Morocco, Pg 5

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Got up early, cleaned up a bit and headed out to the marketplace.
This is a crazy ass place man, so many people, goats, sheep, snakes and whatever else; it was total chaos.
This whole scene was more like some kind of circus/ zoo/ gigantic flea market, all rolled into one; with noise levels that can bring on a headache.

There were hundreds of small carts and stalls jammed with products,
large numbers of men selling all kinds of fruits, vegetables, spices, pottery,
brass items, carpets, clothing, leather goods, jewelry. If there’s something you like, or want, or need, you can likely find it here.
There were ridiculous starting prices for everything but you barter for a better price on everything, you never pay the asking price; never!

The vendor will write his asking price on paper, you see the number, you know what it means, you in kind respond with a number you’re willing to pay, and the game begins.
It’s simple, easy, there’s never a mistake and everyone is happy, or at least satisfied.

As we walked around the marketplace vendors would grab you by the arm and try to drag you into their stall and sell you their wares.
They would swarm around you, all talking at once, most of which we didn’t understand, insisting they had the best price for anything we might want to buy; at least that’s we thought they were saying.
Their sales techniques were more than we’ve ever had to deal with before, it was all quite overwhelming and we just weren’t accustomed to doing business in this manner, but you learn real quick because you have to; if you fail to learn they’ll eat you alive.

Gateway to Marrakesh, 1975

Carpet merchants and snake charmers

Us guys each bought a djellaba, [a hooded body length cloak] the guy wanted about a 150 or 200 Dhm, depending on length, we bartered him down to 40 Dhm. [about $10]
We headed to another area of the Medina where there were more shops down in the winding alleyways.

A young kid, maybe 12 or 13 years old has now attached himself to us and wanted to guide us down into the Medina.
We didn’t ask for his help and we didn’t want it, so we told him no thank you, but he just hung in there anyway.
As we made our way around the Medina the kid followed and tried to engage us, we figured if we ignored him he would just go away, no such luck.

We watched some wood workers making all kinds of artifacts using these antique foot operated belt and pulley lathes, metal artisans tapping designs in urns and plates made of brass, copper and pewter, it was all pretty cool.
Eve was looking to buy a set of shish kabob skewers; I really didn’t know why she wanted them. I think she just wanted to take part in the bartering experience; as there was never a time I could remember ever using them.
The guy wanted 12 Dhm, she bartered down to 4 Dhm, as deals go it was a good one.

We started to head out of the Medina, the kid was still with us even though we had completely ignored him the whole time. We were just about out and he says, ‘I want money’,
I didn’t want to give him anything and told him flat out “no”, because we didn’t ask for his help, but he kept on bugging us and was now creating a scene; I caved.
I reached into my pocket and pulled out about 50 or so francs that I gave him, he took it, looked at it and said “fuck you”, and threw it in my face.

KA-BAM, I flew into an instant fucking rage. My first reaction was to grab the little prick by the throat and smack the shit out of him, but given where we were that might have got me killed.

Now a couple more kids got into the mix, yelling that they were going to get the police because we wouldn’t pay, but that was only after they picked up the money the first kid threw in my face. I was so pissed off. I told him he was just a fucking ungrateful little prick.
I turned on my heel and walked away into the crowd muttering to myself about what a fucking asshole he was…Yeah, I was really pissed off.

Once I removed myself from the situation it only took a couple of minutes to cool off. I’m okay now and ready to rock again.

Jemaa el Fna, [the marketplace]

Late afternoon, food venders are beginning to displace the merchandisers in the market place.
Soon the square will be filled with canopies, benches, tons of food and huge cookers.

The onslaught of hungry feeders begins. Throughout the course of the evening thousands of people will be fed. This will carry on for hours.

The feeding frenzy is in full swing

We continued walking around the marketplace taking in all the various activities. There were a few groups of ethnic dance troupes displaying their talents, acrobats doing some tumbling routines, snake charmers encouraging their cobras to entertain the onlookers.
Also in the mix were several brightly dressed water bearers moving through the crowd selling cups of cool fresh water for just a few francs.

Even though our focus was on trying to take in the entertainment going on around us, the vendors kept trying to get us into the shops to buy stuff we didn’t want or need.
Our interests are now moving in the direction of something to eat.

Somewhere along the way within the huge mass of people we lost track of Al.
So now the remaining four of us moved on by ourselves.
We stopped at a small cafe’ along the edge of the Medina, had some fried potatoes bread and coffee. The coffee was horrible, espresso, way too strong, everything else was okay.
Just then we saw Al walking by looking somewhat lost and bewildered, I ran out to get him and now we’re back to five again.
We went back to the hotel and just hung out for a couple of hours because it had started to rain again.


It’s now early evening, were going back to the marketplace to partake in all the human activity, and to have dinner.

In the evening the open marketplace becomes a huge breadbasket where thousands of people go every night to eat.
Dozens of food vendors set up their canopies, benches and cookers, preparing food and continually feeding an incredible number of people throughout the entire evening.
There didn’t seem to be any breaks for the food vendors, no pauses, no sitting down for a smoke; just working their asses off until everyone has been fed.

Almost everyone appeared to be engaged in the feeding frenzy; those of us that weren’t yet engaged were just waiting for an empty spot at the trough, all fired up for a good tasty dinner, for cheap.
Dinner here is always good and always cheap, and always fresh.
The downside is: no after dinner chit chat over a drink and a smoke. Dinner here is a three step process: 1-get your food, 2-sit or stand to eat, or to go,
3-when you finish, get the fuck out because someone is standing right behind you waiting for your spot.

Even though there was a very high level of noise from conversation and general activity during the frenzy, you could still off in the distance hear the echoing chant of the Meuzzin [crier] announcing to the faithful it was time for evening prayer; prayer occurs five times every day, everywhere.

We all finished our dinner and got the fuck out. The noise level alone was enough to drive us out; but we’ll be back again tomorrow night for dinner.

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On our walks over the next few days we had seen some rather disturbing sights. There were lots of very elderly people in the alleyways dressed in dirty rags squatted down on the ground with arms outreaching, faces grimacing, begging and pleading for you to give them money. Groups of snot nose filthy little children swarming around you tugging at your sleeves, begging for anything you would be willing to give.

It was hard to see this and not feel your heartstrings being pulled. I could have never imagined poverty and begging on such a scale; to actually see it first hand does something to you.
I found seeing this side of life very unsettling.

It had been told to us, framed as a warning, that is was important to understand a basic street savvy fact, and that fact is;

If you give money to a beggar who is part of a small group of beggars, which was the case in most of the alleyways, in only a few seconds you would be surrounded by several of them all tugging and pulling at you, wanting you to give them money also.

This would rapidly become a situation very difficult to get away from, so as difficult as it is to ignore what’s right in front of you, and also having to be responsible for your own safety, you just walk on by and don’t give.
This whole scene was very hard for me to learn to accept.

Poverty resulting in begging has always been a part of their everyday life.
It’s been a part of their culture since their very beginning.
The locals don’t see the horror in it that we do, to them its just part of everyday life. And from the side of the locals, they know for a fact that it’s not part of our everyday life in the hope that you will give them money.

This by far had the greatest culture shock impact on me, I hated seeing it, but it’s everywhere, and you can’t get away from it no matter where you go. You just have to accept it and learn to live with it, because you know you can’t do anything about it.

As we made our way across the marketplace toward the streets were we hassled by young boys, some on foot, some on bikes riding circles around us, all asking for money and cigarettes.
This didn’t trouble me, it just annoyed me. Just ignore them and they’ll go away, but we know they’ll be back the next time we’re out.

We’re out on the streets now several blocks away from the Medina.
We found ourselves on a boulevard that was lined with orange trees on both sides, this is such a beautiful spot. We walked around for quite awhile just sightseeing.
Mel picked an orange from one of the trees but it was way too sour to eat.
It was getting dark now so we headed back to our hotel.

Our hotel was constructed as a traditional Moroccan residence called a Riad. Originally it had no windows on the thick outside walls and only one door on the outside of the building; this was a security measure that dated back to the warring tribal days.
Behind the inner wall was a hallway that had rooms attached. Some had windows and a doors that opened into a surrounded courtyard that would have had a lawn and maybe a few fruit or shade trees.
In this way the occupants were able to enjoy the out of doors without ever having to leave the security of the building; all the while a battle may have been raging just beyond the outer wall.

If we had a window we could have picked fruit right from our room. The only openings we had were some holes in the ceiling, and I remember they were very poorly patched; but at least they were patched on the outside so it didn’t rain into the rooms.
Most rooms were very long and narrow with very high ceilings and a small air vent near the top. There was a community bathroom at the end of a long corridor. It had a stand up or squat down toilet platform.

The shower, if I remember correctly consisted of a pipe with a shower head that stuck through a hole in the wall. My guess was, if it was raining you could shower; the temperature of the rain determined whether it would be a cold or colder shower, no hot shower.
There may have also been a reservoir on the roof for water accumulation.
If there was water in the reservoir and the sun was shining you may have been lucky enough to get a warm shower; but it’s just one of those details I don’t recall. The building itself was about 800 years old, as was the plumbing I believe.

High Atlas valley, Berber village

The next day we didn’t get up until almost noon, we all went out to get more travellers cheques changed, but the bank was closed for lunch. At each door there were two soldiers standing guard holding old style Thompson sub-machine guns; this was the norm at all banks, government buildings and post offices.

We now had some time to kill so we headed to the cafe’ in the Medina for lunch. We had eggs and fried potatoes. The eggs weren’t cooked very well and were quite greasy. After eating we went back to the bank and got money changed.
I started feeling sick, it had to be from the greasy under cooked eggs.
We went back to the hotel and I got real gut sick. Eve stayed at the hotel with me while the others went back to the marketplace.

Later that evening Eve went out with the rest of the gang for dinner. They sat in a stall and had kabebs with bread and mint tea, and as per usual, it was real good and cheap.
Eve brought some food back for me but I don’t remember what it was. I ate some and managed to keep it down. Now it’s time to go to sleep, hopefully I’ll feel better in the morning.

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It’s now morning and I do feel better, much better. Got up, got dressed and headed out into the maze of alleyways that lead to the marketplace and streets.
None of us have had shower for three or four days, but I don’t believe any of us were willing to use the community shower; even though we all really needed one.

Eve and I decided to go to one of the more up scale hotels in the area for one night. We all walked over to the ‘Hotel la Marrakesh, a very nice place, quite expensive by Moroccan standards, $16 a night.
We got a room on the fourth floor. Once we got settled we were going to bring everyone else up for a shower.
Just then the phone rang which really surprised us. It was Mel, he was in the lobby, he said they wouldn’t let visitors into our room. We went down to talk to them for a few minutes, told him, hey, sorry man, there’s nothing we can do. They left and we went back upstairs to our room and a really comfortable bed.

Shortly thereafter there was a knock at our door, I thought it was a hotel person. I opened the door and it was the gang. They had found a side door that was unlocked so they came in and sneaked up to our room.
Al had brought a bottle of wine; nice gesture, but it was so awful we only drank enough for a taste.

Everyone took advantage of the sit down toilet, the first one we had seen since we got to Morocco, it was great.
Never thought I’d get so excited about a toilet, but I did, we all did. We all had a much needed shower, {but separately of course}, hung out for awhile and smoked some hash.

Some time later the gang left and we took a nap.

It’s dinner time; Eve and I went to the dining room and were a bit startled when we walked in. There was at least 40 or 50 people in the room. All the women wore nice dresses and high heels, almost all the men had suits and ties, the ones that weren’t suited up wore open neck shirts and dinner jackets.
Then there was us, Eve with her running shoes, checkered slacks, hippie hair and floppy hat; me with blue jeans, sneakers, long hair, leather hat and jean jacket; what a contrast we were.

We looked so completely out of place that I’m sure it looked quite comical. We may have been their idea of what real Beverly Hillbillies might look like.
We also got some not so pleasant looks from a few patrons as well; but we didn’t give a shit; fuck’em, our money was just as good as theirs.

We had a real good dinner; it was expensive but I didn’t care. After dinner we went for a walk around the neighborhood. We didn’t venture too far because the people out and about were mostly young local guys and I just didn’t want to be a target tonight, so we ended up going back to our room and crashed out for the night.

First thing in the morning we had another shower, we didn’t know when we were going to get another one so we took advantage of it. It was also great to spend the night sleeping in a nice comfortable bed.
We gathered up our gear, checked out and headed back to Hotel du Sud and hooked up with everyone else.

This was going to be our last day in Marrakesh. We went to the bus station to get tickets to Agadir. The bus wasn’t leaving until 6:30 so we had most of the day to kill; so again it’s back to the marketplace.
We cruised around checking out the stalls and shops, Eve got a deal on a nice leather purse. Her and the vendor had been working each other for a better price, in the end she got it for 27Dhm [7 bucks] another real good deal; the quality of this purse was quite good, it lasted her for several years.

We hung out for a couple hours then back to du Sud. It was soon time to catch the bus. We gathered everything up, probably smoked the last of our hash and headed off to the station.

Marrakesh was without a doubt the most exciting city I’ve ever seen. For me, our stay there was like something out of an Arabian Nights adventure.
I’ll never forget how great it was…a total blast…and of course the best part of the whole experience for me was riding on the Marrakesh Express; that was so awesome man. An experience I’ll remember forever.

I’m feeling so free and enlightened :}

On to our next stop, Agadir

page #5

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