I'm currently listening to Toto's "Africa" on repeat while I write this: we were singing this song all weekend as we traversed the medinas of Techaun, Tanger, and Chef-Chaoun. It was a really cool trip and I'll try to recount what I remember here for posterity's sake since I forgot to bring my journal on the trip and I think I'll lose steam if I have to write all of this for a second time by-hand.
Day 1 - Friday, October 16: We left Granada by bus at 1:00 pm - Spain time. We had a few difficulties with an ATM machine prior to leaving - something strange about it not wanting to give Carrie any money in exchange for her debit card... so we had to run to the bus with our backpacks and purses bouncing along behind us. We made it just in time and settled in for a roughly three hour ride to the ferry pier in Algeciras. We stopped at Malaga to pick up some other travelers and arrived at the ferry pier 48-students strong.
The ferry ride to Morocco is only about an hour long. The ferries are different from the ones in Seattle: no white and green sides or round windows for the Spanish ferries. These boats are big. I'm not sure if you can take cars on: I'm assuming you can, but the car area is completely hidden from foot-traffic. The upper area looks a bit like a cruise ship, with a large area at the back of the ship where you can sit in nice, plush chairs and watch the sea through large, floor-to-ceiling windows.
We went outside on the deck and took some tourist pics and then settled in to watch the scene from the comfort of our seats. The sea in this area is so full of ships it looks like a child's bathtub during a mock-naval battle; tankers, pleasure craft, other ferries are all crammed into this narrow stretch of sea that is the gateway to the Mediterranean (or to the Atlantic depending on how you look at it). We passed by the Rock of Gibraltar on our way out of port. I don't know much about Gibraltar, so I'm going to have to do some research on it now that I have internet access again.
The ferry lands in Ceuta, which is actually Spanish territory. The city looks Spanish - they had a SuperSol (Spanish grocery store) and a Burger King - and the architecture is very Spanish as well. I opened my mouth to say that I felt like we hadn't left Spain when we hit the border.
The border was very, very busy. There were people and cars and trash everywhere and very little sense of order, although everyone seemed to know where they were going and when it was their turn. Groups of hooded and clothing-encapsulated women gathered in clusters at the border next to men in much more modern, Western clothing. A washing machine sat in the middle of the parking lot next to a group of vans that looked like they'd come straight out of a Hollywood movie about the desert/the Middle East etc. Many men chose to turn their cars off, put them into neutral, and push them through the border to save on gas.
We had to wait for a while at the border - it does take time to check 50 peoples' passports. We also got to sit through a swine flu check. A doctor boarded the bus and pointed some kind of temperature-taking gun at our foreheads. The bus was silent while he did this: you could tell everyone was super nervous because none of us wanted to be taken off the bus and put in quarantine somewhere at the border. Luckily, no one had a fever, so we were allowed to pass through and head towards our hotel.
We also picked up our guide at the border. His name was Abdul or "Michael Douglas" as he encouraged us to call him. Apparently, past groups have said he looks a little like Michael Douglas: I saw the resemblance only after he'd pointed it out to me. He was quite the character. He spoke Swahili, Arabic, English, French, and Spanish fluently. Quite impressive.
We reached the hotel where they had dinner waiting for us. It was some kind of vegetable soup which smelled like red cabbage but was yellow as well as a plate of fried fish, potatoes, and veggies. Then it was off to bed!
Day 2 - Saturday, October 17: We woke up early and had breakfast at the hotel. I've eaten more carbs on this trip than I care to admit, but Morocco really takes the cake in the carb-loading department (no pun intended). Breakfast was either some kind of Moroccon flat-bread with honey and butter (yum), cornbread-like round cakes with butter and honey (yum), croissants, coffee cake of some kind, or these large, round wheat rolls. It was all very good, but by day 3 we were all making jokes about giving birth to Peter "Pans" (pan means 'bread' in Spanish) because we'd all consumed so much bread.
We went to Tetuan in the morning. Tetuan is a city that used to be controlled by both the French and the Spanish. We drove around the city a bit and then got out of the bus for a walk through the Medina. The Medina is the old city center than contains the market and houses for a large number of people. The streets are incredibly narrow and winding (no cars here) and the buildings lean over the walkways or are built over the walkways so you feel like you're walking through a maze. It's a little claustrophobic at times.
We walked through the food portion of the market: incredibly strong smells, lots of flies, lots of food. I was tempted to become a vegetarian after experiencing this part of the medina. Chickens are butchered in front of you and there are tons of whole fish lying in the streets, staring at you with lifeless eyes. There were also bags and bags of beans, lentils, grains, and nuts and piles of fresh fruit and vegetables. Freshly baked bread was stacked five, six, and seven loaves high. This all would have been incredibly appetizing and wonderful had it not been for the man plucking a chicken in the background, the overwhelming smell of rotting fish, and the flies covering everything.
We also saw men making clothing, selling spools of silk, and visited a rug bazaar where we saw piles and piles of handmade rungs and blankets for sale.
We finished off the visit with an authentic Moroccon lunch at a hidden restaurant in the center of the Medina. We had a heaping plate of couscous, chicken (I couldn't bring myself to eat any of the actual chicken after seeing the birdies in the market), carrots, potatoes, onions, and some other kind of root vegetable. There was also sweet mint tea, soup, and cookies for dessert. Yum! Musicians came in during lunch and played traditional Moroccon music for us. Once we'd finished a man came in and danced around while balancing a tray covered in lighted candles on his head. It was pretty cool.
After lunch, we piled back on the bus and drove to Tangier. Tangier is located on the coast and is a bigger, more touristy city. We drove up to a point that had a lighthouse and beautiful views of the ocean where the Atlantic meets the Mediterranean. You could see the waves and the currents where the two bodies of water meet. It was very beautiful. We also walked around the medina in Tangier, but it wasn't nearly as interesting as the one in Tetuan.
Dinner at the hotel was kebobs, french fries (not really Moroccon), carrots (yum) and a bowl of fruit.
Day 3 - Sunday, October 18: We got up early and left the hotel at 7:00 am to head to Chef-Chaouen - a two hour drive from our hotel. The route to Chef-Chaouen took us through the mountains and was absolutely beautiful. We wound through the peaks as the sun rose over the mountains and tried hard to stay awake and take in all of the scenery.
Chef-Chaouen itself is perched on the hillside of one of these gigantic mountains. It is an absolutely beautiful little town in an absolutely beautiful location and is by far the prettiest place I've visited so far on this trip. The streets of the medina here are also small and winding, but afford breathtaking views of the mountains and the valley below. The buildings are all painted white or some shade of blue - no other colors are allowed - and they are repainted 5 or 6 times a year. The colors are incredible! Each door has a different shape, color, and personality here. I had to stop myself from taking pictures of all of them.
We had lunch at a hotel with incredible views of the mountains surrounding the town. Lunch was delicious once again. It was some kind of pot-roast cooked with potatoes, leeks, carrots, and onions plus lots of bread. YUM!
After lunch, it was back on the bus, back to Ceuta, back on the ferry, back to Spain. We didn't get home until after midnight last night, but it was well worth it.
Reflections:
- It was weird to see all of the women completely covered. There were different degrees of coverage: most women wore a floor-length, longsleeved garment with pants underneath as well as a head scarf, while some women were in just pants and long-sleeved jackets (keep in mind it was in the upper 80s here). A few were wearing full burkas. We dressed fairly conservatively while there (scarves, tee-shirts and jackets, long skirts or pants), but I still felt uncomfortable around some of the men in the streets sometimes.
- Women don't go to bars or restaurants. Every cafe we drove past was full of only men. I stuck my head into one of the bars we walked by because I could hear a soccer game and all of the men turned and stared at me. It was a little uncomfortable.
- You need to be good at bartering to shop here.
- Women don't sell things in the streets except for vegetables and occasionally herbs. All the other stores are operated by men - even when the women have made the crafts.
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