealousy (if you could call it that) that my husband showed was befor ehe left the USA to go back to Palestine. He said to me if I was only going to go off and find another man, forget the papers and don't do anything for him. He has it in his mind that many American women would just cheat on their husband when they are away. Well, as he should know by now, I am not like that. When I love him and committed to him, it was only him. And of course he knows I work 60 hours a week to pay for all these phone cards to call him and try to save money for palestine so he knows I'm not running around.

My situation is a bit different though. My neighbors (who supposedly kow his family or have a brother who is friends with one of his brothers) are spreading rumors like wildfire since we've been together. He does not nkow any of this is going on and it is better he doe snot because he already has enough to worry about being in Palestine. but the things they say about him and his family are semi confirmed untrue. (I could work for the fbi, I have weaseled information out of him to find out:)

So for a time, I was jealous. But I called him everyday and he never minded. He has never turned me away from calling and never gotten mad. he has never called me a pest:) Only one time he said I am at the dentist, call me back later and today he had a friend (a guy, I heard him, lol) there so he called me later.

Still the rumors are just annoying. And if I do not keep in good touch with him my anxiety is going to get the better of me as it did last week when I hinted around about somtehing. Talking to him everyday helps because it reminds me that we are still a couple, even if it is only for 20 minutes a day. And he still talks to me the same way he did before he left, even remembers the things we did and the things we say to each other.

I'm just determined not to let the rumors get the best of me. Not to tell him anything, especially thsoe regarding his family. That will just upset him and I am not with him to hold him down (or in his case, hold him back if he decides to go after someone for spreading rumors about his family). WE will deal with these people here when he gets back together and inshalalh be able to move away from these people and on with our lives free of hassle and immigration!!!

Yeah, I wasn't sure if it was an Arab thing, or a Moroccan thing, because I've only been to Morocco, and I've seen the way guys act there but didn't want to speak about other places!

I do think this concept "jealousy" is also at our disadvantage due to American movies and American tourism, especially when our SOs haven't been to the U.S. before. Movies don't exactly portray us in a very modest manner, and it seems like when young women go to exotic locations alone, they many times go with the intent of "letting loose." At least in my husband's case (he worked at a hotel in Morocco) these are the two ways he developed he ideas about how American women act, but eventually I got him to realize that I'm not like that!

ooooooh the whole "clearing pictures of the ex" thing! i forgot about that! last time i was in morocco i brought my laptop to show my fiance photos and burn music on his ipod. anyway, as he was browsing in my photo folders he came across an ex of mine and was kind of jealous about me still having those around! i hadn't even looked at those photos in quite a long time so to me it wasn't a big deal, but he must have thought i still look at them often and dream about the guy! lol

Yeah, I thought I did a good job getting rid of them, but apparently there was a cd left at my parents house with pictures on it. He all thought I was stashing the cd over there, so I could look at the pictures secretly. It's like, if I thought about my ex enough to go sneaking around to look at his picture, we wouldn't have broken up to begin with! (oh, and my ex is always referred to as "that person")

From my experience in Morocco, it seems like minor amounts of jealousy are a sign of affection. (I'm not talking about controlling jealousy, but the types of jealousy other people have reported in this thread). I had to deal with my fair share of jealousy while we were waiting for the visa, and this was something I had to adjust to. We had quite a few discussions about it. Male friends were out of the question, and I did the whole "clearing away pictures of ex" thing as well. But for both of us, honesty has always been the most important, especially when the distance is so great. For example, we could have easily gone out with a friend of the opposite sex, not tell each other, and we would never know. But we would tell each other these things, even if they would make the other person jealous, because that was more important than trying to hide it (even if it was something in which neither one of us did something "wrong").

Oh, and he tried to get me jealous too, and he was usually sad when it didn't work!

Hi everybody.

I just wanna know from those who had done the medical examination in Morocco , How much was the price and do they send the result directly to the consulate or you take them with you at the interveiw appointement.

I think it was around 1,000 dh or so, and they send the results to the consulate