Passage and Tess in Fez!

Fez from the hillside

I was lucky enough the second-to-last weekend of November to be able to return to Morocco to visit one of my oldest and best friends, Passage, in Morocco, where she has been studying for the semester.  After much discussion, we decided to head to Fez, an ancient city in the north-central part of Morocco.  My first trip to Morocco with Discovery Excursions was fun, but a little too touristy and American for my taste, so I was stoked to have the opportunity to experience Morocco again with Passage as my guide.

The hostel car service (I guess hostels offer car services in Morocco..) picked me up at the Fez airport, and the driver whizzed me through the newer part of the city of Fez right to the outskirts of the ancient medina, where I was met by a tall man in a dark suit with a facial scar that looked like he had been slashed by a sword.  The tall man was there to lead me into the maze of the medina to find our little hidden hostel, Dar Rabha.  I stopped to enter the tiny door and found myself in a small room with a ceiling that stretched up many stories, the walls lined with cushion-filled couches, and a tiny computer and cash register in the corner.  As I was trying to explain that I was meeting a friend here and ask if she had arrived, I heard a shriek of "Tess!" and Passage came flying out of the door next to the computer.  We've been friends since our infant YMCA swimming class, and nothing has changed.

Our first evening (which turned out to be the only dry day) we spent wandering through the medina.  Luckily enough for me, I had the best guide possible.  Although Passage had only been to Fez once before for only a day, she was familiar with the culture of Morocco, spoke enough Arabic that she could bargain with shopkeepers, direct taxi drivers and ask for directions while I smiled and nodded helpfully and had all kinds of interesting background information from her classes in Rabat.  We bought some delicious dates, which were far plumper than any dates I have ever seen.  (so there, germaphobes, I even ate street food this time and I STILL didn't get sick in Morocco).  When it began to get dark, we paid a little kid 10 dirham (about 1 euro) to lead us to Cafe Clock (shootout to Lauren Sanchez for the recommendation!) a famous cafe hidden in the depths of the medina.  We climbed the winding stairs up to the terrace of the restaurant, where we ate couscous and hummus under the shadow of a beautiful green minaret, listening to the evening call to prayer echo all around us.

The first morning, after a filling breakfast of many different types of Moroccan bread, Passage and I took a taxi up to the Merenid Tombs.  I am usually all about walking everywhere, but our taxi was less than a euro.  LESS. might as well have been free, I would taxi everywhere.  In Morocco they care a little bit less about preserving their ancient historical sites than in Europe.  The picturesque stone archways perched on the hill overlooking Fez were crumpling, and every nook was filled with trash.  Where exactly the "tombs" were was unclear.

We also thought it would be neat to take a stroll through a nearby graveyard.  Passage spoke in Arabic with a kind Moroccan man who said it was fine if we walked through the graveyard, but then the next person who approaches us said we had to pay him to be in the graveyard, so we left. 

Passage & the tombs

The rest of our explorations included an incredibly intricate Koranic school, the odorous tanneries, copious amounts of Moroccan mint tea, getting very wet and bargaining.  I was much more successful at bargaining this time around with Passage as a translator, although I won't say more here because several Christmas presents were purchased.  Despite the medina being a complete maze, we managed to find our way around quite well, thanks to Passage's ability to ask for directions in Arabic.  The weekend was quite the mash-up of languages, because while Passage would ask people questions in Arabic, Moroccans would generally respond in French assuming we were French tourists, which would mean less than nothing to us, so Passage would speak back in English and I would try Spanish. My brain felt like a overwhelmed sponge trying to soak in all the new words.  Because sponges for sure have feelings. My favorite new word? 'Bab' in Arabic means 'door.'

ahh the delicious tagines

good thing they gave us strong smelling mint leaves to
mask the odor of drying animal hides. 

After our wet, whirlwind of a weekend traversing the wonders of Fez, Passage and I headed back on the train to cosmopolitan Rabat, where she led me on an even shorter whirlwind tour of the city that has been her home for three months.  Shoutout to Passage's friend Joy, who I didn't get to meet, for letting me sleep in her bed in their apartment.  Passage - I feel so incredibly lucky to have been able to experience Morocco with you and finally put images to the stories I have been hearing all fall.  I could not have asked for a better travel companion, translator, tour guide or friend.  Wish you could have been with us too, Coral.  

Passage, me, Coral back in the day
90's Maine style was practice for Morocco

Halloween & Morocco

Today I was very hungry on my way home from wandering around town, so I popped into my favorite market and found that all I wanted was a jar of mini pickles.  So I bought said jar of pickles and proceeded to eat them at home dipped in pesto that I had left over from my trip to France this weekend. The moral of this story is lacking.

They tell us in writing classes to grab your reader with an interesting lead in sentence but this is all I could come up with. Sorry folks. Since I appear to be unable to blog in a timely fashion I am again left with no choice but to condense all my adventure of the past few weeks into a potpourri post.  Meaning random stories = smelly flower petals; and this post = small bowl in your bathroom full of smelly flower petals.

Halloween: 

Marta made us wear Borja and Fernando's goalie sweatshirts
because she thought we would be too cold. Love her. 

First, I can't not mention Halloween in Sevilla (oops double negative.. try not to be too confused.)  Marie and I dressed up as Cruzcampo cans, which is basically the only beer sold here.  We were going to be diet coke cans and then we decided we needed to be more Spanish sooo.. Our host dad Juan Luis thought it was so funny that he took this picture to tweet at the Cruzcampo twitter account.  Halloween is not really a thing in Spain; I was continually told at the school where I volunteer that they only talk about Halloween in English class so as not to let the kids forget their own tradition of Día de Todos los Santos.  The people our age that dressed up were all wearing terrifying face paint.  Apparently here they take the whole "scary" part of Halloween seriously.  Which meant that the two cans got some weird looks.  Definitely worth it.


Morocco (take 1):
The first weekend of November a bunch of kids in my program peaced out to Morocco for the weekend.  We went with a program that takes students (basically all Americans) to Morocco for weekend trips frequently.  So no, it was not an especially authentic experience, but hey, Morocco is Morocco so no complaints.  The program took us to Chefchaoun, the incredible blue city in the northern mountains of Morocco, where we were given a tour and then set loose upon the aggressive and tourist-savvy vendors.  I tried to haggle for a scarf and proceeded to be severely routed by the sassy storeowner when he didn't fall for my bluff that I would NOT spend 8 euros on that scarf.  In reality I most definitely would pay 8 euros, and would have taken it for 10.  But once I had asked for 7 and not a penny more and been refused, I awkwardly shuffled outside, face red and feeling fooled. After a moment of thought I stamped on my pride and went back in to buy the scarf for his price.  I don't like haggling.

Day number two we all piled back into the buses and drove to Asilah, making stops to visit the Cave of Hercules and ride some camels.  Whenever we were in the buses they popped in a movie, as if we were overactive toddlers that needed a distraction so we wouldn't start banging our water bottles on each other's heads.  Although really I shouldn't complain about that either because I did get to see Grease and Catch Me if You Can for the first time.  The Cave of Hercules looked like it was once a neat little wave-formed cave, and once it had a tourist value it was chiseled into a large cavern.  So that was sort of anti-climactic.  The camel-riding was equal parts exciting, hilarious and sad. Exciting because camels are pretty cool, and when in my life am I going to get to ride on again? Hilarious because of their TWO KNEE JOINTS which was one of the weirdest things that I've ever seen.  And sad in the same way that I get depressed when I go to a zoo or an aquarium and I always think about watching that documentary The Cove in high school.

We had been seriously warned (with stories of puke-filled 6-hour bus rides home) of not drinking the water or eating any fruits / vegetables that might have been washed in the water.  However the first night the salad looked really good and then I accidentally ran my toothbrush under the sink and after that I decided it was pointless to resist.  However my stomach pulled through and no sickness happened. So there, germaphobes.

On the way back we almost had some stowaways when a bunch of young hooligans jumped on the back of our moving bus.  Unclear on whether they were just having a fun time (..?) or trying to run away to Spain.  Because apparently that's a thing that happens.

Overall, despite my snarky comments about how touristy the trip was, I had a great time.  Now I really can't wait to head to Fez in two weeks to visit Passage!!  21st birthday celebration, Moroccan style.

Note : I have a lot of other fun things to write about but Friday night activities call and I am going to have to update more later.  Maybe someday I will write things on time.  But its unlikely. Shoutout to everyone at NU - yell loudly at the Michigan game tomorrow!!