Water Has Memory

What if every river bend, every cracked well, and every drop that once passed through our hands carried a story of joy, survival, or loss?

In this episode of the H2Know, we step inside physical water museums, where memory, heritage, and storytelling come alive in real places.

Our guest, Dr. Abdennabi El Mandour, Director of the Mohammed VI Museum for Water Civilization in Morocco, takes us inside the space where water’s past meets our present. He shares how the museum keeps Morocco’s deep relationship with water alive through stories and traditions that speak to who we are and what we risk losing.

Dr. El Mandour shares how the museum connects Morocco’s rich water heritage to present challenges, inspiring visitors to reflect on the value of water and the urgency to protect it.

Tune in to listen, reflect, and remember!

Transcript

Water Has Memory

Omnia: Welcome back to the H2Know podcast. I’m your host, Omnia Shawkat, and I’m so glad you’re here with us today to journey into the world of Water Museum Making, where memory, heritage, and storytelling come together to shape more just and inclusive water futures.

Omnia: In the last episode, we opened the door to the idea of water museums, spaces where memory, heritage, and storytelling come together.

Today, we step inside those spaces. We move from ideas to real places, where memory flows not only in stories but through rivers, artifacts, and echoes of the past.

We explore how physical water museums across the world are collecting, curating, and activating those stories.

These aren’t museums behind glass; they’re living spaces. Places where memory is not just preserved, but felt, shared, and carried forward.

To help us understand this, I’m joined by Dr. Abdennabi El Mandour, Director of the Mohammed VI Museum for Water Civilization in Morocco. Welcome, Dr. Abdennabi.

Dr. Abdennabi: First, I would like to thank you for inviting me to the H2Know. 

Omnia: Let’s begin by asking: What does your water museum look like? Sound like? What would someone feel as they walk in for the first time?

Dr. Abdennabi: The Mohammed VI Museum for Water Civilization in Morocco was established by the Ministry of Habous and Islamic Affairs. It offers visitors a journey through time, showcasing Morocco’s deep historical connection to water resources and hydraulic heritage.

Our museum is organized around several elements. The first is the outdoor exhibition on the museum’s esplanade, dedicated to both urban and rural hydraulic heritage. For example, the noria of Fez, the khettara of Marrakech, and water mills that represent hydraulic energy and the close relationship between human settlements and mountainous areas. These mills are characteristic of Morocco’s rural hydraulic heritage.

The museum also features a permanent exhibition inside the exhibition tower. The tower has three floors covering 2,000 square meters, where 13 themes are displayed. These themes highlight different regions of Morocco: north, south, center, east, west, mountainous regions, plains, foothills, and oases.

The museum also includes a multipurpose hall used for conferences. Each year, we host between 60 and 80 events. About 75% of these focus on water issues, environmental topics, and the interaction between society and the environment.

Omnia: You describe such a rich mix of indoor and outdoor exhibitions, from the noria of Fez to the khettara of Marrakech. It feels like your museum is more than just a building, it’s a journey through Morocco’s landscapes and histories.. which makes me wonder, among all these collections, what are the objects that carry the deepest stories for you? And what do they tell us about people’s relationship with water?

Dr. Abdennabi: The first impression visitors get when entering the museum comes from the architecture, with traditional Moroccan materials such as zellij tiles, plaster, wood, and marble. At the end of their visit to the permanent exhibition, visitors are often struck by the richness and diversity of Morocco’s hydraulic heritage and by the ingenuity of Moroccan water management.

The museum displays around 100 objects across the exhibition tower and the external esplanade. Among them are the noria, dating back to the Idrisid dynasty in the 8th century, and the khettara, introduced during the Almoravid dynasty in the 10th century. Other highlights include the maada, used for storing and distributing water in Morocco’s imperial cities; the cisterns of Sidi Bou Otman; the raising towers of Tamslouht; the tenast, a tool for water-sharing; and terracotta pipes and pottery used to supply cities.

Morocco’s climate is predominantly arid and semi-arid, with about 75% of its land falling into these categories. The country’s geomorphological diversity, with mountains, foothills, plains, and oases, pushed communities to adapt to their environment. They developed what is known as the Jema’a, a council of wise men responsible for customary water rights.

The Jema’a managed water distribution, infrastructure maintenance, conflict resolution between water users, and planning for drought years.

Omnia: I find it inspiring that your museum not only displays tools and techniques but also shows the systems communities built to manage water, like the Jema’a. This tells us a lot about how people organized their lives around scarcity. So, who are the people who come to learn these stories, and what kinds of conversations do you see happening in your museum?

Dr. Abdennabi:  The museum classifies its visitors into four groups: schoolchildren, university students, Moroccan tourists, and international tourists. About 55% are young people (students and schoolchildren), 27% are international tourists, and 18% are Moroccan tourists. Visitors come from about 30 nationalities across four continents, including many official delegations.

Conversations between visitors and museum staff often focus on three topics. The first is the relationship between the Ministry of Habous and Islamic Affairs and water, and how this ministry was historically responsible for water management before the basin system. The ministry oversaw water sourcing, transfer to cities, and distribution across urban and rural areas.

The second point is the wealth and diversity of Morocco’s hydraulic heritage across its different regions, from mountains to plains to oases, particularly in the south.

The third point is the ingenuity of Morocco’s ancestors in solving water-related challenges, such as droughts. For example, the construction of khettaras and norias, which lifted water from rivers to foothill areas or drained groundwater to the surface.

Omnia: It strikes me that these conversations connect past practices with today’s realities. But, how does your museum use its educational role to help young people, especially students, think differently about water today and in the future?

Dr. Abdennabi: The museum’s educational programs and annual events play an ongoing role in shaping Moroccan society. One of the most pressing issues Morocco faces today is drought. Before the 1980s, Morocco typically experienced alternating wet and dry years. Since the 1980s, however, the pattern shifted to one wet year followed by three to four dry years. Between 2019 and 2025, the country endured five to seven consecutive years of drought.

This crisis is shared with museum visitors, especially as 55% of them are students and schoolchildren. Several programs were developed to raise awareness of water scarcity.

The museum has identified a few missions to share with the public. The most important is to raise awareness among all audiences, particularly younger generations, about the vital importance of water resources and to encourage long-term behavioral change, such as avoiding waste and promoting efficient irrigation.

The second mission is to help the public understand and appreciate Moroccan ingenuity in water management across 12 centuries of hydraulic heritage, while also promoting research, innovation, and cultural outreach on water-related themes.

Another mission is to preserve, interpret, exhibit, and disseminate the tangible and intangible heritage of Moroccan hydraulic engineering through dynamic scientific activities and a cultural program that is engaging, innovative, and accessible to a wide audience.

Omnia: Listening to you, it’s clear your museum is not only about preserving heritage but also creating space for change. But this kind of work isn’t easy. What are some of the biggest challenges you face in keeping the museum alive and engaging, and what dreams do you hold for its future?

Dr. Abdennabi: Being the Director of the Water Museum, and after more than 25 years of building scientific knowledge as a university professor specializing in water, is a remarkable experience, as it allows me to share this expertise with visitors. But it also presents unique challenges. The first is managing the museum and its staff, knowing that it is open all year round from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. 

A second challenge is attracting more visitors and introducing playful, interactive learning experiences for the public.

Another challenge is maintaining interactive installations, objects, and models so they remain functional over the long term. A fourth challenge is the museum’s role as a member of the steering committee of the Global Network of Water Museums, affiliated with UNESCO’s IHP program. This is a heavy responsibility, requiring regular meetings and travel both within Morocco and abroad.

My aspiration is to find a balance between water demand and available surface and groundwater resources in the face of climate change. In the past, our ancestors developed solutions to cope with droughts. They created several management systems, such as khettaras, which drained groundwater to the surface in arid and semi-arid climates like southern Morocco and oasis regions. They collected rainwater in metfias for use during dry periods. They built norias, water-lifting wheels, to supply drinking water to communities and support irrigation.

We must learn from the past in order to manage the future more effectively.

Omnia: Thank you, Dr. Abdennabi. Your reflections remind us that water museums are not only about remembering the past, they are also about teaching resilience for the future.

Thank you for tuning into this episode of the H2Know podcast, brought to you by SciComm X as part of the AQUAMUSE project and funded by the Water and Development Partnership Program at IHE Delft Institute.

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