Monday, December 19, 2011

Trying To Get Turtles To Race Each Other

A couple of nights ago, I walked out my front door and found a few boys, perhaps eight years old, crouched in front of my front stoop. I looked down and saw that they had placed a couple of turtles side by side on the stoop. I think that perhaps they were scaring the turtles, since the turtles had almost entirely receded into their shells.

"Ah," I said to them in Moroccan Arabic, despite the poor prospects for competition between these particular turtles at that moment, "A race." Then, knowing how competitive that Moroccans, including Moroccan youths, can be, I asked, "Which one is going to win?"

A second later, another boy ran up and placed on the stoop a third turtle which was twice the size of the two which had already been there. He exclaimed, "This one!"

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