Morocco impressions

Marrakech: hot, frenetic, oversaturated with entrepreneurial energy, beautiful and hyper-stimulating, but neither energetically nourishing nor relaxing, at least not in ways that some cities can be for me.

Agadir: "developed" for tourists, with a nice public beach, and an unappealing infrastructure of three-story white and pink cement hotels all but on top of each other in the blocks closest to the ocean, and sprawls of gray cement constructions abandoned and uncompleted. Orange taxis zip back and forth in between (the man who leased us the rental car, an inexplicably brand new Renault, on the taxis: "I call them--cockroaches! They are everywhere!")

Mirleft: beautiful seaside town, very mellow, mellow locals, some mellow hippies and surfers, who are presumably the vanguard of the rich French owners of the ritzy villas, with gates and guards, currently under construction along the coast. (cyberanya: there is a little bit of the Matrix feel, although without those horrid faux-rasta/hippie/court jester crossover hats). Fruit market, slightly green but delicious bananas, succulent oranges, ruins of a fort on the hilltop aboe the city.

Oh, we were there right before the local elections, and there was a lot of activity and enthusiasm about this. Every street was covered in political brochures and leaflets, and at night people drove around in pickup trucks honking, basically rallying for their candidates. It was pretty awesome to see.

Fionn was a little trooper, but I think overall the whole thing was OTT for him. He got very sick on our first day in Marrakech--he was probably already getting sick by the time we were getting on the plane, but we didn't realize it until he started running a really high fever that night. So instead of seeing the souks and the gardens of the city, we made friends with a taxi driver who schlepped us to the policlinic and then to the pharmacy (Fionn was pronounced to have streptococcal pharyngitus and prescribed antibiotics, which he consumed enthusiastically, as they appear to be sticky-sweet). He was all better a day later, as we set out for the coast. I think all the moving around was kind of overwhelming for him. The 5-hour bus ride made him understandably cranky, and his sleeping and eating cycles were all kinds of messed up. He loved the ocean, and was fascinated with/terrified of the waves, wading into them and running away from the approaching ones for hours on end. Mirleft is across the road from a long stretch of the essentially wild coast, so it's little beach after little beach after each bend. You can't really swim there as the current is incredibly strong and the waves are pretty big--every day we were there was a black flag day--but just body-surfing on the waves is tons of fun, even very close to the shore.

When we got back to Marrakech it was even hotter than it had been a few days before. Apparently while we were on the coast, the temperature had risen to 45 C. Our last day there it was only (!) 38 C. Somehow I emerged from the souks with a ring that reminds me simultaneously of the night sky and of circus magicians' costumes. It is beautiful, but I don't know the name of the stone. It shimmers exactly like another, more common stone that I have heard called both "sunstone" and "sandstone" but according to google both of those are inaccurate--anyway, this one is violet in hue, rather than sandy-golden-red, the color of the other stone which I will now apparently also have to look up (I used to know its official name, maybe it will come to me...it's an "ite" of some sort). {ETA: I think it's blue goldstone?] Anyway, also on our last day we accidentally discovered the place in Marrakech to go to if one wishes to procure drugs, as we sat in this little park, trying to get Fionn to nap, and then I went to find an ATM, and in the ten minutes that I was gone, like five drug dealers approached theophile. Then we went to the airport, got stuck in the glacial passport control line, where simulatenously some dude was being maybe-detained and also 50% of the booth staff left (for lunch? forever?), and they had to hold the plane for us because that's how long it took to get our exit stamps. Then I realized that the flight I had booked got into Brussels too late for us to catch the last train home, as the trains between Brussels and Nearby Belgian Town were still running, but the train from Nearby Belgian Town and Our Town was done for the night. We were all prepared to camp out in the train station until the morning trains started up again, but then no conductor ever came on the train that we did catch, for that first (and longest) leg of the journey. This meant that we ended up getting a free (normally expensive) train ride, and that was the sign from the universe that we needed to get a cab for the final half-hour ride back home...of course, immediately upon our return, Fionn, who had been asking to "go home, go home!" immediately started asking for "ocean again!" and "baby go on the plane again."

Oh, and for books, I read yet another Marge Piercey procured from the local library, "Sex Wars" which I really liked, even though I don't usually seek out historical fiction--but I like historical fiction about NYC in the tenement era, so that worked. After I finished that, I relied on the universe to send me books that float around when you are traveling. In addition to the Ambush By Coehlo, the Cosmic Library of Travelers also sent my way a Maeve Binchly book, which I enjoyed (I had never read anything by her after "The Circle of Friends" back in high school when the movie of it came out with Minnie Driver and Chris O'Donnell, who, by the way, looked a lot like my high school boyfriend with whom I had gone to see that movie) and "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao" which I am in the middle of, and it's great.

Needless to say, lots of photos to come.

This one is courtesy of theophile.