Monday, August 28, 2006

The Real World?

For the last few days of my vacation, I returned to the Mediterranean coast – first to Martil and Cabo Negro, two beachside towns near Tetuan, and then spent one night in Tetuan itself. The beaches there were far different from that in Saidia, with calmer, cooler waters, probably due to coastlines facing more towards the east than the north. They also felt a lot more low key and family-oriented. To borrow from friends I met along the way during my trip: Saidia is more like Myrtle Beach, SC, while Cabo Negro is almost like the tropics. (I actually stayed in Martil, but took one day to walk up the beach to the more upscale Cabo Negro).

Tetuan began my transition back to the “real world,” but then, not really. Like everywhere I visited in the region, Spanish was the first language spoken to tourists (although my French served me as well as it does in any other touristy area, even if the Tamazight got me nowhere given the radically different dialect spoken by the Rifi Berbers. Even so, people often praised me for the few words of Arabic I do know!). I enjoyed one last seafood meal there (the cilantro-stuffed, fried sardines that are considered a treat elsewhere in the country just don’t do it for me!), although the highlighted seafood meal had been a fairly decent paella that I shared with my pal Jonathan in Martil. The paella had no mussels or sausage (of course!), but lots of tasty shrimp (how will I miss all the shrimp I have eaten this month – and it wasn’t even all that much!!) and reasonably accurate spices… (I had feared that we might be served something like the pathetic yellow rice my mother and I had suffered when we made the mistake of ordering paella in Brussels several years ago!). I also took in the Spanish influences in Tetuan’s architecture (for more on that history, I would recommend C.R. Pennell’s Morocco Since 1830: A History, which I am reading now).

Tetuan:

However, one of the things I’ll miss most about traveling up north was how genuinely nice all the people were (not wanting to talk trash about my own region, I’ll avoid too many specific comparisons for now). Perhaps, in part, they are used to a different kind of tourist from those who go caravanning through the more common touristy areas elsewhere in the country, but in all the places I visited, I was taken aback by the pleasant, friendly tone of everyone, even vendors and shopkeepers. Even in the medinas.

Let’s contrast this to Fez, where I made a stop on the way home (volunteers aren’t allowed to travel at night, so this obligatory stop was more or less a toss-up between Fez and Meknès – Fez barely winning out of sheer stubborn determination to try to figure that city out). This was my third (equally short) visit to Fez, although as I noted earlier, the first one, when I was sworn in, hardly counted (at the time, I had a stunning view of the Merenid Tombs, without the slightest clue what I was looking at). Like my second time there, I spent most of my energy trying not to kick or punch anyone (and I mean Moroccans, not other tourists). For one thing, it is just REALLY crowded (and those of you who know me well know about my crowd issues – I can get quite irritable, sometimes dizzy, and occasionally just plain nutty). And especially in the medina, restaurant hosts will literally jump in your way (I finally just started telling them that I eat Moroccan food every day and to get out of my way), little boys follow you, pointing at signs in the hopes that they’ll be tipped for being your “guide” (even just looking for a hotel, when I finally started telling them to leave me alone, that I could read the signs too… but to no avail), and storekeepers yell at you with increasing hostility once it becomes clear that you have no intention of stopping in their shops, which usually look an awful lot like the ones on either side of them.

Nevertheless, I did feel somewhat more successful than on my last trip, surrendering myself to the not-half-bad, color-coded sign system that can be used as a guide through the medina, based upon your specific interests: gardens, historical buildings, viewing traditional crafts, etc. (I say not-half-bad because, like the road signs that were often my nemesis in Boston, sometimes one is conveniently absent right at a confusing intersection where you need it the most!). So this time, I tried to stay on the “blue” (monuments) trail, with a few accidental diversions to the “pink” (crafts) trail, and found that I noticed a lot more than I did last time around – numerous mosques (which non-Muslims are not allowed to enter, although I got a few nice peeks from the outside), medersas, fountains, and stunningly-carved doors (although in one such case I was disappointed to look up and see that the door now marked the entrance to the ubiquitous Banque Populaire). And the morning that I left for the final leg of my trip home, I stopped by a must-see Fez sight – the tanneries. The walk there, first thing in the morning, was quite pleasant, as the medina was still basically empty, and I was becoming comfortable enough navigating the signage (pink) that I had a little less fear of becoming hopelessly lost and subsequently missing my bus. To view the dyeing process, you have to enter one of the shops, so we located a cooperative with a pleasant proprietor, who took us out to the store’s back terrace to observe the huge vats of dye while he explained the differences between different animal skins, dyes, etc. I had been warned that the smell would be terrible, and having set my expectations accordingly, found that it wasn’t so bad. Thankfully, I barely had enough cash on me to get back home, and I had left my credit card at the hotel, as there were some pretty amazing products at the cooperative, and they ship overseas… (times like these I do wish I were a real tourist, and not a volunteer who is overcome with guilt on the rare occasion that I do splurge on some souvenir!). Oh, and I almost saw a donkey fight on the way back through the medina – never have I seen such an evil look in one of those creature’s eyes!

Fez tanneries:

So, I have now returned from my small (and not especially arduous) vacation with a renewed sense of both wanderlust and homesickness. I have many more freedoms when I travel (dress, beverages, communication with family and friends, and simply being able to go out at night!), and, as I anticipated before I left the US last year (nearly a year ago!?), living abroad can become its own sort of rut, offering plenty of challenges but – after a certain period of time – little of the sense of exploration of traveling to new places. Living in a Berber mountain village for this long, many of the initial novelties have become mundane facts of life, if not outright aggravations! Now, although I am happy with the “comforts” (still no electricity) and solitude of being back in my own home, I find myself wanting to do more, see more – cultivating ideas for future trips both within and outside of Morocco. So (not that I have any intentions of visiting Afghanistan in the near future!), when I got home, I pulled out one of the many books inherited from my former sitemate, Eric Newby’s A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush. In spite of my general enjoyment of travel writing, I had put off reading this one because I saw it had been written by a Brit in the 1950’s, and couldn’t imagine it to be anything but dull. Instead, I was pleasantly surprised – it was hilarious! As someone who never feels more than partially competent in my own travels, I found it perversely encouraging to read such a self-deprecating yet uplifting account of an incredibly ambitious journey. If only, and perhaps in another life…

Treat of the week: Swiss Miss and powdered milk (with water, of course!)

Wednesday, August 16, 2006

More Chefchaouen Flavor

This morning I took a small hike up past a nearby spring to the ruins of a mosque (built by the Spanish, but by my understanding never used by the locals) overlooking town. I can't get over all of the green out here!

Every night, the call to prayer is mesmerizing -- the numerous mosques around town blending together in a way that is surprisingly musical compared to what I hear back in Assoul (where the new loudspeaker has made it quite a bit more difficult to sleep through early morning prayers).

I can't stop feeling like I am in a European mountain town.

And I am making myself ill off of goat cheese, which I did not realize was a local speciality until I arrived here.

Tuesday, August 15, 2006

Al Hoceima and Chefchaouen

Last Saturday, I finally got out of Saidia. As nice as it was to spend two weeks at the beach, I was ready for a change… So I hopped into a taxi to Nador, where I met my friend Nam, and we traveled on to the city of Al Hoceima, which was a fairly clean, seaside town (although with only one small beach in the middle of town, and several others on the outskirts). This area was devastated by an earthquake a couple of years ago, although it was the surrounding villages that suffered the most destruction.

Me in Al Hoceima:

Leaving Al Hoceima Sunday, we met up with a couple of other volunteers who were also heading to Chefchaouen. Together, we suffered the worst bus ride EVER. Now, the road between Ouarzazete and Marrakesh is notorious, but this was a whole other level – basically 6 hours of non-stop puking and wretching thanks to bouncy, winding roads (but not such sharp turns that the driver couldn’t take them at full speed anyhow). Thank God I’ll be taking a different road to get out of here!

As promised, Chefchaouen is BEAUTIFUL – a mountainside town full of Spanish flavor, with a bluewashed medina and generally chill atmosphere in spite of the number of tourists here this time of year. The night we arrived was also a part of a long, holiday weekend, so we couldn’t find a place to stay and ended up sleeping on the roof of one hotel in the medina. Many of the tourists come as much for the kif – a crop so dominant here that we have seen fields and fields of it driving into town and hiking to villages on the outskirts – as for the culture. The Berber dialect spoken here is so completely different from Tamazight that I’ve gotten no language practice, and even though, throughout Morocco, I tend for some reason to hear a little more Spanish than most volunteers (do I look it?), it is still unusual to hear so many Moroccans trying to speak Spanish to us instead of French. Strolls through the medina are quite pleasant, with not as many aggressive sales tactics (or simple attempts at extortion) as one might experience in Fez or Marrakech. So in spite of just having spent two weeks at a craft fair, I have still enjoyed browsing through the numerous craft stalls, and even having a few more in-depth conversations with a couple of local artisans. We also visited the local kasbah, which contains a pleasant garden, small ethnographic museum, contemporary art gallery, and prison cells left over from the Spanish occupation. I felt so wonderfully lost in this small space – more able to simply kick back and enjoy exploring than I usually do here when passing through places while traveling for work.

Chefchaouen medina:

I have, however, gotten one sad piece of news this week. My sitemate called me yesterday to tell me that my host family’s new baby passed away last week after battling significant respiratory problems. I am feeling pretty bad about not being home right now while they are going through this, but at the same time am not sure how much more I could actually do for them other than keeping them in my thoughts. I hope you’ll all do the same.

Friday, August 11, 2006

Moroccan Whiskey

So Saidia is one of those beaches where guys walk up and down selling various snacks: candy, soda, ice cream, sandwiches, nuts, and even hot coffee or mint tea (heat is no deterrent to consuming hot beverages here). As I was lying in a state of semi-consciousness the other morning, I heard one of the tea guys yelling out "Whiskey marocain!".

Anyway, beach is nice, but crowds and tackiness are beginning to overwhelm me a little, and I am hoping to get out of here early tomorrow. In spite of dismal sales, Fatima has decided to stay a few more days until the end of the fair. I've bought one or two souvenirs from other artisans here, but on the PC living allowance, and with another year to go shopping, there is no need to rush.

Monday, August 07, 2006

Saidia Week One

So, the Saidia craft fair has been officially up and running for about 6 days, although the tents actually went up late, as can often be the case with events here, so we’ve really only had 4 full nights of work. The festival itself is running from 5pm-midnight, so daytime has been freed up for me to go swimming and sunburn all the parts of my body that haven’t seen the light of day for nearly a year! Beaches are crowded, and the water and currents have been suprisingly rough (but fun) for this to be the Mediterranean. When you head towards the eastern end of the beach, you can see the Algerian border post -- not allowed to cross!

Since Fatima and I didn’t come with a lot of products, we opted to share a tent with Halim, an artisan from the town of Boujaad, which worked out nicely for us in that it created a good aesthetic balance in our tent set-up without adding a lot of product-specific competition. We’re still struggling with sales, but after feeling a little down on things the first day, Fatima began to make the most of it, meeting other artisans, getting product ideas, and even consulting with Halim, who has a really sophisticated sense of aesthetics, color, etc.

Here I am with Fatima in our tent. The things on the walls are some of Assoul's traditional products, while the boxes and purses are from Boujaad.

Saidia itself is a bit bizarre – lots of Moroccan ex-pats home for vacation, but many actually dressed for the beach, which is startling given what one gets used to seeing elsewhere in the country. The town swells to crowds of tens of thousands this time of the year, although the rest of the year the population is quite small. Some of the artisans let their hair down and play on the beach, while others, including Fatima, have found their first trip to the beach to be a letdown, given all of the hashuma attire they see on the beach, with men and women right next to each other! When we got off the bus, Fatima immediately told me how shocked she was to see so many men running around with their shirts off…

The festival lasts through mid-month, but I’ll only be here through the end of this week (and the first week flew by, thanks to long days on the beach and long nights manning the tents followed by occasional additional “socializing”). I do hope we eventually manage to sell a thing or two…