Naziha's Spring

Nine years ago, a Moroccan-Dutch woman and mother of 10 named Naziha made a drastic decision. She no longer wished to spend hours at the police station after one of her sons had caused trouble, so she threw out her violent husband and took up the struggle to get her children back on the straight and narrow, with the help of a dozen social workers. In perfect Dutch she tells the story of how as a young girl she was married off to a man 30 years her senior, and of how he turned her household into a “terrorist training camp.” She speaks bitterly about this dark period, which has led to her sons’ criminal behavior. “Children don’t behave badly for no reason at all. We make them what they are.” She wants her story to break the taboo on getting help. Now that her eldest sons live on their own, she is more determined than ever. But just as the tide seems to have turned, fate strikes hard, and the normal quiet life she dreams of looks further away than ever. This is the story of an articulate, modern woman who, despite the burden of her youth and continual problems with her children, is tireless in her struggle for a better life.