When I told people that I was going to Morocco, I was surprised by how many said that they had always wanted to go there. I hadn’t thought much about Morocco. And if I had never moved to San Miguel and met Ben, who grew up in Morocco and invited me to visit him there while he was home with family, I might never have thought of it at all.
I was also surprised when people asked if I had ever been to Africa. I figured that most Americans didn’t know Africa from the Middle East and certainly couldn’t know where Morocco fit into that picture. Whenever I’ve thought of Africa, it’s involved a cheetah stalking a herd of watering zebras through a savanna. As far as I knew, Morocco didn’t even have any big cats.
But as I began to research the country, I learned that Morocco is indeed in Africa, has a long history as a base of cultural and political influence, has lots of little cats that might grow up to be big ones, and was the setting for the iconic film, Casablanca, which most Americans have at least heard of, if not seen. It seemed interesting enough, so I packed two pairs of pants and a swimsuit.
FIRST STOP - MOHAMMEDIA
The adventure began in Mohammedia, a working-class port city on the Atlantic Ocean. It’s where Ben, our good friend from San Miguel, was born and raised. Ben was home celebrating the Ramadan holiday with his family. They do this by avoiding each other each day because they are all so lethargic and cranky from not eating.
Being based in Mohammedia is the equivalent of taking your first ever trip to the US and getting an Airbnb in Terre Haute, Indiana. Sure, you can get groceries and beer, but once you get bored of your Sudoku app, there isn’t anything to do. And in this case, given the Islamic restriction on consumption of alcohol, I couldn’t even buy beer.
Even though it was Ramadan, we found this delicious meal waiting for us when we arrived.
But Mohammedia did have highlights. The primary star was Ben’s sister. Naima was an amazing cook. The best meals we had in Morocco were, by far, prepared in her tajine.
Another memorable Mohammedia memory was attending the sprawling Sunday bazaar where I saw chickens, after they had just been decapitated on the chopping block, put through the feather-plucker. They say that if people saw how their meat was butchered, there would be more vegetarians in the world. I believe that; my will just isn’t strong enough to live only on legumes and rice.
The fish vendor; the most popular man in Mohammedia amongst the street cats.
ALL ABOARD THE TRAIN - MARRAKECH
Marrakech is a very old city that has off and on through the centuries been the capital of the country, fallen into decline, been abandoned, and risen again from the ashes. As we arrived by train from Mohammedia, of course, I couldn’t get the song “Marrakesh Express” by Crosby, Stills, and Nash out of my head.
At this point in history, Marrakech is the fourth largest city in Morocco and a major economic center and tourist destination. We spent most of our time in the oldest part of the city, the medina, which is packed with vendors and their stalls. It was here that I purchased leather goods as gifts for my family and had opportunity to contemplate the dichotomy of the Muslim character.
Charity is an important component of the Islamic belief system. Zakat, or obligatory charity, is the giving of a specific portion of one’s wealth over and above that needed for the necessities of living. I’m not a religious scholar, but this seems a more practical, and potentially more noble, concept than tithing in the Christian religion. Tithing is giving material tribute to God, or, his earthly representatives in the form of the Church, which I daresay, certainly isn’t needy, before determining if you have enough to buy food and shelter for yourself and your family.
A less onerous Islamic form of charity, sadaqah, or voluntary charity, can be given daily by anyone in many forms including by smiling at a stranger, helping a neighbor build a home, or imparting wise advice to anyone who will listen. This “do unto thy neighbor” philosophy reminds me of the concept of ”barn raising”. You never know when you’re going to need a favor.
Ben certainly practiced sadaqah during our visit. He often handed over the rest of his meal when approached in a restaurant by a homeless person and regularly purchased treats to hand out to those with their hands out in the streets. The rest of Marrakech, however, seemed to have forsaken sadaqah and made a deal with the devil to either rip us off or run us over.
In the Marrakech markets, prices are not posted and vendors are not embarrassed to drastically overvalue their wares. For example, when I asked how much for a bar of soap, I was told $16, and was then expected to bargain for a more reasonable price. Though, upon reflection, whenever I was quoted an outrageous price for a pair of earrings or a candle, it was accompanied by a smile from the proprietor of the store. Perhaps this was his version of sadaqah.
Regarding the “running us over” part of the trip, it is my experience that, on the streets, sidewalks, and in the markets of Marrakech, the pedestrian right of way does not exist. Approaching drivers will actually swerve, without slowing down, to maneuver around you, without slowing down, rather than stop. This practice was on display most aggressively in the narrow alleys of Marrakech where the waves of people pondering the purchase of a new pair of pointy-toed slippers had to part every few moments to let a motorcycle pass. My advice is to brush up on your math before visiting as a working knowledge of angles, rate of speed, ordinates and abscissas may save your life.
A nice view of the estuary in Rabat, Morocco.
FES, THE CITY, NOT THE HAT
Fes is another old Moroccan city. It was founded in the 8th century and has more than 300 mosques. That’s nearly as many CVS’ as there are in Alexandria, Virginia. But while the US has run out of corners to put another Walgreens, with more than 37,000,000 Muslims living in Morocco, making up 99% of the population, there is a great need for more mosques because there is a lot of praying going on.
Prayer, however, isn’t a quiet, one-sided conversation between the individual and his or her maker. Muslims are publicly called to prayer five times a day - Fajr (sunrise prayer), Dhuhr (noon prayer), Asr (afternoon prayer), Maghrib (sunset prayer), and Isha (night prayer) - by a cult-like chant, which, if everyone is being honest with themselves, is exactly what it is, projected throughout the city using 20th century infidel speaker-technology.
When the believers fall to their knees for providence, they often use prayer mats, known as sajjadat salat. These brightly colored rugs are similar in size to a welcome mat like you would place outside a front door. Having reconsidered religion years ago, I used the various rugs laying around Ben’s place as a temporary yoga mat where I could do some stretching and exercise each morning. If you found me prostrated on the floor with my arms stretched above my head, it wasn’t in supplication to a maleficent Allah. It was to stretch my lower back.
Fes has a lot of winding alleys that lead to shops selling local merchandise. It was similar to what we experienced in Marrakech, with two main differences. First, motorized vehicles are prohibited in the Fes alleys, so we didn’t have to constantly look over our shoulder for fear of being run down while browsing pillow covers. Second, the vendors were much less aggressive in Fes. If you picked up a wallet to look at, the store proprietor didn’t immediately come over and offer to sell it to you for one million dollars.
Fes tannery. The light colored vats are where the cow and camel skins are cured and the darker vats at the top and right are where the hides are colored. You can see hides drying on the roofs and from the rails. We were given a sprig of mint leaves as we entered because the place smelled like pigeon poop, or cow urine, I couldn’t tell the difference.
The most interesting thing we saw in Fes was the tannery, where the men curing the cow and camel skins get right down in the vats of chemicals, pigeon poop, and cow urine to agitate the hides, just like they did 1,200 years ago. No one knows if this shortens their lives at all because most of them get hit by cars while crossing the street.
After seeing animals treated so callously, I enjoyed this peaceful manger scene with watermelons.
The most disturbing thing I saw in Fes was cruelty to animals. Now, I’ve done a fair amount of travel in my 52 years. I’m not a mamby pamby when it comes to reality; I know life is cruel. But I don’t recall ever seeing so much blatant animal abuse. And I’m not talking just about the hundreds of starving, homeless dogs and cats, the captive monkeys held on leashes in the square, the camel rides in parking lots, or the live animal markets where one seller of goats gave me the slash sign across his throat. He was not threatening me, but offering to butcher me a goat on the spot, with hundreds of people milling about who most likely would have just kept milling about while the goat was butchered in the dirt at their feet. But I’m not talking about those things. What I am talking about is a group of boys using a tied donkey as target practice for their soccer balls. And a group of other boys violently dragging a clearly reluctant horse into the ocean by its tether for a “fun” ride. That degree of callousness towards the welfare of animals was shocking. Especially considering that one of the boys from each group of boys probably owned the donkey and the horse. That’s not how you treat family.
RABAT - THE CAPITAL CITY
The minaret of the Hassan Tower mosque in Rabat would have been really tall. But it was never finished.
Rabat is the capital of Morocco. In addition to being clean, ordered, and civilized, it is the site of one of the current King’s many palaces. We took a day trip there, had lunch at a grilled chicken place, visited an old fort at the mouth of the estuary with stunning views, and taxied to Hassan Tower, one of ancient Morocco’s grandest projects (a mosque) that was never completed because the King who ordered the building died and the rest of the populace lost interest in funding his vanity project and just wanted enough money for food.
CASABLANCA - WE’LL ALWAYS HAVE PARIS
I had never seen the movie starring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman, and had no idea who was Paul Henreid. So before we left for Morocco, we streamed Casablanca. Despite it having one of the worst pick-up lines ever “here’s looking at you, kid”, which Mr. Bogart repeats four or five times, it was an entertaining movie that caused me to Google “French protectorate”. I also learned that the movie was filmed entirely in Los Angeles, so we didn't bother to go looking for Rick’s Cafe once we arrived in the famed city.
Instead, we got drinks at another gin joint and went to the second largest mosque in the world, Hassan II Mosque. This mosque was built over the course of seven years by Moroccan artisans who used resources (wood, marble, crystal, tiles, you know, that kind of stuff) almost exclusively produced in Morocco. The one exception was a pair of columns made of better quality Italian marble. Overall, I’d have to say the mosque is a suitably impressive monument to deceased King Mohammed V, with a great setting on the Atlantic Ocean. It was not as majestic as some of the more iconic churches I’ve seen during my years of travel - Notre Dame in Paris, St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City, Westminster Abbey in London, and La Parroquia in my current hometown of San Miguel de Allende, to name just a handful - but, it was nice to learn that Christians aren’t the only religion that wastes billions of dollars on frivolity.
The minaret of the Hassan II mosque in Casablanca reaches 210 meters (690 feet) into the sky. This is 180 feet shorter than the minaret of the Great Mosque of Algiers. But the Hassan II minaret also has a laser beam fitted at the top.
AND THE LESSON WE LEARN IS . . .
While it would be easy to talk about the many different types of craft works, the gritty, beauty of the architecture, the enormous and historic mosques and mausoleums, the frenetic pace of life, and how many times Bogart says, “here’s looking at you, kid”, in Casablanca, I’m going to skip all that. The greatest thing that I learned while I was in Morocco is that I miss traveling! We’ve been living the domestic life here in San Miguel for the last four years. And even though our life is in Mexico, and there are cultural and language issues to maneuver, we are essentially just doing the 9 to 5 thing in another country. Dipping my toes in the chilly waters of Morocco reminded me why we came to Mexico in the first place - to learn about the world and the hundreds or thousands of things about it that we want to see and experience. I want to visit more countries where they put olives on the table before your meal arrives instead of bread.
If you like olives, you might like Morocco. It’s the number three producer of olives in the world, behind Spain and Italy.
Oh, the other important thing that I learned while in Morocco is that a Minbar is not a minibar. So visiting the Dadi Palace in Marrakech to see the oldest minbar in the country wasn’t the all you can drink affair that I was expecting.