Marrakech, or: "I like you because you are nice"

“We are in the life just to live our life as we want” – Moustafa, the best tourguide around.

Perhaps the most stressful travel of this vacation was the voyage from Palma to Marrakech.  So far all of my Ryan Air flights had ended with a little trumpet fanfare and “Welcome! You have arrived on yet another on time flight. Last year over 90% of Ryanair flights landed on time, beating every other European airline.” In order to get to Marrakech from Palma, I needed to fly through another city, so I chose Valencia. I would have about 1 hour in Valencia, no problem. But in reality – yes, problem. Of all my 6 Ryan Air flights, this was the only one that wasn’t on time. We got in about 30 minutes late, so by the time I debarked and exited security the departures board read ‘now boarding’ for my flight, and I still had to get my ticket stamped by a passport checker and get back through both security and customs, since I was leaving the country. No good. I waited in line at the wrong window and was told in Spanish that I needed to run to the other window, then once I got my stamp was told in English that I needed to run to the terminal. Thanks, guys, I wasn’t aware that I had negative minutes to get on this flight. At this point, I’m running my options through my head for when I miss the flight, which in my mind is inevitable. I don’t really speak Spanish, I have no way to get ahold of my friends who are waiting for me in Marrakech, and the next flight on this airline isn’t til 7pm the next day. I settle on trying to find a flight back to Madrid that night, staying with Dave, then catching the first flight to Marrakech in the morning. This is all running through my head as I am literally running across the airport to security. I make it through incredibly quickly, and as I’m running to customs/the gate I’m told once again that I need to run by an announcement that the flight is fixin to take off. I barely make it through in time, but I do, am told to run down the ramp and across the tarmac to the plane. And here’s the kicker – this is the exact same plane that took me from Palma to Valencia. Are you serious, Ryan Air? While I was standing in lines and running from one end of the airport to the other, my plane was being leisurely taxied across the tarmac and my flight attendants (who were giving me funny looks because they recognized me from the last flight) were collecting garbage and tidying. Miserable. BUT I made the flight, got into Marrakech where the hostel had sent a car to meet me, was driven/walked to the hostel and met up with Krista, Richard, and our roommate for the night, another British guy named William.

              

  After throwing down my stuff, we walked to the square for my first Moroccan meal. This is the main square in town which during the day is filled with spice vendors and orange juice stands, but at night transforms into a food court of sorts. Basically it’s just a canopy of white tents, who all have the exact same menu with the exact same prices, only differing slightly in spicing and whether or not there are chick peas in the couscous. So as soon as you’re in sight of the tents, there will be guys in white aprons shoving their menus in your face, promising you free tea (which is turns out they all have), and telling you “we’re all the exact time, so just eat here!” We chose the first place we were invited to and I had a delicious chicken couscous for 30 dirham – aka 3 euro. I love this country already.

free tea!

  In the morning we said bye to William and decided to search out some museums and palaces or some such cultural sites. While wandering through the souks (the insane winding streets filled with shops of anything and everything), some guys illuminated us to what should have been the obvious fact that everything was closed because it was Friday. Duh, whities – how eurocentric of us. They do tell us, however, that the tanneries are open, and point us in the direction. Alright, we think, why not. (at this point, you can skip this entire paragraph and just watch this video instead, or keep reading. Your funeral) So while we’re wandering some more a super nice guy sort of saves us from getting run over by some cars, then tells us we should go this way for the tanneries and goes on his way. A nice refresher after the kids everywhere who will take you where you want to go but only for a price. We start walking that way and are quickly told by the same guy who has reappeared, that it’s this street, not that one, then calls his friend over and says he’ll show us the way. No no, we say, we don’t want a guide, we don’t want to pay. ‘no money no honey’ he tells us, which apparently and counter intuitively means we do not have to pay him. He’s on his way home from work and he lives this way anyway, he tells us. As part of a new thing I’m trying where rather than assuming that everyone is creepy and not to be trusted I have a bit of faith in humanity, I trust the guy, and we go with him across town. He’s very friendly, and tells me all about the tanneries and Marrakech in general while Krista and Richard follow behind. We get to the tanneries and he hands us off to a Berber man, shakes our hands, and goes on his merry way. What a nice guy. The Berber guy gives us some mint leaves ‘for the smell’ and walks us through 2 different tanneries, explaining the dying and drying process  and warning us to watch our feet for all the pigeon droppings. Apparently in order to get the smell of the lime out, you attack it with an equally rank smell, so the hides are soaked in pigeon crap water. Now I don’t curse, but maybe my favorite quote of the trip was his explanation of the process – “shit contre shit – no shit.” Ah, now I see. After the tour he asks if we want to see the finished product. For future travelers, this would be a good time to say no. He takes us across the street to a shop filled with leather bags and hand us off to the owner, an incredibly jovial man who takes us into a back room lined with rugs, sits us down, and brings us tea. “We made you smell the tanneries, so now we have to give you tea” he says. While we enjoy our tea he explains the different types of rugs which his ‘young accomplice’ (as put by Richard) unfurls one after another and lays at our feet. Then the negotiations begin. It’s actually a fun process – the accomplice holds up a rug and we say either ezjma (no dice) or ralay (keep it), then once we get it down to about ten we go back through and do it again until we’ve got the one we want to purchase. Except we don’t want to purchase. After working this out the owner who is now exponentially less jovial shakes our hands, asks for some money for his helper, and sends us out, where the guy who showed us through the tanneries is waiting and also asks for money. Turns out ol such and such who saved us from the cars was actually the first in a 4 man sting operation – kudos to you guys, I don’t even mind that you took my money. It only ended up costing us about four euro a piece and an hour or so, with which I’m fine. We spent the rest of the day exploring the souks, eating, and hanging out on our rooftop terrace playing cards. Lovely.

living the dream on the rooftop

A note about the rooftop: it was here that I had my first experience with the call to prayer. As those of you that have been to Islamic nations know, this is something that happens five times a day and lasts about 10-20 minutes, starting at 5 am. A pretty integral part of my experience in Morocco, thought I should mention it, anyway.

  On Saturday we went on a day trip into the Atlas mountains, where we visited an old Berber home and were fed a delicious breakfast and  taught to make mint tea, visited a ‘Moroccan pharmacy’ with herbal cures for everything from snoring to herpes, took a short hike into the mountains, ate a bomb lunch at a pretty classy restaurant, and rode some camels. I’d say the best part of the whole thing was our tour guide, Mustafa. On the drive there he asked if we knew what the plan was for the day, and when a fellow excursioner said no, exclaimed “then why did you come!” Pretty shortly afterwards he serenaded us through the vans crackly sound system (which is equipped with a mic) with Enrique’s ‘Hero.’ Fantastic.  Later we rounded a corner and he yelled out ‘o my god! Camels!’ which he repeated at least 4 times throughout the day.  He’s starting his own tour company called Desert Dreams, so if you ever go to Morocco, look him up, he’s phenomenal.

                

That night we went back to the square for the 3^rd time and had a very friendly server named Antonio. He deduced that I speak a poco of Spanish, and from there on out only addressed us in español. He was the guy in charge of bringing in clientele, so he was running back and forth in front of our table, and each time he passed us he would throw out a line in our direction – my favorite of which was ‘I like you because you are nice.’ Thanks, Antonio, I like you too. We exchanged facebook info before parting, but sadly that is not a friend request which has popped up. C’est la vida. After dinner we went back to our place to relax and were serenaded by a really beautiful prayer service from across the street. Here's a clip.

                The next day, my final day in Morocco, we got ourselves psyched up for the souks. The man at our hostel had told us not to buy anything until our last day, so that we would be familiar with the prices and know what we wanted. Tell you what – terrible idea. I’ve never bartered before, and it is exhausting. At the end of the day I came out of the souks with a pair of sandals, a ton of earrings, a purse, a couple bracelets, and an avocado icecream for all my hard work. Another afternoon spent on the roof with tea and crosswords, another dinner in the square, and my Moroccan adventure drew to a close. In the morning I gave Krista my remaining dirham, got a taxi to the airport, and headed back to Madrid. Let the one day visits begin!

i don't even like orange juice and i will miss this

p.s. click here to see the rest of the photos from marrakech, and here for my pics from spain!