Last night in the dar chebab (Darija, or Moroccan Arabic, for "youth center"), where I do most of my volunteering as a Youth Development PCV here in Morocco, I saw that one of the boys was wearing a sweatshirt which said "Oklahoma Training Team." I asked him if he knew what Oklahoma was. He admitted that he didn't know. I told him that it's a state in the U.S.
A few months ago, a Moroccan girl was wearing a shirt which said "Lover Girls," and under that, "London." I asked her if she knew what it meant. She said, "Girls who love London." I explained to her that the shirt did not say what she had thought it said.
I often tell kids who come to the dar chebab to ask me questions about forms of speech in English that they don't understand. It has occurred to me that I could add, "And if you want to know what your shirt says, I'll explain that to you, too!"
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