Fes

The reality dawns on us both, the next morning, that we drank too much wine and ate too little food the night before but we were so starved for company that we got a little carried away.  It is always a little tough getting everyone packed up and back on the road and this morning is truly a struggle. Regardless of how long we spend in a place, the contents  of Stella’s bag is always all over the floor. Jasper procrastinates until we are just about out the door and Louie says “finished” but we find half of his things scattered around the house.

When we do finally get out the door, carrying two extra rolled carpets, and make our way to the bus station, I am feeling decidedly . unwell. The bus trip to Fes is very bumpy and the road very winding for the first hour of the trip, during which time I vomit into a plastic bag.

Recently my sister Rachel, who is currently teaching in Vienna, was studying travel writing with her class and used our blog as an example. Apparently, one of the aspects that her students didn’t like, was the mention of diarrhoea and vomiting.

Well sit tight, I’m sure there’s more to come.

When I arrived in Fes at 22 years old, my travelling companions and I had already been befriended on the train by a lovely Moroccan man, returning from University, who wanted very much for us to come to his family home for dinner. Once at his home, we sat down to a meal with all the men in his family (the women were eating in another room) and whilst we dined, we watched “Nine and a half Weeks”. Now, this might have been OK if we were having a TV dinner at home but being in the company of a room full of Muslim men, eating Tagine while watching Kim Bassenger do a striptease to “You can leave your hat on” seemed culturally at odds with how I imagined my first Moroccan family meal.

And as an extension of the family hospitality, we agreed that we would visit the family business in the morning.

And the family business? A carpet shop!

I love carpet shops. What I don’t like is being locked inside a carpet shop and pressured to purchase something that I can’t afford and can’t carry as a sign of my appreciation for what was a very awkward family meal.

The experience is all a bit of a blur but I recall we had to create a diversion to open the locked door and sprint through the Medina, as far away as we could get, with our hosts shouting behind us. Funnily enough, when we arrived back in Tangier at the end of our time in Morocco, the same guy was about to hop onto the train to Fes. I suppose it’s his day job. And I thought we’d made a friend.

This time, having organised a pick up straight from the bus station to our riad, so there is no risk of ending up in the wrong place. The Riad Kouloud is just outside the Medina which means that are dropped off very close by, rather than walking through a maze of alleyways.

We are welcomed by Nordin, the owner, and Soufiane his helper. It seems that we are the only guests at the Riad which is probably just as well considering how noisy we are. A riad is a grand residence in Morocco with all windows facing into an inner courtyard, often open at the roof. So all of the rooms face inwards towards each other and when we open our windows, they look directly into the centre. Riad Kouloud is closed at the top and the central area is a beautiful seating area where, if it wasn’t for the echoing sounds of a constant struggle for dominance coming from our upstairs rooms, might even be very peaceful.

It seems that as the only guests, we have the undivided attention of Soufiane, who is twenty-three and extremely earnest. It doesn’t take long before we have our next day organised, with Soufiane as our companion. Jasper is suspicious! Another person wanting to befriend us. What scam is this? Obviously one that involves a ceramics shop, which is where we will be heading first. We will wait and see.

The food that we are cooked for dinner, is delicious and I finally have my appetite back, after the bus trip.

There is a great view from the top floor of the riad. There are a lot more satellite dishes in Fes than last time I visited!

Soufiane has organised to take us to the Palace in Fes. Whilst we can’t go in, we can stand in the courtyard and take pictures of the doors. This is where many Moroccan wedding parties come for their photos too.  Soufiane explains that he will need to stay inside the car as only official guides are allowed to accompany tourists in Morocco and if the Police see us together, there may be trouble.

We stop for a family fight and some photos outside the beautiful gold doors, then head on to the ceramics shop.

Soufiane is exited because this is his first trip to see the ceramics being made.  We are suspicious because organised trips to shops usually involve expensive prices and a commission for the person who has accompanied us. But Soufiane is really growing on us and his total enthusiasm is very infectious. Morocco is not as cheap as I was hoping and it seems that we wont be starting a ceramics export business anytime soon (not that that was really on the agenda but these ideas pop into my head from time to time).

After an hour, Roger is twitching like he does when it looks like I’m beginning a bargaining process. Some beautiful Moroccan plates are on my wish list but I want to have a look around before committing to buying from the first place we go to.

We are dropped off on the edge of the Medina near the tannery where we are ushered up the stairs and given a sprig of mint. In retrospect, an oxygen mask would have been more appropriate, but with the mint virtually stuffed up your nose, the smell was lessened. We climb several flights of stairs to the roof top which looks down on the concrete pools of the tannery. The smell is putrid and it is hard to watch people dragging the soaking skins from one vat to another. Apparently, much of the curing is done in a liquid made up of pigeon poo, before the skins are rinsed then mixed around repeatedly in vats of natural dye.

We all feel for the people who work here. How you could get the smell out of your nose and skin is beyond me. Most of the workers are wet from their work and in bare feet.

The river running past the tannery is putrid too, although our guide tells us that the vats are not emptied into the river. It’s hard to believe, as this is common practice with the tanneries along the river Ganga in India.

While we are all comparing the wafts of sulphuric stench to Rotorua, Soufiane, who has never travelled out of Morocco says, “yes, I think it is like Hells’ Gate”.

It transpires, that Soufiane, who is undoubtedly the most interesting and engaging person that we’ve met in ages, has been researching New Zealand in preparation for our stay.

We are amazed.

After a long and lengthy discussion about the process of tanning leather, which I spend trying not to dry retch, we head downstairs for an obligatory look at the leather wares in the shops below. We must be very frustrating as a family as we insist on dressing up and taking photos of each other. It is hard to feel enthused about leather after what we’ve just witnessed upstairs, but it is a big part of Fes arts and craft and we find ourselves testing out poufs. Now, no one really needs a pouf, but they are quite beautiful and we walk away with two. Luckily they fold flat.

Soufiane explains that he needs to get back to he Riad but he leaves us with his friend Mohamed as we’re really keen to have a look around the Medina and it is very easy to get lost. It quickly becomes obvious that Mohammed is going to take us on a whistle stop tour of every artisan in the medina. Carpets? Yes? Lamps yes? Fabric yes? Ceramics yes? Argan oil yes? Spices yes? Leather no? already done that.  At one point we lose him completely and head in the opposite direction but somehow he finds us.

We visit the most beautiful carpet shop that I have ever seen, in a large restored riad. We need a small break form Mohammed’s incessant pace so we stop to drink some mint tea and look at carpets that we don’t intend to buy. This is always where the trouble starts although on this occasion, I have promised Roger that we will not buy another carpet, even though we spend an hour negotiating over carpets that are the most beautiful that we have seen on our trip.

Negotiating is part of the visit and ensures extra mint tea.

We walk home from the Medina via the river where we stop for some time to puzzle over the human shaped bundle in the rapids that Stella then spends several days worrying over. I assure her that this isn’t the Ganga and if there was a body in the river, someone would have done something about it already, but we both feel a bit haunted by the idea that it could have been someone…

Lots of kids walk with us as we get closer to home. Because our Riad is out of the main tourist part of the Medina, it is just us and hundreds of locals who frequent the streets around the edges of the medina. Everything is for sale on the market tables along the streets leading home,  although there seem to be a predominance of padded bras. Always curious in a religiously conservative town. You’d think they might be behind a curtain.

The next morning, we set off with Soufiane, to the police station to try and acquire a sort of tourist guide pass for Soufiane, so that he can accompany us on our trips around Fes. We are starting to really enjoy hanging out with him and he is really keen to show us around the Medina and have us around to his house for dinner.

We head to the new city and are shown from one police office to another, without much luck. It seems that perhaps we had better come back on a week day.

We make our way back toward the old city, stopping to pose with some lions on the way.

Soufiane wants to take us to the Jardin Jnan Sbil, a very beautiful park just outside the Medina. Some of our most memorable times whilst travelling have been in parks, wondering alongside the locals.

We realise, as we walk around with Soufiane, that this is the one of the only times that we have met someone on the trip who we can genuinely trust to just hang out with us, who’s company we all enjoy and who makes us all laugh.

We walk from the park into the Medina and Soufiane, leads us through the maze of streets to his home in the middle of the Medina.

He is a keeper of Pigeons, as are many people in Fes and he is very excited to take us up on to the roof to show us his birds.

First we sit down to a delicious meal that his family have prepared. Whilst we have eaten a lot of Tagine and couscous on our trip so far, our favourite meal currently is lots of little plates of things. Fried aubergine, Moroccan salad, kofta, smoked aubergine and garlic and beautiful fresh bread with olives.

There are four children in Soufiane’s family, his older brother, younger brother and sister.

His older brother has won an American Green-card in the ballot and will leave soon for Atlanta where he will study. We talk a lot about his fears of living in America, in the current social climate and it breaks my heart to think of this lovely man meeting anything but kindness and generosity in the States. Soufiane has an entry exam in a couple of days, to get into an English masters program. He has, interestingly, written a thesis on the Image of America in Arab travel narratives.

We are aware that he is whiling away his potential study days hanging out with us but he assures us that he has it all under control.

After dinner, on the rooftop overlooking the whole Medina, we meet his many pigeons. He has many different varieties, many of which we have heard about already. My favourite(which is Soutane’s favourite too) is his common variety pigeon Fahrid who has recently had babies with his girlfriend. In Soufiane’s words the babies are “quite hideous” this is a change from the majority of his descriptions of things being “quite lovely”. We laugh a lot, meeting the pigeons, as we drink mint tea and spend time with his family.

The next day we return again to the police station. Fouad, a friend of Nordin at the riad, comes with us too and gives us a lift. This time, I try to communicate with the police about how much we want Soufiane to accompany us as a friend without being stopped by the police. We are directed to the first police office where there is a guy missing half an ear who has  slashes all the way up his arm. Apparently, this is not the tourist office! Someone is called in to speak with us and it becomes clear, that the police are not going to issue a guide pass. Obviously, guiding is the livelihood of many people around the Medina and the police suggest that we pay an official guide whilst taking Soufiane along with us.

The problem is, we really don’t want an official guide s invariably, we end up going to a whole lot of places we don’t want to go to and pay a hefty commission on anything that we want to buy.

Morocco has certainly tightened up it’s tourist policies which I suppose prevents people being bribed and locked in carpet shops but it is a frustrating situation for all of us.

It is decided after the second attempt, that we will walk around the Medina together and as Fouad is Moroccan, but lives in France, we can all be tourists together.

First, we head to Fes’s only mall where we eat Burger King for the first time as a family (desperate measures). Before our Burger King lunch, Fouard and Soufiane go off to the mall prayer room for their mid afternoon pray and we do whatever it is you do while your friends pray in the mall. We shop for underpants.

We return to the Medina (because I can’t get enough of the atmosphere inside those crazy streets).

Soufiane and Fouad take us to the Kairaouine Mosque which is also the oldest university in the Islamic world. As non Muslims, we are not able to go in, but we wait outside while they pray inside. There are some incredibly beautiful parts of the Medina in this area, including the shrine of Zaouia Moulay Idriss II, the founder of Fes, which is exquisitely decorated. Again, we can’t go inside but it is beautiful on the outside too and there are people coming in and out all the time. Apparently it is seen as good luck to visit and a place that can even increase female fertility.

The rest of the family don’t have the insatiable appetite for exploring, that I have, but Soufiane carries Louie  (who, lives on a diet of Kofta and cucumber and still weighs very little for a ten-year-old) so that we can explore for a little longer.

We spend much of the next day at the riad trying to organise shipping of some of our extras.

It seems that the man at the ceramics shop may be able to organise some of our things to be shipped back alongside any ceramics we might purchase. He even comes and picks us up!

Jasper and I spend a couple of hours there but it becomes clear that the price of shipping will be much more than the items themselves, let alone adding carpets and poufs to the shipping. It seems that we may be surreptitiously carrying another 20kg of ceramics quietly in our hand luggage.

The other Nordin (there are two at the riad) goes home to get his pigeons so that we can release them to fly home. He is also a very keen collector and has a particularly funny one that puffs up it’s chest as it walks around. After the pigeons fly home, we make and fly paper airplanes and wait in the alley for Faoud to pick us up. Soufiane is taking us to another local hangout out of town where there is spring, swimming facilities, shops and food stalls.

We’re all pretty hungry but our idea of a cheap meal is different to theirs and eventually we convince Soufiane, Nordin and Fouad that we don’t care what or where we eat, as long as we have dinner all together.

They take us to a famous Fes fast food joint that seems to have appropriated some of the MacDonald’s logo without being sued. A meal costs about $2 and the food is great. There is even musical entertainment. Finally we can shout everyone dinner!

The next day is Soufiane’s exam and we are on our own. Stella, who has been feeling unwell for a couple of days, stays at home and Louie and I head into the Medina for some excitement.

We visit Madrasa Bou Inania, now a museum which was originally an Islamic place of learning. When we slip through the front doors, the noise of the medina is gone and we are left standing alone in the silence. It is beautiful.

We let ourselves get a little bit lost, despite the many offers from children to be our guide.

We are enticed into another of the three tanneries in Fes. I’m keen for a quick look because it is very interesting but we have to make a run for it after our guide launches into a lengthy explanation about the tanning process. The smell here is equally bad and I can’t feign interest any longer. We are then led down several alley ways into someone’s home. This is a little strange as I thought we were going to look at some weaving. I assume that the “traditional home” tour is part of what this guy does but I feel a bit sort for his elderly mother who is obviously just trying to have some quiet time.   Perhaps we’ll start leading people in off  the street in Grey Lynn and showing them around. It might be a bit of a money spinner.

We spend at least an hour and a half in an old antique shop negotiating on six old tiles. I let Louie do the negotiating because he usually ends up with free gifts.

Roger and Jasper join us and we take them back to the Madrasa Bou Inania.

On our whirlwind tour around the Medina on our first day, we stopped somewhere (it could have been anywhere really, I have such a terrible sense of direction and the Medina is like a maze).

At this particular somewhere, they had little carpets made out of Argave silk. Louie decides that he wants to return to that particular shop and negotiate a price. But how to get there?

It seems that Louie knows exactly where to go and he leads us through street after street, sometimes going into what looks like an identical alleyway and shop front which turns out to be a different place. Eventually we turn up again at “the most beautiful carpet shop in the world” in the beautiful riad.

This is not where I thought we were going and had I known, we would not have returned here after having said that if we ever returned, it would be to purchase the carpet that we spent an hour negotiating over but had no intention of buying.

This is a little awkward, although Louie has it all under control and is soon perusing small carpets and negotiating.

We impress upon the owner that the carpet is being purchased out of Louie’s pocket money and as a deal sweetener, he wants to see a Haka. Now the appropriation of culture for financial purposes, is not really our thing, but Louie does a fierce Haka and it’s been a while since the kids connected with their Te Whanau Whariki roots.

He spends some time in preparation as it turns out he’s forgotten some of the words. Jasper agrees to support him if Louie gives him one hundred kisses afterwards.

The subsequent haka in a Moroccan carpet shop is something to be witnessed.

Back at the riad, Soutane has finished his exam and we play some music and drink some beer to celebrate. (Soufiane drinks tea). We are then treated to a muscle display from Soufiane who at one time entered a lot of body building competitions. We find this very funny, especially when Roger and Louie join him too.

It is a sad morning when we leave the Riad Kouloud. Roger picks up a hire car and brings it back so that we can load it up for our journey towards the Sahara. Everyone at the riad thinks it’s very funny watching us load our things into the car.

Our first days driving will take us to Midelt which is a good halfway point between Fes and our destination of Merzouga.