Friday, Feb 5, 2010

My first day in Morocco, but it felt like three.  We landed in Casablanca around 7:00am, which is 2am back home.  I did get to stretch out and sleep on the plane (good food too), but thats just a bastard hour any way you slice it. Customs was easy enough, especially with Tariq leading the charge.

Baggage claim, not so much.  See, while we were loading in NYC, there was a guy at the door of the plane who was intensely aggressive about forcing people to check bags if they had too many carry-ons. Aunti (who will not be named here) got tagged, and had two laptops yanked in the process.  She was understandably upset when her bag was empty in Morocco.  Turns out the exact thing had happened on the two previous flights from NYC. Fuckers.

Tariq did a good job of dealing with security and filling out forms, but did a lousy job of consoling Aunti.  What is it with us guys who are so good at solving practical problems, but so lousy at smoothing emotional ones?

First steps out of the airport, and my first lung-full of African air erased whatever tiredness I was feeling.  Alert, jovial, and excited replaced fatigue. Our taxi-van ride from the Casablanca airport completely missed the city.  That’s a shame, because I would definitely liked to have seen that place, and may still yet, but I understood the need and desire to Just. Get. Home.

Three hours of driving past lush green fields and beautiful rolling hills, dotted with homes ranging from nothing but clay walls, to small clay fortresses, brought us into Marrakech.  Fatigue had returned, and I felt disconnected from the experience, but it was delightful just the same.  EVERYONE rides scooters, bikes, mule carts, etc. Zigging and zagging; zipping and dodging. It’s a choreographed chaos that seems to work.  This modern chaos on the roads unfolded next to the original BC walls that surround the old part of the city.  This is the Morocco I came for.

Ancient is everywhere.  Ancient buildings, ancient dress, ancient markets, ancient transportation, and I was zooming through all of it with my face plastered against the window of my van. Every mile closer to home, Tariq’s smile got a little larger.  Both of them had had MONTHS of intense preparation to make today possible, so it had to be the largest relief imaginable to finally be done.

Tariq’s brother and a friend where there, along with the cook/housekeeper, Mina.  They are all super nice and I can’t understand a word.  I did understand the delightful delicate pastries and mint tea waiting in the central sun room though. The house keeper worked for years in one of the celebrated pastry bakeries in town.  Nice lady to have on staff.

Our home here is three stories, but not hugely spread out.  It has the feel of a small tower with rooms to the east, north and south of the house, with the stairwell and square hall to the west wall.  The sun room on the second floor is a tower inside of a tower with the ceiling open to the sky.  Sitting at the bottom of this tower on rich blue cushions, you see tall yellow walls leading up to the engraved window for my room on the third story, and a gossamer maroon tapestry to soften the sun a story above that.

My room is wonderfully comfortable with a temperdic mattress on a floor of beautiful carpet, with two oddly shaped sitting chairs and two leather moroccan floor pillows (poofies they call them). Beautiful blue cloth in front my large arched doorway provides privacy. My room is open to a large empty space which is open to a large patio overlooking an expansive park and massive mountains covered in snow in the distance. Not a bad little place in the least. I could get used to this.  A nap helped me do just that.

REM sleep and vivid dreams were in full force when I was woken for lunch. God I needed more sleep, but I needed to train myself for the new time-zone more. A massive silver platter was on the table in the sun room. It was mounded with hand made cous-cous. Which was covered in beautiful cooked vegetables, many of them still whole. Whole eggplant, giant pumpkin pieces, carrots and many other vegetables I couldn’t identify were arranged around the seasoned beef in the middle. Everyone eats from the same platter, starting on the outside and working towards the middle. Luckily, for this meal, we had forks, but typically you eat with only your hand here. Only the right hand specifically, since the left is used for, well, other things.

Rejuvenated, I decided to go exploring.  I love getting lost and getting found in new places.  I followed my feet for several hours as they took me past soccer games played by men with robes in the shadow of the old city wall, past women covered completely in black, only eyes visible, and then quickly adverted, past gold, purple, and richly ornamental robes of confident looking women who at least showed their face, past children playing with yo-yos, past mules pulling carts piled 20′ high with goods, through alleys crowded on all sides by vendors selling everything imaginable.  I followed my feet till they were raw in my sandals, then looked for the sun and headed that direction.

I rested for a while in a park and watched the kids play games I’ve never seen while being looked after by groups of women ornamentally dressed. The city sped by on foot, by scooter and bicycle, by mule and taxi. I just sat and watched, feeling invisible even though everyone glanced at me.  I was the only foreigner out, and I was alone in their land today.

I awoke from my second nap with an invitation in Aribic to ride on the scooter into the old city to meet up with Tariq. I put on my jacket, jumped on the back, and we sped into the chaos.  This beats the shit out of walking! We zipped along, pulling in our elbows and knees to keep from loosing them to oncoming cars, or people, or animals. We zoomed through traffic, onto sidewalks and through the opening to the old city.  The roads narrowed to alleys, the cars thinned, the scooters and people multiplied. Zoom zoom we go.

We stopped at the office of Tariq’s catering business.  I asked lots of questions to get a feel for how business here works.  An hour or so of this and it was time to zoom on to the famous central market for some real cultural experiences (aka, FOOD!).  I think Marrakech has a million inhabitants and they all come to the market at night. Seas of people crowd every space.  The chaos of spice vendors, leather workers, basket makers, pirate DVD sellers is only overwhelmed by the smells of the thousands of food options. Most foods I don’t recognize, but the lambs brains I did, simply because the lambs head was still there with the cooked brain in it’s rightful place.

Tariq and I walked, talked, laughed and gawked.  The multi-story mazes seem designed to ensure you never find you way out.  We sat and ate a delightful chicken pita accompanied by a bowl of snails and talked about women, sex, marriage, homosexuality and other topics of cultural difference.

Tariq had some ideas on homosexuality I haven’t heard before.  His theory is that homosexuality is so rare here because a man is mandated to always be with his son.  The family and cultural gender distinction is reinforced by the amount of man with boy, and woman with girl interaction. There is not a lot of overlap.  Boys learn to be men because it is men they spend all their time with.  This rigid gender structure doesn’t leave much room to explore, or even question your sexuality. In theory anyway.  I can’t help but wonder if homosexuality is just as common, but hidden much deeper.

This was only one day? WOW. I am excited to see what else this delightful country has in store for me!