12/27 through 12/29/ - Marrakesh

At the Marrakesh bus station we spent some time researching places to stay. A cab driver who was hanging out at the station noticed we weren’t having any luck (a lot of visitors for the holidays made it difficult to find what we were looking for -he noticed all of our attempts of calling places). He suggested a riad that was close to the area where we wanted to stay (Riad Ammssaffan).

• We split up into two taxies; one couldn’t hold all of us plus our luggage. Driving in Marrakesh is CRAZY! There are no dividing lines on the road and there are just as many mopeds carrying multiple people as there are cars. In-between the cars and mopeds were donkeys pulling carts full of various building materials. The cabs were weaving in and out of the traffic barely missing the others on the road. I closed my eyes and prayed we wouldn’t hit anyone or have anyone run into us! We almost made it free and clear, but right when we pulled into the medina, BANG a moped crashed into the back of us! The driver of the moped seemed to be OK and just threw a dirty look at our taxi driver and rode off.

• We pulled up to Riad Ammssaffan and went inside to make sure it was somewhere we wanted to stay. The place was really nice and looked like something out of a movie. The rooms were the nicest we’ve seen since we’ve started to trip (and were $40 a night!). It would take too much time to describe all details, so hopefully the video will upload on to my blog site. Just like every other city we’ve visited in Morocco, we were immediately asked to please sit, relax and enjoy some mint tea. The tea served in this riad tasted kind of like spearmint –it was really good and probably my favorite so far.

• Our favorite part of Marrakesh was the “big square” which was in the Medina. In the day, the big square is packed with people selling fresh orange and grapefruit juice (which is SO good), snake charmers, women applying henna tattoos, people with monkeys, acrobats and mopeds full of people zipping through all the chaos. The square is outlined with restaurants that have rooftop decks where we ate most of our meals watching the locals and tourist enjoy the activities. At night, the square has pretty much the same stuff going on except about 30-50 make-shift little restaurants we set up –rows and rows of them selling snail soup, BBQ goat faces, kabobs, etc. We only made it to the night time restaurants one time and had fish, olives, bread and steak kabobs –all of it was very good.

• The path to the big square is lined with hundreds of souks each selling something different. Some sold babooshes (leather Moroccan slippers), scarves, carpets, t-shirts, knives, jewelry, strange meats, leather bags, jedi robes…sometimes the souk owners were making their products right in front of their shops and all for a “big welcome price.” Our first day in Marrakesh Caroline and I decided to go shopping and leave the boys to have their own first day experience. EVERYTHING in morocco is a negotiated price (hotels, cab rides, clothes, etc.). The first thing we bought (3 shirts) we negotiated them from 800 Durham to 150 Durham (about $13). The negotiation turned out to be the same routine each time: they give you a ridiculous price, they laugh at your first price and then sometimes you agree on a price and sometimes they let you walk out of their shop. If they really want you to buy something they’ll chase after you after you’ve left thier shop and say things like “scuse me, scuse me, OK, you have for your price.” There were a few times were they got angry with our price; truthfully, the negotiating got to be pretty exhausting and we ended up buying things from the few souks that had prices on their items (we found about 3 of these places). After our day of shopping we headed through the medina to our riad to meet up with the boys. The medina alleys all look the same so it was easy to get lost….we were unsure if our last turn was a left or right. We took the wrong turn and soon realized it when nothing looked familiar. On our way back to the “right” path, we ran into the boys who took the other wrong turn. After laughing about our mishap we heard about the boys’ afternoon.

• The boys met a man named Hammad in the grocery store. He introduced himself and after talking to them for a little while invited them to lunch to meet his wife and daughter (we read that these types of invitation are common). After gathering all the ingredients, they headed to his home where his wife cooked fresh fish and potatoes. Something they mentioned about the experience was that they didn’t eat off of plates. The meal was served on the glass coffee table and each person’s portion was eaten right off of the coffee table. The boys said Hammad’s wife was really nice and three year old daughter was adorable.

• They asked Hammad where we could go for dinner to see a belly dancing show; he offered to take us to his friends show that included dinner. Hammad picked us up that evening and we all crammed into his tiny car. He took us to his friends place to pick up VIP tickets (http://www.chateaudhakim.com/en/presentation_en.php). The place was huge and impressive…I felt really underdressed. After Hakium wrote up a VIP slip for us, we paid and soon left for the dinner show at Chez Ali (http://www.ilove-marrakesh.com/chezali/index_en.html). The food was really good (lamb, couscous & veggies and dessert). The entertainment was fun, but was kind of cheesy. We ended up naming the place Disneyland of Morocco.

• Overall I liked Marrakesh and enjoyed being in one place for a few nights. I LOVED our riad and the Moroccan feeling it provided. I’ll miss Morocco’s raw atmosphere and I really enjoyed all of our experiences, but I’m looking forward to Portugal where public affection is acceptable, prices aren’t negotiable and where toilet paper is more likely to be available than not.