début de l'aventure au maghreb

i get pissy when i'm dehydrated, hungry, and tired. i think i was all of these things on our day of plane travel to morocco. darcy graciously covered the price of my lunch at the airport in barcelona, and our flight to casablanca was definetely more on time than the one out of casablanca to fez. we saw some extremely trashy spanish people while we were sitting outside of the duty-free shop in casablanca, though this perception may have been skewed by my pissiness. i didn't have any euros, and of course there aren't any atms within the perimeter of the airport, and none of the restos take credit cards. so there i am, sans water or food, pissy mostly because darcy is there to witness my weaknesses while traveling, mais tant pis, there it was. we had to wait to board our flight for god knows what reason, but it was blessedly short.

we got 1000 Dh each out of the atm at the airport after being brisked through security (the scary guy was charmed by my french, and when i said darcy was my friend, he let us through without ripping open our bags) and took a taxi for 45 minutes (140 Dh) to our hotel. along the ride we began to see how geographically morocco fits into those blurrily defined categories of "second" or "third" world. it was intense, and we were only just seeing landscape at night.

we ate dinner at our hotel (named, paradoxically, "hotel fes inn") because we were too exhausted to wander around the new city to try to find a restaurant (and the neighborhood in which the fes inn was located left something to be desired). it was nice actually to just crash our bags (although the room they gave us had an enormous unidentifiable bug behind the bed so we quickly changed rooms) and not have to think about anything. the servers were nice to the point of artificiality, but no matter. we were tired and hungry.

the next day we asked for a map at our hotel (to no avail) and were directed to go to place mohammed V to the office of tourism. we decided to walk there as it was an astonishingly beautiful day. we got lost along the way, and had to ask for directions at some pharmacies, but people in general were very kind and sufficiently clear. eventually we found the small office, grabbed a map (shittier than the large, vague one we picked up at a tourist shop), and by this point were ready to eat. food is incredibly cheap in morocco, you can get a tea or fresh orange juice for 10 Dh (1 euro) and a full menu sometimes for as low as 40 Dh (4 euro for more food than you can possibly eat).

we then set out for the mellah (jewish quarter) and tried to find the old city (none of our maps agreed). the beautiful weather helped motivate us. upon entering the old city walls, however, all 3 disparate maps were rendered useless, and the 15-20 year old boys taunting us with their offers of berber massages and guided tours were tempting but since they tried to swindle us out of cab fare i played the role of cold-hearted bitch at all times. we never asked for directions. darcy can get berber massages from soufiane back home any time she wants.

...continued...