Cobras and Monkeys on the Loose!

August 7th
This morning I quickly ate breakfast, packed, and met my group to head out to Casablanca, Morocco! I usually know most of the people in all of the groups I’ve been in, but this time I only knew one or two! We left the ship from deck 5 this time, so we had to go down some really steep stairs carrying all of our bags! There was a bus waiting for us at the bottom that took us about 15 minutes out of the port and then to the train station. Casablanca reminded me of Egypt, but less chaotic. It had the same crowd of covered women and robed men, with little kids everywhere too. The street traffic was much more calm and all of the traffic lights worked and were followed! It was also a lot cleaner than Egypt and there weren’t nearly as many random pedestrians weaving around. We pulled up to the train station and it was beautiful! The entrance had all sorts of designed carved in it and it was very clean. Inside was very nice, marble floors, restaurants, air conditioning etc. It was so much nicer than any train station I’ve been to this summer. Also, there were French announcements after the Arabic ones. In Morocco, everything is either in Arabic or French. There were 34 people in my group and 3 tour guides. They passed out our tickets and we hoped on the train! It made me think of the Hogwarts train from Harry Potter. The hallways were super narrow and there were little rooms on the side where 6 people could sit. A man would walk around with a cart selling cokes and candy while we rode 3 hours to Marrakech! The hallways of the train were as hot as outside, but the little cabins had AC, which was nice since it was around 90 degrees outside! When we arrived to Marrakech, we walked about 5 minutes down the (organized) street, which was very convenient! The hotel was called Hotel Oyuda and it was definitely a resort. It was really nice and decorated beautifully with traditional Moroccan designs and rugs. There was a huge courtyard with shops inside the hotel, and a big swimming pool with caves. We put our stuff in rooms then headed out to the market for our one day to shop! I met a few girls on the Egypt trip I took and they were on this one too! They are all from Colorado and go to UC Boulder- Annie, Kelley and Lauren. I plan on visiting them in Colorado sometime!
We got a taxi ride to the market because it was a far walk and we only had a few hours. I am a pro at getting a taxi and negotiating prices after all of this practicing in other countries! It’s crazy how much you get used to everything, which seemed so different and strange in Spain when we were still figuring out how to manage ourselves! When we walked up to the markets, there was a huge open space (like a giant parking lot) filled with entertainers. There were monkeys, women doing henna tattoos, and snake charmers!! We saw a huge crowd gathered so we went to check it out. It was several older men playing instruments and charming cobras! There were so many huge snakes everywhere, just slithering around! There were also these huge vipers that looked like rattlesnakes. These were some of the biggest vipers I’ve ever seen! The men would ask for money every time you take a picture so I would take as many as I wanted and then pay at the end when I was finished. Sometimes you have to be strict back with them or they will charge you each time you put your camera to your face! The men started bringing the snakes towards us and putting them around people’s necks. The cobras had their fangs removed but I still squirmed when they came near. We kind of ran away when they would bring snakes towards us. The old men thought it was funny and kept chasing us with snakes… what a scary memory that was!! Once we passed the massive crowding of people and cobras, we started shopping at all of the stands. At the first few places, things were picked though, expensive, and not that great. We decided that we would walk 10 minutes deeper into the market and then start browsing and bargaining! The market had the same atmosphere as a few other countries but very different things inside. One of the things that you can find everywhere here is the hand of Fatima (or something like that). It is the hand that represents good luck and everyone wears them in all sorts of forms- earrings, necklaces, hennas, shirts, bookmarks, paintings, anything! I bought some bracelets, shirts, and a few gifts, the typical market purchases! There was a local who was working in his shop with a Texas Rangers shirt on so I got some pictures with him. It’s always so strange seeing shirts from Texas and other places while we are in Morocco and they have never been to America. Women were everywhere selling yummy treats and nuts. There was one woman who we bought cookies from. The cookies were some sort of coconut that was roasted or something- delicious. Her face was completely covered so I had no idea where to look or how to communicate! I put a few coins in her henna-covered hand and she handed me several cookies, they were amazing! I bargained some more (which I LOVE doing). What I’ve started to do is when they give me a price, I say no and then name half of that price. They laugh, say no and I start to walk away. Then, I will get called back in with them saying, “Ok, what is your lowest price?” and I will say something lower than half of the price! It takes a good 10 minutes to get something at the price you want, but so far everything I’ve bought has been less than half the price that they started me off with! It is definitely a game and they try to take advantage of us. When the pick up the fact that I’m not some dumb bargainer who will pay a ton of money for something cheap, they realize they need to make a sale and I end up getting so much stuff because they work with me! I loveeeee bargaining, it is so much fun! One store had a pet chipmunk and it was crawling all over everything and doing tricks, so cute! I was in one shop and there were turtles and chameleons in wooden cages. I asked the worker if they were his pets and all he said was, “Kous kous”.......... He eats chameleons and turtles in his kous kous I guess!
So we walked around this market for a few hours and then it started getting reallllly windy. The spices were blowing everywhere and making us all sneeze and have itchy eyes. The bamboo roofs had pieces flying off and it started to sprinkle a little bit. We headed out of the market and into the giant area where the snakes were! As we were starting to run a little bit to avoid the heavy rain, oranges from the fruit stands flew off in front of us and were rolling everywhere. It started thundering pretty loudly too! We safely made it to the street and hoped in a taxi. When we were telling people about the rain ‘storm’ we were in, we said, “Snakes were on the loose, monkeys were running everywhere, it was pouring rain, a palm tree fell in front of us, oranges were everywhere, horses were getting loose!” etc…. Haha we told this story to everyone and exaggerated it so much each time! We still laugh about that one time there was a tornado in the market... with wild animals and falling trees…. Haha.
Once we made it back to the hotel, we dropped off our purchases and walked around the corner to a little café. I knew I’d be getting local, real Moroccan food when I went to the Berber villages so I decided to get a chicken Panini and French fries for dinner because I was craving it!! Another thing, I never get cokes at home but it just tastes so much better when you are in another country and tired and hot! Plus, their cokes and stuff come in glass bottles that make it taste so much better and it’s cheaper! The placemats for the table were pieces of butcher paper and there was a stack of smaller pieces on the table. We asked the waiter for napkins (not that he spoke a drop of English…) so we figured that the small pieces of thick paper were napkins… it was pretty funny and awkward to use as napkins, we laughed every time we used one! We got some Dirham at the ATM and headed back to the hotel. Outside of Morocco, you can’t get Dirham or trade it in anywhere. They have strict rules about their money and you can’t trade Dirham for American dollars or vice versa unless it’s inside a bank; thought that was interesting.
In the hotel, a few other SAS trips were staying there too so we all hung out in the courtyard and then went to Africa’s largest club- Pasha! It was about a 20-minute taxi ride and a little more expensive because the prices go way up at night and they won’t bargain. When we got there, the entrance was massive! It was like an adobe house, but much bigger with fire torches lining the top and a big fountain with stairs next to a long line to get in. It was pretty remote around and no other building was in sight, which I found strange. I would think that Africa’s largest club would be deep in the city in Marrakech and not 20 minutes outside of it! When we went in, it was huge! It was really nice and cost about 400 Dirham a person ($50). Yes, we all paid a lot, but I kept telling myself- when would I be in Africa again with all of my friends??? Inside was nice too, it was very modern and there were crazy decorations and lights. The crowd was a mixture of half Arabic, a third French, and a third Semester at Sea students, haha. There are so many French people in Marrakech! The DJ was amazing and played some great songs that we have been hearing all throughout Europe and some American music mixed with Arabic words. There must have been some glass on the floor and when I walked by a table, I accidentally kicked some. I ended up getting glass in the bottom of my toe and it wouldn’t stop bleeding- another foot injury, but this time in Africa! Each country is something new…. what did I tell ya. We left Pasha (and we got some cool t-shirts) and went back to the cozy hotel for a 6 am wake up call!
I was so anxious when I went to sleep because I couldn’t wait to wake up and head to the Berber villages!!!!