This morning, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex took a Moroccan military helicopter to the Atlas Mountains so they could visit an NGO called Education For All. The EFA boarding houses are for girls aged 12 to 18, and they provide education for those girls at those critical ages, when many girls that age are leaving schools or finding that there are few educational opportunities for them. EFA boarding schools were founded by a British entrepreneur named Michael McHugo. It’s a good way to highlight an NGO associated with British interests and Moroccan interests, plus one of Meghan’s biggest issues as a royal is “education for girls and women.”
For this leg of the three-day tour, Meghan wore a pair of black maternity jeans, a black t-shirt, a navy blazer and Birdies slippers. I’m not seeing any good IDs on this outfit, but I don’t think it’s very important. This is her casual look and she looks lovely and appropriate for traveling by helicopter into a remote mountain region and meeting lots of girls. You can also see that Meghan received a pretty henna tattoo on her hand and arm. The girls at the boarding school were so excited to see Meghan.
Also: despite all of the unhinged racist press Meghan has gotten over the past six months, Meghan and Harry didn’t “punish” the traveling royal press pack whatsoever on this trip. The press were provided with access completely.
Meghan takes part in a henna ceremony to celebrate her pregnancy #RoyalVisitMorocco pic.twitter.com/93Kr0lBxyo
— Rebecca English (@RE_DailyMail) February 24, 2019
Photos courtesy of WENN, Getty.
I’ve seen a few people saying Meghan spoke to some of the girls in French, which is a really lovely gesture if true.
It’s true. There are several clips on twitter so you can see for yourself 🙂 and yes, I agree, a very nice touch of diplomacy. I love that the Sussexes are always well prepared for their engagements (unlike some other royals *coughWilliamcough* who brag about not reading their briefings). There is also video of them both touching their hearts after shaking hands which I read is a Moroccan custom (or maybe just of the area?).
Fantastic! I did a bit more digging on twitter and found it! I’ve been disappointed by some of the other royals’ language skills (again *coughWilliamcough*) considering their role in diplomacy and the fact that TQ and Charles speak several languages, so this is great to see. She spoke Spanish to an elderly woman on an engagement recently too.
From their tours so far, Meghan and Harry read their briefing notes. I think Meghan especially knows she can’t put a foot wrong on tour, plus she seems like a diligent woman anyway.
@Beli can you please indicate how you found it on Twitter? I can’t find it.
The Spanish woman she spoke to said that she could not fault Meghan’s fluency and pronunciation in Spanish.
@PrincessK I think it was somewhere under #RoyalVisitMorocco, but I don’t think I can link here and would need to go looking again.
in the twitter search box you can write Meghan French and click on videos. some will pop up.
Inshallah with a hand placed over the heart is the standard greeting in Muslim nations.
Inshallah means “If God Wills It” or “God Willing” and is a standard greeting along with the hand over your heart.
She actually just asked a couple of simple questions. And to be fair with her,she acknowledged that her French is very basic. I think she’s more comfortable with Spanish. But it was a nice touch,I agree.
I’m an east african muslim, and ive never heard of insha allah/inchallah be used as a greeting. I currently live in Belgium which has a sizeable morrocan community, and they use this phrase they way we do too.
It is used as a blessing “inshallah you’ll succeed in your exams” for example.
Here as a greeting they should have used “asalam ouailaikum”.
Also women do not greet other women with a hand on the heart gesture. We kiss, hug, clasp hand but the hand on heart is a little odd.
I lived in Morocco for several years and, in my experience, touching the heart after shaking someone’s hand is absolutely customary – everywhere in Morocco and for both genders. But yeah, Inshallah is not a greeting. Though it does mean “God willing”, many Moroccans use it as “maybe” to be polite. They will have said “Salaam Oualiaikum” as a greeting.
@Beli,
I thought this clip was cute. Someone in the background, despite the reserved behavior of everyone else, keeps calling for her attention. Also, you can see the young women making the hand gesture as she greets them.
https://twitter.com/scobie/status/1099614118644985856
I’m glad Harry and Meghan are taking the high road and giving full access to the royal reporters that threatened to not cover them again.
It was noted at Meghan’s last public visit to the Hubb Community Kitchen that she has been practicing speaking in French.
The RR’s are full of it. They can threaten all they want but Harry and Meghan get international attention and there is social media. Those reporters need Harry and Meghan, not the other way around.
I’ve been thinking of how touring is the way a lot of musicians make money and build/establish/maintain their careers. Those who can successfully manage the rigorous schedule and consistently get people into seats can pack a lot of strong positives into a short, intense time period (money, media, happy fans etc.)
I think tours have the potential of being how these two distinguish themselves, as well. I wonder if they will have a solid and consistent tour schedule (with two to three (or more) significant tours of varying lengths per year) since they both seem to like to travel and genuinely connect well with new people and they get so much positive press in the process.
Harry always seemed to enjoy touring when he was single so it makes sense that they will tour a lot as a couple, but I think their schedule for the next few years will depend on how many kids they have. I think they will have at least two kids.
Ooh this is a great casual look – I especially love seeing her hair down and loose like this.
That was my thought, too. She just overall looks so lovely. Love the hair and how she tied her scarf, especially.
And she wears an almost beatific expression lately. As if she cannot believe how blessed she is. It makes me feel very happy for them.
Considering the nonsense she faces every day, and being 7 months pregnant she is doing marvellously well.
I think she looks so much better with light make up. She is so pretty the heavy bronzer actually distracts from her looks.
One small note, I wish Meghan and Kate would stop wearing jeggings when they are working.
Yes, she looks so natural and lovely. I know she has to be dressed up for the majority of royal engagements, but she (as well as Kate) always seem so much more relaxed and enjoying the events when they’re casual.
I love the whole look, head to toe.
I love this whole look, including the hair and makeup. She always looks so much better in these casual outfits. I really liked her pre royal street style and it seems like she still has it!
Great casual look, very natural.
Love seeing her wear flats – I wish more glamorous women in the public eye would wear flats.
Enjoy seeing her wear flats while you can. She is much shorter than Harry and needs heels, but I must say they still looked OK side by side but she is a tiny woman.
I’m tall but I don’t see how anyone must be a certain height to “look OK” next to their spouse. It’s silly.
No one needs heels. She wears them cos she wants to.
I love this look, it is The Real Meg. The Dior look is a disaster. She looks 25 here and 20 yrs older later that day…
For certain events she does need heels to go with her outfits and so she does have to look sky high up to speak to everyone and people don’r have to peer done to her. That suits her best. When you are short and your partner is tall you usually want to wear heels.
I’m really happy to see all the young girls in the boarding school.
Education is so important and it’s terrible that people have to fight so hard for it.
I love this look. That scarf is gorgeous – simple but works so well for the outfit – and I love that blazer. The visit itself also seems perfectly designed for Meghan and her interests, so someone planned that well.
Can we talk about Tom Sykes article from this week, where he talks about Meghan as an international star? it was great.
What a beautiful couple. I love that he is still using his beads, I wonder if they are the ones he shares with Meghan. Sadly she probably can’t use them to events.
Love the blazer and the rolled up sleeve.
Harry’s lost weight, you can’t see him in silhouette anymore..😂.
Wonder what this couple eats for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Wish one of the RR could do an article on that.
Avocado toast, avocado toast, and more avocado toast! 😉
I live in Avocadoland, so, more power to them!
👍😜
With the occasional roast chicken as well I guess, 😂
I agree Miriam! I’ve long wondered what the royals eat on tour. While I love all different kinds of food, I have a pretty sensitive digestive system so eating strange food and then being in front of the cameras would fill me with anxiety 🙂
This is how i like them best.
They both look great. The bitter Becky’s can say all they want ( looking at you royal dish and crazies on twitter) but harry and meghan bring it when they are working, especially on tours.
Meghan also deserves an award for talking to emily Andrews when Emily brought up her speaking French. If I was Meghan I would have ignored her after all the crap she wrote.
The strategic thing to do would be to kill them with kindness. That’s the best way of serving it to those ahole reporters! They’re all suck ups anyway
Exactly, ‘when they go low we go high’……
That’d be a different spin on the failed Hello to Kindness thing.
Well, in theory, that’s a great idea. Unfortunately, kindness doesn’t sell papers and online clicks. Richard Palmer is a perfect example; he couldn’t even wait 24 hrs to start the SOS, implying Meghan (not Harry) is the key royal representing the British monarchy in a country with a missing princess.
https://twitter.com/RoyalReporter/status/1099545762931924993
Anything other than kindness is going to bring on heaps more criticism, so I do agree it’s the best way to go. The “royal reporters” are going to be horrible no matter what, so Meghan and Harry might as well keep their heads held high and not stoop to their level.
I have to wonder if Emily Andrews was fed really bad information when she wrote about the shower. She isn’t the RR that usually writes attack articles compared to others so it seemed odd for what she usually does.
I think she looks fantastic here and it’s very sweet that she spoke in french. Also, good on them for not keeping the press away, I would not be that nice. On a side question, and I’m sorry if this has been asked before, but how tall is Meghan? She looks so tiny here next to Harry.
Apparently, she’s 5’5 and he’s 6’1 or 6’2.
She seems so much taller, I’m actually surprised.
She does seem much taller! I was surprised too, this is the first time I see her look this tiny next to him.
She’s 5’6 and Harry is at least 6’2.
What is a boarding school, in this instance? Is it similar to the international schools that wealthy Americans send their children to? Or does it have a totally different meaning? I’m sorry if my description is offensive; that is my limited understanding of its meaning!
I am not sure, but it seems that in Africa they make use of boarding schools for older children and teens that otherwise do not have the opportunity to study because they hail from rural areas. In my country they have a few of those (government funded) in some municipalities and they have the kids during the week, otherwise they cannot come and go daily to the school because there are more elementary schools alright, but after 6th grade, the schools are more sparse and concentrated in some areas, so some of them find it difficult because of money or distance to come and go.
I figure that being a female child makes the journey to and from school more difficult in a mostly muslim country.
That is really fascinating, and wonderful!! I figured there was something my Western view was interpreting wrong. Thank you for sharing!
I would imagine it’s because in rural areas, how would these kids get to school? How do rural kids in the US get to juniors & high school? Buses, usually; or parents with a car, or once they’re old enough, they drive themselves. My friends who lived way out in the country had very long bus rides to & from school. I’m guessing it’s more economically & logistically feasible to create boarding schools.
I love that she (they) consistently put focus on the education and empowerment of girls and women.
Yes, I love that about them as well. I feel like both Harry and Meghan genuinely care about both of those issues and it’s not just an act for them.
I do too and was shocked to hear about the illiteracy rate of women in rural areas. How can we as a society ever except things to get better when we treat half of the world’s population as though they don’t matter?
Digging her look here. I love the scarf and blazer. Beautiful.
They both look relaxed and happy, and the school visit was a good choice for the limited time they’ll be in country.
In Morocco the official languages are: arabic and berber which are those two languages which most people there speak as their native tongue. Unfortunately in many areas of the education system the language used in the lesson is french as Morocco is a former french colony. That is one of the reasons why moroccan children do badly in school and in international school ranking tests.
French in particular as well as English and Spanish are the languages of the former colonisers of Morocco who committed unbelieveable crimes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morocco
Wow, Harry is very long-waisted.
There’s a possibility that there was a mistake with greeting the prince. It happened before with William and it’s something they all need to work on. The food tasting thing is a non-issue to me. She’s pregnant so I’m sure her hosts understand.
They’re amazing and so cute. This was a great day
My husband is Moroccan. There is no 7th month tradition that you speak of. They do pamper and do henna for good luck on pregnant women, but the time of pregnancy doesn’t matter. They are more for celebrating after the child is born. Just wanted to clear that up.
Chris Shipp from ITV News said, Meghan and Harry are the most powerful Royal couple.
He covers the Royal beat.
Quite true, and this is why there is a campaign to pull them down from inside the Palace with the help of the right wing racist media.
This is seriously exactly what the world needs – more understanding between cultures and accepting people no matter what background, gender or religion they have chosen or were born into. I’m so tired of hatred and pointing fingers. We need more focus like this IMO. Meghan looks great btw.
Maybe this is just my perception, but Meghan seems sad or I guess subdued than she usually is.
I really prefer this casual look to what she has worn in other occasions that also required a more casual look. She should keep using this light makeup too.
Education is her interest area,but since when it comes to others there’re always a lot of “why are they speechifying” ” what are they DOING” type of questions.. what was the specific purpose of this visit? Or the whole trip,for that matter.
It already looked like the whole thing was hastily put together more as something “requested” by them for some good PR before her maternity leave (after weeks of tabloids stories and family drama).
It is a bit of a mystery this sudden trip. It could be cynically thinking that the want to bump up her numbers before she goes on maternity leave. But I also heard that there was a specific request for this couple to go to Morocco. H&M are definitely the ones foreign governments would like to host the most for sure.
I am a teacher and I would like to tell you from experience.
When you get a visit from some celebrity at your school this is what happens behind the scenes: you have to spend lots of hours working with security BEFORE the visit. You have to plan where the celebrity goes and who she meets and sees. You have to re-schedule lots of things: you can’t write a class test just before or after the visit because the pupils just aren’t concentrated on anything but that visit.. So all tests planned beforehand have to get re-scheduled. Teachers have to re-arrange their lesson sequences which is very annoying. When you announce the celebrity visit your pupil’s concentration goes away from the announcing until one or two days after that.
The celebrity visit doesn’t really do anything positive for your pupils. really not. Usually your pupils aren’t even given the chance to ask questions. (Morocco as a former french colony … questions to one of the biggest imperialists aka Britain??? Monarchy and inequality in a democracy? Immigration to Europe and the European/british perspecitve?)
At best it is advertising for your school (In Meghan’s case it was a private school) and you get more subscriptions. At worst not even that. Improvements for the majority moroccan state-funded schools? None.
She looks great, very youthful.