Into the Night

Hi there-- been a while (been home, been busy, been having only distinctly un-travel adventures!).

For some reason I never posted what was by far the most commented upon travel update/email I've ever written. So, for nostalga's sake, cast your mind back to July 08, in the sticky sizzling heat of Morocco.

Into the Night

My Dear Friends,

As taken from my journal, July 30th, 2008.

Marrakech. It is nearly 6:30 by the time we stumble off the bus from Essaouira, dripping with sweat, bad temper and shopping bags. We find taxis. We argue with taxi drivers. We pile into said taxis like sunburned sardines, sticking to each other, the seats, the windows... It is 40°, and the sun is beginning to set. Four people in our group have "dodgy tummies" and are dreaming of nothing more than getting to our hotel and spending quality time with the toilet. I just want to put my bags down and to my somewhat tiresome "stuff check"; has everything survived the journey, do my clothes really smell like mold, or is that my imagination? I will be so glad to be rid of this luggage. My roommate sets up camp in the bathroom and I fiddle with the air conditioning (we have air conditioning! a rare luxury) til even my teeth are chattering. Our room has three beds, a sink the size of the Atlantic, and a pink crib with a phone in it. I really don't know why. We have agreed to meet at 8 o'clock to walk to the nearby Place Djemaa el-Fna, the centre of the town, the central market, the heart of everything.

The streets are wide and lined with fruit-bearing trees, and horse and carriages driven by tuxedo wearing Berbers chatting languidly on cell phones line the road. Everywhere there are red and green flags flying, as tomorrow is the anniversary of the King's coronation, and everyone must celebrate. We have come from the mountains, from the desert and then mountains again; from the place where entire dust-coloured villages appear out of the hills and fade again like mud brick apparitions. It is strange to be in a city like this, where there are as many Moroccan tourists as Europeans, and knees and shoulders are far from the only skin exposed. This is what I'm thinking as I walk down Mohammad V Avenue, towards the Place Djemaa el-Fna, when our guide ways "Let's keep a tally of how many times our butts get pinched tonight... because it will happen!"

Oh my friends, my friends, I have never seen anything like this place, the Place Djemaa el-Fna. It is a large square, unfathomable in length of width or god forbid capacity, though it is not the size that strikes me first, but... what? Behind us is the floodlit Koutoubia Mosque, both left and right are expensive hotels with overflowing rooftop bars which serve no alcohol, and which we cannot afford to drink at. And ahead, directly in front of us is... chaos. A throng of people so dense and jostling it is hard to say just what you are looking at, as the crowds dart between the rows and rows of carts and stalls arranged by delicacy. Whatever you are looking for --be it date soup, camel tajine or sheep's' head and grapefruit juice-- you can find it here. In fact, there is a good chance it will find you, whether you are looking for it or not.

At first we stay bunched together in a nervous clump; none of us are sure where to go in this enormous space. Should we stroll through the nearest souq, or watch the acrobats or the ageless musicians with their tall red hats and castanets, or stop somewhere and watch the grand human drama, or get swept along and make some of our own? The three disappear into the market, and our guide sneaks away to meet up with her Marrakechi boyfriend. The remaining 6 of us --British, Belgian, Australian and Canadian-- stop at one of the neatly painted, absolutely identical juice stands and order 2, no, 3, no, 4 orange and two grape fruit juice, which come to us in tall glasses which empty as if by magic, and send us once again spiraling into the throng. Already the loud-mouthed vendors are waving their arms at us, offering bags of nuts and prunes, apricots, boiled snails and yet more orange juice, and everyone shouting. "3 dirham! 5 dirham! Madame! Mademoiselle! Senora! English, no!"

As a group of 10 women traveling together, we are used to being conspicuous, used to the shouting and hooting and ludicrous kissing sounds that follow us down each and every street no matter hos sticky or unattractive we are feeling. In the past few days I have heard them all, from "You are the most beautiful woman in the world", to "Tres sexy, yum yum", and "You want a Berber husband, yes?" If you are in a group, and can laugh it off together this can be quite funny, occasionally flattering, and eventually just irritating, when all you're trying to do is buy a drink and someone unrelated to this transaction is hanging over the counter breathing in your ear. One wonders what these same men would do if a tourist spoke this way to their sister of daughter, but at the end of the day all you can really do is keep your wits about you, and your sense of humour handy.

Actually, in comparison La Place actually seems refreshing, for though our attention is being pulled and fought for in every direction it is not because we are tourists, not because we are white, if the equally stunned looking Moroccan visitors are any indication. This is not a show for tourists, this is... I don't know what this is, but everywhere I look there are people of all ages, colours and groupings. There are mothers and daughters wearing their best dresses stopping for a 5 dirham henna painting, fathers and sons chatting genially with the man selling individual cigarettes and I Love Morocco fridge magnets, awkward first daters drinking orange juice and watching the acrobats, and large groups of teenagers doing their best to look disinterested with their iPod headphones in, yet still mysteriously bobbing their heads to the rhythm of the restaurateurs enticing, scolding and wooing the passing crowd.

Once we leave the juice department and wade towards entrees the mayhem becomes physical as each cart seems to have at least two men who's job it is to corner you into their row of picnic tables, at all costs. Cries of "Ooh la, la!" fill the air as we wrestle our arms free of the "waiters" who try and pull us towards their carts, pretending to faint in front of us or bowing and blowing us kisses. We are practically weeping with laughter as we reach the centre, where one kebab seller slaps another kebab seller while I conduct an impromptu arm wrestling competition with yet another who has his hands (and menu) all over my roommate who is too stunned to care.

We choose a stall and the chefs applaud, while the cook at the neighbouring cart spits into the dirt and curses something which needs no translation. I don't know what we ordered, or how it tasted, or how we managed to fill the table with tiny little dishes, or how dinner for 6 cost only 20 dollars, or why the waiter didn't even bother to count the money we gave him. I am finding it hard to process these things because I have this funny feeling in my fingers and my toes, in the back of my throat and ringing in my ears. Perhaps it is disbelief; I find it hard to believe this is the last Wednesday in July and I am in Morocco, wading waist deep through a carnival which lasts all year and celebrates nothing but life. Perhaps it is this life that I feel.

We don't really know where we are going as we half run half dance through the labyrinth of souqs which light the night with stained glass lanterns and a rainbow of kaftans next to an avalanche of handbags and spices --beep beep, a car is coming through, and so is a donkey and a man carrying a monkey and a 6 year old wearing stilettos. I am high on water and chili sauce, colour and that hypnotic drum, we pop in and out of clouds of smoke scented like burned popcorn and meat and some potent incense, but all I can breathe is the rush and the irresistible urge to explore.

I want to cover myself in glittering silver jewelery so I can sparkle half so bright as that lantern twisting in the breeze above my head. I want bells on my shoes and flowers in my hair and I want to dance along with the grinding song of the snake charmers, just because I can, because I want the whole world to see me, to know me, to understand that I am here and I am now and I am grateful for both these things. The men are bowing down before us like reeds in the wind, and I think tonight I could have anything, I could do anything, I could be anyone, but right now I can think of nothing better than being me, here, tonight. We are six girls together but we are each an island of shock and wonder, and when someone i can't even see through the darkness purrs in my ear "Tres belle les gazelle-- beautiful girls!" I think, "Yes we are!" We are young and we are beautiful and maybe this has nothing to do with us, it is only this place, this night, it is something in the air, the water, the atmosphere. Something magic has fallen over us and we cannot help but shine like diamonds, or glow like the red gold sand at sunset, like stars. SO while the others pause to argue whether the 50 dirham bags or real or fake leather I only just resist the urge to sit down with the nearest fortune teller (and they are very near) and say "I don't understand you and you don't understand to me, and it doesn't matter. Just tell me the truth."

Several of the girls have managed to shop in the few moments we stopped moving, and everyone is tired though we are loathe to admit it. Vowing to come back the next night to watch the entertainment --from where we stand you can see nothing of the acts but the boisterous elbows and shoulders crowd surrounding them-- we turn and leave La Place. We brave the perilous road-crossing with courage and some hysteria, not even noticing the blisters on our feet or the public bus smell still clinging to our skin. From the way we tease and move now as one harmonious unit you would never guess that only hours ago these girls were crawling under my skin with their spas and shopping and lack of imagination. But tonight we are together and we are happy and we are comfortable leaving tomorrow in the future, where it has always been. Well, I am, at least.

We arrive back at Hotel Yasmine around midnight, and the others rush off to the roof to have a drink, and I rush down to my room and my journal and think how meaningless words sometimes can be. I want to remember this night for ever, and yet nothing I could possibly write or say could do justice to the madness, or the scope of this feeling on my skin in my heart. But they are all I have. And all I can say is that tonight I know my heart is very large, because in it I can fit all of La Place, all of Morocco, all of the world, and all of you, especially. I wish you were here.

Love,

N.

--
"We don't need a map to get this show on the road!" Kermit the Frog