Elbows out, Dentures in: Adventures in Morocco.

Just walking into the airport in Nimes to catch our $100 dollar flight to Morocco (why don't we have low cost airlines in Canada!?!?!)I had a feeling that we were going to be a little out of our element. The airport was puny and ours was the only flight out in the morning. There was a long line to check in and we were the only two non Arabic people in that line. The airport check in and security process was a terrible combination of French and Moroccan views on timeliness, ie.  painfully slow, inefficient and not at all concerned about it. We didn't even make it through security until well after the time the plane was supposed to leave. But apparently that was normal and no one really seemed too fussed about the fact that the plane left over an hour and a half late.

You don't really realize how strictly regulated airplane behavior is by both spoken and unspoken social norms until there is a complete absence of them. This flight was a complete and utter free for all.

Pull out other people's carry on out to make space for yours..... sure

Refuse to move out of the way for the beverage cart ... yup that makes tons of sense.

Elbow your neighbor repeatedly all flight without an apology ....I guess we aren't in Canada anymore

Stand up while the plane is landing... go ahead,  the flight attendants LOOOVEEE that.

And when the plane lands....it is like a bunch of gladiators entering the arena for a duel to the death. I wonder if everyone thought that the last person left on the plane was going to be killed or something. As a result it was apparently perfectly acceptable to  crawl over and/or push through people all in the hopes of getting into the already full aisle or out past the still locked doors.  I actually told off the 70 year old granny (in french) the third time she tried to physically assault me to get out into the aisle. She was surprisingly spry for her age as she tried to scale me.

While in-flight behavior was not really regimented, there were some strict rules outlined on safety instructions for an emergency landing. This is an important reminder for all that in case of emergency - leave your dentures on board. And don't forget to hold on tight to your skirt when exiting the plane.  Modesty would definitely be first and foremost on my mind if I was lucky enough to survive a plane crash.


My half shocking, half amusing plane ride was a small preview of the massive culture shock that I would experience throughout my brief stay in Northern Africa. Perhaps the thing that made us the most uncomfortable was the attitude of men towards women, especially foreign women. It seems to be culturally acceptable... No... Culturally encouraged, for men to make lewd and sexist comments as you walk by.  During the day it was a little less intrusive and if you stopped paying attention you could forget about the eyes blatantly staring at you and you could tune out the mutters as you walked around. But as soon as the sun began to set and the amount of men in the streets multiplied all bets were off and it became truly unnerving. Not unsafe or dangerous necessarily, but it certainly leaves you feeling frustrated and with a bad taste in your mouth.  It is quite the experience to have a guy follow you for 200 meters walking behind you and bending over to get a better view of your ass so he can loudly comment 'nice, nice, nice' with every step you take. Or having a guy cut you off so he can circle around you with elevator eyes and give you a long drawn out sexually charged "okay' as if it was necessary for him to pass judgement on your appearance.  I am soooo glad I passed the test ( insert extreme amounts of sarcasm here). Also despite there being cats everywhere in the Medina it was the men who hissed at us where ever we went. Check out the

 video to get an idea of what it is like to walk around in some Arabic countries as a women.

Another creeper

However after about a day and a half of this you start to just laugh it off. Some of their comments are down right humorous... Aka calling us the Spice girls ( because naturally all white girls are just like the spice girls) or saying we have beautiful eyes ( not sure how they noticed cuz their view was a whole lot more down south)  also we met a couple guys at the hostel and when we walked around with them they were hailed as princes and Muslim kings for having conquered us. While it is easy to laugh it off when you get to escape their behavior after the weekend it really saddens me to think of people growing up in that environment and being taught these attitudes and practices as a way of life. In talking with other travelers, apparently morocco is actually quite tame in comparison to some other Arabic nations like Egypt. Yikes.

It is a little sad that I have written this much of a blog post and not even gotten to talking about what we did or saw.  By the second day in Morocco I had developed a thicker skin and was able to focus on enjoying the City. Fez (or Fes en Francais) is an amazing city that has largely remained unchanged by the times. If you stood up on the roof of the hostel the view is largely the same as it would have been 100, 200, and even thousands of years ago (minus the satalite dishes).

no cars allowed in the medinas. Donkeys are the transport

not a skyscraper in sight

Washing time at the fountain

A play ground

  For me one of the most interesting things was to be in a city (and country) that is is so united and devoted to their religion. There are numerous mosques throughout the city including the third oldest one in the world. Sadly non Muslims are not allowed into the mosques but you can catch glimpses of their inner beauty when they open for prayer. The first time I heard the call to prayer echoing thoughout the medina I was in awe. The fact that almost everyone drops whatever they are doing to go to the mosque and worship 5 times a day in inspiring. I tried to catch the call to prayer rippling over the city at sunset but I am afraid it doesn't do it justice.

The Minarets of the mosque were the only landmarks in the Medina

 The actual Medina of Fez is mind blowingly intricate. Mind blowing both the size and the frustration level. Maps literally don't work.

You just have to memorize your way around over 9500 tiny little streets filled with maze like markets, majestic mosques as well as houses, ha-mams and schools.

School

 

There are some streets that are so narrow you have to turn sideways to fit through and some alleyways so dark you can't see where you are going.

 

Every review and blog of the city said that you should try to lose yourself in the Medina. As if that is a choice!!! After three days we could figure out how to get to the market but once we took a few turns in the market we could never find our route back to the hostel again. We always ended up lost. I usually am pretty good at keeping a sense of where we came from, what direction to major landmarks but but time and time again after wondering for 2 hours and just getting deeper and deeper I just had to throw my hands up and laugh.  They say you should just walk uphill to get out of the Medina... Simple enough. But that so does not work when you are staring at four different streets all of which will take you uphill and you haven't the faintest idea of which direction will take you home. It was a common occurrence to walk past a group of Moroccans sitting or standing and then a couple minutes later have to do a walk of shame back past them because we had reached a dead end or realized it was the wrong direction. Thankfully despite them rolling their eyes or laughing at us they did always point us in the right direction. But to give you a scope of just how lost we usually were we often had to ask more than ten different people to get us all the way back to an area we recognized.

 Finally on the third day we succeeded in just walking long enough to get ourselves to a place we recognized. And we found this cool shop where this man whittles and carves wood using his feet. I call that a successful day.

One of the highlights of the Medina were the Tanneries. All the beautiful leather products sold in the market are produced in a section of the Medina using methods from hundreds and hundreds of years ago. Surprisingly they somehow involve large vats of pigeon poop.
Unsurprisingly they don't smell very good.

   

The leather is then taken up onto the large nearby hill with some ruins and dried in the sun. We hiked up there to get some perspective on the Medina that we spend copious amounts of time lost within. It didnt really help out navigation much sadly.

Drying on tombs

Finished products

The food was fantastic. I cant emphasize that enough. All the couscous, Kebabs, Pastilla and Tangine that you could eat for the price of a coffee or tea in France. And free, delicious, warm mint tea to drink everywhere you go. Suffice to say I should probably go to the gym every day this week. Since it was the low season there were not a lot of tourists and all the restaurant owners went bananas when we walked by frantically trying to get us into their stalls. They would come across the market to block your path and shove a menu in your face. However we found a peaceful quiet restaurant with no crazy menu chasers and we ate there a couple of times. In fact the food was so good their and so inexpensive that on the last night I ordered two meals just because it was my last chance to try the different things. Luckily I was eating with a 6 foot five inch perpetually hungry new zealander so nothing went to waste.

When in doubt and in Morocco - order both!

As amazing as the city was, one of the highlights of this trip was actually the people we met at the hostel and got to experience the city with.  We met fellow Canadians and fellow language assistants as well as some Americans, Australians and New Zealanders. There were several passionate travellers at the hostel who have been on some amazing adventures and had some interesting stories to tell everything from getting tear gassed in Isreal to swimming to Asia.Yes you read that right... Swimming to ASIA! That one was Sarah, an American who is in the process of a 4 year long trip around the world retracing the steps and adventures of Richard Halliburton, a famous world traveler and author from nearly 100 years ago. She is blogging and writing a book about her adventures - very interesting stuff. On our last night there everyone went out for a fantastic dinner at our favorite restaurant and the interesting and varied conversation ranged from how to load an AK-47 (thank you Americans) to nuclear fusion.

A nice relaxing end to the trip... well more of the calm before the storm that was trying to get to the airport in the morning. But I am not even going to try and recount all of that drama. Suffice to say we barely made it to the airport on time to catch our flight and after rushing onto the plane we then sat there for an hour and a half while they waited for the sun to melt the ice on the wings. I guess de-icing machines are not prevalent in Africa like they are in Canada. I settled in for a nice relaxing nap. Thump. Or not, my new neighbor was once again having some difficulty with the boundaries of the armrests. Time to get my elbows out I guess. Are there rules against elbowing elderly women back? Probably eh?

Random goats outside the Medina. Sadly not in trees as I was promised. I guess I will have to go back to a different part of Morocco to see that.