I was with Aziz when three men wearing djellaba and carrying traditional native instruments approached us, twisting their heads to twirl the tassels on top of their fez hats.
"Do not mind them," said Aziz. "They will go away for 20 dirham."
As I fetched for the appropriate baksheesh in my pocket, I stumbled on a loose cobblestone and came close to another merchant's live, and rather perturbed, cobra.
"Do not mind him. For 50 dirham, you can step on his cobra."
I realize that on Thursdays I tend to write of beaches, bars, and Cleveland. Well, as used to be said in the heyday of this medium, it's my weblog. Perhaps it's time for something more exotic. As summer now begins its inevitable surrender, it may be time for a travelogue.
My wife and I, having attended one of those mandated conferences a few years ago that usually carry with them all of the interest one would expect of an experience that needs to be mandated, heard a truism that altered our thinking; or at least made more urgent our planning.
The conference was about retirement [the fourth or fifth retirement conference that I've attended during my career; the first being just two weeks after I was ordained]. The speaker said, "Remember, you will not always be able-bodied."
I realized that we were putting off some things until some future date, travels that really did depend on our being able bodied. As we had both experienced some minor orthopedic surgery that year, and since there I had an outstanding invitation to lecture in Sydney, we began the first phase of what was to become a three-stage circumnavigation. The only rule was to spend as little of the journey in air travel as possible, so that we might see and feel the vastness of the world and richness of its cultures.
So, in the first stage, we traveled from Seattle to Sydney by ship with stops in Oahu, Maui, Fiji, Vanuatu, and New Caledonia. In stage two, we traveled from Florida to Spain by ship, with stops in the Canary Islands and Gibraltar. After spending a few days in Barcelona, where I delivered a lecture, we weren't ready for the trip to end, especially since we were literally in sight of Africa when we passed from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean, so we traveled by train and ferry through Portugal and into Morocco, ending with a week in Marrakesh.
You know those things you've always wanted to do, but maybe thought you wouldn't quite experience? For us, one was to tour [and maybe shop in] the vast marketplace in the Medina, or old city, of Marrakesh. Since the Medina is a rabbit warren of narrow, twisting alleyways filled with shops that sell, well, everything, and since the Fodor's guidebook, some Cockney on a travel show, and the hotel's concierge all suggested strongly that we would get lost in the souks, we hired Mr. Aziz, a bi-lingual scholar, bon vivant, and former resident of Oklahoma City, to be our guide. He was perfect.
[For those wondering, a guide charges 100 dirham an hour; about 10 bucks. Aziz was originally hired for 4 hours but enjoyed our company so much, and was so thankful we weren't French, that he spent 8 hours with us, offering the second 4 hours for free. Naturally, that did not stand and I paid him for his time and with a generous tip. So much so, that Allah was thanked many times upon our parting.]
So, here was our day, rendered in photos:
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| The one and only...Mr. Aziz |
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| The plaza of an ancient sultan's palace |
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| Examples, here and below, of the magnificent Islamic tile work |
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| And now, on to the marketplace in the Medina |
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| Aziz on scooter patrol; they really whiz by at considerable speed and expect pedestrians to get out of their way |
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| A common sight is a door knocker representative of the Hand of Fatima, a good fortune portent |
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| The souks |
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| Jimi Hendrix and Mick Jagger slept here |
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| The plaza was just setting up when we were there. They were a little slower than usual as it was 108 degrees at noon and it was Ramadan |
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| Aziz leading us into the depths of the souks; the sign that is center right is for Le Maison de Souks, perhaps the only place to get real Moroccan jewelry and rugs. Yeah, I bought a couple of rugs. |
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| After my near mishap with the cobra, Aziz took care to point out hazards to me |
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| Such colors in this country |
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| Between the heat, closeness, pedestrian traffic, and fumes from the scooters and the leatherworkers' skinned animal flesh and glue, I think I was in a dispossessed state for most of the day. That may explain the rugs I bought. |
Anyway, that's our travelogue for this week. It's a fine country where the old-fashioned Muslim values of hospitality and serenity are found in abundance.