Michelle and I spent 4 days in Marrakech last weekend.
We barely managed to arrive at the Marrakech airport after an aborted attempt at landing. We were about 100 meters from the ground when all of a sudden the plane engines go into overdrive as the aircraft accelerates madly to lift back up into air. Not knowing what the hell just went wrong is not the world’s most pleasant experience. But after a couple of long minutes the captain gets on the speaker – “not to worry ladies and gentleman, we just hit a spot of bad weather, these things happen all the time, everything is ok”.
Oh ok then. I feel much better.
Our 2nd attempt was successful and within minutes we were stepping into torrential rain on the tarmac. I only mention the rain, as to me it was quite a shock to see.
In my naivety I assumed that Morroco was sunshine and lollipops all year around – and to be fair I don’t think I’m completely off the mark. From getting off the plane, our taxi ride in, to walking through the old town and markets – it only proved that the Marrakechies don’t expect a lot of rain either. They don’t have adequate draining systems and everywhere was flooded with dirty water. It was quite unpleasant being out and about in a generally filthy city with water soaking into your shoes and up your jean legs.
Needless to say my first impression of Marrakech was not good. Day 1 totally sucked for me and I was thinking I might be spending the next 3 days in our Riad.
Thankfully day 2 brought with it a whole heap of that wonderful blue stuff and plenty of sunshine. Losing ourselves in the old town’s maze of interconnected alleys is much more enjoyable when you’re not ankle deep in water and brushing the rain out of your eyes.
Over the next 3 days we spent a fair amount of time walking through out the old and new towns of Marrakech. The old town is exactly like you’ve seen in an old school christian production of Moses. Its local market owners in those dress thingies, workers leading donkeys and trailers down alley ways and snake charmers, chained monkeys and acrobatic performers in the main square. It’s like you’ve stepped back a 1000 years – except 50% of the population are on motorized scooters and zip past you with reckless regard.
We spent our 4 days staying in a local Riad. A small hotel of rooms that surround a gardened courtyard. The rooms are all authentically decorated and furnished. We really enjoyed our Riad, especially our breakfasts in the morning. Fresh OJ and bread with cheeses and jams. But like all of Marrakech everyone only speaks French or Arabic. We could barely communicate with the Riad staff and struggled a bit throughout our whole time there.
It was especially hard communicating with the staff at the local Haman – a Turkish-style bath. Getting naked in front of men where your only form of successful communication is grunting to each other with hand movements is quite a nerve wracking experience. The whole experience of being scrubbed down, massaged and having the word “douche” yelled at you by strange men might be enjoyable if you’re used to it but I was quite uncomfortable the whole time and just couldn’t relax enough to enjoy it.
The language barrier however, doesn’t stop the Marrakech people from being some of the most considerate people I’ve ever met. They were kind enough to provide us with a 4am wakeup call every morning as they prayed to their man upstairs. They sounded like they were making cow noises so I felt like I was back out at my grandad’s farm. I always woke up expecting fresh milk with breakfast but it was always strangely absent from the brekkie table.
While Marrakech is a bit old school and without some of the modcons of today’s western countries there is one thing that they do better than any western country I’ve been to – free wifi. Turn on your ipod touch or laptop and you can pick it up without fail. It’s everywhere. So much so, that they even have a cyber park. A massive park sponsored by corporations like Nokia and Sony which has internet terminals scattered throughout for the locals to come in and surf the internet for free.
The cyber park is not the only impressive garden in Marrakech. There are quite a few around the city and they are a breath of fresh air when you need to avoid the people congestion of the old town.
With all the walking we were doing we soon got tired and had frequent rest stops, usually at places to eat. I must say I’m not the world’s biggest fan of local Moroccan food. The tagines and pigeon pies just didn’t do it for me. I don’t like ordering a meat dish when they don’t specify what exactly the meat is.
Knowing this, we upped our budget a little and indulged in some more upmarket restaurants for dinner and had some amazing experiences in these gorgeous restaurants with outdoor rooftop balconies and extravagantly decorated and furnished indoor eating areas. Yes, these restaurants were a little more westernized with their menus. Thank god!
All in all, Marrakech is an interesting experience but being disorganized we didn’t plan our time the best. A day or two in the city is more than enough. Any longer and you need to organize some day trips out to the coast or inland to the Atlas mountains.
I always said to myself that when I got to a point in London where the adventure was replaced with the feeling of normal living that it would be time to think about moving back home to Brizzy.
