On our way out of the canyon we passed some loaded burrows, donkeys? Not quite sure which one but they were cute, brown and black furry, and not at all impressed by the noise and people that were about. We exited at the palm trees that mark the entrance to the gorge and the river that is clear and cold and at this point very inviting. The heat hit me in the face like an unkind slap.
Hassan turned to me and ask, ”What did you think of my little rock climbing spot?’
“Magnificent, really. I enjoyed it. I wish I had longer to explore,” I said.
“Next time we'll come for a few days so we have time to explore some of the trails,” he said turning his attention to the road.
Next time? Next time “WE come”? All right then. I was just being really quiet, but that ruckus going on in my stomach and the small difficulty with breathing might have had something to do with what the charming fellow next to me just said about “next time we come”.
We left the gorge for the hotel in the afternoon heat, which was approaching surface-of-the-sun standards. I don’t understand how anyone in this country doesn’t wear a hat, but most of them don’t. Hassan drove back through the Todra River valley road so I could have another look; there are apparently almonds as well as the pomegranates, olives, and palms. It really is lovely. Banks of dirt and rock built up to keep the moisture in surround the fields. The sky here is endless and a blue that is so intense you get lost in it. The green of the fields and palm trees stand in stark contrast to the surrounding desert of unending parched earth and sand in shades of red and brown. It makes you want to drink in the sight of green with your eyes and take it in through your skin. Now I know why the religion of Islam, born in the desert, has green as its holy color.
The houses along here look like they have risen directly out of the earth with the cutout windows staring at us like ageless eyes. It is a lonely beauty. There were quite a few of the small Berber villages dotted among the palms and set against the backdrop of ruined Kasbahs that cling to the rocky sides of the valley. Hassan is familiar with the area and pointed out the different crops to me. In the villages the sounds of children’s laughter is mixed with the sound of the calls to prayer from the mosque.
Coming back into the city of Ouarzazate the countryside is every shade of beige and brown. The towns and settlements look like dusty Lego bricks stacked to different heights, and every body of water stands out like a blue beacon in the dryness and heat of the desert. On the way to the airport we drove past the Taourirt Kasbah. It’s huge, very impressive and forbidding. Hassan says at night when it is all lit up it looks a time from when the Berbers ruled the deserts.
We arrived at the hotel to find that Ali had not even risen yet, let alone was packed and ready. I was beginning to have an uneasy feeling about this fellow. Hassan sent someone to his suite to roust him with a message we were waiting. “Shall we go in and have some lunch? I have the unfortunate feeling he will be a while.”
We sat down and a young woman came to the table with a silver ewer filled with water that smelled like sandalwood to pour over our hands. We were the only people in the dining room, not an unusual occurrence in Morocco I have found. The food is so good at home they don’t frequent the expensive restaurants.
First we were served Bstilla, a paper think pastry that you can watch the women make in the Fez medina, it is amazing. The cooked-just-right flakey pastry was filled with spicy lamb. I have had this before in Fez but with chicken. It is mouthwatering I-can’t-believe-this-good, and I am not a “food person”.
Then came the spread of salads. In Morocco the word salad has an entirely different meaning than in the west. Anywhere from six to ten small bowls are set out around a larger bowl of hot cananelle beans and a plate of fresh bread. The small bowls are filled with different dishes depending on what is in season, and the restaurant – steamed carrots, beans, squash, a sweet apple dish that is brown and thick like jam spiced with something tangy, eggplant, another apple dish like apple crust, beets, corn, tomatoes, and the variety is endless and so filling. I always have to monitor myself on the salad or I can’t eat the rest of the meal – a very big insult. You dip the bread in the bean dish and put the others on your plate to eat with the bread or alone.
For the main course we had lamb and prunes in one of the loveliest decorated tagines I have seen. It was a delicate design of red and rust over the deep brown of the pottery. A tagine is traditionally used by nomads. Placed over charcoal braziers they are used to cook the meal. Tagines are made from iron or ceramic. The bottom is a large round platter and the top is shaped like a tent with a knobbed handle at the apex for removal. It fits snuggly onto the ridge of the bottom part. The dish inside, lamb, chicken, beef, or pigeon is also called tagine. It was succulent; the meat was so tender it fell apart. “I see you are fond of Moroccan cuisine,” Hassan noted as I was chewing with my eyes closed in bliss.
“It’s among the best foods of the world, don’t you think?” I ask.
“I can’t decide if I had rather eat my food or watch you enjoy yours,” he said grinning.
“How ‘bout you just eat and not make me self conscious. How does that work for you?” I couldn’t decide if I was charmed or annoyed.
He kept smiling.
After the tagine she came with the water again and we cleaned our hands. I love that.
Next a huge platter of fresh fruit was placed on the table with individual plates and knives for serving. Oranges, bananas, apples, cherries, and grapes. I was beginning to feel stuffed in spite of the morning’s exertions, as I had worn my snug jeans. No, not at all for reasons you are thinking! They help me remember to maintain good posture – and to keep my tummy sucked in. No, really.
After the fruit they filled the table with every kind of cookie made in Morocco, and Morocco is the queen of cookie country. You find them in mounds in the bakeries, the medina, and every home you visit. Cookies are served with tea, after dinner, and afternoon snacks. The café’ au lait was perfect. Both of us admired the cookies, put passed them by as we leaned back in the cushioned chairs and sipped our coffees.
All right this is obviously going to take four parts, not three. So I shall see you tomorrow then?
Wednesday, 6 June 2007
Tuesday, 5 June 2007
BlogPower Awards
james higham (nourishing obscurity) is running the Blog Power Awards.
Nominations close at 9pm, Tuesday June 5, i.e. tonight. jameshigham AT mail DOT com is the address to which nominations should be sent.**
Rilly already has nominations in #16 (most consistently entertaining), I just cast my vote so go and give her a boost eh?
The more votes the blog makes the top list for voting. Check out Blog Power site for more data.
The voting for the awards starts tomorrow. check the Blog Power site.
Nominations close at 9pm, Tuesday June 5, i.e. tonight. jameshigham AT mail DOT com is the address to which nominations should be sent.**
Rilly already has nominations in #16 (most consistently entertaining), I just cast my vote so go and give her a boost eh?
The more votes the blog makes the top list for voting. Check out Blog Power site for more data.
The voting for the awards starts tomorrow. check the Blog Power site.
Part II
Eight o’clock Sunday morning found me waiting on the corner of the grassy lawn just in front of the entrance to the Oudayas. Even though it was early it promised to be another scorcher of a day. Since we were going to a gorge I thought western clothes were called for in the circumstances. I don’t have any proper “desert clothes” with me, so it was jeans, a short sleeve pullover shirt, and Q’s snazzy little cap. I took along my silky beige djellaba top in the hope the plane would be cool enough to require sleeves. I could feel the ocean breeze blowing on my neck and I knew I would miss it today. I wasn’t at all sure where we were going, but I knew it was inland. Inland is hot! On Saturday night I had done some research and apparently Todra Gorge is a big hit with rock climbers. I have been climbing mountains since I was eighteen but I find rock climbing to be nuts. I mean you can’t see anything except the sheer rock wall in front of your face, your fingers are digging into the rockface, and it looks too easy to fall off, but then again Q has some choice words about climbing mountains.
“I don’t get it Mom. You struggle up to 26,000 feet or more, you can’t breathe, your feet are killing you, you have to haul your air up with you on your back, and when you get to the top you’re too exhausted to enjoy the view! Now exactly which part of that is fun for you Mom?
The car pulled up precisely at eight, a good beginning because after my bold acceptance I was still a bit nervous about getting into a airplane with some chap I didn’t know, lovely manners not withstanding. The driver spoke no English but I got the message – we were headed for the airport to meet Hassan who was doing a preflight on the plane. The car was blessedly cool. It was the beginning of a day where I was wrapped in a soft cocoon of foreign languages I don’t speak. I love the sound of Darjia. It has some of the bur-r-r- sounds of the Scottish highlander’s brogue and a soft blanket sound of Sanskrit. French is, well French is fabulous isn’t it? French sounds like Paris, champagne, and romance.
It took about half an hour to the airport where the car drove onto the tarmac which already smelled of heat, and delivered me to the Citation Ultra, which was ready for take off. I know it was a Citation Ultra because Hassan told me, I thought it just looked like a posh little jet! (see photographs to the right)
I didn’t take a camera because I didn’t want to look like oh-my-gods-I-never-get-out-so-I-have-to-have-photographs-of-everything idiot. Last night I went online and found the photographs for you so you would have an idea where we went – my bit for Moroccan tourism.
The flight was uneventful, as I couldn’t see much. Hassan said we would be flying IFR all the way. The air is murky in Morocco. I asked why, and he said "It seems to be a mixture of smog, (lots of old cars), dust from the Sahara and then moisture from the ocean. Even in town you can't see very far. From 3000 feet you can't see the ground." The scenery might not have been much but the plane was very plush with a couch, bar, kitchen set-up, and a bathroom with a full-length mirror! And blessedly frigid air conditioning! The seats were leather with silk cushions for your head. It was all done up in shades of beige, gold, and brown.
We sat down outside The Valley of the Kasbahs at Quarzazate airport where a driver and a 4X4 awaited our arrival. We had brunch at the Berbere Palace Hotel before heading for the Gorge. The hotel looks out over the surrounding countryside and there is a beautiful dinning room decorated in the style of Berber-does-Hollywood, but it works. Brilliant bathrooms. I am a sucker for a lovely bathroom.
After brunch we drove about an hour or less to the Todra Gorge but I was not so slowly melting in the hot sun, which was being reflected back from the sand and rock in waves. Thank goodness for the wind blowing over us as we drove, stopping was not so pleasant.
At Tineghir we took a 20 Km side-trip through the Todra River valley road through green ribbons of palm and olive groves. I saw pomegranate trees like the ones Q and I saw in Fez, and patchworks of tiny crop fields. There were about a dozen pink-grey villages before we entered the mouth of the Todra Gorge. At one point we had to stop and wait while a chap and his young son herded camels across the highway. We saw a lot of sheep and goats all along the way.
The canyon is 1,000 ft high where the river has cut through pink and green walls of rock limestone. Hassan said this is part of the High Atlas. I thought there were a lot of birds in Fez; this place is an aviary full of hunting birds and nesters in the canyon walls. You can hear birdsong all throughout the gorge. Unless you are going to climb, a 4 x 4 vehicle is essential.
About half way through you come around the turn, splash through the riverbed, and there sits several little houses and a hotel. I put a photograph for you. Apparently some people, tourists and climbers, like to stay over so they can walk the gorge at night. I don’t think so, thank you anyway, but I can see the appeal. Hassan said at night the canyon has its own climate. Apparently he IS a rock climber and spent a good bit of time here when he was younger. That could explain why when we got out to walk a bit he was as sure footed as a mountain goat of which we saw many. I on the other hand managed to stumble, fall over a bolder and bang my head on the side of the canyon and get a mouthful of sand. Graceful eh?
“Are you hurt? Are you bleeding?” he asked anxiously as he came up to me sprawled on the path like an awkward grasshopper.
My head certainly hurt enough to be bleeding. I mean really if you have that much pain you should get blood.
“Here let me check that,” as he ran his fingers over my head while I sat on the rock trying to recover my composure.
“This is not what I envisioned when I thought of you running your fingers through my hair you know,” I said.
“No? You’re not bleeding but you have a hell of a bump there and your sense of humor seems to be intact.” He has a smile like the sun coming up I swear it and smells like a cold day in Bath.
“Great. I’ll hang an earring on it and call it a third ear shall I?”
The sun only bathes the bottom of the gorge in the mornings. There is an ice-cold river that runs through, but even in the gorge the heat was impressive. We stayed about an hour or so. We had to return to the Rabat airport before 6:30 pm or they won’t let you land, they send you to Casablanca.
The best time for visiting the gorge is between is between 8.00 and 13.00, as the angle of the sun in the afternoons passes over and out of sight said the nice man at the hotel in the gorge where we had tea. The nice man who is a Moroccan and thinks you might MISS the sun.
Now this puts us at right over 1000 words which is where I try to keep the posting and the poll agreed.
As the forecast for today was 95 degrees, I intended to do my banking, pay the rent, and then be VERY STILL during the day, which I did. I made the foolish mistake of going to the roof to water the plants while the sun was still up and I thought I would burst into flame. It is going DOWN to 31 degrees C tomorrow (87 degrees F). Here I sit now in the coolness of the ocean breeze looking down on the river from the roof/terrace with Rabat spread out and sparkling to my right, thinking of all of you. Wherever you are be ready, you never know when adventure will come knocking – answer the door!
Q called to say she is having a fabulous time at the Music Festival in Fez, and to ask after M.C. Solaar – who is looking very fuzzy and growing by leaps and bounds. He does a lot of leaping and bounding actually.
Tomorrow I shall tell you about lunch and the return to Rabat shall I?
“I don’t get it Mom. You struggle up to 26,000 feet or more, you can’t breathe, your feet are killing you, you have to haul your air up with you on your back, and when you get to the top you’re too exhausted to enjoy the view! Now exactly which part of that is fun for you Mom?
The car pulled up precisely at eight, a good beginning because after my bold acceptance I was still a bit nervous about getting into a airplane with some chap I didn’t know, lovely manners not withstanding. The driver spoke no English but I got the message – we were headed for the airport to meet Hassan who was doing a preflight on the plane. The car was blessedly cool. It was the beginning of a day where I was wrapped in a soft cocoon of foreign languages I don’t speak. I love the sound of Darjia. It has some of the bur-r-r- sounds of the Scottish highlander’s brogue and a soft blanket sound of Sanskrit. French is, well French is fabulous isn’t it? French sounds like Paris, champagne, and romance.
It took about half an hour to the airport where the car drove onto the tarmac which already smelled of heat, and delivered me to the Citation Ultra, which was ready for take off. I know it was a Citation Ultra because Hassan told me, I thought it just looked like a posh little jet! (see photographs to the right)
I didn’t take a camera because I didn’t want to look like oh-my-gods-I-never-get-out-so-I-have-to-have-photographs-of-everything idiot. Last night I went online and found the photographs for you so you would have an idea where we went – my bit for Moroccan tourism.
The flight was uneventful, as I couldn’t see much. Hassan said we would be flying IFR all the way. The air is murky in Morocco. I asked why, and he said "It seems to be a mixture of smog, (lots of old cars), dust from the Sahara and then moisture from the ocean. Even in town you can't see very far. From 3000 feet you can't see the ground." The scenery might not have been much but the plane was very plush with a couch, bar, kitchen set-up, and a bathroom with a full-length mirror! And blessedly frigid air conditioning! The seats were leather with silk cushions for your head. It was all done up in shades of beige, gold, and brown.
We sat down outside The Valley of the Kasbahs at Quarzazate airport where a driver and a 4X4 awaited our arrival. We had brunch at the Berbere Palace Hotel before heading for the Gorge. The hotel looks out over the surrounding countryside and there is a beautiful dinning room decorated in the style of Berber-does-Hollywood, but it works. Brilliant bathrooms. I am a sucker for a lovely bathroom.
After brunch we drove about an hour or less to the Todra Gorge but I was not so slowly melting in the hot sun, which was being reflected back from the sand and rock in waves. Thank goodness for the wind blowing over us as we drove, stopping was not so pleasant.
At Tineghir we took a 20 Km side-trip through the Todra River valley road through green ribbons of palm and olive groves. I saw pomegranate trees like the ones Q and I saw in Fez, and patchworks of tiny crop fields. There were about a dozen pink-grey villages before we entered the mouth of the Todra Gorge. At one point we had to stop and wait while a chap and his young son herded camels across the highway. We saw a lot of sheep and goats all along the way.
The canyon is 1,000 ft high where the river has cut through pink and green walls of rock limestone. Hassan said this is part of the High Atlas. I thought there were a lot of birds in Fez; this place is an aviary full of hunting birds and nesters in the canyon walls. You can hear birdsong all throughout the gorge. Unless you are going to climb, a 4 x 4 vehicle is essential.
About half way through you come around the turn, splash through the riverbed, and there sits several little houses and a hotel. I put a photograph for you. Apparently some people, tourists and climbers, like to stay over so they can walk the gorge at night. I don’t think so, thank you anyway, but I can see the appeal. Hassan said at night the canyon has its own climate. Apparently he IS a rock climber and spent a good bit of time here when he was younger. That could explain why when we got out to walk a bit he was as sure footed as a mountain goat of which we saw many. I on the other hand managed to stumble, fall over a bolder and bang my head on the side of the canyon and get a mouthful of sand. Graceful eh?
“Are you hurt? Are you bleeding?” he asked anxiously as he came up to me sprawled on the path like an awkward grasshopper.
My head certainly hurt enough to be bleeding. I mean really if you have that much pain you should get blood.
“Here let me check that,” as he ran his fingers over my head while I sat on the rock trying to recover my composure.
“This is not what I envisioned when I thought of you running your fingers through my hair you know,” I said.
“No? You’re not bleeding but you have a hell of a bump there and your sense of humor seems to be intact.” He has a smile like the sun coming up I swear it and smells like a cold day in Bath.
“Great. I’ll hang an earring on it and call it a third ear shall I?”
The sun only bathes the bottom of the gorge in the mornings. There is an ice-cold river that runs through, but even in the gorge the heat was impressive. We stayed about an hour or so. We had to return to the Rabat airport before 6:30 pm or they won’t let you land, they send you to Casablanca.
The best time for visiting the gorge is between is between 8.00 and 13.00, as the angle of the sun in the afternoons passes over and out of sight said the nice man at the hotel in the gorge where we had tea. The nice man who is a Moroccan and thinks you might MISS the sun.
Now this puts us at right over 1000 words which is where I try to keep the posting and the poll agreed.
As the forecast for today was 95 degrees, I intended to do my banking, pay the rent, and then be VERY STILL during the day, which I did. I made the foolish mistake of going to the roof to water the plants while the sun was still up and I thought I would burst into flame. It is going DOWN to 31 degrees C tomorrow (87 degrees F). Here I sit now in the coolness of the ocean breeze looking down on the river from the roof/terrace with Rabat spread out and sparkling to my right, thinking of all of you. Wherever you are be ready, you never know when adventure will come knocking – answer the door!
Q called to say she is having a fabulous time at the Music Festival in Fez, and to ask after M.C. Solaar – who is looking very fuzzy and growing by leaps and bounds. He does a lot of leaping and bounding actually.
Tomorrow I shall tell you about lunch and the return to Rabat shall I?
Monday, 4 June 2007
Part I of the adventure in Tadra Gorge
4 June 2007
Good news! The embassy in Casablanca re-opens today.
***********************************************************
I looked straight up and all I could see was rock, pinkish rock with sides so smooth it looked like a carving. The walls shoot up 300 meters of brown limestone and I could feel the heat of the day locked in the rock and pulsing outward. The wind coming off the water carrying the spray was cooling me like a fan. It was after two, the sun had passed overhead and the temperature had plummeted like a rock. I was actually shivering. After having spent the day feeling like a piece of chocolate melting and leaking out the sides of the packaging, it was bliss. “Feeling better are you?”
“Mercy yes. I'm afraid I don’t do well in the heat,” I said as I stood there still dripping and wiping my face with his kerchief.
“That really begs the question of why you have decided to stay in Morocco,” Hassan laughed. God he has great teeth. Sorry I have a real thing for great teeth and a nice tight bum (Q just read ahead if you roll your eyes any further back you could lose them).
‘Many reasons not the least of which is that I love the people here,” I said feeling decidedly cooler and more articulate. I think my powers of verbalization decrease as the temperature increases. I bent down in a squat and rinsed my arms and neck in the very cold river water.
“We best turn back here if I am going to get you back in time to feed the cat. The airport in Rabat won’t allow landings after six-thirty and we need to have lunch and pick up Ali. We can have tea on the plane if that’s alright,” he said taking my arm and helping me over the rocks. Yes, yes I didn’t need the help, but I ‘m not completely stupid!
It all began with a walk to the market on Saturday when I decided to take my cherries (of which there is a bounty and they are magnificent) over to the park. I am sitting on a bench eating my cherries and watching the people, like you do, when I spot coming toward me a cutout from “world’s yummiest men”. In the heat he was wearing a three piece Saville Row suit complete with red power tie. He looked as though he was walking through a fall day in London, not ninety degree heat in Morocco. I was dressed in my gold djellaba with the black trim and black linen trousers. Thank the gods I had just done my hair! I don’t think my makeup had melted off just yet.
“You are not a tourist,” he said sitting down beside me. He spoke in English with a soft Moroccan accent. When Moroccans speak English it’s like they polish the words first like a river rock, takes all the rough edges off.
“No, are you?” I said being a smartass.
“No, but I am visiting Rabat. I'm taking my plane down to Quarzazate tomorrow and I wondered if you would like to come along and visit the Todra gorge. I hate to fly alone. You are Lady Macleod are you not?” He had the look of someone who had just said, “gotcha”.
“Yes, but how would you know that?” Now I was really interested and not a little nervous. I am pretty sure I had managed not to have my mouth hanging open.
My son attends university in America and his friend from Fez told him about your blog and he read it. He wrote me to ask if I knew you..”
“If you KNEW me? Like a celebrity? Oh my giddy aunt!” I really had no idea how to react to this. Morocco is not that small a country.
‘Yes. Exactly like that really. He told me where to find you on Facebook so I would know what you look like when I told him I was coming to Rabat before I leave the country.” He was saying all this as though it was all perfectly normal that in a city the size of Rabat he would just buzz into town and FIND ME.
“Now you don’t want to pass up another chance like the chap in the market do you?” he asked looking like the cat who ate the cream.
“What? How…” Oh shit I am thinking perhaps the blog has become a bit too personal.
Apparently Hassan (that’s his name) is leaving on Monday for six months in Saudi Arabia on mission for the king. I can tell you he will be working with Prince Sultan bin Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud who is establishing an aviation club with the aim of teaching more Saudi nationals how to fly, and doing some other thing which I can’t tell you just as I can’t tell you the rest of his name. We discussed this in some detail. I am really counting on the fact my blog is censored in Saudi Arabia, but his son’s friend may be a regular reader. He was flying to Quarzazate to pick up a Saudi national who was climbing in the gorge. A real live sheikh, Ali (something I can’t tell you). Apparently Ali is an avid rock climber and had buggered out of the Morocco – Saudi Arabia talks in Rabat to go climbing. It was Hassan job’s to get him back home.
“Fine, when we do we leave? I have to be back t in time to feed my daughter’s cat, “ I said in what I hoped was an authoritative voice. “ She'll be calling to check on me around eight.”
“I can have you back by then. You live in the Oudaylas right? I can have my car pick you up at eight tomorrow morning.”
“Did you read the entire blog?” I asked in amazement at his knowing where I live.
“No, I’m sorry but my son gave me the highlights. He and his friend are quite the fans,” he said grinning at my obvious discomfort.
Wasn’t the day supposed to be cooling down? If so why did I feel decidedly warmer? “Now that I’ve met you I think I will,” he said.
“Can I see you home? I have to attend a meeting over at the palace, that’s where I was heading when I saw you. I truthfully can’t believe I ran into you, even though you are rather easy to spot.”
“It’s the hair and the hat,” I laughed. “No, no go ahead. I still have some errands to do. I'll see you in the morning then?”
“Yes.” And he took his leave with a small bow. Where was this chap educated? What was he going to be doing in Saudi Arabia, and why did he have a jet? My mind was spinning and I was laughing out loud as I walked along the street thinking of Q’s face when I told her.
that's Part I. I shall get the rest to you on the morrow. Frankly it's ninety fine degrees here and too hot to think, let alone type. I will be doing some daydreaming however. See me smiling?
Good news! The embassy in Casablanca re-opens today.
***********************************************************
I looked straight up and all I could see was rock, pinkish rock with sides so smooth it looked like a carving. The walls shoot up 300 meters of brown limestone and I could feel the heat of the day locked in the rock and pulsing outward. The wind coming off the water carrying the spray was cooling me like a fan. It was after two, the sun had passed overhead and the temperature had plummeted like a rock. I was actually shivering. After having spent the day feeling like a piece of chocolate melting and leaking out the sides of the packaging, it was bliss. “Feeling better are you?”
“Mercy yes. I'm afraid I don’t do well in the heat,” I said as I stood there still dripping and wiping my face with his kerchief.
“That really begs the question of why you have decided to stay in Morocco,” Hassan laughed. God he has great teeth. Sorry I have a real thing for great teeth and a nice tight bum (Q just read ahead if you roll your eyes any further back you could lose them).
‘Many reasons not the least of which is that I love the people here,” I said feeling decidedly cooler and more articulate. I think my powers of verbalization decrease as the temperature increases. I bent down in a squat and rinsed my arms and neck in the very cold river water.
“We best turn back here if I am going to get you back in time to feed the cat. The airport in Rabat won’t allow landings after six-thirty and we need to have lunch and pick up Ali. We can have tea on the plane if that’s alright,” he said taking my arm and helping me over the rocks. Yes, yes I didn’t need the help, but I ‘m not completely stupid!
It all began with a walk to the market on Saturday when I decided to take my cherries (of which there is a bounty and they are magnificent) over to the park. I am sitting on a bench eating my cherries and watching the people, like you do, when I spot coming toward me a cutout from “world’s yummiest men”. In the heat he was wearing a three piece Saville Row suit complete with red power tie. He looked as though he was walking through a fall day in London, not ninety degree heat in Morocco. I was dressed in my gold djellaba with the black trim and black linen trousers. Thank the gods I had just done my hair! I don’t think my makeup had melted off just yet.
“You are not a tourist,” he said sitting down beside me. He spoke in English with a soft Moroccan accent. When Moroccans speak English it’s like they polish the words first like a river rock, takes all the rough edges off.
“No, are you?” I said being a smartass.
“No, but I am visiting Rabat. I'm taking my plane down to Quarzazate tomorrow and I wondered if you would like to come along and visit the Todra gorge. I hate to fly alone. You are Lady Macleod are you not?” He had the look of someone who had just said, “gotcha”.
“Yes, but how would you know that?” Now I was really interested and not a little nervous. I am pretty sure I had managed not to have my mouth hanging open.
My son attends university in America and his friend from Fez told him about your blog and he read it. He wrote me to ask if I knew you..”
“If you KNEW me? Like a celebrity? Oh my giddy aunt!” I really had no idea how to react to this. Morocco is not that small a country.
‘Yes. Exactly like that really. He told me where to find you on Facebook so I would know what you look like when I told him I was coming to Rabat before I leave the country.” He was saying all this as though it was all perfectly normal that in a city the size of Rabat he would just buzz into town and FIND ME.
“Now you don’t want to pass up another chance like the chap in the market do you?” he asked looking like the cat who ate the cream.
“What? How…” Oh shit I am thinking perhaps the blog has become a bit too personal.
Apparently Hassan (that’s his name) is leaving on Monday for six months in Saudi Arabia on mission for the king. I can tell you he will be working with Prince Sultan bin Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud who is establishing an aviation club with the aim of teaching more Saudi nationals how to fly, and doing some other thing which I can’t tell you just as I can’t tell you the rest of his name. We discussed this in some detail. I am really counting on the fact my blog is censored in Saudi Arabia, but his son’s friend may be a regular reader. He was flying to Quarzazate to pick up a Saudi national who was climbing in the gorge. A real live sheikh, Ali (something I can’t tell you). Apparently Ali is an avid rock climber and had buggered out of the Morocco – Saudi Arabia talks in Rabat to go climbing. It was Hassan job’s to get him back home.
“Fine, when we do we leave? I have to be back t in time to feed my daughter’s cat, “ I said in what I hoped was an authoritative voice. “ She'll be calling to check on me around eight.”
“I can have you back by then. You live in the Oudaylas right? I can have my car pick you up at eight tomorrow morning.”
“Did you read the entire blog?” I asked in amazement at his knowing where I live.
“No, I’m sorry but my son gave me the highlights. He and his friend are quite the fans,” he said grinning at my obvious discomfort.
Wasn’t the day supposed to be cooling down? If so why did I feel decidedly warmer? “Now that I’ve met you I think I will,” he said.
“Can I see you home? I have to attend a meeting over at the palace, that’s where I was heading when I saw you. I truthfully can’t believe I ran into you, even though you are rather easy to spot.”
“It’s the hair and the hat,” I laughed. “No, no go ahead. I still have some errands to do. I'll see you in the morning then?”
“Yes.” And he took his leave with a small bow. Where was this chap educated? What was he going to be doing in Saudi Arabia, and why did he have a jet? My mind was spinning and I was laughing out loud as I walked along the street thinking of Q’s face when I told her.
that's Part I. I shall get the rest to you on the morrow. Frankly it's ninety fine degrees here and too hot to think, let alone type. I will be doing some daydreaming however. See me smiling?
Sunday, 3 June 2007
having an adventure
I’m actually out having an adventure today, so I’ve posted this previous adventure for you. I shall return on the morrow with details. I will tell you there is a camel and an actual sheikh involved.... must go..
28 November 2006, Fez Morocco, 1223 hours local time
So it’s 2430 hours this morning and I’m sleeping, like you do; when I hear a timid knocking on the door. You know the sort, “Are you there and receiving visitors?” sort of knock. In my somnolent state I’m thinking, “No, go away you fucker, I’m sleeping.” But noooo, the knocking continues.
I get up, open the door just enough to peak my head ‘round, because I sleep au natural – and thus I am. Standing on the other side of my door is the rat-like chap who works on the staff here, the one at the bottom of the command chain as I have noticed. The one my daughter tells me was at the party in the Medina given by one of the other students last week, where he was up on the roof smoking Hashish and pillaging the teenage daughter of the school secretary who is visiting from the U.S.
“The water, the water is on,” he says. Now this chappy is not Moroccan, he is not American, and he is not French. Some say he is Russian. Ha, I have been to Moscow; this sneaky son of an alley cat is not Russian.
“What? What are you talking about?” I asked in my sleep-dazed state. Let us remember I had ver-r-r-r-y little sleep the night before, as the Baby was ill.
He pointed through the cracked door toward the back of the apartment where the rooms for the bath are located. “Hang on, just wait there,” I said closing the door and walking to the end of the bed to retrieve my clothing I had just taken off an hour before.
I turned to the Baby who had been sleeping most of the day in recovery from her night before of yet another (why oh why did the gods of the gene pool not give her my digestive system) episode of food poisoning and said, “Now stay there. Cover up and snuggle down while I see what is going on.”
I returned to the door, and opened it further.
“Alright, what is it? What do you want?”
Again with the pointing. “Do you have the water running?” he asks.
“What are you talking about? I was sleeping,” like I am talking to a brick.
I turned and headed toward the back of the apartment. I got to the end of the bed when my feet started feeling wet. By the time I had reached the bathroom door, I had already bent over to cuff up my trousers away from the water now at my ankles and swamping my little Moroccan red leather shoes.
I opened the bathroom door and from the far corner of the – wall – was spraying forth in an arc, a fountain of water that hit me square in the face. “Oh yea, this was going to be fun.”
You have to get this picture – the Villa is one of the nicest places to live in the New City. We live in “the apartment” which is the most posh accommodation in the Villa. We have two; I say again two, working electrical outlets. You with me?
I have two of the “Moroccan version” of extension cords on a surge protector on the right side of the room which gives power to Q's Apple, the tiny red lamp, my precious and beloved electric kettle, and the re-charger for her phone; with an empty space for the toy iron when I need it. On the left wall I have the surge protector, one “Moroccan extension cord” (24” maximum with three to four outlets mounted on a brick like affair) and my find of the month – a ten-meter actual extension cord (albeit has a funky outlet at the far end). This serves to hook up my phone re-charger, my speakers for my computer, my Dell, and runs under the settee, past the box with the German goodies (another tale), under the armoire, and around the doors to the “back room” that sits between the two –with doors- bath, rooms. That area is my little office. Quite nice really, has a window at the …oops that is not this story.
I have curly red hair, really curly hair, black-women-understand-there-is-a-whole-dimension-to-my-life-that
-is-devoted-to-my-hair-curly –
and I had just blown it out straight two days ago. So the shriek that left my mouth was not so much about the three to four inches of water I was standing in, or the electrical cord just to the back of me floating in the water, or the six pairs of shoes now floating out from where they had been carefully placed under the armoire. No, it was the thought that I would frizz!
I turned to see “rat face” standing behind me and he said, “I thought you were cleaning your apartment.”
I grabbed the little weasel by his collar and lifted him up into the air until his abnormally small feet were kicking in terror, and looked up into his smarmy face and screamed, “You’re telling me you knew the water was gushing in here for the last hour and you did nothing? You think I was cleaning my fucking apartment at one in the morning with all the lights out?” And then I smashed his head up against the wall and watched as his unused brains slid down the wall and into the standing water.
All right I didn’t. But I really wanted to!
“I beg your pardon? You thought I was cleaning in the dark? You mean you knew the water was leaking into the apartment?” I said very quietly and very calmly. Now see, my child who knows me well, at this point hearing my tone, hid her head under the blanket.
“Yes, it is leaking into the apartment on the first level,” he said as though he had just confirmed the certainty of the theory of relativity.
“Go turn the water off,” I said very slowly.
“I will go turn off the water now,” he said as though I had not spoken and he headed for the door. Yes, yes the smashing his head fantasy had returned, but now it had blood gushing from his ears, and loud screaming noises.
Once the water was turned off and the geyser in the wall had ceased to spew forth, I spent the next two hours getting the water out. Now under “good news, bad news, and just the way it is” – Moroccan villas are built on a tilt. I have every confidence there is a proper architectural term, but I know it not. The floors are all stone or marble and at the ‘back’ of any large room that leads to the outside is a – hole. Yep, just like it sounds Sparky, a hole in the floor. Not a drain, not a decorative object, not an ecological device – a hole.
After the maid sloshes the water from her pail, this is on a normal day, not the flood scenario; she uses a device much like a window squeegee but with a mop handle to push the water out said hole.
Uh oh, word count is 1198, and there is still the part with the gorgeous Norwegian with a voice like mink, and Nancy’s reaction to no water, and the plumber with the paper bags.
28 November 2006, Fez Morocco, 1223 hours local time
So it’s 2430 hours this morning and I’m sleeping, like you do; when I hear a timid knocking on the door. You know the sort, “Are you there and receiving visitors?” sort of knock. In my somnolent state I’m thinking, “No, go away you fucker, I’m sleeping.” But noooo, the knocking continues.
I get up, open the door just enough to peak my head ‘round, because I sleep au natural – and thus I am. Standing on the other side of my door is the rat-like chap who works on the staff here, the one at the bottom of the command chain as I have noticed. The one my daughter tells me was at the party in the Medina given by one of the other students last week, where he was up on the roof smoking Hashish and pillaging the teenage daughter of the school secretary who is visiting from the U.S.
“The water, the water is on,” he says. Now this chappy is not Moroccan, he is not American, and he is not French. Some say he is Russian. Ha, I have been to Moscow; this sneaky son of an alley cat is not Russian.
“What? What are you talking about?” I asked in my sleep-dazed state. Let us remember I had ver-r-r-r-y little sleep the night before, as the Baby was ill.
He pointed through the cracked door toward the back of the apartment where the rooms for the bath are located. “Hang on, just wait there,” I said closing the door and walking to the end of the bed to retrieve my clothing I had just taken off an hour before.
I turned to the Baby who had been sleeping most of the day in recovery from her night before of yet another (why oh why did the gods of the gene pool not give her my digestive system) episode of food poisoning and said, “Now stay there. Cover up and snuggle down while I see what is going on.”
I returned to the door, and opened it further.
“Alright, what is it? What do you want?”
Again with the pointing. “Do you have the water running?” he asks.
“What are you talking about? I was sleeping,” like I am talking to a brick.
I turned and headed toward the back of the apartment. I got to the end of the bed when my feet started feeling wet. By the time I had reached the bathroom door, I had already bent over to cuff up my trousers away from the water now at my ankles and swamping my little Moroccan red leather shoes.
I opened the bathroom door and from the far corner of the – wall – was spraying forth in an arc, a fountain of water that hit me square in the face. “Oh yea, this was going to be fun.”
You have to get this picture – the Villa is one of the nicest places to live in the New City. We live in “the apartment” which is the most posh accommodation in the Villa. We have two; I say again two, working electrical outlets. You with me?
I have two of the “Moroccan version” of extension cords on a surge protector on the right side of the room which gives power to Q's Apple, the tiny red lamp, my precious and beloved electric kettle, and the re-charger for her phone; with an empty space for the toy iron when I need it. On the left wall I have the surge protector, one “Moroccan extension cord” (24” maximum with three to four outlets mounted on a brick like affair) and my find of the month – a ten-meter actual extension cord (albeit has a funky outlet at the far end). This serves to hook up my phone re-charger, my speakers for my computer, my Dell, and runs under the settee, past the box with the German goodies (another tale), under the armoire, and around the doors to the “back room” that sits between the two –with doors- bath, rooms. That area is my little office. Quite nice really, has a window at the …oops that is not this story.
I have curly red hair, really curly hair, black-women-understand-there-is-a-whole-dimension-to-my-life-that
-is-devoted-to-my-hair-curly –
and I had just blown it out straight two days ago. So the shriek that left my mouth was not so much about the three to four inches of water I was standing in, or the electrical cord just to the back of me floating in the water, or the six pairs of shoes now floating out from where they had been carefully placed under the armoire. No, it was the thought that I would frizz!
I turned to see “rat face” standing behind me and he said, “I thought you were cleaning your apartment.”
I grabbed the little weasel by his collar and lifted him up into the air until his abnormally small feet were kicking in terror, and looked up into his smarmy face and screamed, “You’re telling me you knew the water was gushing in here for the last hour and you did nothing? You think I was cleaning my fucking apartment at one in the morning with all the lights out?” And then I smashed his head up against the wall and watched as his unused brains slid down the wall and into the standing water.
All right I didn’t. But I really wanted to!
“I beg your pardon? You thought I was cleaning in the dark? You mean you knew the water was leaking into the apartment?” I said very quietly and very calmly. Now see, my child who knows me well, at this point hearing my tone, hid her head under the blanket.
“Yes, it is leaking into the apartment on the first level,” he said as though he had just confirmed the certainty of the theory of relativity.
“Go turn the water off,” I said very slowly.
“I will go turn off the water now,” he said as though I had not spoken and he headed for the door. Yes, yes the smashing his head fantasy had returned, but now it had blood gushing from his ears, and loud screaming noises.
Once the water was turned off and the geyser in the wall had ceased to spew forth, I spent the next two hours getting the water out. Now under “good news, bad news, and just the way it is” – Moroccan villas are built on a tilt. I have every confidence there is a proper architectural term, but I know it not. The floors are all stone or marble and at the ‘back’ of any large room that leads to the outside is a – hole. Yep, just like it sounds Sparky, a hole in the floor. Not a drain, not a decorative object, not an ecological device – a hole.
After the maid sloshes the water from her pail, this is on a normal day, not the flood scenario; she uses a device much like a window squeegee but with a mop handle to push the water out said hole.
Uh oh, word count is 1198, and there is still the part with the gorgeous Norwegian with a voice like mink, and Nancy’s reaction to no water, and the plumber with the paper bags.
Friday, 1 June 2007
Music, Bureaucracy, and Residency
The Sacred Music Festival (it is the music that is sacred not the party) begins today in Fez for nine days. Q is going up to Fez today, and I will go toward the end. There are different bands from around the world all playing religious music. The theme this year is “Weavers of Peace”. In addition to the bands there are readings of Sufi poetry. On the program are listed musicians from Sweden, Iran, south Africa, Portugal, Brazil, France, Turkey, Pakistan, Mauritania, Spain, Benin, India, Syria, Lebanon, and Uzbekistan. The London community Gospel Choir from the UK will be performing the last evening. There are to be art exhibits and films as well.
All the evening concerts are at Bab Makina (14th century King’s palace reception court). The afternoon concerts are in the sumptuous Moorish Palace of Dar Bat'ha, except the H'madcha Sufi drummers of Fez, concert will take place in the Roman ruins of Volubilis with Arc of Triumph (300 B.C.) as a backdrop. It sounds as if it will be grand. Fez is expecting a crowd.
During the time of obtaining my Residency Card, the trip to the Police was another lesson in frustration. They wanted me to return the next day and the “receipt” will be ready – thanks to some fancy linguistic dancing by Q; but they wanted a monthly bank statement. Yeah, that’s gona happen. I will take my “receipt” in every month for stamping and use their own technique against them. I will not take Q with me, and will act unable to understand even a word of French or Arabic, my only phrase will be a *shrug* and “Inshallah”. I also considered tears, I am not at all above using every tactic in such a situation.
After three months of dancing around the bureaucrats I took Sally the Aussie with me after giving her strict instructions not to let on she could understand anyone, because the idiot foreigner act was going pretty well. We arrived and I discovered what I had been doing wrong all these months. Obviously I should have taken an Australian with me from the start because I walked in and bada boom they handed me my residency card complete in its little plastic cover!
In my dealings with the police not once did I see a computer anywhere in the building and I was in the main offices upstairs as well. All the files are on paper and kept in the rickety file cabinet, the “confidential” files out on the desk in a cardboard box. It’s no wonder the guy is cranky.
I am most pleased I did not end in the Kasbah for murder of the chap who supervises the staff at the Villa, or any one of the three bureaucrats at the Police in charge of residency cards who must really love the sight of me as they had me come in once a bloody week, or the trying-to-be-helpful but instead landed me in a pile of yak droppings Austrian, or the pirate at the Customs office who kept ransoming my books, or the galactic undesirable who lost my "Harry Potter IV" DVD, or the repairman who got lost on the way from Casablanca to Fez stranding us without heat, or "Rat Face" who when told the light bulb needed replacing (the one in the very high ceiling) brought a metal ladder that had the legs held together with a red string to the door, along with a light bulb that has the wattage of a dying candle - and walked away; or the housekeeper who had been too "busy" to clean lately. All in all Rabat is much more calming on my state of being.
Q and I were discussing, what to do to resolve any moral questions, ethical dilemma, or military difficulty; I proffered that “I just think, what would Billy do?”
Q: “I find that really disturbing Mom. I guess I can just close my eyes and “think of England”.
Billy is my friend who is a special forces Marine in the U.S. A very fine chap who is a true Renaissance man, he can discuss military tactics and go right into philosophy without slowing for the turn.
You know I gave it some thought and I think serial killers should own a crematorium for convenience. It would cut down on littering the bodies all over. Yes, one too many James Patterson novels eh?
I saw an interesting sentence on the form I must fill out for the Residency card: “My sex is (optional item).” Think about it.
On the walk to the gym, speaking of the present and latest in a line of copy-cat killers in London; the self styled Jack the Ripper murderers Q was commenting on how prostitutes to this day remain a disposable population. “I read the blogs of a prostitute and a dominatrix,” she said as if informing me her subscription to the International Herald Tribune had just been renewed.
After I was done clutching my chest for the expected angina, I said, “Yep, four years at Penn.”
“I read them to get their point of view. It is part of my “Women’s studies” you know. “
“How do you know it is actually a prostitute? I ask, like I am inquiring after the credentials for a lawyer. “I read about one blog that was supposedly from a prostitute, but was in reality some teenager from Hoboken.”
“No, the woman who is a dominatrix has been quoted in ***’s column, he is very reputable; and she has a weekly column in the Seattle Times, “ she said.
“So she is not worried about getting arrested?”
“No, she doesn’t have sex with her clients, “she said.
“Then it is legal?” I asked getting quite an education. Now remember we are walking along the sidewalks of Morocco having this conversation as we doge the numerous and very deep holes that litter our way.
“Yea, she pays taxes,” Q. said.
“Man that is one tax form I would like to see,” I laughed.
All the evening concerts are at Bab Makina (14th century King’s palace reception court). The afternoon concerts are in the sumptuous Moorish Palace of Dar Bat'ha, except the H'madcha Sufi drummers of Fez, concert will take place in the Roman ruins of Volubilis with Arc of Triumph (300 B.C.) as a backdrop. It sounds as if it will be grand. Fez is expecting a crowd.
During the time of obtaining my Residency Card, the trip to the Police was another lesson in frustration. They wanted me to return the next day and the “receipt” will be ready – thanks to some fancy linguistic dancing by Q; but they wanted a monthly bank statement. Yeah, that’s gona happen. I will take my “receipt” in every month for stamping and use their own technique against them. I will not take Q with me, and will act unable to understand even a word of French or Arabic, my only phrase will be a *shrug* and “Inshallah”. I also considered tears, I am not at all above using every tactic in such a situation.
After three months of dancing around the bureaucrats I took Sally the Aussie with me after giving her strict instructions not to let on she could understand anyone, because the idiot foreigner act was going pretty well. We arrived and I discovered what I had been doing wrong all these months. Obviously I should have taken an Australian with me from the start because I walked in and bada boom they handed me my residency card complete in its little plastic cover!
In my dealings with the police not once did I see a computer anywhere in the building and I was in the main offices upstairs as well. All the files are on paper and kept in the rickety file cabinet, the “confidential” files out on the desk in a cardboard box. It’s no wonder the guy is cranky.
I am most pleased I did not end in the Kasbah for murder of the chap who supervises the staff at the Villa, or any one of the three bureaucrats at the Police in charge of residency cards who must really love the sight of me as they had me come in once a bloody week, or the trying-to-be-helpful but instead landed me in a pile of yak droppings Austrian, or the pirate at the Customs office who kept ransoming my books, or the galactic undesirable who lost my "Harry Potter IV" DVD, or the repairman who got lost on the way from Casablanca to Fez stranding us without heat, or "Rat Face" who when told the light bulb needed replacing (the one in the very high ceiling) brought a metal ladder that had the legs held together with a red string to the door, along with a light bulb that has the wattage of a dying candle - and walked away; or the housekeeper who had been too "busy" to clean lately. All in all Rabat is much more calming on my state of being.
Q and I were discussing, what to do to resolve any moral questions, ethical dilemma, or military difficulty; I proffered that “I just think, what would Billy do?”
Q: “I find that really disturbing Mom. I guess I can just close my eyes and “think of England”.
Billy is my friend who is a special forces Marine in the U.S. A very fine chap who is a true Renaissance man, he can discuss military tactics and go right into philosophy without slowing for the turn.
You know I gave it some thought and I think serial killers should own a crematorium for convenience. It would cut down on littering the bodies all over. Yes, one too many James Patterson novels eh?
I saw an interesting sentence on the form I must fill out for the Residency card: “My sex is (optional item).” Think about it.
On the walk to the gym, speaking of the present and latest in a line of copy-cat killers in London; the self styled Jack the Ripper murderers Q was commenting on how prostitutes to this day remain a disposable population. “I read the blogs of a prostitute and a dominatrix,” she said as if informing me her subscription to the International Herald Tribune had just been renewed.
After I was done clutching my chest for the expected angina, I said, “Yep, four years at Penn.”
“I read them to get their point of view. It is part of my “Women’s studies” you know. “
“How do you know it is actually a prostitute? I ask, like I am inquiring after the credentials for a lawyer. “I read about one blog that was supposedly from a prostitute, but was in reality some teenager from Hoboken.”
“No, the woman who is a dominatrix has been quoted in ***’s column, he is very reputable; and she has a weekly column in the Seattle Times, “ she said.
“So she is not worried about getting arrested?”
“No, she doesn’t have sex with her clients, “she said.
“Then it is legal?” I asked getting quite an education. Now remember we are walking along the sidewalks of Morocco having this conversation as we doge the numerous and very deep holes that litter our way.
“Yea, she pays taxes,” Q. said.
“Man that is one tax form I would like to see,” I laughed.
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