well i’m on my way…

Leaving El Jadida was a bit hectic- I think because both of us were done with Morocco mentally and we were sick of the crazyness.  We witnessed many near fights today.  I almost got in a few when little men would work their way through lines to ensure they weren´t left behind. 

Bus from El Jadida to Casablanca was eh, we coudln´t get a seat until the CTM (Moroccan bus company) guy started taking order.  Got to Casa and my bag wasn´t in the pile, just sitting on the bus, I was afraid someone was going to take it, or plant something in it, I got yelled at by the baggage handler.  The people around had to translate for me:  I´m only one person, blablabla. 

The ride from Casa to Tangier wasn´t that bad.  We got dropped off at the port, which was unexpected, but we had a bit of a hard time finding tickets.  We purchased tickets for a ferry leaving a half hour later, had to wait at border patrol and got pushed by more little men sneaking through!  Stamped, got through security, headed down a portish runway, some man tried making us run, took Ryan´s backpack, tried to take my purse (no way!), showed us to a bus, I wanted to know if it was GRATIS?!  We got on, and he wanted a Euro for carrying Ryan´s bag.  Ryan said no, the busdriver and tout got into it; I seriously thought someone was going to pull out a gun.  The bus filled up, we got on the ferry, and we instantly felt relieved.  We sat, ate crap food, and exchanged our money. 

We arrived in Tarifa Spain for the easiest border crossing I´ve ever experienced,  after getting mad at a Moroccan woman for cutting the line.  I wanted to kiss the ground once we got off the ferry, but with my top-heavy backpack, I would have never gotten up.  I got to practice my Spanish, got on the free bus to Algecerias to get a bus to Malaga, bought ticket, went online, left for bus station at 1015, realized the bus was for 10, thankfully it was still there, got on, dozed in and out of sleep. 

When we arrived in Malaga we were in the middle of a commercial hub.  Great.  We found a taxi, who took us to the cheap hotel, it was full, went to another one, they were full as well, but their sister hotel wasn´t, went there, thanked the taxi driver.  All in Spanish.  Good thing I took a year of it before I left, otherwise it would have been a long rough ride.  Once we checked into the nicest room we´ve stayed in yet, we passed out.  Welcome to Spain.

Essaouira looked super dirty without any of the shops open.  The bus to El Jadida was hot and puke-smelling.  We were late arriving at El Jadida, but Simon and Ursula were still there.  Bought tickets to Tangier, the port city, and followed Simon to the hotel.  It was so nice being able to follow someone and not have to do all the navigating!  The hotel was super nice, we paid 100 Durham each, cheapest we´ve spend anywhere so far.  Our room had hot showers, a fridge, and tile on the walls. 

We all went out for lunch at a nicer restaurant, since the budget was nonexistant, where I had a cheese omlette and fries.  We walked around the edge of the median up high by canons.  El Jadida is an old Portugese Port, UNESCO owned. 

Simon was in search of a bar, we found one, we all walked in, but I noticed instantly Ursula and I were the only girls in there.  The bar was a big dark room with men clustered in groups around little tables.  We caused quite a commotion about wanting to purchase beer, and then to take it out of there.  We walked out, beer in hand, Ursula and I went to the beach while the boys went back to the hotel to put the beer in the fridge.  We chatted and read for a good hour or so all the while wondering what happened to the boys. 

Once we all met up we didn´t stay at the beach long, just enough time for all of us to take a dip in the sea, which wasn´t that much bluer than Essaouira.  They wanted to eat at some fish place, I went to watch, but coudln´t stand the smell so I left for a cheese and bread dinner.  There was a guy at the stand drinking hot unpastuerized milk probably fresh from the animal that was not cool for my nostrils nor my stomach.  Got bread and cheese after a lot of pointing, back to the hotel for dinner and to watch the only English channel on the TV.  We drank in our room with Simon and Ursula, played card games that we each took turns teaching the others how to play.  They liked Bullshit, and we liked their version of Asshole.  We took shots of their homemade schnapps/rubbing alcohol.  I showed them my Europe on A Shoestring so they could laugh at what it said about Slovenia, and then they started asking us about Chicago.  They both seemed really interested and said we´d see them in America soon.  They were leaving for Fez in the morning, and us for Tangier, to the get the F out of Morocco.

Our bus to Essaouira on the Atlantic coast was airconditioned, a nice change from what we had travled in the last three days.  When we arrived in the middle of a clusterf***k of what they called a bus station, I realized I had thrown out the directions, but didn´t feel any anxiety.  Ryan went into a hotel that he thought was really a brothel and asked for directions to the Medina (square).  We headed towards it, started walking around, and I realized we would never find it this way.  I popped into an internet cafe, got directions, and we started walking. 

I heard Ryan behind me say ‘Hey!’  I turned around and he was talking to a fire engine red haired girl and a dude with surfer style hair, there were talking to us like they knew us-I had no idea who they were, and tried to place them…then the German girl from the Couchsurfing group came up, with the Moroccan host.  Aha!  He showed us to our hostel and told us to meet him/them at the beach.  We were still kind of wierded out by them. 

We got to the hostel and Alex and Sophie were there.  We realized our reservation was for the next night and night after, the guy told us the place was booked, but said we could sleep on the terrace for half price.  Showed us to a room and wanted 200 Durham each, I talked him down.  WTF are we doing wrong?  Always getting hassled, ripped off, screwed over?  We sat on the terrace with Sofie and Alex, who didn´t have a care in the world, and smoked sheesha (flavoured tobacco) with them.  I still felt anxious and angry after they left.  Ryan asked what I was thinking–‘Jumping off this terrace’ I replied, gravely.  We laughed, because we both knew that I was half serious. 

We left to get food, but realized Ryan had to make his routine call to Jorge, the handler of his money, to put more in the bank.  I sat outside while Ryan contacted his accountant, waiting for someone to step on me or mess with me.  I saw Simon and Ursula, called them over, and started chatting.  We realized quickly that we all felt the same way, distraught, disgusted, and tired of being taken advantage of.  I wanted to hug them and cry at the same time. 

We walked together, Ryan and I went to eat, Simon and Ursula said they´d be back, maybe, maybe not.  We figured we wouldn´t see them again.  We had just finished our food when they came back.  They had seen the beach and said the water was crap, dirty, nasty.  We walked down to the beach together and Ryan made a quick comparison:  this beach looks like Lake Michigan.  Except Lake Michigan is bluer.  We all walked down the beach, then walked back, fighting the wind.  We found a bar, drank a few, then went back to our hostel to drink cheaper beer with Sophie and Alex.  Great night.

We met Simon and Ursula the next morning for a breakfast of crepes.  We bought bread and cheese (laughing cow) for lunch, had coffee, and made plans to go to the other beach.  Back to hostel to switch rooms, and realized we didn´t get screwed over in the room upstairs as we thought we had, since we were charged half price of that room.  The new room had 6 beds, and still got charged less than the 10 bed at 10,50 Euros a night.  We sat a bit and learned a disgusting thing about this hostel we were really starting to love as our ‘safe haven’ in Morocco:  they don´t change the sheets.  The woman swept the crumbs off the bottom sheet and folded the top sheet and blanket tightly so they´d look fresh.  She even went as far to flip over the pillow.  Eww. 

We met up with Simon and Ursula again, they didn´t want to go to the other beach, since it was so late, so we went to the Lake Michigan beach.  They had a surprise for us-they had met a Slovenian who gave them booze!  We went to the beach, ate our feast, Simon hated the wind and the sand, so he and Ryan went to the internet cafe while us girls stayed, lied down, and read.  The sun came out and we slowly started taking off our clothes.  I realized that if I didn´t look at the men, I wouldn´t know they were staring at me.  We would stop reading every once in a while to chat and wipe the ever blowing sand out of our books and off our faces.  It was a bit frustrating but we were relaxed, something I hadn´t felt in a while, since we had been in Morocco, in fact…Being with them, being a group of four made it easier, less threatening, besides they were feeling the same way as us.  It was a good connection.

The boys came back with Hawai (juicy drink kind of like orange pop-Ryan and I can´t agree if its carbonated or not) and we mixed some of their alcohol.  It was homemade and tasted like gasoline.  Everybody made faces;  I dont see the point in drinking something thats this nasty.  I went in the sea, made Ryan go with me.  I made a point not to look at the people as I walked by–Ignorance is bliss. 

We had dinner as a foursome.  They´re so funny, they never agree on anything, but it seems to work for them.  It might be uncomfortable if we knew what they were saying, but it´s just funny listening to them debate in Slovenian.  We wandered looking at stuff, Ursula buying things, I started looking and touching things, found out telling shopkeepers ‘I have no money’ is pretty effective, until one guy gave me hell and told me I shouldn´t touch because I was wasting him time.  I told him I´ve had loads of my time wasted, but walked away as I was saying it.  No point in telling him how Moroccan sales tactics don´t work-desperation is not attractive.

We left Simon and Ursula, said goodbye to them, hoping to see them again.  They were heading to El Jadida, the Moroccan holiday town and they will facebook us to let us know if its cool or not, and if we should bother coming.

I woke up the next morning early and got out of the room so I wouldn´t disturb Ryan.  That boy can surely sleep!  I decided to go get food-my first time venturing out alone in Morocco.  No problems.  Got cheese and 4 circle breads.  Saw a mother cat nursing her kittens in a box someone set up for them.  Aww, cute.  When I came back I heard mewing and saw the kitten wasn´t nursing anymore.  An adult cat was going to town on the passed out Mamma.  I was heartbroken; those kittens will die.  It´s cutthroat out here, in Essaouira kitty world.  I was pretty upset and lost my appetite. 

I vegged out in front of the TV and watched bad movies until Ryan woke up.  We headed out to the beach, where it was extremely hot.  After about 20 minutes, we were sweating from all of our pores.  There were guys playing ping pong and soccer.  Ryan and I took turns going in, and when Ryan left guys started talking to me.  Thank god I dont know any French, else I´d probably get mad…I went into the sea on my own, no harassment.  We left the beach, walked along the port and got food.  I mentioned to Ryan about taking the ferry over to Spain, since we were so confused on where to go in Morocco, since going far was out of the question after I changed all money over and realized I could hardly afford to eat.  Spain sounded good, real good.  We checked the internet, Simon and Ursula had written, saying that we should come to El Jadida, beause the sea was blue there.  Ryan and I were both set on Spain, but once we realized we wanted to meet up with them again, decided to deter our Spain plans back another day.  We were going to El Jadida.

We arrived at the meeting point for the tour early, even though we woke up late.  There were 15 people in our 2 night 3 day tour of the Sahara:  3 Japanese fashion students who spoke perfect French; 1 brave Japanese female solo travler, Yuko; a Korean guy who just finished a smemester in London; 2 college age Brits, Alex and Sophie, friends only; a married couple from Boston, Zara and Leigh; Bachir and Annic, a male-female friend team from Quebec, and Ursula and Simon, a Slovenian couple the same age as Ryan and I.  It was the best tour I´ve been on, in terms of everyone getting along well. 

After driving a couple hours, we stopped at a kasbah where there were kids trying to charge us for looking at it and taking photos.  Ryan and I were like No, Why?  The kid said ‘Money’.  Nice, straight, and to the point.  At least the kid´s honest.  I gave him the rest of my drink, and he seeemd happy with that.  We drove on, stopping a few times for photo opportunities and toilet breaks, most of which were Turkish style (squat time!).  We stopped for lunch at an expensive restaurant (cause everything but lunch was covered in the orignal price) in Ouarzazette, which is supposed to be a nice town that we didnt get to see, but Ryan and I, Zara and Leigh , Yuko, and the Korean guy went to a cheaper restaurant, where we all ordered the same things on the menu at the previous restaurant, but for half the price. 

Back on the bus to sweat our asses off, I had a window seat and had it open, but the air was so hot it felt like I was sticking my head in an oven.  The driver, who wasn´t a guide since he only spoke Arabic, propositioned Bachir, who had family in Morocco and spoke perfect Arabic, that for 15 Durham a head he would turn on the aircon.  Ryan and I were skeptical, figured that the aircon wouldn´t work, but everyone else was dying and wanted it.  I said I´d only do it for 10 Durham, which the driver reluctantly agreed to.  We also bargained that we would give the guy 50 Durham a day just in case something went off, or so the guy couldn´t charge us more the second or third days.  After a few hours of closed windows and a lack of fresh oxygen, Ryan and I were convinced that the aircon was crap, and that windows open, even though circulating hot air was better.  Unfortunately, no one else agreed. 

We stopped to look at the finger rocks, which look like blobs of rock.  I want to know how they came to be, unfortunately our guide coudln´t tell us…Ryan walked up to a parked car, met some locals, and drank a beer they offered him.  Ryan had been wanting a beer since we got to Morocco.  The guy supposedly owned a hotel next to the one we were staying at that was having a Spanish band play, and don´t you know, they serve beer!  Everyone on the tour was invited.  We never found this hotel that was spoken about.  Darn.

We pulled up to Hotel Le Vieux Chateau Dades.  Our room was complete with a view of a rocky cliff and you could hear a stream.  We had a dinner of tomato soup, vegetarian couscous that consisted of eggplant, carrot, and different squashes, and a dessert of honey dew and banana.  Everyonewent to bed after dinner, but not after checking out the stars.  They were nice and big, but not as close as I hoped they´d seem.  Hopefully tomorrow night!

We drove the next morning until we got to some valley where we were met by a guide who spoke English.  Took a look at alfalfa fields where Berber (the nomadic aboriginals of Morocco) woman worked.  The guy got mad cause we were talking amongst ourselves and offered not to speak since ‘we knew everything’.  We all instantly wrote him off as a dick.  Then Bachir overheard the working woman start talking shit about our guide ‘He doesn´t know us, he´s not a part of us…’  Bashir started talking to him, our guide was obviously peeved, but the women offered Bashir to try to cut the alfalfa himself, then the girls, and they offered us the cut alfalfa as a souvenir.  Bashir said that they were pleased with the interaction.  (The women don´t like that the dude makes money off them, and I don´t like anything that exploits humans.) 

We were lead to a Berber rug shop where the girls were allowed to brush wool through combs.  Then our new guide/merchant gave us green tea with heaps of sugar and showed us rugs hoping someone would buy.  We sat in uncomfortable silence as he stared the women down, then tried to guilt us by saying ‘If you can find it in your hearts, then you can find room for it in your homes and in your budgets’.  After more uncomfortable silence, he said bitterly, ‘Well I won´t keep you waiting, I´m sure you have more things to see’.  I left with a bad taste in my mouth.

We drove to the gorges, beautiful and cool (temperature wise).  Walked around, Ryan went in the stream that had cut through the rock to create the gorge, and we headed back where everyone had ordered lunch.  Ryan and I had purchased bread, La Vache Qui Rit (The Laughing Cow as its know at home) cheese, and already had some peanut butter.  We sat on some rocks and had our own feast, for less than 2 Euros!

We got out of there, headed for the desert, drove through nothing, went off roading, our driver wasn´t on the well marked path (idiot), and we finally got to a hotel.  Through the entrance you could see the dunes silently calling our names…They were amazing, spectacular, just…wow.  The sand was so golden against the grey sky, just went on, it looked so surreal it could have been the backdrop for a movie set, just painted on a wall. 

We got on camels (actually a one humped camel is called a dromedary) that were tied together in two 10 dromedary caravans and I named mine Camilla; Ryan named his Joe.  Joe kept on biting Camilla´s ass, that made her mad and me nervous.

I rode a camel a few years ago when I was in Egypt and swore I would never ride one again.  But I realized that in Egypt I rode a camel for the picture, and in Morocco was for the experience, and this time the ride was much more comfortable than I remembered.   

The experience was AMAZING.  We even got rained on-huge raindrops just came over the sand dunes and attacked us.  After being in that hot bus it felt good.  (And, I figured, only on my trip would it rain in the Sahara…)  We could see sandstorms in the distance, creating sand tornadoes, and we could hear the wind carrying the sand over the dunes before we could see it. 

We rode over the ridges of dunes while our  guide walked barefoot.  Dromedaries are so docie, but not skittish.  We passed through the real deal biviouacs, saw a woman milking goats, and tents made of blankets half covered in sand.  We arrived at our site and our guides told us to climb the dune behind our biviouac.  It had to have been 100 feet high, nearly straight up, and impossible to climb.  I finally made it to the top and sat.  It was goregous.  The sun came out to set and played with the lights of the desert.  I took heaps of photos, all the while warning everyone else of getting sand in their cameras, since I know so many people who lost theirs due to sand in Australia and New Zealand…

A sandstorm came up and we all ran down the dune, when the sand died down, or so I thought, I took my camera out to take a photo-it opened and it stuck there.  SHIT!  It made really bad noises and wouldn´t close.  I had a few people look at it, but everyones diagnostic was the same as mine : It´s f***ed.  I thought I was covered on insurance, and was planning on ‘breaking’ my camera anyways to get a new one near the end of my trip, but learned later that I wasn´t covered.  Crap. 

While we were gone the Berbers had laid down blankets so we all lied on them, exhausted from our walk up and down the dune.  We all chatted, since we were becoming friends now, and once it got dark they brought the food out-massive plates of chicken tangine (stew) that they put on little tables we sat on the ground at.  I got my own dish of veg tangine and it. was. good.  It needed a bit of salt and it reminded me of my Grandmother´s stewfatto, but delicious.  They brought out melon (honeydew?  Everyone I´ve met seems to switch what I know as honeydew and canteloupe) and oranges for dessert. 

We all lied down, extending our overstuffed bellies, looking at the stars which weren´t too phenomenal yet because of the lights, while the Berbers brought out drums and a sort of cymbally thing and sang and danced.  Bachir and Annic got up and started dancing, and after a while Sophie and Ursula joined.  Lots of drums, lots of dancing, then they ivited us up to play on the drums, it was cool.  The couples started cuddling up and everyone was lying down looking at the stars, listening to the drums, and the beating of our own hearts, sometimes seeming to be the same.  I could hear Annic talking to one of the Berbers ‘Young people today are more aware of the world around them, and that´s why theyre more open-minded.’  I thought to myself, this is true, but sometimes, you just have to be.  Stop talking and just listen. 

One guy started talking to Ryan and I, telling us how tourists sometimes come to his home for a ‘Real Berber’ experience, for a good price, of course.  Ryan and I were kind of peeved about him, he wanted to know if we had any questions, No, so he told us we weren´t riding camels, that they were dromedaries.  Ryan asked him about the Berber/Muslim religion, and he gave us a respons that didn´t really answer the question.  It was clearly a scripted answer.  I asked if the Berbers were the first people in Morocco only to get an answer of ‘I think so’.  He left us not long after that.  We looked at the stars and fell asleep under them.

We were supposed to see the sun rise, but once we got to the spot, the sun was high in the sky.  It was still spectacular, being there, seeing nothing but Sahara and plateaus in front of us, dunes surrounding us, the contrast between the bluest blue and almost terra cotta of the dunes was just amazing.  We went back to the hotel for a breakfast of crepes, bread, and Turkish coffee. 

The driver wanted 50 extra Durham today for aircon, and everyone was adamant in unison: NO WAY.  We opened the windows, closed the drapes and it was quite pleasant.  We drove the entire way back in one stretch only for pit stops and a lunch break.  We got back to Marrakech around 9 and went to the square as a group to spend our last 5 durham on freshly squeezed orange juice, probably the cheapest in the world-3 Durham, or 37 cents US! 

After kissing everyone goodbye, European style with a kiss on each cheek, Ryan and I went back to our hotel where Kemal wanted to hear crazy stories in his hot/cold way.  Went to bed somewhat early that night, exhausted from our trip.

We had breakfast with some English girls who told us the tanneries smell sooo bad.  We went, and it wasn´t that bad.  We keep on getting told horror stories that we have yet to encounter-do these people want to seem worldly, or that they´ve been to battle and survived, or what?  We tried getting lost, deliberately, but people sent us back towards ‘big square’.  Kemal laughed this morning when we told him we wanted to go the the hammam (spa bath type place), that it´s touristic, but once we tried to get off the beaten path, we get sent right back in. It´s a bit frustrating.

The tanneries were wierd, for lack of a better word.  There were little pools of different agents to make leather different textures: bird shit (I kid you not), flour, paprike, saffron.  Guys would stand knee deep in this liquid to rinse and scrub hides.  We learned lamb hide is smoother than sheep hide. 

We walked and I saw rabbits getting skinned alive.  We tried to haggle for a sheesha pipe, no dice.  The merchants laughed at us and our price.  Went back to the hotel for a nap.  Woke up earlier than I wanted to, and literally waited for time to pass so I could shower and not sweat.  We picked up our laundry and even the locals laughed when we handed over our money.  We got really really ripped off.  Oh well, it´s part of the experience, right? 

We had a dinner of sandwich that consisted of egg, mayoish sauce, potato, tomato, onion, lettuce, cabbage, and carrot-for 10 Durham-that´s  1 Euro!  As we were walking out of the sandwich shop, we saw a solo white girl who looked completely out of her mind.  I wanted to make friends, but she disappeared before this could register. 

We made it an early night since we had to wake up at 6 the next moring for our desert trip!

Woke up and had a breakfast of bread and a ‘pancake’-spongy, holy yellow bread that had the consistency of a sponge (yes I have chewed on a sponge before, don´t ask) with butter and jam, coffee, and OJ-fresh OJ.  We headed out to book our desert tour and to call my bank.  They informed me that the problem wasn´t them, that the Moroccan machines were rejecting my card for whatever reason.  It was out of their control.  I swallowed this informating, realizing that I was on a tight budget, since I only had 250 USD and 100 English Pounds on me.  That was all the money I had for Morocco.  Yikes!

To escape the heat, we headed for what is called a park next to the mosque that dominates the square.  We sat for a long time, in the shade, comparing notes between our culture and theirs. 

We wandered some more, Ryan decided to get a hair cut, to make his mohawk stand out even more, so we had to haggle for that.  Once decided on a price of 3 Euro, I watched like a hawk to make sure this guy didn´t destroy his hair.  We came across men selling random things on blankets, two right next to eachother, and I saw a pair of scissors, which I had been saying that I needed.  I asked the second guy how much, he replied 10, so I went over to the other guys, how much did they want?  15, they said, I laughed, said this guy wants 10!  Went back to him, handed him the a 20 Durham coin, and he gave me 15 back.  He was just happy I came back to him.  Nice, even cheaper.  After walking around some more, we both started feeling woozy from the heat.  It probably was close to 40 C, near 100 F, but since there was no humiditiy, it wasn´t that bad, but it still was bad. 

I got hissed at by men and watched them through my sunglasses make ‘elevator eyes’ at me.  I could see the lust in some of their eyes, and thought to myself with a laugh ‘I know you want me.’ 

Back to hostel for a nap and to chat with Kemal who wanted to hear any crazy stories.  I could never tell if he was genuine or mocking in his inquiries.  Ryan and I needed laundry done, so we went to the place Kemal takes the hotels laundry.  Perhaps I offended the guy by bringing my underwear, as he held it so delicately away from him, and that´s why he overcharged us.  It was a bit of a nerving experience, as no one there spoke English and Ryan and I are both nervous about other people cleaning our clothes.

We headed out for dinner; I had the most watery couscous I´ve ever had; I thought couscous was supposed to be dry.  We ordered some olives too, but they had some spices on them that reminded me of the feces smell that seems to blanket the whole city.  In my opinion, olives don´t need spices.  They´re flavorful enough. 

We headed out for the new town, to see what there is to see, and ran into some couchsurfers and their host heading the same way.  Couchsurfing is this wonderful idea that people can sleep on other people´s couches for free all over the world.  Ryan and I have been trying like hell to be part of this community, to save a buck or two, but with no luck.  We heard that you really have to make it sound like you really really want to get to know the people whose house they´d be sharing with you.  We just wanted free accomodation, and if the people were cool, thats a plus.  We also dont have any references so people are less likely to host you; its a bit of a catch-22.  We realized that after hanging out with these people at a juice bar that you also have to kiss your hosts ass, which is somehting Ryan and I refuse to do.  We aren´t brown nosers, and feel it´s really fake and decietful.  No couchsurfing for us! 

We left the couchsurfers quickly and realized that it opened up some channel for us, as we realized we had a lot to say about travel and people and how it affects them and how it affects us.  You´d think it´d restore ones faiting in humainty, but it´s done just the opposite.  I´ve become more intraverted, more skeptical, less trusting, more…me.  All these people go aorund and act like crazy carefree people for what?  So others think they´re ‘cool’?  I don´t get it.  I want to see, feel, react, observe, experience, and most of that doesn´t mean I have to give myself up (emotionally) to people I´ll never see again nor care to.  Of course all of the people I´ve met don´t fit into this category, but unfortunately, most of them have. 

I´ve given up looking at faces as we walk by, I´m sick of being looked at like a piece of shit (or meat).  Ryan´s getting sick of it too, but he´s getting aggressive, which is entertaining.  We headed back to the hotel before both or either of us snapped.

When I woke up it was still hot out, but it was obvious the sun was setting, so I decided to take a shower.  I noticed the water pooling up around my feet, and then into the bathroom, but I just figured the drain was slow.  When I finished, I was standing in a pool of water, the curtain was soaked, and when I pulled it back, noticed that half the room was underwater!   I put some clothes on, and opened the door, to ask Kemal, who was sleeping, if they had a squeegee.  Of course they didn´t so Ryan and I used a few towels to mop it up.  I thought Kemal might give us a hand, that this may have happened a few times before, and there was a quick and efficient way of cleaning this up, but no, he just slept.  This was our problem.  He told us after we cleaned up that the drain pops up.  This would have been good information when he showed us our room…

We wandered around the souks (the maze of shops that is Marrakech) and held a monkey.  First he gave us a high five, and I noticed how creepily his hand resembled mine.  We walked around some more and dodged people, carts, and motorbikes.  Ryan and I were crossing a square at one point and we heard a motorbike coming before we saw it.  I´m really good at running into people, and sort of dancing with them in order to get out of eachothers way, so I just frooze.  There was plenty of room on both sides of me for this motorbike to pass by.  He was headed straight for me, but I still stayed, since there was room and I figured he would move…But he didn´t, and ran into me as I put my hands out to stop the windscreen, so the guy started yelling at me.  WTF?  He had heaps of room, and he was moving faster, making it easier to change his path…I was unscratched, just a bit shaken up, and we continued walking. 

Went for dinner at Cafe France since I wanted pizza to ease my way in to Moroccan food.  We sat for a long time, just people watching, and got a kick out of seeing an entire family of four on a motorbike.  We headed back to the hostel and chatted with some people staying there, getting info on this desert tour we wanted to take. 

We headed back out, this time at the end of our street there was a human traffic jam.  We pushed our way through, and as we were sneaking along, I could feel fingers on my butt!  I turned around, and saw lots of guys looking everywhere but at me.  I turned around and continued shuffling through the crowd, but I could still feel these fingers on my ass.  I wheeled around, and yelled at these guys STOP TOUCHING ME!  Ryan turned around and said DONT TOUCH HER in a forceful tone.  One of the guys put his finger to his lips, as if saying, Be quiet.  We got out of that mess and Ryan admitted that he felt it too but thought I was grabbing his ass for whatever reason…Good thing we don´t keep anything in our back pockets…

We laughed about it, which was good.  I think one needs a large dose of a good sense of humor to travel in Morocco and a lot of tolerance.  We wandered around the food court, batting off the men trying to get us into their restaurant like they were flies.  The hassling seemed annoying, and not as terrible as people had warned us about.  We were also warned that we would be walking through horse manure, but never encountered more than a few ‘road apples’ in our path.

We saw a crowd of people around a smallish man and a girl-both wearing boxing gloves.  They were taking bids on them, it was obvious, but we stayed for 20 minutes and never saw a fight.  We watched a man go through the crowd, shoving his empty upside down hat under tourists noses-Ryan and I said no, since we hadn´t witnessed anything, but were shocked when we saw a man go through multiple pockets in his backpack looking for some change.  Scared. 

We watched some snake charmers, and learned later that they were setting up for snake fights.  Saw some children dancing traditionally-I assumed since they were in costume and following an older man.  It could have just been for show too. 

I saw the saddest, mangiest, hungriest looking cats I´ve even seen, loads of kittens too. 

Ryan got a henna tattoo (which he later got an allergic reaction to) which was supposed to last a month.  I write this two weeks later and it´s gone. 

All in all, harassment aside, it was an awesome awesome day.  =)

I had Crosby, Stills, and Nash´s Merrakech Express in my head the entire flight to Morocco, that is, when I wasn´t sleeping.  The landscape was so clear, as there weren´t any clouds in the sky-I could see desert, more desert, squared off sections of land, and cities every once in a while.  At last mountains loomed into view and we circled for twenty minutes before even thinking about landing.  We flew over field upon field of olives and I hoped this would be a precursor of what´s to come as I love olives. 

We finally landed, walked across airfield into a building that had a line snaking out of it for thermo testing-no swine flu for me!  Filled out the customs sheet, stood in line.  We were welcomed to Morocco by all the crying babies, toddlers, and kids too old to be jumping up and down, throwing tantrums, slapping their mothers, and feigning tears on their already tear stained faces.  It was mostly girls, dressed in cute little dresses, that showed their knees everytime they pushed back their tangled hair.  At what age does a girl start covering up?  Got to the man at the border control desk, and he took us to the health services desk, where there was no one to wait on us.  I was growing impatient, wondering why we counldn´t continue into Morocco.  Finally a man came out, disappointed we didn´t speak French (we would continue to get this throughout our 10 days in Morocco), and motioned for us to fill out another customs card.  Once we finished, he looked them over to make sure the two were identical, took one, stamped the back of the other, and sent us back on our way through customs.  We got our passports stamped, found our bags, and headed into the Moroccan part of the airport.

For some reason I wasn´t nervous entering Morocco, despite the fact that I encountered another border crossing, and it was a Muslim country (Im a very independant woman).  It could have to do with the fact I was with my friend, Ryan, whom I hoped would be my shield and protect me from the harassment I experienced in Istanbul.  It could also have to do with the fact that I feel I´m a bit more traveled and can handle whatever life throws at me (I´ve learnd that I can only take so much). 

I did my normal thing in any aiport in a new country, and hit up the ATM.  After countless tries, I gave up.  My card was `unidentifyable´.  Damn bank-I had had problems with them when I was in London and when I called them they said it was because I was in another country.  I´ve been outside the US since December and I´ve had no problems until now, until WaMu switched over to Chase…I told them I was coming here, so what´s the problem?  I always keep a few hundred USD with me while traveling, for an emergency, and this was. 

As we were walking out of the airport, a taxi driver approached us.  He offered us a ride to the center for 100 Durham (10 Durham is about equal to 1 Euro, or 7 USD), I said 50, he shook his head, so we walked on.  I love haggling!  We saw the bus for 20 Durham was waiting, but I decided to try the other drivers, who were lined up waiting for tourists to overcharge.  They told us 150, we laughed and told them their buddy was offering 100 inside, one dropped to 80, I said 50, he 70, I 50.  He said 60, I took a step forward, pretending to bite, said 50, and turned on my heel and headed for the bus.  Ryan followed, but the man came and said, OK 50, but he wanted to put our bags in the trunk and to share the taxi with another guy.  Ryan didn´t like the dodginess of that, so we happily saved money and took the bus.

We walked through the main square, Djmaa el Fna, ignoring every person who tried to talk to us, smelled horse shit, saw a donkey carrying a cart that had car tires on it, lots of bicycles, lots of vespas, lots of tourists.  Saw women in tank tops and short skirts; it always makes me mad, these people who don´t follow customs and don´t seem to be fazed by the fact they´re in a Muslim country, especially after I was in Istanbul and dressed very conservatively and still got harassed.  What is my body language giving off?

We turned after Cafe France, as the directions said.  We were supposed to turn down the third street, but I wasn´t sure if all the alleyways we were passing were just that or streets, as there were signs posted in Arabic on them.  Ryan said he hadn´t seen any streets, I told him I had seen streets, and some pig brains he might want to eat later, both of which he hadn´t seen.  I told him to ask a guy, but all we got was `Parlez vous Francois?´ (sp?)  No, no French.  He looked at us, a bit desperately, Espanol?  Yes, yes!  He told us the directions in a mixture of Spanish and French, as he didn´t know the spanish word for street.  We found our street, and our next direction was to turn after the Mosque, and I had to point out the large-boxish minarette that was obvious to me from the electronic megaphones sitting in each of the windows. 

A man tried telling us the street we were going down was dead, too quiet, but lead us to our hotel, making us promise we´d see his brothers leather shop tomorrow.  Yeah, OK buddy.  We sat down with three Moroccans, a woman, man, and a guy around our age, Kemal, who did all the talking, although the others understood English, at least when we asked their names.

We had to fill out info cards, of course Ryan first (no ladies first here!), and most of the questions asked were directed at him:  if this your first time in Morocco, first time in Africa, what do you plan on doing here, how long are you in Morocco…  The woman brought us tea, which we drank out of clear glasses about twice the size of shot glasses.  It smelled like Halls Menthol cough drops, and tasted of it too, until you could taste the sweetness of the sugar, which came as an aftertaste.  I felt as if I could chew the sugar there was so much, but it was still good, and hot, refreshing, even though it was already extremely hot at 10 am.  

After sitting, feeling like we were at an interview, we were showed to our room.  The bathroom had a blanket seperating it and the bed.  There was just enough room for our backpacks between the wall and the bed.  Turned on the fan, took off most of my clothes, and slept in my tank top and underwear until 4.