Morocco
Transit is the most inconvenient time for me. Of all the things about living in flux that I’ve become accustomed to and take in stride, being in transit between places – the time and space between morocco to libiera and Liberia to Italy for instance – is maddening. Packing for different purposes, one eye in […]
What looks like the absence of a plan is actually my plan. Losing myself to the medina, the moment, the opportunity to be caught in the current of a place is entirely the point…entirely my point. I realize most people prefer a plan. A schedule. A map. People prefer an order in the chaos of […]
Big and deficient, at least in overt gestures of the decorative accoutrements I’ve become accustomed to, Casablanca appeals to me. It is a biased affection, bread from the closest thing to anonymity I’ve experienced in any city here. Big as it is, few people try to sell to me here –hard or soft. Part of […]
May 30, 2010 Asilah, Morocco Food fantasies have subsided for me here. What began as palpable anticipation has faded into a mechanical routine; something required of me but not for the joy of it. It isn’t that I haven’t had any good food, only that the good food I’ve had has been in remote pockets. […]
May 27, 2010 Merzouga, Morocco We are herded. Like the sheep on the side of the road – the young girl prodding them forward gently and then more aggressively when they strayed. Hers were headed to pasture, we were headed to Moroccan culture (or a timely and affordable facsimile). I tend to shy away from […]
May 25, 2010 Marrakech, Morocco Hope is both guiding light and cruel tool. Marrakech, an ephemeral dream of possibilities, met me at the end of a seven-hour (and delayed) train ride from Fes. Older and more crowded than every other morocco train ride so far, this one included 18MAD sandwiches (expensive at just over $2 […]
Hope is both guiding light and cruel tool. Marrakech, an ephemeral dream of possibilities, met me at the end of a seven-hour (and much delayed) train ride from Fes. Older and more crowded than every other morocco train ride so far, this one included 18MAD sandwiches (expensive at just over $2 but unnecessary for me […]
I hate being a tourist. I hate to see so many folks herded together to take the same photos and hear the same stories. To buy the same crafts and eat the same food. It is the sameness…the sameness and the impossibility of intimacy. Don’t get me wrong, I understand hustle. I know that my […]
Once I got over the naked part the rest was easy. I took off my shoes, put on my flipflops, and smiled from my perch on the blue and white benches. Women, those who worked there and those there for the hammam (bath) themselves, watched me with bemusement. One of the stewards brought over a […]
I surveyed the rolling hills. They were steeper than they looked. And in the heat of the day, afternoon call to prayer echoing over the browning grass beneath the rich blue sky. We’d already walked up a series of hills in search of Moulay Yacoub thermal spa-scoffing at the 50 MAD price the taxi drivers […]
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