Rocking The Kasbah

Distance Traveled:   32,120 kms (BNE-MEL-SYD-BKK-PKT-BKK-CNX-BKK-PP-SR-BB-PP-HCMC-NC-TH-HA-H-L-MR)

Time Difference: -10 hours (from Brisbane)

Soundtrack: Robert Plant and the Strange Sensation provides a perfect background for the colourful and exotic nature of Marrakech.  I have been listening to classical at night, particularly Mozart concertos, to unwind from the mania of this place.

Currently Inspired by: "You will not achieve righteousness until you spend in charity the things you love" - from the Qur'an.  I thought it was appropriate to seek alternative avenues for inspiration, considering my current location! And before anyone complains at me for quoting from the Qur'an, here's another quote: "Only people with bad hearts do bad things to one another. Religion is just one of many excuses they use." - Natalie O'Driscoll. :)

The offending floor

Stacks:  Islamic architecture is highly patterned and makes great use of mosaics, particularly on the floors.  One of the main problems with a patterned floor is that it can be difficult to see if it is going up or down, or staying flat.  When walking through the Sultan's Palace I fell into a small hole that housed a concrete bowl on a pedestal, which was full of water.  Putting out my hands to steady myself so I wouldn't fall, I completely dunked my digital camera into the bowl full of water.  Fortunately I took it apart right away and after hours of drying, put it back together and it worked just fine.  I also slid while walking back down a mountain after visiting a waterfall, and hurt my knee.  Ahh, the joys of doing adventure type traveling when one is unco-ordinated, out of shape and in one's thirties!
Interesting NB: each morning I have my breakfast on the terrace which consists of a sliced baguette, a croissant, hot milk, orange juice, mint tea and apricot jam.  You can't alter it, it just comes out.  Each morning I end up with a bee doing backstroke in my jam, and swallows jumping on my table picking at my bread.  It annoyed me, until I realised that each morning I was most assuredly and literally having breakfast with the birds and the bees!  I have found it thoroughly amusing since :)

I recently re-read the last couple of blogs in order to get my narrative bearings, so to speak, and realised that I left out a very funny story from Hanoi in Vietnam, which I shall quickly re-tell here before getting onto the end of my London trip and the beginning of Morocco.  As I mentioned in my blog “Children of the Revolution”, Hanoi is the capital city of Vietnam and the heart of communism in the country.  It was the communist capital of the North just as Saigon was the capitalist capital of the South before the end of the war and reunification saw the north and south combine into one country.  As this all happened in the seventies, one would expect a certain sensitivity regarding these issues to still be present in Vietnam and in Hanoi in particular, however this was not the case as far as I perceived in my nearly four weeks there.  One afternoon a minibus was taking several other tourists and I back to our respective hotels after a day trip, and I was staring tiredly out of the window at the passing scenery while most of the others slept.  A bright flash of pink neon caught my eye and I noted that it was a sign above a dress shop.  Upon closer inspection, it turned out that the name of the shop was in fact... brace yourselves... “Pink-O”.  I am not kidding.  My burst of wild cackles caused a few starts among the sleeping travellers but as far as I could tell no one else was awake enough to share the joke, so it simply provided me with several minutes of sniggery personal amusement, and yet another anecdote for the blogs.  Now!  Back to London...

Me and Esther at NYE

I left you after our crazy Xmas shenanigans, jetlagged and loving the pure sloth of lying around on couches, drinking tea and watching movies all day.  Jetlag was to dog me for the rest of my trip in London, unfortunately.  I’ve never had it so badly, and am still unsure why it hit me so hard in this particular instance.  It certainly made for an interesting New Year’s Eve, as I felt unable to properly drink lest I pass out, so I spent the entire night relatively sober and veering wildly between the most oppressive exhaustion and wide-eyed mania.  For me, the trip to the local pizza shop in the cold rain at 4.30am for a slice of cheesy garlic pizza and some hot chips was the most pleasurable aspect of the evening.  I just didn’t really feel up to being in public.  However I was a happy observer and people watcher for most of the night, and the proximity of the friends I hadn’t seen in so long was enough to keep me content.  As my flight to Marrakech was leaving early in the morning, I had to spend my final evening in London at the Ramada near Heathrow Airport.  Not only was it the public holiday for New Year’s Day, but London is just so massive and all of its airports so inconveniently located that it would have been close to impossible to make it there in time on public transport, and a taxi would have cost not much less than the hotel room and would have meant waking up considerably earlier.  So I opted for convenience.  Click here to see the rest of the relatively tame pics from NYE.

I know a lot of people seriously dislike Heathrow but I just love it.  Clearly, it was designed by a madman, with its tiny obscure hallways and branching corridors that make you feel as though you’ve accidentally stumbled into a “staff only” area and any minute someone in uniform brandishing a walkie talkie is about to tackle you and demand to see your staff pass.  Which other airport has helpful signs telling you that it is a generous twenty minute walk to your gate?  This is within a single terminal.  Don’t even think about walking to terminal three from terminal one, that is what the underground is for!  I’m sure even the longest term employees at Heathrow would have little idea how to navigate it anywhere beyond their own little area without the assistance provided by the abundant signage. It’s simply gigantic, and what’s more it appears (at least in my experience) to run in an incredibly smooth and orderly fashion considering the sheer numbers that it must deal with on a daily basis.  I’ve never seen any cranky or complaining customers at Heathrow, just miles and miles of patient queues, as though the mere act of landing in England equips one with the patience and yes, I’ll say it, the strange sense of enjoyment that the Brits seem to get out of standing around in long lines.  In a country so densely populated I supposed it is engendered from birth.

Typical buildings

My first feeling when landing in Marrakech was one of surprise.  Initially it was over the sheer friendliness of the men I encountered at the airport.  From the immigration officials, who as a profession are notoriously surly regardless of nationality, to the security guards and the man who came to take me to my hotel transfer, they were a picture of congenial warmth and welcoming smiles.  It was as though they were having a terrible day and my arrival simply turned everything around and made it brilliant, that’s how pleased they seemed to see me.  All new hospitality recruits should be sent to Marrakech for their customer service training!  Now, I said I was surprised, and surprise cannot exist without expectation.  I am ashamed to admit that prior to going to Morocco I bought into the hysteria surrounding the behaviour of Islamic men towards Western women, and was fully expecting to be catcalled, spit on and called a whore by the inhabitants.  So it was with kind of a sheepish wonder that I accepted all this warmth and hospitality and trundled off to my hotel.

The surprise continued while looking out of my taxi window.  I had to constantly remind myself that I was on the African continent.  Morocco looks nothing like I expected Africa to look.  For starters, there aren’t any African looking people about (and I sincerely hope that is not offensive towards Moroccans).  Secondly, the architecture which is made up predominantly of wide, flat-topped stone buildings all painted in the same shade of salmon, struck me more as something that one would see in the middle east.  Finally the mosques and pointed arches everywhere confirmed that impression.  I would have not been surprised if my taxi driver had turned around and said “welcome to Afghanistan, miss!” as this is precisely how I would have expected it to look.   

My hotel is in an area of the town that cannot be accessed by vehicles so the driver pulled up and shouted at a friend to come and take my bag and guide me to the hotel.  We plunged out of the sunlight and into these cold and bewilderingly high walled alleys which make up most of the old town, and he led me a merry dance before we finally happened upon my hotel.  My second reaction of the day was a nervous one: “how the hell am I going to navigate my way around this place?” Although I hate to perpetuate a stereotype, turn me around once with my eyes open and I’m lost.  NB: the man who took my bag and guided me all the way to the hotel, when I scrabbled around for a tip, demurred and said “please don’t worry about it”.  I’m certain I stood gaping at him like a lunatic for a full ten seconds.

My third reaction was “what a dump”.  Although carefully researched on a map (and in fact, this hotel has the best location in Marrakech, in my opinion) I had failed in my usually thorough accommodation review research on this one occasion, and as Murphy’s Law would have it, this was the one occasion on which it would have been of the greatest benefit.  The style of accommodation is known as a Riad, which is a traditional type of Moroccan accommodation, made of stone with about four stories and containing a large atrium from floor to sky in the middle.  It is designed especially for (and I imagine would be incredibly effective in) the 45 – 50 degree Celsius heat experienced here in summer, however as we are currently in winter it was not a wise choice.  The cold stone floors and walls seems to suck any little bit of heat from the air, and the lack of any form of temperature control means that I am constantly walking about booted and in three layers, shivering and / or huddled desperately under blankets while in here.  I have developed a complex series of actions for showering, from the running of pure hot water in the closed up room while collecting my fresh layers to the ninja-like speed of undressing I have now perfected.  The hotel, in addition to having no heating or air conditioning, also conspicuously lacked soap or any kind of bathroom accoutrements, a fridge, sink, safe, clock, window or bottled water.  The only furniture in the room is the bed (for which I had to request extra blankets) and the world’s tiniest chair and table from which I am currently writing, hunched Quasimodo-like and with my knees up around my ears.  There is only room for one of my butt cheeks on the chair so I am constantly having to shift from side to side, which from any observer’s perspective I imagine would look quite amusing.  It’s like a child’s chair.  Yesterday after a long Skype session I stood up too quickly only to find my feet were numb and promptly sat down again, missing the tiny chair and ending up sprawled on the cold stone in a most ignoble fashion.  I just laughed.  What else can you do?

A quiet part of the Djemaa El Fna

I am in the Medina, which is the heart of the old town in Marrakech.  The new town, as they call it, is just yet another modern urban sprawl, filled with department stores, (surprisingly) McDonalds “restaurants”, internet cafes and monuments etc.  I had one drive-through visit to it on my second day and decided that was enough.  The only way I could tell the difference between the city of Marrakech and any other of the countless CBDs I have seen in my life was in fact this damn salmon colour that every building is painted.  I don’t understand the significance of this colour yet.  At first I thought they were made of clay, but I picked at the corner of a building and it is definitely grey concrete with salmon paint.  I had no problem with salmon, pink or orange before I came here, however I believe two months in this country (if all the cities are painted the same way) will bring about something approaching a phobia of them.  Already the idea of clawing my own eyes out just to see something different doesn’t sound completely absurd.  I’d say that I’m looking forward to going to the desert on Sunday for some visual relief, but unfortunately it is going to be the same colour as the city!  

Spices for sale

A small and vibrant pocket of the Medina is called Djemaa El Fna, and this is where the action is.  It’s a large square, full to the brim of donkeys pulling carts, zooming motorbikes, market stalls with sellers hawking their wares, benches full of oranges and lovely sweet dates, monkeys on leads that climb on you as soon as look at you, blankets covered in cobras doing their deadly yet lazy swaying to the charmers punghis, street acrobats, lots of drummers in brightly coloured silks, pungent herborists, stalls selling fresh and tasty tagines, roaming patisserie carts with sticky French / Moroccan delicacies and more.  It’s one of those places where you never know where to look!  I have had to fight to stick by my principles with regard to not using animals for entertainment because the monkeys are unbearably sweet and cute and I desperately want to hold one, but I shall resist.  In the same vein, the snake charming looks incredible and I would love to show you all some photos, but you have to pay to take photos of it and I don’t want them to profit, as it is a cruel practice (in North Africa in particular, they sometimes sew the mouths of the snakes shut and they eventually die of starvation or they de-fang or de-venom them, so it’s not even the true practice of it).  Principles are principles, no matter what country you are in.  Unfortunately!

Poor wee sheep's head in the markets

One of the belly dancers

Every single night about half the square transforms into scores of brightly lit white marquees under which are an array of open air kitchens selling all manner of cheap and delicious street food.  There are some with kebabs and salads, soup and bread, sticky pastries with fruit, deep fried fish with calamari and chips, sheeps head curry with the brains nicely cooked and whole on the plate (and the sheep’s head sitting next to it, from which they will carve, if requested, the meat from the face, a delicious albeit tragic part of it all), an array of cous cous and tagines, delicious dishes with aubergines and dates and small pumpkin and sweet potato breads that have to be tasted to be believed.  I spent a few days with an online Travel Buddy called Nadim – another Canadian actually, I’m collecting them for some reason – and we ate at four different stalls one night til we were full to bursting with the most delicious food and drink, and spent $12 between us.  Then as a contrast we went to a swanky establishment in the new town called Comptoir which has a sister restaurant in Paris apparently.  It’s one of the few places here you can purchase alcohol (Islam = no booze) and they certainly make you pay for it.  We had an INCREDIBLE two course meal there and a lovely bottle of Moroccan red wine (which struck me as odd – what other “dry” country produces wine?) for $130.  Not to mention the talented belly dancers who cavorted around our table.  And yes, boys, I got lots of photos.  So you can dine cheaply or expensively in Marrakech, it’s up to the individual.  Prices here are wildly divergent also and not really open for prediction.  You can eat inexpensively, like I said.  This morning I had a cheese omelet with bread and orange juice that cost me $2, including tip.  Then I went to a supermarket and bought 4 apples and a triangle of Brie, and it cost $10, what I would expect to pay in Australia.  The "souks" (markets) here sell tiny little plaited leather wristbands and try to charge you $10 for them.  I have been only able to bargain them down to $5, which isn't terribly cheap if you consider what you would pay at home.  Also rugs and clothes are expensive by any standards ($50 for a nice shirt)... but oh... the SHOES.  The shoes here are to die for, and you can get gorgeous pairs in actual shops for $30 or less.  I have again and again cursed my need to travel light and lack of spare funds because of this, my one real girlie concession.  The beautiful shoes!  They will haunt me.  I drool.

Mint Tea is as ubiquitous here as cafe au lait is in France, and a bafflingly large percentage of the population appears to have nothing better to do all day than sit in cafes drinking it and smoking, smoking, smoking.  As I am now one of those awfully self righteous ex-smokers  and a fairly light traveller considering the length of my trip, I must say I am getting back to my room each night and sniffing my clothes in despair.  Still, whilst here there is nothing to be done about it.  The cafe culture here is massive, easily as big or bigger than pub culture in England.  I had read before arriving that it is usually the exclusive province of men or occasionally appropriately covered and accompanied women, however I forgot this and strode into a cafe on my first night, bold as you please, and took a seat and ordered a tea.  It was only when I realised I was getting quick glances and outright stares from the all male patrons, and a kind of bemused sneer (if you can picture that) from the maitre d, that I realised I had committed a rather embarrassing faux pas.  However, considering my options were to stay and brave it out, or slink out in shame and without my tea, I chose to brave it out and in fact, even after the humiliation of being served my tea by a man who very deliberately wouldn’t look at me, I managed to choke it down.  After finishing it, despite my jangled nerves screaming at me to remove myself at once, I managed to sit there for an additional ten minutes with affected air of laziness and perfect contentment.  I thought “in for a penny, in for a pound”.  It’s a ridiculous piece of discrimination anyway, and the more women that flaunt these rules, the easier it will become for women there to do as they please.  Despite my bluster however, I have since avoided “those” cafes and have only eaten and drunk at the appropriate, touristy ones.

Stunning mountains

This blog is long!  My apologies, it has been longer than usual between them.  A couple of days ago Nadim and I hired a driver to take us up to a nearby and incredibly beautiful mountain range that graces one side of the city.  Our driver – named, unsurprisingly, Ahmet (it’s like “John” here) – was from the Berber people, which you can click here to read more about, and was absolutely tooth-achingly sweet, I simply adored him.  The villages on the mountain that we visited were Berber villages and the people almost made me cry with their loveliness.  Do you think that poverty makes people more happy and content generally with what they do have, or do you think that our white middle class guilt makes it impossible for us to see anyone in that situation in a negative personal light?  Or is it that our increasingly isolated and technology driven first world lifestyles make it seem sweet and quaint when people still live with their entire families and enjoy the simple pleasures of interacting with other human beings?  Or a combination of all of those things? Or none of them?  Certainly the people of Cambodia and now the Berber people here have tugged on my heartstrings in a way that no race of first world Europeans or Anglos ever has in my travels.  It’s something I shall think on more.

OK, enough philosophy.  To see the pictures of (almost) everything I have described, click here.  The reason I say almost, is because it is difficult to take pictures of people here.  I always ask anyway as a matter of courtesy, but here they simply say No.  And in such a way brooks no second urging.  In fact you have to be incredibly careful, when taking pictures of buildings / landscapes, that you don't get people in it accidentally because they will, at the least end of things, wave a remonstrative finger at you, and at the other end will tell you off mightily. (Is remonstrative a word?  It should be). So for those who are curious about the people, their appearance, clothes etc... they are mostly Arabic in appearance, the men are quite tall and everyone is dark haired and dark eyed.  The women seem to be predominantly lighter skinned than some of the men, perhaps because they are reasonably well covered.  Most of the women cover their heads but not their faces.  Some older ladies (I imagine, how would I know?) cover the face and merely have the slightest slit for their eyes to be able to see out.  It is expected here that you don't show flesh, as a woman.  I don't know what the consequences here would be, as Marrakech is quite progressive and tourist oriented, but I imagine in the smaller places a display of flesh would cause some consternation. In other words, as long as you cover your bits and are respectful, they will be respectful towards you. In most cases.  I have been hissed at twice.  Common sense prevails.

Stray Kittehs!

The usual poor country prioritisation of animals applies here.  I shan’t go into masses of upsetting details, I think we have covered it in previous blogs.  And this isn’t really a “poor country”.  There is a ton of money here, it’s just incredibly unfairly distributed, although I challenge anyone to find a country these days where such is not the case.  On a positive note, unlike Asia, the majority of strays here are cats rather than dogs, and they all seem quite well fed and content, being the superior hunters.  As I mentioned previously, I am off on a camel trek and camp into the Sahara desert for three days and two nights, beginning on Sunday morning and returning on Tuesday night.  Assume I shall be uncontactable during that time, and freezing bloody cold (at night, anyway).  I will return the following Sunday no doubt full of tales of spitting camels, sand in my undies and endless ceilings of stars.  I shall allow you to be jealous of any of those things that you wish.

Til Next We Speak,

*LOVE*

N