The Marrakesh express

Date: Apr 25, 2010


Well, it wasn’t Crosby, Still, and Nash’s train but we bolted down the road to Marrakesh. The super high speed highway is a toll road. In all it cost about $25 to get here, plus the $50 learning curve, but it enabled us to get here in one day regardless of what the guide said.

We knew that the desert didn’t begin until you got further south than Marrakesh, but we didn’t realize how green and fertile the northern part of Morocco was. We literally had hundreds of miles of farming activities, from little acre-sized plots being tilled by combinations of horses, oxen, and donkeys. Put them together in any combination or separately and we saw it. Larger plots had tractors, but they were more an anomaly than the norm. Corn, potatoes, wheat, row crop vegetables, and fields of some kinds of leafy green things that were too distant to identify. Lots of carts being pulled by donkeys added to the view, and in many ways it was like stepping back to when I was in Arab lands 50 years ago. Obviously, tremendous changes have occurred, but in others, things look very much the same.

They have rest stops every 40-50 miles, and they are very nice indeed. Gas, shady spots for resting, restaurants, and even little rooms for prayer – separate ones for men and women of course. I was headed for the loo at one stop and saw several pairs of shoes lined up at the door of a room. A glance inside as I walked by revealed several men in prayer position. You can’t do a 6-8 hour drive without the requisite time necessary to pray.

In the north, the cities were comprised of regular cinder block construction. High-rise buildings maybe 10 stories high in many cases. Looked very “Urban,” while as we got further south, that changed to single-storied red colored adobe houses, sometimes with a veneer of smoothed mud baked hard by the North African sun. It went from urban to very rural. Cities changed to villages, villages changed to single family outposts. Every once in a while in the middle of nowhere there would be a beautiful compound which was surrounded by high walls. When the road rose with the rolling earth you could see inside. There would be an orchard providing shade and producing fruit, a two storied dwelling looking very plush, and a little gazebo type structure in the middle. It evoked visions of what Sultans, caliphs, and sheiks must have had in times past.

As in any place with a large peasantry, there are lots of fat cats who have gotten to a place of comfort and ease. Whether that happened by their own guile, ability, ambition, or ravaging the masses probably depends upon the individual case. I suspect you could pick any of the above and it would pertain to an individual situation.

All along the drive we were constantly on the alert for people running across the busy highway. With the average speed of 75 mph and a lot of cars greatly exceeding that, it created a slightly dangerous proposition for all involved. It raised the question: “Why did the Berber cross the road.” Who knows? But lots of kids not older than my grandson, women in full purdah, old men who you’d think should know better all did.

Further south, the topography changed from farming to grazing land. Flocks of sheep and goats, or a mixture thereof with cattle sometimes thrown in, roamed the land. A scan of the general area always revealed someone tending the flock, usually a young boy, but often a girl.

One of our big disappointments on this trip was the inability to hook up with our Servas network. This has always been our guide to a culture and rolling down the road I had so many questions running through my brain and no outlet for them and no input of honest insight to a culture about which I know little. Last year in Scandinavia we had a plethora of Servas hosts and it was wonderful to get a lot of inside information. However, we already had a firm handle on European cultures, and it was a lot of fine-tuning. Here however, we enter with a modicum of knowledge and a lot of questions.

For example, when stopped at a rest stop we saw many women in what we euphemistically call “Traditional Arab dress.” Women in long Jalabas, head scarves, no make-up, and a very docile nature around men. There were also men with the long coats to their knees, the head caps which are much larger than Jewish skull caps, and traditional pants where the crotch bags. However, there were also a large contingency of women with make-up, stiletto heels, tight-fitting jeans no head scarves with very coiffured hair who sat around smoking and being anything but the docile, quiescent Muslim woman. I wondered how this all worked, and how it all fit together. This would lead to innumerable questions and thoughts which inevitably flow from such conversations.

We got up this morning and took a taxi to the Medina area and began our walkabout in the bazaar area. It is an absolute labyrinth of alleys where the general rule is: “If it’s made, we sell it here.” As in so many places, I don’t see how so many people selling the same thing can make a living off tourists. There are hundreds of shops selling scarves, and a like number selling wooden boxes, glassware, shoes and slippers and such. Bargaining is a must in these places. It’s an art form, and you have to go in with the precept: “I’m going to pay too much and I know it, but I’ll get the best deal I can.” The rule I use is make a ridiculously low bid, and if they let you walk away, you know it’s too low. Then you come upon the next shop selling the exact same items, and you raise your bottom line a little, and again if they let you walk away…….and so on. Sometimes they’ll come after you and then they’ve got you. You’re still paying too much, just not as much as you would otherwise. We’d bargain and get a feel for what we should be paying, but in the end we’d go back to a particular stall where we found the man amiable and interesting. No women are sellers in these markets. This type of commerce is strictly a man’s environment.

Since Morocco was a French colony for so long, it is a favorite destination for the French. And there are lots of them here. Young, old, families, groups of girls and boys – all sorts of combinations make it a place where as a tourist you don’t stand out individually. Everyone speaks French here, it’s safe, exotic, cheap and a lot of fun. The main square is a lively and fun tourist trap. We got out of our taxi and there were snake charmers, with real cobras just like in the old movies, monkeys on chains and chipmunks all there for you to have your picture taken with, all for a small price naturally. If you try to video or snap a photo, the spotters run up to you and demand a fee for the photo. A pocketful of what amounts to dimes makes the whole process inexpensive and everybody wins. Walking down the street in front of you will be a man carrying an armload of dead rabbits, while a man might be coming in the other direction with a load of chickens. Berber women have small stands in the square where they will make intricate henna tattoo designs on whatever part of your body you wish to have that design.

There are very few motor scooters here, but they’ve been replaced by their little cousins, the motor bike. They are easier to get through the bazaar area, they can really zip in and out of traffic, and as Carol said, “They’re like hornets when you’ve disturbed the nest.” They literally buzz past you coming from all directions. The general rule seems to be, don’t change your angle of walking, because it’s all calculated to miss you by a very small margin of safety. Alter your angle, change your pace, and you’re liable to get stung.

I still have my haircut to do while here. It’s always one of my favorite things when traveling. I won’t let Carol cut it before we leave because I know I’ll want to have it cut on the trip. Couldn’t see having it done in Spain or Portugal when Morocco seemed a far more exotic experience. For those of you who have been on the mailing list for a while, you might remember my Botswana cut “Jim has a bad hair day,” and my experience in Tibet on Buddha’s birthday. Both wonderful memories. Didn’t see any “Barber shops” in the Souks (local name for the bazaar or casbah), but my eyes are pealed.

Lots more wonderful days lie ahead,

Carol and Jim