Day 5 - More Fes

The plan was to get up early and visit the tanneries, but we had already done that, so we slept in and took it easy before wandering back into Fes medina.

The reason my friend Ali is in Morocco is he wrote his Master's thesis on these bells that the Arab kings brought back to Morocco after they conquered Spain. They originally hung in a Spanish church, but now they have been converted into lamps and they hang in the Kairouine mosque in Fes as spolia, or war booty (feel free to post corrections if I'm wrong, Ali!). Now Ali has a Fulbright scholarship to study them in person. Anyway, I edited his thesis at least twice, so I feel like I'm pretty invested in these bells, too. Seeing them was the #1 thing I wanted to do in Fes.

However, there are a couple of hurdles I had to overcome. First, I'm not a Muslim, so I'm not allowed in any of the mosques in Morocco. This is not the case in other countries, but for some reason Morocco is very serious about it. They do open the doors of the mosque at prayer time, though, in order to let everyone in, so we had to time our visit to coincide with that if I was going to see them. We ended up getting there at exactly the right time, and one of the lamps was hanging right near the entrance. With a little help from my camera's zoom, I got a pretty good picture, although Ali says you can't really see the bell part unless you're standing right under it.

Success! I was so excited!

Next, we tried to find the Belghazi Museum which I had heard was a beautiful Moroccan art museum. We ran into one of the ladies who had offered to help us the day before (not the one who took us to the wrong terrasse), and she started guiding us to the museum. It was really pointless, though, because there were actually signs with arrows telling you how to get there. I was pretty grumpy about it, since I knew she would expect us to tip her for leading us to a place we could have just gotten to by ourselves. Once we arrived, the museum was closed for restoration. Little did I know it, but this was to be a recurring theme on this vacation (dum dum DUM! Nice foreshadowing, eh?).

So, we just kind of wandered around after that trying to find the exit. I made several attempts to photograph the many donkeys laden with goods walking up and down the alleys, but I just wasn't quick enough. I finally found one who was standing still, though, and his owner let me take a picture. There are so many donkeys in the medina that they have put up donkey bars to keep them out of certain areas. I'm not sure why they want to keep them out, but they do, so every once in a while you have to duck under a huge piece of timber.

We also went into the Medersa Bou Inania. It was tiny but very pretty. I was so hot, though, I kind of just stood against the wall the whole time.

We took a little break at a restaurant, and it was so hot I started fanning myself with the ashtray.

After we were done at the medina, Ali took us up a hill outside of the city to the Merenid tombs. The Merenids were a dynasty of Moroccan rulers in the Middle Ages. Their tombs are in shambles now, but the view from the hillside is pretty amazing and well worth the cab fare up there. Ali put on his scholar cap as he explained to us about the history of the city and pointed out the oldest parts. Fes still has most of its medieval wall, and we got a really good view of it as well as the rest of the city.

That evening, Ali and Tasneem's maid Fatima prepared us a huge meal of harira which is a kind of chickpea soup, and couscous with vegetables. It was so neat to have such an authentic meal, and it was delicious on top of that. Then we all watched "The House Bunny" which was not really an authentic Moroccan experience, but it was still really fun!

Day 4 - Fes

We took this day really easy and mostly just lounged around Ali and Tasneem's apartment until the sun started to go down a bit. But, then, we ventured into the Fes Medina. In Arabic, medina just means "city," but in Morocco it also means the oldest part of the city. Fes Medina has been around since the Middle Ages, and it apparently hasn't changed that much. The streets are extremely narrow - in some places only wide enough for one person at a time, and they wind around in a sort of labyrinth that is nearly impossible to navigate. It was kind of awesome!

Obviously they can't drive cars down these narrow streets, so there were a lot of donkeys. It was set up like the Marrakech souqs in that there were just stalls and stalls of vendors, but I got the impression that the people in the stalls also actually made the merchandise since several times we passed by artisans handcrafting their wares. Also, the vendors did not harrass us. Many of them kind of shouted out to us to come look in their store, but when we said no, they left us alone.

The medina is broken up into these small public squares where the streets meet, and there is a public water fountain in nearly all of them.

In the end, we decided to go to the tanneries. However, getting there proved difficult. It's a big attraction, so a lot of people approach and offer to take you there, especially children. You can't go onto the tannery floor; you have to go up on someone's balcony and look down on it. So, we agreed to let an older lady take us up to a "terrasse" where we could look down on the tanneries. She took us to a staircase, accepted a small tip, and left. We climbed the staircase and ended up in a rug shop. The people there let us up onto their roof where they said they had a great view. They did, I guess, but not of the tanneries! Swindled! We took a bunch of pictures of Fes anyway, then wandered back downstairs only to discover that the shop owners expected payment. Ali talked them down from whatever exorbitant price they were asking to the equivalent of about $2. So, we paid two people to take us to see absolutely nothing. Ugh!

We finally made it, though, and got there around 6:30 or so. I had read in several places not to go in the afternoon because they use pigeon poo to treat the leather, and when it has been baking in the sun all day long, it STINKS. As you might imagine poo would. We braved it anyway, and it did smell pretty bad, but it was not as bad as I was expecting from reading other people's comments about it. Wussies. While we were there, they told us they also treat it with cow urine. I, of course, bought a handbag there. Who could resist that combo?

The brown ones are the poo vats. The white ones are chalk. That big wooden drum at the bottom middle of the picture is a giant laundry vat for washing the leather.

These are the skins being hung out to dry.

These are the dyes. We were there the day before they changed the colors, so it's hard to see. You can see orange in the back left and green in the front left.

Day 3 - More Marrakech

Jonathan and I came up with a nice little plan for this day that worked out pretty well, although we ended up having to cut a couple of things out in order to make our train to Fes that evening.

1) We took a taxi to the Medersa Ben Youssef which is in the old part of town which is pedestrian only. So, our taxi driver dropped us off, and was like, "Go straight, then turn left. You can't miss it." Right. So, some dude started talking to us and told us he would take us to the medersa, so we followed him a bit. His route seemed circuitous, though, so Jon pulled out a map, and the guy got kind of offended that we didn't trust him. He did eventually lead us to the right place, and Jonathan tipped him with a baseball cap. Best. Idea. Ever.

The medersa is a school for studying the Quran. Kind of like a seminary, I guess. It's really just made up of one big central courtyard with some rooms surrounding, and then there's a dormitory area for the students. They advertised that there was a museum there, so we wandered around until we saw two rooms set up as though students were living there. One of the rooms was the "Rural Student's Room" and the other one was the "Urban Student's Room." They both had little desks on the floor and some teapots and stuff. The main difference was that they had different teapots. And that was the whole museum. As Ali would say, "Pretty underwhelming." But, the building was still beautiful, and we had a lot of fun waving at each other from the courtyard windows.

2) Next we went to some other museum with this giant copper lamp. It was just a few buildings down from the medersa. It had some art and ceramics and stuff, and it was included in the ticket price of the medersa.

3) From there, we went to this domed building that is one of the few remaining examples of Almoravid architecture. The Almoravids were one of the ruling dynasties in the 11th-12th centuries in Morocco. When we went down into the building, we discovered that it is actually an ancient latrine. Very nice!

4) To get home, we wandered back to the Djemaa el Fna through the souqs. The souqs are like a giant marketplace where vendors sell anything and everything. The best thing about them, though, is they are covered! Precious shade!

5) After lunch back at our riad, we went out to the Saadian tombs. These are tombs from the 16th century of one of the ruling families in Marrakech. When the sultan died, his successor had the tombs covered over, and they weren't discovered again until 1917. So, they are in fabulous condition since they were undisturbed for so long. They're very small, but very beautiful.

6) Finally, we went to the Bahia Palace which is an 18-19th century palace. I loved this place. It was humongous and gorgeous and there were orange trees and fountains everywhere. I could totally live there. The story goes that the guy who built it was such a jerk that the minute he died, his family swooped in and cleaned the place out. So, there's no furniture left or anything, but it's still lovely.

Our second day in Marrakech was much better than the first! We ended it by eating KFC in the train station before taking the 7 hour train ride to Fes. Ali bought this hat from an old man on the street and Tasneem was mortified by it. I think it's hilarious.

Day 2 - Marrakech

We woke up in the morning and took the train to Marrakech with Ali, Tasneem, and Zahra. It took about three hours. Train travel in Morocco is inexpensive and very reliable. I was impressed.

We got to Marrakech and took a taxi to our riad (guesthouse) which was located in some back alley in the really old part of the city. I was kind of scared, but when we got to it, we opened the door onto an oasis. It was really beautifully decorated, very clean, and comfortable. Whew!

The first thing we did was walk over to the Djemaa el Fna, which is the main square. Most of the buildings in Marrakech are made with red brick or clay, so they all look the same color, and people call it the "Red City." It is also the Hot City. By the time we got to the Djemaa el Fna, we were already grumpy and exhausted from being so hot.

The square is filled with vendors and street performers like snake charmers and women who will paint henna on your hands. Unfortunately, the Djemaa el Fna is also the place where many tourists go, so the Marrakshi vendors tend to take advantage. They grabbed us and dragged us around, then demanded payment for their services. One henna lady grabbed me and just started squeezing henna on my hand saying, "Free flower for you," then when she was done, she refused to leave me alone until I paid her. So, feeling a bit tricked and taken advantage of plus feeling unbelievably hot and tired made the Djemaa el Fna kind of an unpleasant experience for me. If you ever go, go late when it has cooled down a bit, and don't let the henna lady get you!

It was neat to see, though. There were people selling all kinds of things from skin care products to live animals to fresh dates.

Another warning for any potential travelers: the taxi drivers in Marrakech don't use their meters, and they will attempt to haggle with you on how much you owe them. Either insist that they turn their meter on, or agree on a price you are willing to pay before you get in the taxi and do not back down from it. There are so many taxis around that you will eventually find someone who will not overcharge.

Day 1 - Casablanca

Our trip to Morocco was fantastic! We made all of our connections and arrived in Casablanca on the 23rd at around noon. We got a taxi to our hotel, which turned out not to be a hotel, but a guesthouse. It was lovely!

We managed to make a phone call to our friends Ali and Tasneem to let them know we made it, and they arranged to meet us. We went for a little walk around the block to keep ourselves from falling asleep, and when we turned the final corner, Ali and Tasneem were pulling up in a cab with their baby Zahra in tow. Talk about good timing!

We went to La Corniche which is the beachside area of Casablanca. It's really beautiful there and we had a little snack at one of the seaside cafes before heading to the Mosque of Hassan II. We got there right at prayer time, so they had the doors open and we could peek inside. As non-Muslims, we weren't allowed in, but the building was gorgeous and we could see the intricate decorations on the inside from the doorway. Jonathan had brought a bunch of baseball caps to give as tips, and he traded two of them to some young boys who were selling tissues at the mosques. They were ecstatic. Jon hadn't brought enough for all of them, however, and he nearly incited a riot!

That evening, our cab driver took us to a lovely restaurant right on the beach where we had an authentic Moroccan tajine dinner.

It was a fabulous first day. I really liked Casablanca. It felt very European, and I was surprised at how large it was. It was hot, but since it's on the ocean, there is a nice breeze, and it wasn't stifling. I was also surprised at how easy it was to get around. There are taxis everywhere as well as buses, and they are in the process of building a tramway. It's very tourist friendly!