Marrakech

Driving into Marrakech is crazy. This is a big developed city compared to Fes and it is full of other tourists. We need to navigate ourselves to the car rental office where we will drop the car as there is no point in having a car while staying in the Medina.

Youssef, who looks after the airbnb riad that we are staying in for the next five nights, organises a taxi to bring us to the edge of the Medina, where luckily, we are met by guy with a cart who loads all of our bags and wheels them through the narrow alleyways to the riad.

There is a family of kittens living outside the front door.

We are just a few minutes walk through the Medina, to the main square, Jemaa el-Fnaa.

Twenty years ago, the square was already a tourist hub but now it is absolutely crazy. To my delight, the freshly squeezed orange juice stalls (which may or may not leave you with a bad stomach) are still dotted around the outside. There is a crazy collection of snake charmers, monkeys on chains, food stalls, acrobats, drummers and crappy toy sellers.

We avoid the animal cruelty, despite having to dodge several over zealous monkey handlers and head to the food stalls.

Despite a warning from Youssef that we should avoid eating in the square, the atmosphere is chaotic and interesting and the food all looks fairly fresh. We pause for just a moment too long outside one stall and all of the staff start clapping and chanting until we have no choice but to sit down. It seems this is a common ploy.

Whatever you do, don’t catch the eye of the drummers in the square. Next thing you know, you’re wearing a hat and paying someone some money. What is amazing is the eagle eye hawkers, particularly snake charmers, in the square who as soon as you pull out a camera to take a surreptitious photo, spring out of nowhere and ask for money.

The next morning we have some local visitors who have come to play with the kittens.

They also seem to be quite enamoured with banging on our kitchen window.  Roger and I have an argument because he thinks that I’m encouraging them. I am of course, just trying to make friends. I go outside with them and play with the kittens but when I return back inside they start banging on the front door.

I politely try to mime to them that  we are busy now and when we ignore the door, they start putting the kittens inside a plastic rubbish bin and whirling them round and round.  This is the last straw and with our kids in tears, I head outside to do some shouting. The kids run off, throwing a kitten onto the ground in their haste.

We have found that a lot of kids around the world treat stray animals really badly. When we see the boys later with their older sister, who must be about 12, I try to explain to her that the boys were being very cruel to the kittens. She promptly hits her brother across the head. I’m not sure which is worse!

For lunch, we go in search of Café des Spices, recommended to us by our friends Tim and Michelle who lived in Marrakech a few years ago. There are many distractions along the way.

Tim and Michelle have described to us, the intensity of living in a completely foreign country, in the middle of the Medina, spending all day with each other and struggling to home school the kids. We are starting to understand this struggle very well.

Café des Spices is surprisingly Western and makes delicious food and coffee. I can see why it might have become a favourite if you lived in this crazy city for a while.

We come here several more times during our Marrakech stay.

On the 17th of October, Stella has to sit her Te Reo Level 1 exam.

Roger, obviously not understanding the exam system has been urging me to show Stella the exam before she sits it so that she can prepare. Stella and I think this is very funny.

Whilst she hasn’t had the most concentrated year of Maori study, she has eight years of schooling in Te Reo, behind her and she has been studying hard over the last couple of weeks.

Whilst she is in Year 10, it is possible for her to sit a Year 11 exam if she chooses.

Finding some space and quiet is the hardest thing. She needs three hours of uninterrupted exam time in a cool space.

Hmmmm… we’re in Morocco with no air conditioning, sharing a small space with five noisy people.

Roger takes the boys away for three hours and I supervise as I don’t trust him not to let her do an open book test! I’m not sure if the toys on the table are regulation but in all other areas, we followed the rules. Now to scan it and get it back to the Correspondence school on time.

Our last evening, we spend in the square, and feeling confident, we eat again at the stall where we had our first meal. Whoops

Jasper vomits through the night and I wake up feeling very sick too. Whilst we have organised a taxi back to the car hire place at 10am, we have to postpone while I am sick several times.

Today we drive to Essaouira, South of Marrakech, on the coast.