one final adventure
Please forgive me, but this post will be short and error strewn. The keyboard on this computer is significantly different, yet similar enough to really mess with me. In most places, you can change it to an English keyboard and ignore the letters on the keys; but that won’t work here. It’s frustrating being reduced to hunt and peck after years of touch typing.
So. We’ve made it to Marrakesh in one, albiet very tired, piece. We left Prague 2 days ago on another wonderful night train and arrived in Frankfurt at 6 in the morning. Each of our 3 night trains has sucked in its own special way; the first time with the all night passport checks, the second with the dreaded stinky roommate and this last journey because of the 2 middle aged drunks that were in our compartment. It was actually pretty entertaining: they were funny drunks and they were more interested in laughing than anything else, we were just ready for them to quiet down around midnight or so.
So we had a short night of sleep on the train. We wandered blearily around Frankfurt’s (closed) red-light district and the “old town” (almost everything was destroyed in WWII and subseauently rebuilt) before taking a bus out to Hahn airport, which is where Ryanair flies out of. The airport is called Frankfurt-Hahn; but that’s something like calling Duluth’s airport Minneapolis-Duluth, because Hahn and Frankfurt aren’t even close to each other. We’d done our research and knew this, so we booked a night at a hotel by the airport and did the 2 hour bus ride yesterday instead of at 2 this morning.
Marrakesh strikes both of us as a sort of India-lite: there is some of the same flexibility in traffic rules, there is some of the same madness, and the people are somewhat similar in their approach to life, from what we can gather. Still, it has none of the intensity of India, its not so overwhelming and intimidating. Most of the smells (and there are many) are pleasant instead of foul. Our hotel is centrally located, not insanely expensive and is nice. All of these things would be different in the big I. It seems a great place to end our trip: some of the madness of South Asia, but in a more managable form.
I’m surprised I made it this far, but I’m sick of typing. I’ll find another internet shop and post again once we’ve had a full day here and explored a bit more.
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Tags: Marrakesh, Morocco, Travel
awrichner
sorry you have to deal with that keyboard, but we appreciate the effort.
i realize it was a while ago that you mentioned this, but I thought of you this morning when they had a short story on the radio about aljezerah-english (sp?) starting free web broadcasts since there are only 2 states in the US that carry the netowrk on cable. their hope is that they can get enough online viewership to convince the cable companies that its worth carrying them. Just thought you might be intriuged, as you had been complaining about that earlier on your trip.
no problem. I enjoy posting here and will probably miss it once we’re home and I’ve got nothing to write about.
Glad to hear about the web broadcasts for aljezerah-english. it’s a good news station and it’s a pity the US doesn’t really carry it.
have you guys ever tried to watch the Spanish network news? Very intriguing…well as much of it as i can understand it is. And I think our news is depressing with crime and dealth all over the place, especially North Minneapolis. I can only imagine what the news is like in a war ravaged area. I mean really… do they pay attention to the Weather Report or the Sports segment when Al Queda post a new video with some guy with a gun to his head?? I doubt it. I will stick to the filtered media of CNN. For every 15 very depressing, heartbreaking segments, there is one that makes you laugh casue some guy did something stupid somewhere. Forget FOX… those guys aare just friggin crazy! 🙂 Hope the next nine days aare just as good if not better than the first 9 days were. Peace out.
nothing says you have to stop posting when you’re back in the real world!
i’d read about your daily grind just for an excuse not to be doing work.
one thing I like about Aljezerah English as opposed to CNN is that they give you reason for why things happen instead of just the news. You get some context and it is easier to understand why this muslim said something that sounds crazy or this country took some kind of seemingly unreasonable action or stance.
Also, in American media, it is apparently not allowed to question anything the Israelis do in the Israel/Palestine conflict. Aljezerah gives a Palestinian perspective, perhaps to the point of neglecting the Israeli side, but I think in that conflict it is important to remember that both sides have been horrible and unreasonable and not just the Palestinians as CNN et. al. might have you believe. Both sides share the blame for the lack of a resolution to the conflict.
and justin, maybe I will keep posting. I’ve a bunch of reflections and things like that that I haven’t got around to posting, so I’ll keep putting them up for a while. Who knows? Maybe I’ll enjoy this at home too.