Nov 27, 2006

Alien

I feel a stranger in this land.
Where every step the gods command.
I breathe and children wander fatherless,
Through fields that spent their happiness.
I grieve.
Take them away to a higher place.
Give me a day 'cos I'm losing (face)

And I've never felt so alien.
Yes I've never felt so alien.

I feel danger every day,
With every stone we throw away.
Careful it's falling,
And who will sing a difference song?
I hope to God it won't be long.
Believe.
Show me a way to a higher place.
Why is there sunshine on my guilty face?

Yes You are brighter than the sun.
Only Your love can make us one.
Jesus You're brighter than the sun.
Only Your love.

-Delirious

Nov 19, 2006

Final Thoughts and Travel Suggestions

So after leaving Fes, we went to London where J hosted us for a few days in her serviced apartment, and Woe joined us from Toronto for the weekend. It was a fairly low key affair, we didn't do too much except for a one day bus tour of Salisbury, Stonehenge and Bath.

It was interesting to note that one day for a car and driver in Morocco cost only about 25% more than the price for 1 person on the bus tour.

I've actually switched over to the new Blogger Beta, and went through the old articles and inserted photos, so if you haven't read up on them, they're a little more interesting with the photos. I've also uploaded a couple more from the UK onto my flickr. I've had some people ask about travelling to Morocco, so I've put down some thoughts here.

So the original fantasy trip would have been a budget trip from Spain, across Gibraltar to Morocco, then across the northern coast of Africa to Egypt via train or ferry. However, given the amount of time we were going to spend in Spain, and wanting to spend some time in London, I pretty much decided to cut down the scope to Morocco only. Tunisia, Algeria, and Libya also require visas for entry, so staying in Morocco avoided having to deal with that.

Destinations
The next decision was really what to cover. There's a fairly wide range of things to see and do in Morocco. We wanted to stay with some people for some time, and elected to stay in Casablanca for four days, leaving us a week to travel. It really isn't much time to cover Morocco, but it is enough for an interesting trip.

The original plan was to cover the major cities, Casablanca, Rabat, Meknes, Fes and Marrakech, and possibly all the way down to Essouaira. These are all connected by train, and the train system is fairly easy to use and reasonably priced (but more expensive than say, India). This would have been a fairly easy trip to plan on the fly. We had bought a first class ticket from Casablanca to Fes a day in advance, with no problems. It might be more difficult in high season. This was the compromise plan, which was compromising my being able to go with the limited time budget.

However, after a few email exchanges with Jeff Wilson of ExperienceIt! Tours, I realized that I could in fact cover a lot more variety of geography, see the Middle and High Atlas and the Sahara, all within a week. This was something I'd much rather do. I originally decided against this, because these areas aren't well serviced by trains, and buses are prone to delays. On a 1 week trip, a bad delay on the edge of the Sahara could mean I'd miss my flight home. The alternative we got was the private grande taxi. Although I have a few minor complaints with this experience, I'd certainly recommend this route if you want to cover a lot of area with a limited time. The main drawback of the route we took was that more time was spent on the road than really exploring. More on the grande taxi later.

If you want to cover the more remote areas like the High Atlas or the Sahara, I would not recommend local buses unless you really don't care for comfort and you have a lot of time on your hands in case of contingencies. The bus we saw in Erfoud looked old and beat up, more of a school bus than a coach you'd find in North America or Europe. The majority of the other western travellers we saw out there were either on private cars, or organized tours in 10-seat vans.

The 2002 edition of the Morocco Lonely Planet I had covered a bit on trekking in the High Atlas, but I probably would not have managed it on my own. It's definitely a true backpacking affair, with tents and sleeping bags and now showers. In most of the small villages out there, there are no hotels or even hostels. If you want to be housed, you'd have to find a local Berber family who would be willing to house you. And out there, not everyone speaks French. The driver told us that the suggested way would be to hire a local guide, but I really have no idea how you'd find one, other than to search for one in Fes or Marrakech.

The other interesting thing I saw were organized bike tours. Some of these actually had SUVs that would pick people up along the way so that they wouldn't have to cover the entire range by bicycle.

Of all the places we stayed (Casablanca, Fes, Erfoud, Merzouga, Tinghir, Marrakech), I would suggest that perhaps Erfoud and Tinghir could be cut out, but that basically means you take a long drive, without seeing anything to get to Merzouga and the desert (which is cool, but the dunes of sand get repetitive pretty quick, although it's good for peace and tranquility), and another long drive to Marrakech.

Casablanca is good for about a day, it's not really a tourist city with a lot of tourist sites. In fact, most of the tourist nightlife is in the Corniche, which we didn't really cover much of. We felt like we covered Fes pretty well in a day with our guide. You might stay longer if you wanted to do shopping. After a day in Marrakech, I felt like there was potentially a bit more that we could see, but I was still fairly satisfied. Of the 3, Marrakech was definitely the most interesting in terms of atmosphere, and Casablanca the most dull and modern.

We didn't notice too much happening in the mountains, except for the scenery you see while driving through and little stands and villages where locals sell honey, fossils, or minerals/gemstones. The main draw would be the trekking. The villages are mostly Berber, and even the french out there seemed a bit limited. Having an Arabic or Berber speaking guide was the way to go.

Of course, there's tonnes of areas we didn't cover (a bunch of the main cities, the Rif mountains and the north (although it sounds like the main draw there is the weed), and the balmy south.

In Country Transportation
I already mentioned that the trains are pretty good (for the cities they connect), and that I like the grande taxis. We didn't actually go on any buses, but the ones I saw made me uneasy, and I'm willing to go the ghetto route. The other way seems to be organized groups, which is the way we saw most western travellers doing it. I think you can book a van at some of the hotels, or book a tour in advance. Depending on your personality, you might like to go with that; it's not really my thing.

My main complaint on the taxi was that it seemed like the driver had his own agenda and suggested shops, and if we wanted things our way, we had to really push for it (although we did get our way in the end, which you're just not going to get on a tour bus). In retrospect, a solution might be to offer a "tip" up front and make it clear that you don't want to be taken to the average tourist spots.

It's a bit expensive, but if you have two or three people, the cost is not overly extravagant. As I mentioned, compared to the price of a bus tour in London, it's actually pretty cheap. You get the benefit of being on time, setting your own schedule (although at some points, your schedule might be dictated by weather or safety, i.e. avoiding driving through the treacherous mountain roads at night). The route we took covered a good deal of ground, and to be honest, we did spend a lot of the daytime in the car. I'm not sure if it's possible to arrange for the driver to drive at night, I haven't tried that.

In City Transportation
The petit taxi are very inexpensive. The drivers seem to mostly be native Arabic speakers, but there's a range of how much French they know. Occasionally you'll find one who can speak some English. About half our taxi experiences involved some kind of rip off, from taking the scenic route, to not resetting the meter and trying to blackmail us with the high meter reading. Keep in mind that the extra we paid (or refused to pay) was in the order of $0.50 to maybe $2-3, but the fares themselves are in that range.

First I would recommend that you make sure the cab driver resets the counter before you close the door and the cab starts moving. In our case, we had noticed the counter, but the cab was already moving and the cabbie, good naturedly waved it off and said it was fine. Don't let this happen to you. The other thing to be aware of is occasionally taxi drivers will take a second (or third) passenger if your cab is not full, and if the passenger is on the way. In this way, they make a bit of extra money, since the meters handle this. The first passenger pays for the full cost of his trip from when he got on to when he got off, the second passenger pays for his/her portion of the journey. The cabbie hence gets double for the section covered by both. I'm skeptical of this, since if the cabbie has to make a detour, someone ends up paying extra, but it's part of the system.

Hotels
Originally, I didn't plan to stay in nice hotels, but in the end, the 3 star hotels were worth it for the washroom facilities which were quite useful. Within the bigger cities, it seemed like there was plenty of choice in terms of food, and the hotel dining is not recommended (unless you're at one of the 5 star places, they supposedly have very good food). Out in the boonies, the main restaurants are in the hotels, and the ones we had were pretty decent. The alternative restaurants in the towns/villages looked risky. Especially out in the boonies, I recommend sticking with at least a decent hotel. You either eat at the restaurant so to avoid any problems, or you take your risks and enjoy the convenience and luxury of the clean and private bathrooms when the gamble goes the wrong way.

The unfortunate side is that most reasonable clean restaurants in the boonies cater to tourists, and they all feature a variety of tagines, couscous, omlettes and brochettes (kebabs) that get repetitive after a while. The more adventurous street food is more interesting, but you know how that goes.

We didn't book any of the hotels personally, so I'm not sure about the price. In Marrakech we were housed in the Riad Omar, right by the square. I'd recommend staying at a nicer Riad close to the center of the medina just once during the trip, the experience is worth it. Note that most Riads are older buildings, and while they may be decorated nicely and air conditioned, there will be issues like poor sound insulation or poor drainage. If you need privacy, you ought to specify it. I noticed the Riad Omar had some suites that were not facing the main atrium and hence were much quieter.

The nightlife in most cities seem to be centered around hotel bars and discos in the nicer hotels. And in almost all the cities, these tend to be in the hotels in the ville nouvelle instead of in the medina. If you want to stay up, you should stay near these places. Our timing was low season, so the two bars we tried checking out were both pretty dismal. I recommend just not planning for this. Walk the medina till it closes, and then go to bed.

Hammams
Yes, these are an intrinsic part of Moroccan life and not to be missed. I put it off until the end of the trip, and by that time I was a little weary and not too adventurous, so I skipped out on the public bath experience.

Culture
If you've been to another developing nation, Morocco isn't too much of a shock. If you've only lived in develop nations, it could take a bit of getting used to. Note that the main languages are Arabic, French, and in the rural areas, Berber. It seems like you can get almost anywhere with Arabic, and all but the most rural places in French. At tourist destinations, you'll find that a number of locals know Spanish, and a good deal know a few words of Japanese, at least enough to try to sell you something. I highly recommend on brushing up on the French. It's absolutely worth it. You'll find a decent number of English speakers in tourist areas, but even there you may occasionally find English useless. Once you're out of a tourist hotspot, English is rare.

If you're Asian, you'll likely get pestered unceasingly with "konnichiwa" and "arrigato", especially in more commercial tourist areas. I've noticed that I got less attention travelling alone than when I was with Jason (greater spending power between 2 people?). You'll also notice yourself being stared at a lot, especially from kids. I got used to being a novelty.

My impression of most Moroccans are that they carry themselves with a very stern and almost angry face, but that is merely a facade, and most everyone I've talked to was warm and welcoming. If you find yourself lost, often you can smile and ask a stony faced old man, and he'll break into a smile and give you all the help he can. You'll find a lot of people will approach and talk to tourists. I started out suspicious of everyone, but it seemed to come down to some people wanting to sell you bring you to a friend or family member's store, sell you drugs, beggars or just want to have a friendly conversation. Of all of these, I found the drug dealers the most amicable. They'll start up a chat, and after getting friendly, they'll offer drugs. If you turn them down, they'll let you go in a most friendly way. Beggars, Conversationalists and salesmen are much more difficult to get rid of, and it's hard to tell the difference between latter the two. I have been wary about pickpockets trying to distract me with conversation while working, but I have usually had my hands in my pockets and never run into problems here.

Getting In and Out of Country
For the sake of expediency, we flew in from Malaga to Casablanca, and for cost, we took EasyJet from Marrakech to London on the way out. Orbitz featured some really cheap fares from Malaga on Regional Air Lines. However, you can't actually buy them on Orbitz, and in reality these fares no longer exist. It's actually quite pricey to fly from Malaga to Casablanca.

I talked to a number of people who drove down to Gibraltar and took the ferry over. Apparently the ferry cost of a car with two people is almost equivalent to two people travelling without a car. I found that hard to believe. It's also possible to bus down to Gibraltar and take the ferry, but I've had numerous people recommend me against taking the ferry from Gibraltar to Tangier, unless you know what you're doing. Apparently there's a lot of frauds at the station, and it's easy to get onto a fake taxi or what not and get ripped off.

The best prices for flights to Morocco from North America seems to be via some European city where you can find a discount airline that flies to Marrakech, Tangier, or Casablanca. There's a number of discount airlines in Europe. EasyJet and RyanAir, based in the UK, seem to be really big ones, and Atlas-Blue is a discount airline that services Morocco (mostly Marrakech) to a few other European cities including Paris. Note that the discount airlines usually offer flights from a secondary airport, so, for example, if you travel to London Heathrow, you'll need to transfer over to Gatwick or Stansted which takes a significant amount of time. I'd recommend staying a day or two in the European city of choice just to make it worthwhile. This part does take a deal of research, especially if you end up planning a multi-hop vacation (but I think it's worth it).

Nov 14, 2006

The Last Day

We had one more full day in Marrakesh, which started with a guide and ended up with some of our own wandering. Our guide, Fouad, showed up at our hotel at 9:30 along with Driss. This guy was quite the opposite of Halid, our previous guide in Fes. Fouad was a balding and slightly overwight man in his 50s, with a weak grasp of th English languag that was barely sufficient to pass himself off as an English guide. To cover this, he would exclaim "beautiful day" (it certainly was) every five minutes or so when he was at a loss of something better to say.
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Fouad and Driss took us to a few of the sights in the city, of which none really stood out as noteworthy or memorable.

Halid seemed to enjoy showing us the mosques and madresas, the religious buildings that Islamic life flowed through. Fouad avoided these; its possible that Driss had told him that we'd already seen them in Fes, but it seemed like Fouad himself was uninterested. "Did you see a madresa in Fes?", he asked, "well you've seen them all". Instead he showed us the palaces in Marrakesh, his favourite quarters being the harems, his favourite tidbits being the facts about wives and concubines (Islam allows 4 and 40 of them, respectively, although Fouad indicated having more than one was costly, perhaps trying to inspire some sort of sympathy from us that would bring more tip). He threw in a bunch of profanities here and there to demonstrate his mastery of English, which was funny in a way, but I must admit I was laughing at him and not with him.
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The tour ended with a short trip through two shops in the market, oddly, since this was probably the day he could convince us to buy souvenirs. In any case, the tour ended far sooner than we expected, which wasn't a bad thing since we weren't getting much out of it. Driss mentioned that Fouads misogynist humour often went well with tourists, which made me feel a little guilty for encouraging the sad little act.
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After driving us around the ville nouvelle as we requested, Driss made his move to slip away and make his leave from us. I'm pretty sure he was supposed to be our driver for the rest of the day, and drop us off at the airport the next morning. However, our interest was mostly in the souks (markets) of the medina that were mostly pedestrian, and we were hoping that he was eager to return home to his wife and daughter, so we bid him adieu with a grateful tip and started wandering on our own. Even in retrospect, the only use we might have made with the car was to get a ride to some of the bars or clubs in the ville nouvelle in the evening. However, if they were like the ones in Fes, it probably wouldn't have been a worthwhile trip anyways.
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We spent the afternoon wandering with the Lonely Planet, looking for food and checking out the Museum of Moroccan art, which turned out to be closed from noon til 3pm, and pretty lame when we returned after 3. There was another Museum of the Friends of Marrakesh mentioned, which seemed to have potential, but at this point we were tired, and in need of a toilet, and the beautiful day seemed to have faded with the want of Fouads pronouncements, and drops of water had started falling from the sky. We returned to the hotel for a break.

At some point after this Jason fell asleep and I realized that the rain was light and petering off, so I made my way back into the medina. I would have to say that the majority of the shops aren't that appealing to me. There were many shops selling spices and dates (which were good, but I didn't want to risk bringing back potential diarrhea for anyone), metal work plates, local style clothing and shoes, wooden sculptures and jewellry boxes made from a fragrant wood, carpets, and jewellry. On the whole, the quality of the items was mediocre, the finish wasn't quite there, and slight imperfections, the hallmark of inexpensive manual labour, abounded.

Occasionally there was a shop carrying quality goods, but they commanded prices similar to North American retail. A cheap metal bracelet might cost 10 drms in one of the shops selling junk, whereas the shops carrying real silver might ask dor over 1000 drms (and you could try your luck bargaining it down).

I ended up spending almost all of the little cash I had on hand on a little rug that could be suitable as a gift. As much as I enjoy the negotiating process (some people hate it), in the end it this way of purchasing is entirely unrewarding for me. Instead of feeling proud that I paid %50 of the original price, I inevitably end up feeling ripped off, suspecting that I probably should have argued it down to something like %10-%25. The process seems like a game, with each side vying for the better position, but it always ends with the seller agreeing on a price, upon which my heart sinks as I realize that was too quick, and I should have been harded and driven it lower.

Anyways, I'll let bygones be bygones, and I continued to wander with my camera over my shoulder and the recent acquisition in a little package under my arm, until I realised it was dark, and I had reached an area where there were few tourists about. I pulled out my compass and attempted to make may way southwest to the square, but as I headed west, I realized all the southbound streets were little empty alleys.

After wandering about an hour, I started getting rather hungry, and dropped into a pharmacy to ask for directions, upon which the kind pharmacist promptly laughed at me and told me to take a cab. I tried to tell her I wanted to walk, but she only instructed her assistant to hail me a cab and instruct thr driver to the square for me.
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In the end I was grateful for the kindness; I was headed in the right direction, but the number of turns required would probably have taken me another hour to make it back on my own. The cab drive brought me down to having about the equivalent of $2 in my pocket, but I was back for dinner.

Jason wasn't around, so I left a note at our room and headed up to the restaurant, which did have some slightly more interesting tagines, and I ordered a rabbit tagine preceeded with a salad. Halfway through the meal Jason showed up, and we recounted our shopping stories. The food was not bad, but the service was absolutely horrid, so I didn't bother waiting for the desert and lovely mint tea.
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Instead, we headed out to the square, and found a rooftop patio overlooking the square to enjoy a coffee. Sitting in a cafe, just cahtting with a friend while watching people bustle by was one of the great enjoyments of morocco. Doing this in the cool evening air, overlooking the liveliness of the square was absolutely incredible.
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We returned to the square for another evening of being accosted by people shouting "konnichiwa" and following us around, trying to pull is into their food stalls. Tonight however, we were prepared with castanets (finger cymbals) that Jason had scored, and we managed to turn the tables on them a few times, mostly leading to some shock and confusion on their part, and some good laughs for us.

We headed in as the life in the square wound down around midnight. The next morning, we packed and met a driver that Driss had arranged to take us to the airport on his behalf. We managed to spend all our remaining dirhams on two coffees in the departure lounge, and toasted the end of an unforgettable adventure.
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Nov 13, 2006

Marrakech

Now on the night we arrived in Marrakech, my digestive system was still in pretty bad shape (in fact, it still isn't back to normal yet). On the plus side, my lunch had stayed in for the length of the drive to Marrakech, and even then it didn't feel too bad. This was an encouragement. Jason on the other hand, wasn't doing so hot, but being the trooper he is, we forged out into the Djmaa.

So far, our experience of nightlife in Morocco has been pretty tame. While Marrakech doesn't run late, it's incredibly lively from sunset onto 11pm or midnight. The Jna is a huge square, that's mostly empty during the day. Surrounding the Jna are a number of cafes, some with terrace patios. The daytime crowd tends to hang around these cafes overlooking people in the square. At night, the square fills up with a number of food stalls and street performers.
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There's a huge number of brightly lit food stalls, but there are a few different food types that are cloned through the various stalls. The biggest ones had a windowed case of kebabs and and also had a variety of deep fried seafood. These ones tended to have the most publicists, who would run out to tourists and lure them into their stalls, sometimes forcibly. Jason and I got pretty sick of the calls of "konnichiwa" and "arrigato" from these guys. I never ended up eating from these stalls, since they seemed to serve foods that were fairly typical.
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Now given my poor digestive condition, I probably shouldn't have touched anything, and I knew it, but Jason had to start it off by ordering some fresh orange juice from some stands that had citrus juices. The floodgates having been opened by the one who could barely stay off the toilet, I figured I might as well give it a shot. You only live once.

The first thing that caught my eye really was a street food I had previously seen on some evenings in other cities, large vats of escargot. It was 5 drms for a small order (50 cents?) that was a bowl of maybe 10 or 15 snals. You stand at the stall and use the toothpick to pick out your snails, tossing the shells into the large pile at the stall, perhaps sipping a little of the heavily peppered (but lightly salted) soup.
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From there I moved on the the mutton stall, which had a number of roasted lamb heads on display (you could order them and eat them if you'd liked), but I stuck with the stew, and tried some sheep tongue. The stew was only about 10 drms, and the tongue seemed to have been thrown in for free, since the chef seemed to have built up some rapport with us.
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From there we took a further look, and passed over some stalls that served harrira soup and dates (we already had that in Fes), and others with lots of eggs, serving some sort of egg dish (had eggs, Berber style, for lunch). The next one we hit up was deep fried fish and chips, with some of the most excellent deep fried fish I've had. It had a very light, perfectly salted, and extremely crispy batter (not the fluffy beer batter you'd get on a north american style fish and chips). The fries were also fresh and hot. They were served with a salsa-like pureed tomato sauce (that was also popular at some other food stalls). I was under the impression we were over charged a bit on this one, costing us 20 drms for fish and chips, but it was still rather cheap. At this point, Jason also gave into the temptation of food that's not recommended for a bad stomach.
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From there, we noticed some stalls serving tea. We gave that a shot, they served some chocolate/spice cake, that really wasn't very good in my opinion, being pasty and much less sweet than the tea it was being served with. The spiced tea (no milk, unlike indian chai), was incredibly hot and spicy, and aromatic too. I loved it, although it was too spicy for Jason.

For the last item we were drawn to huge plumes of grease smoke, coming from a flaming grill upon which some fatty skewers and sausages were being cooked on. We ordered one serving of the breakfast sized links of allegedly beef sausage (although I would have guessed that they were lamb). They were incredibly meaty, and non greasy, and only 7 drms for a little plate.

Having had quite enough (actually, way too much), we moved on to the less well lit areas, were large crowds had congregated around the various shows. I'd say there were primarily three types. One was a storyteller, telling some story we had absolutely no understanding of, but they drew large crowds with their animated recantations. The next were the musical groups, highly percussive with drums and traditional stringed instruments. These guys weren't as professional as the dinner show we saw in Fes, and the rancour from the various different "bands" pounding away in close proximity to each other left more of a sense of energetic anarchy than cultured music, but they gathered plenty of spectators, both tourists and locals. The last were the guys hawking medical cures, with tables of dried animals and bits of bark, and exotic herbs imported from China. Despite the sales pitch being in arabic, one can easily tell from the delivery, that the conviction of the salesmen far exceeded those of North American paid TV commericals.
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We enjoyed the bustling atmosphere for a while, but pretty soon the call of nature beckoned us back to the safety of the hotel for the night.

Crossing the River

It might sound romantic to some, a night in the Sahara, with the sand dunes as your pillow and the stars forming a canopy over your head. To others, the idea of sleeping in the frigid night, with the sand crunching in between your teeth, the camels galloping around in the background, and the people in the next tent rustling might not be the best way to spend the evening, when a proper hotel with a proper bed and shower might only be a couple of miles away. It's really a matter of perspective. Except that the full moon is actually really bright, especially if you're used to sleeping in the dark.

I actually didn't end up sleeping well, but I still have to say it's quite an experience to see the camels running around under the light of the moon in the middle of the night. Early in the morning we hiked back up to the top of the tall sand dune, to watch the sun rise. There were some clouds on the horizon, so we missed the actual event, but soon after the sun, higher in the sky, rose about the clouds and made the reddish brown sand resplendant in every direction.

Jason had brought his Bible up, and had his own moment on top of the dunes.
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We returned to the breakfast at the camp, and quickly packed up for a camel ride back out. Back at the hotel in Marzouga, we had to wait a little while for our driver. In the meantime we had a chat with one of the camelmen, Moha, a Berber who had been working as a camel guide into the Erg for quite some time. He was trying to trade his Berber shoes for our Nikes.

From the hotel we heade back to Erfoud on the Land Rover, where we got back into our grand taxi to head to Marrakesh. The return trip was two days of mostly driving. We'd start from Erfoud and briefly visit the Todra Gorge, then stay in a town called Tinghir. The next day we'd make our way first to Ourzazate, then over the mountains to Marrakesh. Although long, I'd have to say it wasn't a dull drive as we watched the scenery change from desert wasteland to patches of oases, then to mountain and then back down to plains.
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Our drive to the Todra Gorge and Tinghir was not too eventful. Of primary interest were small town after small town that we passed through as we made our way through the edge of the Sahara. Little towns, almost clones of each other from our foreign perspective, repeated themselves, with the same architecture of pink buuldings, the same storefronts, the same donkey carts and women enshrined head to toe in black. The people we had met in Casablanca were all working to create businesses that would allow them a work visa. Out here in these villages though, the chances of seeing any spiritual influence other than Islam seems dim, unless perhaps some organizations working to alleviate the poverty might show up. In the towns out here, many of the working men are seasonal labourers in Europe, hopefully sending some of their earnings back to their families.

The Todra Gorge is indeed a rather impressive gorge with sheer walls rising up some 300+ feet. we walked along the river at the bottom, and noticed foreign rock climbers who had come to conquer the stone walls. There's a tourist village of restaurants and services at the bottom of the Gorge. The overall size isn't that impressive when compared to features like the Grand Canyon, but it was a nice stop during the day of driving. When we made it to Tinghir, Jason went to bed, struggling with whatever bug was still having its way with his insides. Driss took me to another "artisan exhibition" of Berber goods, where the same process of "buy or no buy, we are still friends", "don't buy one, buy more, I'll give you a good price", and "I'm sorry, but you have expensive tastes" was repeated.
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The food at the Hotel Kasbah Tizimi in Tinghir was actually very good (had cous cous, with harissa, the local hot sauce). Since Jason stayed in bed, I ended up having dinner with Driss, we danced around topics of religion, family, filial piety, and why one ought to buy presents for ones parents when travelling. I have to say, the Muslims here certainly have their religious faith and everyday breadwinning tightly integrated. The oddity of this fairly comfortable hotel was the shower, where botht he toilet and shower sat behind the shower curtain that stopped about a foot off the ground, guaranteeing a good sized pond in the bathroom after a shower.

The next day was November 7, and as we came out of our hotel room located on the rooftop, we noticed that it was wet out, and it had been raining during the night. As we made our way towards Ourzazate, there were occasional spots where a stream from the rainfall had overrun the road. We'd see a section of asphalt ahead disappear under reddish brown rippling waters. Luckily our car was able to navigate over all these instances. Locals continued about their business in the rain, and on more than one occasion we saw women in hajib walking along the highway with baskets balanced on their heads despite the rain and wind.
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We stopped briefly in Ourzazate to see casbah that had once belonged to some wealthy chieftan near the early 20th century. The town of Ourzazate is home to a thriving film industry. There are a number of studios with soundstages here, and a lot of moviemaking is done in the desert-like countryside. After the casbah, it was a short drive to Ait Ben Haddou, a classic looking Berber village built up the side of a hill. The locals were rather proud that part of the Gladiator was filmed here.

It was still raining at this time. As we got out of the car and walked towards the village, it was clear that a rushing river blocked our path. Some entrepreneuring locals with horses stood by the river, offering a ride across the rushing waters. We took up the offer (it only ended up being 50 drms total for the 3 of us). On the other side, the ground was a bit muddy, but turned to rock on the way up. The village was pretty quiet. There are few locals that live there, and the ones that do run various shops for tourists. I did notice a woman on a loom weaving a rug through an open doorway. There were few other tourists given the rain, and we made our way all the way to the top of the hill (despite our guide giving up at the top of the village). There were only ruins at the top, but it was clear that at one point, this hill had been a commanding location. One could see in miles in all directions, with a clear view of the river and the plains below.
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The rain let up as we left Ait Ben Haddou and headed into the High Atlas mountains (a different mountain range than the Middle Atlas we had passed through on the way from Fes to Erfoud). The hills near Ourzazate grew into towering mountains with deep valleys. The towns changed from the pink buildings of the Saharan villages to terraced Berber houses, where the entrance of one house would be on the roof of the one below it, much in the same ancient style of Ait Ben Haddou. In the larger towns, minarets would tower above the town, the central landmark much like the way church spires stood in small European villages.
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The missed photograph was a brilliant quarter rainbow against the mountainside, as light streamed through the clouds, painting spots on the rock face that dropped hundreds of feet into a valley below.

We had a brief stop for Berber omlettes (eggs in a tagine pot, cooked with spiced oil and cumin), and some sort of Berber porridge for Jason, and from there we started the descent in the winding, mountain roads, somewhat treacherous in the rain that was occasionally starting and stopping.
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As the sun set, we hit the foothills and eventually the plains. The drive was now treacherous in the dark, with nothing to light the roads, not even the reflectors we're used to in California. The road no longer contained hairpin turns, but even around the wider turns, there was always the danger of seeing a donkey cart loom up instantly in the headlights. Passing cars on the two lane highway was occasionally frightening, but eventually we saw the signs of civilization grow as we slowly made our way into Marrakesh. The lights in the distance closed in, and eventually we crossed the outer walls, and made our way into the medina, the old city, and towards the Djmaa El Fna, the famous city square that defines Marrakesh. Our hotel, the Riad Omar, was located right off the pedestrian square. After the extended ride, I couldn't wait to explore the bustling medina.

Nov 9, 2006

Wandering in the Desert


In the US, the Bible belt where the fundamentalist Christians reside tend to be more rural farmland. Likewise, in Morocco, the cosmopolitan cities of Casablanca and Fes appear much more liberal than less developed areas, if judged only by women's fashions.

The next morning, we were taken back to Rissani to see the souk, or local market. While we had already been through the medinas (old city areas) of Casablanca and Fes, we were still surprised to see sellers hawking fresh fruits and vegetables to women, almost all in hajib, and the vast majority in all black. Donkey and human drawn carts routinely wound their way through the crowded streets.

Beyond the stalls was an open area with numerous donkeys braying, roped to posts, with the occasional horse thrown in for good measure. The equivalent of a used car lot, old men in julabas (traditional cloak) bargained, apparently angrily, over their beasts of burden. In the corner two men reshoed a horse as the owner watched nearby.
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Beyond were additional stalls, filled with cows, sheep and goats. This was not your average Californian farmers market. After were other markets, for clothing, woodworking, and dates, given that it was just nearing the end of the date harvest.
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After the souk we were taken to see two casbahs nearby. A casbah is a walled city or fortress, usually accessible by two or more gates and made of mud and straw. The first we visited served as a town. Houses are all attached to one another, and two stories (plus the roof). The streets, mostly smelling of animal filth, were occasionally tunnels under some architecture of the casbah. Dark sections were plentiful, but we saw that the walls were wired for flourescent light for nighttime.
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The dirt paths might better be described as gutters, with the two sides raised and a wide trench in the middle for clearing rainwater. This certainly wouldn't be a pleasant place in a rainstorm. Driss brought us to a Berber woman's home in the casbah. Although she looked far better off than the nomads living in tents, the relative poverty of the place was still apparent from the darkness, the smell, and the flies. On her roof was a satellite dish; this is still seen as a luxury item in North America, but in Europe, there's a good quantity of free satellite programming, so the dish is pretty much the equivalent of a TV antenna and fills the skyline of any Moroccan city.
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Given the religious atmosphere, it would seem to me that either TV broadcasts or Internet access might be the only exposure to the gospel that people might have here.

As we left, Jason tipped the lady 20 drms, and she grabbed onto him, repeating something in Berber. From her tone it sounded like she wanted more, but our guide said it was actually profuse gratitude (for about $2.50).

The next stop was another casbah nearby, this one a crumbling 300 year old palace. The outer walls still stood, as well as some of the rooms with their lofty decorated ceilings surrounding sunny, paved, courtyards and gardens. An old army official maintained the harem quarters (since the palace is still property of the king), and had invited musicians and guests for an afternoon of entertainment when we toured the palace.
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We had luch back in Erfoud, at a nondescript restaurant in the nouvelle ville. I just had a salad in hopes that my oncoming stomach troubles would work themselves out (they persisted). On the way back to the hotel, Driss dropped us by a "workshop" where they worked a local marble that is filled with fossilized shells. The pieces would actually make great countertops or sinks in a fancy home, but that's not for us.
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Back at the hotel, there was a rugged Land Rover waiting for us. Within a half hour, we were out on a 4x4 track in the desert, a flat and rocky barren plain that stretched into a horizon hazy with dust. There were little spots of weeds here and there, but nothing close to the dry shrubs that are typical of the deserts in California. Along the dirt path in this wilderness, there were one or two nomad tents, with tables of rocks and trinkets, manned by children and aimed at tourists.
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It was about an hours drive into the Sahara (pronounced exotically as Za-ha-ra, with well enunciated syllables and a rolling R) where we were able to see the golden red hues of the Erg Chebbai rising in the haze of the horizon. It reminded me of the dunes in Death Valley, but instead of seeing the patch of dunes in California, it was a wide, expansive stretch. We had arrived in Merzouga, but from where we were there wasn't much of a town to be seen, just a few, well spaced casbah hotels.
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We pulled into the Auberge Dunes D'Or, which was going under massive renovations as a pool was being put into one of the courtyards. We checked in and pulled out our toilletries and long sleeved clothes as we left out bags in the hotel and jumped onto two camels lead by two Berber teenagers on foot.

They led us about an hour into the desert. A camel ride isn't exactly the most comfortable method of travel, with bumps in the ride that tending to shift you into the wrong position, so that the camels hump or bumps in the saddle poke at the wrong places with each step. I was constantly considering whether to get off and walk. It might have been a good idea.
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Photographs cannot describe the vastness of the dunes, with no point of reference, I was mostly able to get pictures of piles of sand, but I'll assure readers that the piles were very big, and grand, and stretched quite far. The Erg in Morocco is not as big as ones that cover much of Algeria or Tunisia, and only takes a few hours of trekking to reach from one end to the other. Inside though, you certainly feel the vastness around you as you cannot see an end to the sand.

As the sun had set, we made our way around a huge sand dune. As we came around the far side, we saw a patch of tiny palm trees and tents, an oasis used by the hotels. Each hotel had a camp of three or four Berber style tents. Although it feels sufficiently remote, its not quite isolated. Voices and laughter can be heard from nearby camps, and within a camp, tents are side by side. There is definitely no electricity or running water. There is a shallow well from which water can be scooped out from, and I never discovered whether bathroom facilities were available since we didn't wander to all the other camps. It seemed like all the camps were serviced by a couple of Berber families, and the kids that did all the cooking often ran between the various camps.
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We happened to be the only two people in our camp, and as we arrived, some Berber kids pulled out a large rug, two mattresses, and a small table and set it up in the courtyard formed by the tents in the light of the full rising moon. It brought a new meaning to the phrase "prepared a table".

As the kids started cooking something up on a gas stove in one of the tents that served as a kitchen (with walls of straw mats!?) , Jason and I started hiking up the giant sand hill, 150m in height. With numerous stops and laboured breathing, we eventually made it up to the top. From that virtual mountain we saw the sea of dunes spread beneath us, a landscape of lines and shadows in the moonlight. The kerosene lanterns of the camps shone below as the quiet and cool desert wind blew constantly from the east.
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After some failed photos in the dark, and a moment to enjoy the peacefulness, we ran, screaming down the steep slopes of the dunes. We washed our hands in the water of the oasis, and returned to hot chicken tagine and bread on the table, with carrots, onions and potatoes. The hearty meal was perfect after the hike, and luckily for me, no immediate adverse reactions kicked in.
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Immediately after dinner, we were brought thick blankets and asked if we prefered to sleep outside or in the tents. We decided on outside. The clouds and the bright moon excluded all but the brightest few stars. As the kids took the dishes and the table and retired somewhere, so we also settled into the mattress that were previously our seats, under the shelter of the sky.
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Nov 7, 2006

The Exodus Story

Our pastor Scott Grant seems to have two favourite Biblical themes, the Exodus and the Woman at the Well. These themes are repeated in the Bible, and Scott loves to find them in various stories through the Old and New Testaments.

Jason, having just quit his fulltime position at Microsoft, has beem trying to find his own Exodus story, and the next part of the trip has to be the Wilderness.
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Our driver, Driss, showed up a little late at our hotel. I have to say I was a little annxious waiting for him, both as to whether he would show up and whether we'd get along with him. He would be our driver for the next 6 days, and I suspect a good relationship could make all the difference in this trip.

The first day consisted of mostly driving from Fes to Erfoud, a town on the edge of the Sahara that's ysed for tourists for staging excursions into the desert. Along the way, we drove over the Middle Atlas mountain range. It reminded me a bit of Nevada or Arizona, or southeastern California, rocky with small dry shrubs dotting the landscape. Huge sedimentary rock formations were all around, and the layers were visible, often at an angle.

Occasionally there are small stands at the side of the road, selling honey, rocks containing fossilized shells, or crystallized minerals or figuerines carved from them. The other common sight were nomadic shepherds tending their flocks, and sometimes tents or huts.
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Eventually we got to the river Ziz, which carved a valley in the rock that was filled with green date palms, an oasis in the rocky mountains. Along the way here, terraced Berber houses lined the valley walls. On the roofs, piles of dates were being dried, the fresher ones yellow, the drier ones brown. We happened to hit the annual date harvest season.
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For lunch, Driss brought us to a typical tourist restaurant. It was built in a kasbah style, with three tour buses parked out in front. This had me annoyed. If I wanted bus tour food, I would have asked for a bus tour. I suspected he was bringing us there for the kickbacks. However, being fairly non-confrontational, I was just going to suck it up and deal with it.
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Jason saw my disdain though, and walked us right out of the restaurant and asked Driss for another, more local choice. It's funny how one of us would be "daring" in ways the other is totally uncomfortable with. I'm not sure which part of the wilderness journey this would be (I'll need a post-mortem with Jason on this), but we ended up at an empty truck stop, with the three of us, the owner, a cat and a beggar. The three of us ate a rather tasty chicken tagine on a plastic patio table with our hands. In retrospect, this could have been the big mistake of the trip, but it was certainly off the beaten path.
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I'm not sure if it was my cynical side, but I noticed that Driss got a lot quieter after we declined the fancy restaurant. Jason thought maybe he was hungry and we made him drive further, but I'm suspicious that we screwed some business deal of his.
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He did cheer up as Jason asked him for a suggestion for a better place to have dinner than the hotel since it was my birthday. He immediately picked up his phone and set up something special for that evening, and was back to his semi-cheery self.

We arrived at the Hotel Kasbah Tizimi in Erfoud around sunset. It was more roomy than the one in Fes, with a better air conditioner, and no mosquitos in the room. The shower was a bit odd, with the showerhead mounted about chest level and having no curtains. Like all the other showers we've seen in this country, the shower head is handheld and attached with a hose.
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The hotel was located a bit out of the town center, but once we walked out we were accosted by kids who either wanted to sell us trinkets or guide us to the "downtown" where their friends owned shops. We let one 15 year old Hassan lead us along after he hounded us for a good 10 minutes. He took us to a shop where Jason bought a head scarf for the desert, for 70dms (from 150dms).
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We headed back to the hotel, where Driss met us to take us to the home of some Tuoregs, nomads of the Sahara.

Driss had driven us to the nearby town of Rissini, to a large building where we were greeted by a gentleman in traditional dress named Abdul. He led us into a large room in what was obviously a large carpet shop, with walls lined with rugs. It really was rather beautiful and expensive looking. We had a seat by the wall as Abdul opened up a thick orange rug in the middle of the room (dyed with saffron, as we later found out) and set up a short table and invited us to make ourselves at home. His cousin Ali joined us and they told us how their family would travel in the Sahara in caravans and find tribes in the desert with whom they would trade.

After some time, the food came out, a large flatbread, much like the inch tall circular breads seen in shops all over, except that this one was maybe 18 inches in diameter, rather than the typical 6. As they cut it up though, we realized the inside was filled with spiced meat, liver and onions. It wasn't just bread, it was a meal. They told us this was a special Toureg dish, which I appreciated, since everywhere else we've seen the same couscous, tajines, and brochettes.
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The food was pretty good (could have used a bit more salt, but I've noticed every restaurant tends to be low sodium here), and we ate to our fill. It was followed by fruit and tea. The lights then dimmed as they bought out a birthday cake, complete with my name mispelled in icing and candles, and Ali pounding away on a hand drum.

This was all quite festive, and I was getting kinda cheery, but it was after the cake that the magic happened. Ali got up and gave us the grand exhibition of their carpet collection, from tribes of nomads, berbers, touregs and bedouin. He said they were called kirim, meaning message, as the design of each rug held a story, with symbols and icons representing different facets of tribal life.

By the time he was done, the large floor was covered in carpets, Ali was sweating, I was asked which ones I liked, and Jason was on the porcelain throne.

"What style do you like?", asked Ali, "Buy or no buy, we are still friend" (a line I've heard a number of times after this incident). "Pick which ones you don't like", he saidn dutifully folding up and tossing aside the ones I disregarded.
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Franlky I wasn't interested in most of the carpets. Even though they're made of wool, and varied between basic and intricate designs, most where fairly rough to touch. After saying no to his various carpets for a good 20 minutes, and feeling almost guilty for the dinner and festivities, Jason reappeared and I buckled and picked a few that didn't feel so rough.

"Buy more, we give you a good price", said Ali, trying to get us to buy 6 or more, "sell them to your friends". Eventually after we had a few that we liked, he pulled out some paper and a pen and wrote down some prices. I was aghast, with rugs I figure to be $50 coming in at $250 or so. "I cannot help you have expansive tastes", said Ali. "I can sell you 500dms rug ($60)", pulling a huge gaudy coloured monster out, "but it is cotton and. synthetic dye".

Eventually we went from 8 or so rugs down to 2, and talked the price of the two rugs from 5400 dms to 2250. "Just a little more", said Ali, which, we figured means we hit a good price. In retrospect he might have been happy with less, but we bumped it to 2500 (too used to dealing with nice round numbers).

Driss chimed in (all part of the game), "they're young, give them a break. Maybe when they're older they'll come back for more, ensh'allah". Ali looked disappointed and started to roll up the carpet. We had struck a deal. Jason paid by credit card, and our rugs were packed up and we were ushered out. We also paid 300dms for the dinner.
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Driss seemed quite cheery as he popped in Bob Marley for the drive back to the hotel.

Nov 5, 2006

Libitibito!

I'm sorry I'm a few days behind on the blog, but right now I'm standing on top of a 150m tall sand dune in the western sahara and the sunrise is spectacular!
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Tourist Time!

I think I managed to upload all of my Casablanca photos before our internet connection crapped out, and I was getting too lazy to write a huge post on the blackberry.

I'll try to do a quick review of the last two days. While I arranged the first half of the trip (admittedly with large chunks unplanned except for the host we were staying with), I found myself running out of time and booking a tour with an agency specializing in Morocco.

That pretty much involved us checking their website and finding the suggested tour sounded interesting, emailed them with the time and place we would start and end, and commented that we'd like to try an Anthony Bourdain style goat in the desert. The agency asked me the level of hotel I wanted to go with and quoted me a price a few days later.

The first part of the trip we spent a lot of free time wandering semi-aimlessly and hitting gold occasionally on things that we stumbled upon. Although rewarding, it definitely chewed up a lot of time, and there were things like the Catedral in Granada we missed out on.

Fes began the first part if the agency planned trip. After getting off the train, we followed directions to get to a hotel arranged by the agent, where a mention of the name of our travel agent set things in motion that whirled beyond our comprehension, in arabic.
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The hotel price was half board and included dinner. I figured we could give it a shot since we were staying two days. Foodwise it was a bad call, but easy on the pocketbook. At least we had a taste of chicken tagine and meat skewers. The hotel was very basic, and clean enough. There were towels and soap provided, and even an old air conditioner, which helped since we had to bunker down after finding mosquitos in the room.

The next day we met a guide in the foyer at a preset time. Our guide, Halid, dressed in a sports jacket, was a little cold at first, but soon warmed up. He opted to walk initially instead of taking a cab, and I have to admit that I was initially suspicious of him for bring cheap and minimizing costs.
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However, he turned out to be an awesome guide. He basically took us through all the sites mentioned in the lonely planet, all efficiently. It was probably also much quicker since it was a friday, the muslim equivalent of sunday, and many shops were closed and the medina uncrowded. While we weren't allowed inside a mosque, we did get to see a madresa, a Koran school, Some of the sites, like the tannery or carpet coop, included both an informatiobal aspect and a sales aspect. Our guide stayed completely out of the sales aspect, even helping us to get away from salesmen quickly.
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He seemed like a pretty devout Muslim, and was very enthusiastic about explaining various aspects of. his faith. He also dropped us off at a restaurant for lunch as he. headed to the mosque. The tourist. restaurant was very nice inside and served very good food, six or so moroccan salads, a chicken pastilla and a beef tagine, with fruit and tea for dessert.
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Stuff we talked about reminded me of conversations I've had with co-workers that really showed that I didn't have a good understanding of Islam. Often I've been told of the 5 pillars of Islam that must be followed for entrance to heaven, which certainly makes it sound as I one is earning his or her way there. However, they also believe that if you're not quite good enough, the prophet Mohammad has the power to forgive you and grant entrance to heaven. While this certainly clashes directly with Christianity, it also bears the same image of a gracious God, who offers salvation and forgiveness by grace.
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After lunch he brought us to see a few more places we asked to see. We had asked about dinner, and he not only suggested a place, but also brought us there to check it out for our approval before making a reservation and arranging a ride for us.

We tried to take a cab back to the new city, but given that it was friday, cabs were few. He ended up negotiating a ride on some random guys minivan. The van reminded me of the starting scene from the Insider, but it worked out well.
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We spent the afternoon wandering the ville nouveau, which could have been a poorer neighbourhood of a european cities with city streets. We had coffee and fanta and sat and chatted business and watched people for a long while, which seemed appropriate for a cafe.

We returned to our hotel to meet our ride. Instead we got the owner of the hotel with a cab and a call from Halid appologizing about not sending a proper ride. The dinner menu was similar to the lunch, we ordered a harissa soup, pigeon pastilla and a roast lamb (complete with smoky wood flavour, but with no salt) and enjoyed the two hour show with live music, singing, drum performance, belly dance and magic show.
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With the guide, the day was full yet still relaxing. It didn't feel as adventurous but I thought it was a worthwhile way to see Fes.