Rkia, the courageous mother who takes care of Girona 24 hours a day
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Girona“Everything I’ve done has been for my children, so giving up has never been an option,” explains Rkia Essolaymani (Morocco, 1979), the cook at the Les Hortes residence, the space where Girona takes care of the planter. Raised near Rabat, her life has not been easy. But for whom is it, after all? “I was looking for opportunities wherever I went. With his hands, with his teeth … And he couldn’t find them, because there simply weren’t any. There was nothing. ” His gaze shines, surrounded by an environment he now considers safe and stable, two words that did not previously exist in his dictionary. It also shows some tears that give way to a past that is still very much present. “There are things that are not forgotten,” he added.
The roads of La Rkia and Girona were joined in 2018 thanks to the Girona Actua program of the Municipal Employment Service of Girona City Council, financed entirely with municipal funds. The initiative serves as guidance and support for job search, training and aid to companies for the hiring of vulnerable groups. When the Girona club opened its residence, Rkia came in as a cleaning worker and kitchen assistant. Today she is the cook and also cleans the homes of some footballers of the first white-and-red team, which this Saturday plays in Las Palmas (6.15 pm, #Vamos). “I want it to come out big that I am eternally grateful to the club; to Gerard Herrera, the director of the residence, and to the people in the program. I owe them a lot, ”he said.
The roads of Rkia and Girona were joined in 2018 thanks to the Girona Actua program of the Municipal Employment Service of Girona City Council
But we go back to 2008, when he decided to leave Morocco, at the age of 28 and with two children (he now has three). The kids, by the way, stayed there. “It’s been three years without them, and I don’t wish on anyone. It’s so hard I have no words, “he says in a low voice as a tear falls down his cheek. “I went to schools to see other people’s children come out, because that made me feel that mine were closer. And when I went to pick them up at the airport, I didn’t recognize the girl. ” More than a thousand days waiting for a hug that the lack of a residence permit prevented. An eternity praying before going to bed so that no bad influence would seduce her eldest son, from whom she has never been separated: in Les Hortes she works with him.
The low weight of women in Morocco
“It simply came to our notice then. I got married at 16, the age at which I also had my first child. My husband made me feel bad, he didn’t work and we couldn’t pay the rent. Until I wanted to divorce, but do you know what a divorce means where I come from? ”She asks angrily, referring to arranged marriages between relatives and how little weight women have in society. “When I was young I was an athlete. I loved it, it made me feel excited. He practiced karate, athletics and basketball. And at home I was told that he looked like a boy, because he came back from training when it got dark. They wanted me to think it was wrong, but it wasn’t. ” Tired of the shoes he had improvised in the garage, he raised the money – he already had the courage to do so – to pay for the separation and, tempted by a job offer in Huelva picking strawberries, he decided to start again. from home.
But that was not what it seemed. Anxious and childless, she tried her luck in Murcia. “I contacted a friend, who was so desperate that she was working on the street. And since I didn’t want that and without expecting much, I made a call to an acquaintance who lived in Bescanó “, he continues, according to before admitting, with a smile, that this acquaintance today is her husband. “I only spoke French, but that didn’t stop me from getting up early every day to look for work.” And she found them, and she found them: in a bread oven, caring for the elderly, cleaning and training in Catalan, digital literacy and job search courses, and as a forklift operator, in food handling, in the meat industry … Whatever it takes to turn three years old in the country and see the face of your children again, before coming across Girona. “Everything for my children,” as I said at the beginning.
A family that includes more than a hundred boys who have passed through the Les Hortes residence since its premiere. Rkia is a cook, yes, but she is also a mother, a counselor and a psychologist. Because, like her, they, coming from every corner of the state and some from abroad, are far from theirs. “We have each other, for everything we need. Expressing feelings is easier than you think, it’s a matter of will. ” The will she had to survive.
