Maddening Marrakech

I think I’ve been misrepresenting my feelings on Morocco in the hundreds thousands of text messages I dispatch to a myriad of friends and family from all corners of the globe (thanks T-Mobile! Thank you especially for not kicking us off the network even though you keep threatening to! And thank you to everyone who listens to me via text!). I think I’ve been messaging that I didn’t like Morocco, which isn’t true. Or rather, it’s only half true. The best way to describe my relationship with Morocco is…tumultuous. A love/hate thing. If it was 2005, I would label our relationship as “it’s complicated”, and if I were a modern-day teenager or Kardashian, I would definitely do the vicious “unfollow” on Morocco’s Instagram more than a few times, only to start following again a few days later. Suffice to say, we are still working things out.

A majority of the time, I was in awe of the colors, the tastes, the iconic scenery that is unlike anything I’ve ever seen before, the thrill of being in a place that is so different from my own home. There is truly nothing like wandering an ancient medina lane or seeing the Sahara dunes. I can’t believe that I have been in a place where mules trump trucks for hauling goods. The aesthetics of Morocco are stunning: the textiles, the spices, the palm trees, the color of the ancient walls.

Furthermore, so many of our positive memories in Morocco came from triumphing over the unfamiliar: the first time we made it to a restaurant in Fez without incident, when we successfully made it to the desert in the rental car, even the first time we stopped for a bathroom break on the Moroccan highway (unsurprising report: bathrooms at rest stops are gross everywhere!). There was so much joy, delight, and pride in our time in Morocco. The snacks were tasty, the riads cozy and beautiful. It remains one of the more tantalizing destinations we visited, and one I would actually like to return to.

Yet I can’t deny that at times, being there pissed me off like the ten-year old in my class that just won’t stop talking…in fact, sometimes it was the actual ten-year olds in Morocco that caused my frustration! My default negative emotion is anger. I very rarely feel sad, but in times of trouble, I get annoyed, frustrated, and downright furious. So I spent a good chunk of our time in Morocco mad at something (how fun for Ben!): the crooked cab drivers, the lack of public transit, the weasely rental car guys, the perpetual 10-20 year old boys who harassed and obstructed us all over the medina, and (most often) anger at myself for allowing any of this to get to me.

Furthermore, after delighting in what some would call suffocatingly rule-obsessed countries like Singapore and Germany, I know that a huge part of my frustration in Morocco comes from what makes it most charming and intoxicating: the lack of rigidity. Cabs in Morocco don’t have meters! There aren’t public busses, much less public busses that come on time! Products don’t have price tags! Sidewalks don’t exist, so everyone and every vehicle just mingles in the street! Thus, my exasperation in Morocco has less to do with the country itself, and much more to do with my own personality and preferences. As a tourist and a human, I like knowing rules so I can follow them. I like public transit because I don’t like being dependent on taxis. I hate bargaining because the outcome is uncertain. I tried to go with the flow, but I’ve found that traveling doesn’t mean one transforms into a different person. I only go and flow to a certain extent, and after that point I usually just want to go to bed. It isn’t Morocco’s fault that I am a boring rule-follower.

My girl.

Important note: one thing that I won’t blame on myself or my perspective is how men and boys treat tourists and women in Morocco. As I write this on the plane to our very last destination, I can safely say that in traveling to 25 countries and sticking out like sore thumb tourists in all of them, we didn’t experience anything even remotely close to what it was like to walk around Marrakech and Fez in any other place. It is a sign of my own privilege and circumstances that I’ve never felt as on edge about the men in my sphere as I was in Morocco. Every time we went anywhere, we were inevitably approached and often physically blocked by men and boys telling us that we were going the wrong way. When we ignored them, they followed us. It would often take several minutes to shake them off. More than once, a group of them circled us in a bid to confuse us and then “help” us out of quandary they created (we were doing just fine before they showed up, thank you very much). The circling up was claustrophobic, aggressive, and made me feel like I was on a TV show with the camera swirling around us. Those moments were deeply unpleasant. For the first time in years (but probably not the last! Teaching!), an adolescent boy called me a bitch because we ignored him when he told us a path was closed.

Streets in Morocco are NEVER CLOSED. This street had active construction happening and was never closed, and we picked our way through many a street just like this. Therefore, the whole thing is a scam.

Ben and I discussed this phenomena a lot, and ultimately concluded that it was unfair to judge a place based on the behavior of its young men and boys. As much as I love my students, I think we can all agree that kids this age can be real cretins at times. Every other Moroccan we met was deeply gracious, warm, and hospitable. In fact, in one of the “circle up around the tourists” incidents, a young woman chased them off and smacked the main assailant on the head. BLESS HER.

Furthermore, I would hate for visitors to my country to visit a classroom full of disrespectful teenagers or a raucous college bar and judge America based on those experiences. Having been in those classrooms (and having ducked various projectiles!) and those sticky-floored bars, I cringe at the thought of a kind Moroccan family seeing that gross part of our culture. Unfortunately for Morocco, their badly behaved boys aren’t hidden away in basements playing video games: they are hanging out in the very streets that hapless tourists like to wander. So the collision is an inevitable daily onslaught. I know all of this intellectually, yet I still had to gird myself every time we left our riad, and some nights I wanted to stay in our nice room and eat oranges instead of wade through the nasty attitudes outside. No matter the culture, it is not okay to make women feel unsafe or preyed upon, and that was a struggle for me in Morocco.

But enough psycho-cultural analysis. Marrakech! This is a place that is on many a dream vacation list. We spent five days in Marrakech after our mini-roadtrip to the Sahara Dessert, and despite the issues I mentioned above, exploring this city gave us some great memories, including many “only in Morocco” moments.

You just never know what you are going to see walking around.

First, a big part of the fun in Marrakech is staying at a riad. It is absolutely worth it to spend a little more on one of these beautiful, intricate guesthouses instead of staying at a typical hotel or trying to stay at a budget place. In Marrakech, you absolutely want to spend the money on accomodations. Our riad was done in all white, and had a beautiful tiled pool in the courtyard and an orange tree. Just being within the walls was special.

Moroccan breakfasts are incredible, although I do feel bad for whoever has to wash all of the tiny little bowls and dishes. Every morning, we got to eat this gourmet spread in the riad courtyard. Mint tea, coffee, the BEST orange juice, homemade bread, different jams, freshly made omelets…it was all so good.

ALL FOR US!

Once we dragged ourselves out of the riad, I really liked the food in Marrakech. I never got sick of chicken tagine (yum!), and there are a lot of Western options if you need a break from tagine and kebabs. We went to a great burger place in the middle of the medina, and some of my all-time favorite trip snacks (a high honor!) are in Marrakech: Moroccan pastries from a stall we found and then visited several times, and clementines from a cart around the corner from our riad. Both of these treats cost less than a dollar for a box of treats or 5-6 oranges, we got to know the vendors a little bit, and they were uncommonly delicious. I wish we had gone to one or two fancier or more popular restaurants during our time in Marrakech, but overall I really enjoyed the flavors in Morocco (more on that in a minute).

Other than snacking and lounging in the riad, three activities stand out from our time in Marrakech: the Majorelle Gardens, visiting a hammam, and taking a cooking class!

The Majorelle Gardens

This is the hot new thing in Marrakech: these beautiful gardens and two new museums opened in 2017. Apparently, Yves Saint Laurent was very into Marrakech and Moroccan culture, and it is through his support that this cultural center opened, with a lush garden, a museum about Yves Saint Laurent, and a museum of Berber culture.

Not being the fanciest of people, we declined on the Yves Saint Laurent museum and instead focused on the gorgeous trees, flowers, plants and overall design of the outdoor space. This was truly a fabulous oasis in the middle of a crowded, chaotic city, with fountains and all kinds of greenery. We noticed the cities in Morocco are sadly lacking in green space, so this was extra-appreciated.

After filling up with green joy outside, we headed into the Berber museum. This was awesome. Berbers are a size-able minority in modern Morocco (with about 14-20 million people), and their nomadic lifestyle and colorful textiles are a huge part of the lure of Morocco. Berber culture is ancient and multicultural: there have been tribes of Christian, Muslim, Jewish, and indigenous faith Berbers, and their intricate costumes were just incredible. Pictures are not allowed in the museum, but I did sneak one of this amazing headdress and necklace.  

Visiting A Hammam

What a memorable, “only in Morocco” experience! I’m so glad we did this, and I was thisclose to chickening out. A hammam is a traditional Moroccan bath which involves thorough exfoliation and black soap. There are many different kinds of hammam places in Marrakech, with most being targeted at tourists and more spa-like. However, we picked out a place that was, according to the internet, traditional in style but used to dealing with tourists. It was also quite a bit cheaper than the ones targeting Western tourists, at $15 a pop. So, perfect for us! Without really knowing what to expect, but with the ominous directions to bring an extra pair of underwear, we took the plunge.

While the place was easy to find by Marrakech standards (we only got turned around once or twice), once we got there we squeezed through this tiny, crumbling alleyway, past an old man sleeping next to a giant coal-fired boiler. I guess the hammam is heated the old fashioned way!

After parting ways and going to gender-seperate entrances, it was time to get scrubbed. I don’t have a ton of spa experience, but this was NOT a typical body treatment. The best way I can describe this hammam is that I was like a newborn kitten being taken care of by a very thorough and exeprienced mother cat.

Weird but true.

They have you strip down and lie facing down on a plastic mat in a dark room with a bunch of Moroccan ladies who are just doing their thing and do not care at all about your pasty tourist self. Ben described the room as a bathing dungeon, and I have to agree, but it was very clean and warm and I was happy to be there! Then, an oldish woman lugged over three or four giant buckets of water, put on this glove thing, and just started scrubbing hardall over. At one point, I was lying with my head in her lap while she scrubbed under my arm. Every inch is taken care of, and the whole thing is so ludicrous but also so great that I was holding back giggles the whole time. After this kind woman washed my hair (yes, that is part of it!), the grand finale is when they fling the remaining water in the huge buckets on you.

A pound lighter from all the skin that got scrubbed off, I floated out and met Ben, and we both agreed that our experience in the hammam was FABULOUS. Weird and very thorough and open, but fabulous. I’ll never forget this, and it was a unique experience unlike anything else we’ve done.

Cooking Class

This was the best thing we did in Marrakech! This is a city where organized fun is really, really beneficial. It helped us immensely to have a guide to break into the culture, explain everything, and get us to places we would have never explored on our own. Plus, when we take classes, we meet fellow travelers, including our favorite kind of people: Americans! We could not be more biased, but traveling internationally has made us appreciate the kindness and friendliness of Americans so much. Everyone in our class was lovely, but we especially enjoyed getting to know an awesome family that is currently stationed with the military in Germany. They told us all about traveling and living internationally with their children, and it was great to be around kids again. In fact, Bree, the mom in the family, has an amazing professional photography business and blog and wrote about our cooking class beautifully, and with far better pictures.

Another really cool aspect of the class we chose, Souk Cuisine, is that the first part of the class was actually a market tour and we bought a lot of the ingredients we would later use to cook. We all got a list, a pouch of money, and tote bags, and then followed our guide like a gaggle of ducklings into the market. I loved that for every category, there was a little stall specifically for that item. We visited the spice stall, got fresh sardines, walked around the tiny vegetable market, and saw some incredibly fresh (ie alive) chickens just waiting to be turned into tagine. Poor things.

After getting all of our ingredients, we walked back to this gorgeous riad where the class took place. Then, we started chopping, mixing, and putting together the best meal we had in Morocco.

A beautiful place for a cooking class!

Each group of us were assisted by wise Moroccan women who were deeply patient when it took me several minutes to skin a tomato, and laughed at our sad attempts to shape cookies. At one point, we took everything that needed to be baked to the communal oven around the corner. Traditionally, Moroccans did not have individual ovens, and would instead send everything that needed to be baked to this neighborhood institution. We saw a bunch of kids running this errand, taking trays of dough to the bakeries. A wonderful tradition.

Once everything was ready, we sat down and ate the incredible food in the lovely, orange-tree shaded courtyard accompanied by wine and great company. The food was SO GOOD. It absolutely belongs in the Top 10 meals of this trip. This was a perfect end to our time in Marrakech, and such a positive way to finish what had been a turbulent, thought-provoking few weeks in Morocco.