morrocco
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Tuesday, June 21, 2005
Morrocco
There are pictures now in the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, and some of Czech Republic Blogs as of 4-11-05. Go to individual blogs to see.The Turkey Blog now has pictures.6-8-05Ok this is good. In some internet places you have the option to change the keyboard to American, and i have here so typing is a lot easier.On the ferry. We arrive at Tangier and wait for the rush of people to get off the boat and as we are getting off they check our passport and low and behold we were supposed to get our enttry stamp to Morrocco on the boat before we docked. They wouldn't let us off the boat until the stamper guy came back on. Apparently they made this announcement over the intercom in 3 different languages, but the intercom sounded like a drive through speaker and I didn't hear anything resembling English come out of it. 2 american brothers and one australian wife also missed the message. The lady raised hell at the workers and got absolutely nothing accomplished. We have found out in these situations to just wait and be polite and not cause trouble is the best way to go. Linh used our down time to find out some basic Morroccan words that we might need to know. Eventually the passport guy came back and stamped us and we got off the boat. We walked into town with the other people we were stuck with and the lady brokered a group discount for us in the hotel. That was kind of cool. Our first impression of Tangier was not good. It was a dirty, smelly city, with lots of beggars and such, but then again, we hadn't made it very far past the port. We took a much needed shower and it was getting dark so we asked the hotel for a cheap place to eat and he pointed us across the street. A nice little hole in wall place. We had a four course meal and drinks for about 15 us. The food was really good and the people nice. A lot of the people here speak French, which is good for us because Linh speaks French.We crashed out and slept like rocks.6-9We woke up at a leisurely pace and decided we had to find the train station to move on to Marrakech. We saw a map in the lobby and the train station didn't look to far away, so we decided to hoof it. Well, eventually we ran into signs pointing to the train station and we kept following them and following them. The walk was a lot longer than we had anticipated and when we finally got there we realized the station is brand spanking new and that the one on the map was probably the old one. The train to Marrakech was going to take about 10 hours and instead of arriving in the middle of the night we opted for the night train, and thanks to Morroccan priced we were actually able to afford a bed this time. The train didn't leave until 11pm so we had a lot of time to kill. We hopped a taxi to the bus station where we were able to leave our packs and walked around town a bit. We dont like Tangier much. It is not pretty, smells like sewage most of the time and all kinds of weird people are approaching you all the time. We read this is a transient town and most of the countries scam artists are here. Even the beach was ugly. So we found a cheap internet and spent about 4 hours in there. We went to cafes and ate a little and read our books. (Uncle Rob gave us a couple of books in Spain, and also he offered to take some things back for us so we loaded him up with all our winter clothes and some useless items we had packed way back when. So, mom and dad, if you run into Uncle Rob can you get our stuff?) We decide it was wise to get the train station before dark and so we ate at the bus station and collected our bags and walked back to the nice, clean, no beggar train station about 3 hours before our train left. Our train came and we there were 4 bunks, we had the bottom 2, the people on top were quieter than us and Linh and I slept peacefully and bliss fully.6-10 Marrakech! Our free internet is almost out of time so i have to go, but Marrakech is a lot better than Tangier.BrianOk! big day in Marrakech! When the conductor woke us up at about 8 am i looked out the window and saw nothing but desert. As we pulled into the city things got greener and busier. It was weird to watch it go from absolutely nothing to a busy city. We cheated when we got off the train around 9 am and got a taxi into town and found a hotel Linh had written down from the the internet. Hotel Ali. We each got a free hour of internet with our room and have access to a hammam(turkish bath) but it is so hot here i dont know if i can deal with scalding water. Breakfast is included too. Its weird because it is really hot here, but its not North Carolina or Georgia humid hot. At least the sweat evaporates off your body at some point. Anyway, internet is dirt cheap here, I am paying about 50cents an hour. The cheapest we have run into yet. We really love the food here, but in all our travels I think New Zealand is about the only place where we didn't love the food. Linh decided and I agreed that she should get a Djalaba(the Morrocan dress that the women wear). We went into a shop and an English speaking lady that lives here told us what to expect to pay. That was very helpful. Well, Linh found a really nice one that was on the mannequin, beautiful orange and gold and red and yellow and white stripes with a hood. It was the priciest one in the shop we bargained and bargained and tried to walk out and the sales guy looked pained when we got to the final price. It was kind of pricey, but it is really beautiful and everyone we have talked to afterward said we got a really good price. Even another shop owner said he couldn't beat the price. After that purchase we decided to go to the big market. In the open area before you get to the enclosed market are big umbrellas set up with people hawking stuff under them. We saw a guy selling monkeys. We saw snake charmers, and before we got too far Linh was practically accosted by some henna ladies and they made her sit and drew henna on her hand and on both her feet and drew a scorpion on my arm. The whole time they made polite conversation but wouldn't tell how much it was. At the the end, and we didn't ask for any of this they just started drawing and I knew we never should have sat down, they said it cost about 60 us. I laughed and Linh laughed. Our room only cost 22, her fancy smancy djalaba only cost 24. But instead of getting irate or irrattional we sat there chatting while the stuff dried and started whittling away at the price. We got it down to 15 dollars and Linhs sandals, which we had been planning on getting rid of anyway. We still felt ripped off when we went back to our room, but after thinking about how much henna we got and how much we have paid at the international festival at home we realized we really probably did get 15 dollars worth. I don't know if we wanted 15 dollars worth, but that is what we got. Later we decided to try and go to the market again. We skirted the open area so we didn't have to see the henna people again and made it into the back alleys of the market. People were hawking their wares but they were polite about it. And everywhere we went they commented on LInhs djalaba and really it was almost like she was a celebrity or something. I guess not a lot of foreigners try to do the local dress. We were hoping for her to blend in more, but i'm not sure if it may have had the opposite effect. Anyway, it does look good on her and it covers her body, which is the polite thing for women to do in this country. Later we bought me a tunic for 8 dollars and if I put my bandanna on my head, I might start to look like a pirate or something. I have already been called Ali Babba a couple of times with people referring to my goatee. We ate dinner on a rooftop terrace and watched the people walk by below. The only bad thing here is that we get the same feeling from the men that we got from the men in Turkey. One of the first questions Linh always gets is "Is he your friend?" and she dutifully replies no he is my husband. But you can see in their eyes that women are considered more objects than people. Sometimes it gets old having people flirt with your wife all the time, I know she gets tired of it, but it just confirms the fact that i have a cutie for wife and I am a lucky guy. Its weird how this is really only a problem in the muslim countries. Tommorow we have big plans. We are going on our first paid tour of our trip. We are taking a 3 day 2 night excursion into the desert on varying modes of transportation including camels. We are sleeping in a big tent one night and in a hotel the other night. We get to go to an oasis and this valley Linh really wanted to see. We are considering this our early anniversary present to each other. We really cant wait to go. You may not hear from us for a few days. I know we are going to some cities but I dont know about internet access. Wish us good luck,Brian6-16 reflecting back to 6-11We are in Seville, Spain right now and we have so much fun over the last few days and met lots of really cool people and gained a few friends.7:00 am, we meet in front of the tour office with a bunch of other people and wait to get on our minibus. Their are about 15 people going on our trip. One of our worries was who we were going to be stuck with. Obviously people around our age (or our internal age, which is more like post college) would be ideal and hopefully people who speak English. Well, there were a lot of people from different ethnic backgrounds but every single one of them was from an English speaking country! and they were all in their twenties or early thirties. 2 Pakistani brothers from England were quite the comedians. A few Aussies. Two Asian Aussie girls, Kai and Sally. A college grad from California, Garrison. Four Asians from Canada. A Texan girl living in Barcelona, Claire. And us, the married couple. It really was quite a motley crew and we got along famously.The first day we get on the bus to go see an old kasbah. In Morroco, once you get out of the big cities, most of the buildings are made out of straw/mud bricks and the kasbah was made entirely of this. It looked kind of like a desert castle. It had turrets and was really interesting. We had a couple of cool guides who showed us around. To get into the kasbah we had to cross a river. Instead of paying to ride a donkey across we just pulled up our shorts and crossed on foot. On the way back out Linh really wanted to ride the donkey, so they put both of us on there and I thought the poor things legs were going to buckle. But, we made it safely across and were back to the bus. After riding for a few more hours we came to the place we were going to eat lunch and there was another bigger kasbah there. Nobody went to that kasbah because it looked pretty much the same as the last one and nobody wanted to pony up the money for another entrance fee. One thing we have found on our travels is that no matter how money a backpacker has, and we have met some that are really rich, they will scrape and scrounge to save a dollar. Oh, and another thing, the Morroccan dinner menu is really limited. Basically, the meats are chicken and beef and you can either have them with cous cous or in a tagine (a ceramic cooking dish) with vegetables. After lunch it was back on the bus and on to the Dades gorge. We had to cross the Atlas mountains to get to these places. Now, Morrocco is one of the most barren and desert looking places i have ever been to. Unless there is a valley around the landscape is just hard bare earth with a few half-alive scrubby bushes dotting the landscape. That said, on the way to the gorge (which we really wanted to explore) it began to rain. When we arrived at our hotel for the night which was right next to the gorge, it was raining pretty steadily....in the desert. Well, that kind of hampered our hiking ability. Most people just walked up the road a bit to take some pictures, but the four Americans, Linh, Claire, Garrison and I really wanted to a little hiking. The only problem was the stream in the bottom of the gorge was flowing pretty steadily. Garrison led the way and found a place to cross where the creek only came up to his thighs and when we were all about half way across, a couple of locals that were watching yelled out to us that there was a bridge upstream and sure enough, about 30 yards away there was a log bridge. Stupid tourists. Anyway, we walked around in the drizzle for a little bit, but it was getting dark so we didn't get to hike much. We went back to the hotel for dinner (cous cous!). We ate and then went upstairs to get cleaned up. I think our group was the only customers in the whole hotel. The rooms were decent and after our showers we hung out in the foyer talking to a few people. Not long after the lights flickered a few times, came back on, then went out completely. This must happen often because it was then that we noticed there was one lit candle with a bunch of unlit ones next to it. So we all lit a candle and started telling scary stories and talking about our favorite scary movies. After a while we got tired and went to bed. I slept well but Linh couldn't get to sleep. In fact the candle burned out before she fell asleep.6-12Breakfast at 7:00 am. Breakfast is bread and butter and jam and coffee and juice. Yum (sarcasm). 7:30, back on the bus. The seating arrangement on the bus stayed the same the entire trip I ended up sitting in the front seat next to the driver. Linh sat on the first bench seat behind me next to Kai and Sally. Kai and Sally were travelling together and were quite friendly with Linh. I didn't really talk to the bus driver much because he didn't speak English and I didn't speak arabic or French.The bus driver was a really cool guy though. He was an older black man and just had the best temperment. Yesterday he got stopped at a checkpoint and got fined for some inadequate tires, I think. Well, we started driving and about 3 minutes down the road the van cut off and driver put his head on the steering wheel like he couldn't beleive this was happening. It was nothing serious though. We had just ran out of gas. A quick call on his cell phone and scooter shows up. The scooter guy took off and came back with about 5 gallons of gas. We were back on the road and the whole escapade only took about 15 minutes. Running out of internet time, hopefully will update more tommorow,BrianAfter running out of gas we were back on our way to "tea with a Berber family" in valley somewhere (i can't remember the names of these places). We went to this verdent valley and saw how the locals grow their crops and then we went into a Berber household and had tea. The tea of Morrocco is mint tea and it is quite good. You can get the stuff pretty much anywhere. Then they proceeded to show us how carpets are made. They made of a combination of camel and sheep wool and have various ways of knotting and stitcheing. And then, and we all knew this was coming, we were offered to the chance to buy some carpets. Let me tell you something, between Turkey and Morrocco I would be happy to never set eyes on a carpet salesman again. At this point the 4 Canadians just walked out. The rest of us sat there staring at each other not sure what to do. It was a long uncomfortable silence, but we all knew that noone was going to buy a carpet and so I stood up and said thank you very much and that got everyone moving out. I have to props to the sales guy just for the fact that he wasn't very pushy. Well we escaped from there and got back on the bus and headed to another gorge. Along the way we stopped for lunch (cous cous or tangine anyone?). The lunch stops are at places where there is no other place to eat around and we are sure that the tour company gets a cut of the money spent. So on to the gorge. This one was not as impressive as the last one which is a shame since it was a nice sunny day. There was no trail, just a road to walk on. The road was interspersed with kids trying to sell you useless knick knacks and trying to bum money off you. We didnt' walk far and decided to head back to the bus. We have found that the constant begging and touts from merchants really wears you out metally. That is a shame because we really want to enjoy a country, but some times you are being pestered so much that you don't want to do much of anyting. So after everyone returned we got back on the bus and headed for the Sahara. The trip up to this point had been nice but this was the part everyone was most looking forward to, I think. This is the part where we get to ride camels! So after a few hours of staring at shale covered dirt we finally see the dunes on the horizon. At this point our bus driver pretty much takes a hard left off of the paved road and starts driving over the broken pieces of shale towards the dunes. We get to the outlying parts of the dunes and there is a building. We disembark here. The camels are there waiting for us. We each grab a blanket and head for a camel. There was one psycho camel and the Pakistani guy got it. That thing was darker colored than the rest of the camels and made it know that he wasn't too interested in standing up. It was bellowing loudly and making all kinds of weird camel noises. We were all cracking up. A few of the the other camels had their quirks, but were for the most part normal. Now, a camel is pretty much sitting on the ground with its legs folded under it when you get on. Then it comes up about halfway on its front legs, all the way up on the back legs, then all the way up on the front legs and then all of a sudden you are way up in the air. Camel legs are really long and spindly. The camels were all tied together one in front of another. Off into the dunes we headed. Some of these dunes were huge, like sand mountains. One thing I discovered about camels and thieir hump is how unergonomical it is with the physiology of male. Uphill and level was fine but going downhill has the propensity to cause a bit of pain if you not situated just right. Other than that we were all having a blast, I mean, how often do you get to ride a camel on the continent of Africa in the Sahara desert? Some things are little hard to grasp the reality of. We rode the camels for about an hour to a little camp site among the dunes. There were tents set up. About 8 people to tent, nothing fancy, sand floors. For bathrooms, well, we had the Sahara as our litter box.more to come, BrianWe got to camp about 1hour before sunset. Our camp was right under a huge sand dune. Where else to go but up the sand dune to watch the sunset? The guide said the hard way was to go directly up the sand dune and the easy way was...... well i dont remember beacause we never go the easy way, so why start now. Linh and I took off of the dune-mountain. We were the first ones to start and we made it about 1/3 of the way up and we were ready to pass out. We attacked the thing full force and while we had to rest we has a few people pass us on the way up. It was like taking a full step forward and then sliding about half a step backwards. Well, after a few more rests and crawling on all fours we made it to the top. It was quite and accomplishment, I thought i was going to pass out at one point. So we get to the top and what do we see? Clouds! No pretty sunset tonight, but the view was outstanding. Dunes as far as the eye can see. The peak of the dune was cool, because it was a perfectly undisturbed line, it actually came to a really fine point, that is until we walked all over it. We found it really nice and Linh and I kicked around the idea of sleeping up there on the dune instead of in the ratty tent. Well, it got dark and it was time to head back down for dinner. Now, this part was fun, we ran full speed down the dune. Imagine for a minute being on top of a really steep mountain and then just runnning down full speed, and instead of taking two steps and tripping and killling yourself, every step you take sinks in about 8 or 10 inches, it was kind of springboarding down a marshmallow or something. Well we get down and all sit around on rugs laid out on the sand and wait for our dinner. Chicken tangine! and mint tea! We love the diverse menu of Morrocco. We sit around for a bit after dinner and then our guides pull out some bongo drums and flute/recorder wind instrument thing and proceed to give us a little Berber desert concert. After that dies out one of the guides says we should go with him back up to the top of the dune to look at the stars. Everyone groans and then he says he will take us the easy way, well, about half of us took him up on it. I mean, really, how often do you get a chance to do something like this? So, true to his word, we go a round about way that is twice is long and not nearly as tiring and we get to the top and lay there. We've looked at stars in a lot of places but this is probably the most I have ever seen in my lifetime. It was really awe inspiring, the milky way was just splayed out across the sky. Wow! Linh and I had the foresite to bring our sleeping bags up with us and one by one the other people decided to go back down to bed, we tried to talk them into staying, but I guess we just have a bit more of an adventurous spirit than most. Before long we had smoothed some sand out for to sleep and were looking up at the stars, no tent, no nothing between us and the sky. I even saw a few shooting stars. We fell asleep on one face of the dune with our feet pointed downhill and our heads right at the peak of the dune. It was a little weird because of the incline, almost like sleeping standing up, but it was really comfortable because the sand just conforms to your body. About 2 am the wind started to kick up. This kinda of sucked because the wind was blowing up one face of the dune and we were on the other face. That meant that the sand was blowing up the dune then cresting and coming to rest in my ear mostly. Well, I was in my sleeping bag and Linh was jsut in her djalaba which has a hood and good sand protection. My entire head was becoming covered so i woke her up and made her change sides of the dune with me. That worked really well and we slept peacefully until just before sunrise.6-13Woke up just before sunrise and then watched the sunrise as Linh slept. It was beautiful. I really loved the sights and the way the low sun cast shadows on the dunes was awesome. Well, after the sunrise, Linh woke up and we got to run back down the dune again. Camp was up and it was 6 am, time to get back on the camels and ride back to the bus. The trip to the Sahara was definately the highlight of the trip. Everyone absolutely loved it. We got back to where the bus was parked and had bread for breakfast. Then they tried to sell us some fossils. No takers. We backpackers are a tough sell. The rest of the day was mostly riding the bus back to Marrakesh. We tried to convince the bus driver(his name is Sayid)to fill up the gas tank more often, but he didnºt seem to think we need much gas to get around. Linh and her seatmates, Kai and Sally, talked for a lot of the trip and became friends. Really all of us on the trip ended up being friends which is a nice thing when you are stuck with the same people for three days. After 10 hours on the bus and a few stops we arrived in Marrakesh. We followed some of our tour mates to a cheap place to stay. We all decided to go to Essouira, a beach town, the next day. Come to find out that Kai and Sally and Claire and Garrison were heading that way too, so we all decided to hang together. After washing my hair about 30 times (the fine sand of the Sahara turned my scalp into 100 grit sandpaper.) we headed out to eat dinner. If you remember our first trip to the Souk(the central market) took place early in the day and the place was not very crowded and we got accosted by the henna women. That left a bad taste, so we hadnºt been back since. We were starving and it was after dark so we headed towards the Souk and Wow! the place was so alive! It was really crowded and we couldnºt even see the dreaded henna women. There were open air grills everywhere and as we were looking at one menu a competitor drug us over to his place and sat us down. They had all their food laid out and you could pick and choose what you wanted. They had so many different sides and seafood and we were so happy that we didnºt have to choose between cous cous and tajine. Everyone working at our booth looked so happy and seemed to be enjoying working in the market atmosphere. I told Linh "we seem to have the happiest booth around". Not long after I said that one of the guys bent down and took a huge hit of hash and then tried to sell me some. I politely refused and it became apparent why our booth was so happy. During the course of our dinner we also learned how to flip somebody off in Morroccon. The things you learn while traveling...After dinner we went back to the motel which had a nice rooftop terrace and hung out up there talking with Kai for a bit. Then we hit the sack totally exhausted.6-14 We woke up early because we had to catch the bus to Essouira. And buy our train tickets for tommorow nightºs all night trip back to Tangier. The six of us took a taxi to the train station, bought our tickets, took a taxi to the bus station, where there were exactly six seats left on the bus we wanted... whew! We rode for about 3 hours and arrived around noon. We went to this cheap place that was recommended by friends of some of the other people from our tour that had already been there. It cost about 10 dollars a night for the both of us. The bathroom was outside of the room, but that didnºt matter much to us. We dropped off our stuff and went to find some lunch. Claire ran into some people at the motel that she had met before and they told us about a cafe that had hamburgers. I donºt think I have had a hamburger since I left the states and with the previous few days limited menu, that sounded like heaven in a bun. We went there, Garrison and I ordered hamburgers and Linh ordered a steak. Well the hamburger was pretty much a meatball on a bun and the steak looked like it had been run over by a steamroller. Man, that is one thing I miss about home...big, fat, juicy steaks. After lunch Linh, Garrison, Kai, Sally and I took a really long walk on the beach. They had camels on the beach, they called them taxis. The beach was really, really windy and even though the temperature was hot the gale force winds and cool water temperatures kept us from going in the water. That was kind of disappointing but it was still relaxing. There were kite surfers and wind surfers everywhere. After the walk we relaxed and then ate dinner. We walked around the town center a bit and then went to bed.6-15 Happy 3rd year anniversary to us! We had kicked around the idea of staying in a really nice place last night but we figured we could do that anytime and we should hang out with our friends while they were still around. Friends are so transient while you are travelling. We did sleep in though and our big plans for the day were to go to a hammam. A hammam is a public bath where you can get a massage and someone will wash you down. We had wanted to go to one in Turkey but never did get the chance. Lucky for us, because in Turkey they tended to be really touristy and expensive. Here it was more a way of life for these people. Anyway the one here in Essouira was dirt cheap. Claire knew the way and just before we were about to leave she metioned that the hammam they were going to was for girls only. So, Linh and Sally and Claire took off in their own direction and Garrison and I werenºt really certain if we even wanted to go. In the end, we figured, what the heck you only live once and we got the hotel guy to show us where the guys hammam was. At this point in the story I am going to tell about my experience and Linh will tell her part about what she did.Guys hammam: Ok, the hotel guy took us down some back alleys to this little hole in wall doorway. It looked kind of sketchy. Garrison and I, being the men that we are, and not having another male wash us since we were babies, really debated whether or not we would go in. The people there didnºt speak english at all. We figured all the locals used this place, so what the heck we will give it a shot. And in we went. In the entry room you strip down to your skivvies and give you clothes to the baggage guy. We werenºt too keen on the skivvies part, so we both wore our board shorts. We were each handed a big rubber bucket and we headed toward another room where we saw some other people go. We eventually ended up in this all tile room with a heated tile floor. Some guy was doing some sort of yoga or something on the floor and another guy was scrubbing himself. We didnºt have any soap or anything and we didnºt know what the heck to do so we sat there and stared at each other across the room wondering what the heck we had got ourselves into. Eventually, this rotund guy in his briefs wanders in and we try to get across that we donºt know anything and he figures out that this is our first time in there. We gesture that we want the massage/bathing thing that we had seen some other dude get. He figures out what we want and then he grabs me by my hair and motions that i follow him to some faucets and sink looking things. He makes me squat down and then proceeds to pour 2 buckets of cold water on me. very cold water. The he tells me to go back to where i was. He calls in some other guy, who starts on Garrison. I am then made to lie down on my stomach on the floor. The guy grabs my left arm near the wrist and then some sort of twisting motion that causes all these bones i didnºt even know i had to pop. Same thing for the right arm. He pops my fingers. Then he starts on the legs. Pops my toes, then he bends my legs at some weird angle and nothing happens. He drops my legs then proceeds to straddle and starting pressing on and cracking my back. He did about a 10 second massage on my back then he was done. the whole thing took about 2 minutes, but dang, it was like i just went to the chiropractor. I look over at Garrison and his guy has him sitting up. The guy is behind him wrapping his legs around him and contorting him into some weird position. My guy came back and signalled it was time for a scrubbing. He puts on some sort of glove that feels like the hook side of velcro and procceeds to scrub the heck out of me. I saw huge rolls of dead skin sloughing off of me. It was really gross, but man, I guess I really needed to be cleaned. He seemed amazed at the amount of crud coming off me and he does this for a living. Soon enough he had scrubbed me clean and I was done. The whole process was a little bit bizarre, very professional, and not gay at all, thank goodness. We rinsed off with a few buckets of water and then found out they donºt have towels. We dripped dry for a bit, but it was so hot in there that we just started sweating. We put on our shirts and paid the massage guy and then hit the road. I donºt know if i would do it again, but i was happy for the experience. and the whole thing cost me about $4 US. Girls hammam: Kai was sick from eating something bad the night before, so Claire, Sally, and I went to the womenºs hammam without her. As we walked in, we saw 2 men...I was a little apprehensive about that, seeing as how it was a womenºs hammam. It cost us 59 dirham, which is about 6 US. The men didnºt go past the entry door, thank goodness. You know me and Muslim men...never know what theyºre thinking! We put our change of clothes in little cubby holes and took off our outer clothing, leaving our bathing suits on. The hammam is a bathing ritual for almost everyone in Muslim countries. Their religion requires them to be clean, and women and men almost never bathe together. Each gender has separate baths or separate days of the week where they can attend. Itçs a very important thing for the women since they have to remain covered up for most of their lives. when they go to the hammam, it seems to free them. The same stony-faced, or shy, women you see on the streets suddenly look so happy and carefree in the hammam. They rarely talk. They spend hours and hours just scrubbing themselves, completely engrossed in their own little world. The irony is the women arenºt shy about their bodies in the presence of other women. Some were completely naked. More often than not, thereºs one scrubber-masseuse lady who basically bathes you. It sounds so strange to us westerners, but itºs so clean and professional in there. Our bather was a pretty big women who was very sweet, but preferred to work in only her bottoms..no top, which is pretty standard practice. We had a room to ourselves and she washed out the room really well. She poured buckets and buckets of different temperature waters so we could rinse ourselves. We each had our own pouring bowl, soap, and glove. The gloves are really rough textured, almost like a loofah. We soaped ourselves up really well, she helping each of us in turn. We used a special soap called hammam soap which was all natural biodegradable, non-sudsing but smoothe. It was a really cool soap. I bought some to take home. After cleaning ourselves, she poured water all over us. Claire had brought in powdered henna and the lady made a paste out of it to use as shampoo for us. She applied carefully on our heads. Then I was the first one to get what they call a wonderful ritual of abuse...the scrubbing. She scrubbed every single corner of my body not covered up like I was a dirty, caked-on steel pot. Then she scrubbed some more. I didnºt know whether to feel exhilarated or to scream i pain...but it was good pain! She paid careful attention to every finger and limb. This took a good 20 minutes. Remember that henna tattoo I got? She scrubbed until I only had little traces left. So much for ´´i promise henna last one month!´´ Then Sally and Claire each had a turn. They mentioned the digusting blackness they saw when she scrubbed them. That was their dead skin cells being washed away. They told me how the masseuse pointed to all the skin cells while she scrubbed them and laughed at them. This is one of the rewards of all the pain, to see all impurities wash off the skin. I had paid attention and was hoping that when she scrubbed me, Iºd get to see all skin cells falling off, but I think because I scrub myself that hard everytime I shower, nothing really came off. It was a little disappointing. But then, the masseuse beckoned me to another room, made me lay down and started massaging me. She stretched, pushed, pulled, yanked and bent anything that would go. It felt so good. Then she got behind my head while I was sitting down to massage my neck. Note that she did everything very professionally and rhythmically, like sheºd done only about 8000 times. But I had to really stifle my laughter when she leaned over to massage my neck and I could feel her ample tahs tahs smacking against the back of my head! What an experience. I can tell why the people look forward to this bathing ritual. When we left the hammam, everyone was rubbing their skin. It was so smoothe and clean. We know now how it feels for a baby to be bathed by its mother.
posted by BananaCreamPie 2:10 PM 16 comments
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Tuesday, June 21, 2005
Morrocco
There are pictures now in the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, and some of Czech Republic Blogs as of 4-11-05. Go to individual blogs to see.The Turkey Blog now has pictures.6-8-05Ok this is good. In some internet places you have the option to change the keyboard to American, and i have here so typing is a lot easier.On the ferry. We arrive at Tangier and wait for the rush of people to get off the boat and as we are getting off they check our passport and low and behold we were supposed to get our enttry stamp to Morrocco on the boat before we docked. They wouldn't let us off the boat until the stamper guy came back on. Apparently they made this announcement over the intercom in 3 different languages, but the intercom sounded like a drive through speaker and I didn't hear anything resembling English come out of it. 2 american brothers and one australian wife also missed the message. The lady raised hell at the workers and got absolutely nothing accomplished. We have found out in these situations to just wait and be polite and not cause trouble is the best way to go. Linh used our down time to find out some basic Morroccan words that we might need to know. Eventually the passport guy came back and stamped us and we got off the boat. We walked into town with the other people we were stuck with and the lady brokered a group discount for us in the hotel. That was kind of cool. Our first impression of Tangier was not good. It was a dirty, smelly city, with lots of beggars and such, but then again, we hadn't made it very far past the port. We took a much needed shower and it was getting dark so we asked the hotel for a cheap place to eat and he pointed us across the street. A nice little hole in wall place. We had a four course meal and drinks for about 15 us. The food was really good and the people nice. A lot of the people here speak French, which is good for us because Linh speaks French.We crashed out and slept like rocks.6-9We woke up at a leisurely pace and decided we had to find the train station to move on to Marrakech. We saw a map in the lobby and the train station didn't look to far away, so we decided to hoof it. Well, eventually we ran into signs pointing to the train station and we kept following them and following them. The walk was a lot longer than we had anticipated and when we finally got there we realized the station is brand spanking new and that the one on the map was probably the old one. The train to Marrakech was going to take about 10 hours and instead of arriving in the middle of the night we opted for the night train, and thanks to Morroccan priced we were actually able to afford a bed this time. The train didn't leave until 11pm so we had a lot of time to kill. We hopped a taxi to the bus station where we were able to leave our packs and walked around town a bit. We dont like Tangier much. It is not pretty, smells like sewage most of the time and all kinds of weird people are approaching you all the time. We read this is a transient town and most of the countries scam artists are here. Even the beach was ugly. So we found a cheap internet and spent about 4 hours in there. We went to cafes and ate a little and read our books. (Uncle Rob gave us a couple of books in Spain, and also he offered to take some things back for us so we loaded him up with all our winter clothes and some useless items we had packed way back when. So, mom and dad, if you run into Uncle Rob can you get our stuff?) We decide it was wise to get the train station before dark and so we ate at the bus station and collected our bags and walked back to the nice, clean, no beggar train station about 3 hours before our train left. Our train came and we there were 4 bunks, we had the bottom 2, the people on top were quieter than us and Linh and I slept peacefully and bliss fully.6-10 Marrakech! Our free internet is almost out of time so i have to go, but Marrakech is a lot better than Tangier.BrianOk! big day in Marrakech! When the conductor woke us up at about 8 am i looked out the window and saw nothing but desert. As we pulled into the city things got greener and busier. It was weird to watch it go from absolutely nothing to a busy city. We cheated when we got off the train around 9 am and got a taxi into town and found a hotel Linh had written down from the the internet. Hotel Ali. We each got a free hour of internet with our room and have access to a hammam(turkish bath) but it is so hot here i dont know if i can deal with scalding water. Breakfast is included too. Its weird because it is really hot here, but its not North Carolina or Georgia humid hot. At least the sweat evaporates off your body at some point. Anyway, internet is dirt cheap here, I am paying about 50cents an hour. The cheapest we have run into yet. We really love the food here, but in all our travels I think New Zealand is about the only place where we didn't love the food. Linh decided and I agreed that she should get a Djalaba(the Morrocan dress that the women wear). We went into a shop and an English speaking lady that lives here told us what to expect to pay. That was very helpful. Well, Linh found a really nice one that was on the mannequin, beautiful orange and gold and red and yellow and white stripes with a hood. It was the priciest one in the shop we bargained and bargained and tried to walk out and the sales guy looked pained when we got to the final price. It was kind of pricey, but it is really beautiful and everyone we have talked to afterward said we got a really good price. Even another shop owner said he couldn't beat the price. After that purchase we decided to go to the big market. In the open area before you get to the enclosed market are big umbrellas set up with people hawking stuff under them. We saw a guy selling monkeys. We saw snake charmers, and before we got too far Linh was practically accosted by some henna ladies and they made her sit and drew henna on her hand and on both her feet and drew a scorpion on my arm. The whole time they made polite conversation but wouldn't tell how much it was. At the the end, and we didn't ask for any of this they just started drawing and I knew we never should have sat down, they said it cost about 60 us. I laughed and Linh laughed. Our room only cost 22, her fancy smancy djalaba only cost 24. But instead of getting irate or irrattional we sat there chatting while the stuff dried and started whittling away at the price. We got it down to 15 dollars and Linhs sandals, which we had been planning on getting rid of anyway. We still felt ripped off when we went back to our room, but after thinking about how much henna we got and how much we have paid at the international festival at home we realized we really probably did get 15 dollars worth. I don't know if we wanted 15 dollars worth, but that is what we got. Later we decided to try and go to the market again. We skirted the open area so we didn't have to see the henna people again and made it into the back alleys of the market. People were hawking their wares but they were polite about it. And everywhere we went they commented on LInhs djalaba and really it was almost like she was a celebrity or something. I guess not a lot of foreigners try to do the local dress. We were hoping for her to blend in more, but i'm not sure if it may have had the opposite effect. Anyway, it does look good on her and it covers her body, which is the polite thing for women to do in this country. Later we bought me a tunic for 8 dollars and if I put my bandanna on my head, I might start to look like a pirate or something. I have already been called Ali Babba a couple of times with people referring to my goatee. We ate dinner on a rooftop terrace and watched the people walk by below. The only bad thing here is that we get the same feeling from the men that we got from the men in Turkey. One of the first questions Linh always gets is "Is he your friend?" and she dutifully replies no he is my husband. But you can see in their eyes that women are considered more objects than people. Sometimes it gets old having people flirt with your wife all the time, I know she gets tired of it, but it just confirms the fact that i have a cutie for wife and I am a lucky guy. Its weird how this is really only a problem in the muslim countries. Tommorow we have big plans. We are going on our first paid tour of our trip. We are taking a 3 day 2 night excursion into the desert on varying modes of transportation including camels. We are sleeping in a big tent one night and in a hotel the other night. We get to go to an oasis and this valley Linh really wanted to see. We are considering this our early anniversary present to each other. We really cant wait to go. You may not hear from us for a few days. I know we are going to some cities but I dont know about internet access. Wish us good luck,Brian6-16 reflecting back to 6-11We are in Seville, Spain right now and we have so much fun over the last few days and met lots of really cool people and gained a few friends.7:00 am, we meet in front of the tour office with a bunch of other people and wait to get on our minibus. Their are about 15 people going on our trip. One of our worries was who we were going to be stuck with. Obviously people around our age (or our internal age, which is more like post college) would be ideal and hopefully people who speak English. Well, there were a lot of people from different ethnic backgrounds but every single one of them was from an English speaking country! and they were all in their twenties or early thirties. 2 Pakistani brothers from England were quite the comedians. A few Aussies. Two Asian Aussie girls, Kai and Sally. A college grad from California, Garrison. Four Asians from Canada. A Texan girl living in Barcelona, Claire. And us, the married couple. It really was quite a motley crew and we got along famously.The first day we get on the bus to go see an old kasbah. In Morroco, once you get out of the big cities, most of the buildings are made out of straw/mud bricks and the kasbah was made entirely of this. It looked kind of like a desert castle. It had turrets and was really interesting. We had a couple of cool guides who showed us around. To get into the kasbah we had to cross a river. Instead of paying to ride a donkey across we just pulled up our shorts and crossed on foot. On the way back out Linh really wanted to ride the donkey, so they put both of us on there and I thought the poor things legs were going to buckle. But, we made it safely across and were back to the bus. After riding for a few more hours we came to the place we were going to eat lunch and there was another bigger kasbah there. Nobody went to that kasbah because it looked pretty much the same as the last one and nobody wanted to pony up the money for another entrance fee. One thing we have found on our travels is that no matter how money a backpacker has, and we have met some that are really rich, they will scrape and scrounge to save a dollar. Oh, and another thing, the Morroccan dinner menu is really limited. Basically, the meats are chicken and beef and you can either have them with cous cous or in a tagine (a ceramic cooking dish) with vegetables. After lunch it was back on the bus and on to the Dades gorge. We had to cross the Atlas mountains to get to these places. Now, Morrocco is one of the most barren and desert looking places i have ever been to. Unless there is a valley around the landscape is just hard bare earth with a few half-alive scrubby bushes dotting the landscape. That said, on the way to the gorge (which we really wanted to explore) it began to rain. When we arrived at our hotel for the night which was right next to the gorge, it was raining pretty steadily....in the desert. Well, that kind of hampered our hiking ability. Most people just walked up the road a bit to take some pictures, but the four Americans, Linh, Claire, Garrison and I really wanted to a little hiking. The only problem was the stream in the bottom of the gorge was flowing pretty steadily. Garrison led the way and found a place to cross where the creek only came up to his thighs and when we were all about half way across, a couple of locals that were watching yelled out to us that there was a bridge upstream and sure enough, about 30 yards away there was a log bridge. Stupid tourists. Anyway, we walked around in the drizzle for a little bit, but it was getting dark so we didn't get to hike much. We went back to the hotel for dinner (cous cous!). We ate and then went upstairs to get cleaned up. I think our group was the only customers in the whole hotel. The rooms were decent and after our showers we hung out in the foyer talking to a few people. Not long after the lights flickered a few times, came back on, then went out completely. This must happen often because it was then that we noticed there was one lit candle with a bunch of unlit ones next to it. So we all lit a candle and started telling scary stories and talking about our favorite scary movies. After a while we got tired and went to bed. I slept well but Linh couldn't get to sleep. In fact the candle burned out before she fell asleep.6-12Breakfast at 7:00 am. Breakfast is bread and butter and jam and coffee and juice. Yum (sarcasm). 7:30, back on the bus. The seating arrangement on the bus stayed the same the entire trip I ended up sitting in the front seat next to the driver. Linh sat on the first bench seat behind me next to Kai and Sally. Kai and Sally were travelling together and were quite friendly with Linh. I didn't really talk to the bus driver much because he didn't speak English and I didn't speak arabic or French.The bus driver was a really cool guy though. He was an older black man and just had the best temperment. Yesterday he got stopped at a checkpoint and got fined for some inadequate tires, I think. Well, we started driving and about 3 minutes down the road the van cut off and driver put his head on the steering wheel like he couldn't beleive this was happening. It was nothing serious though. We had just ran out of gas. A quick call on his cell phone and scooter shows up. The scooter guy took off and came back with about 5 gallons of gas. We were back on the road and the whole escapade only took about 15 minutes. Running out of internet time, hopefully will update more tommorow,BrianAfter running out of gas we were back on our way to "tea with a Berber family" in valley somewhere (i can't remember the names of these places). We went to this verdent valley and saw how the locals grow their crops and then we went into a Berber household and had tea. The tea of Morrocco is mint tea and it is quite good. You can get the stuff pretty much anywhere. Then they proceeded to show us how carpets are made. They made of a combination of camel and sheep wool and have various ways of knotting and stitcheing. And then, and we all knew this was coming, we were offered to the chance to buy some carpets. Let me tell you something, between Turkey and Morrocco I would be happy to never set eyes on a carpet salesman again. At this point the 4 Canadians just walked out. The rest of us sat there staring at each other not sure what to do. It was a long uncomfortable silence, but we all knew that noone was going to buy a carpet and so I stood up and said thank you very much and that got everyone moving out. I have to props to the sales guy just for the fact that he wasn't very pushy. Well we escaped from there and got back on the bus and headed to another gorge. Along the way we stopped for lunch (cous cous or tangine anyone?). The lunch stops are at places where there is no other place to eat around and we are sure that the tour company gets a cut of the money spent. So on to the gorge. This one was not as impressive as the last one which is a shame since it was a nice sunny day. There was no trail, just a road to walk on. The road was interspersed with kids trying to sell you useless knick knacks and trying to bum money off you. We didnt' walk far and decided to head back to the bus. We have found that the constant begging and touts from merchants really wears you out metally. That is a shame because we really want to enjoy a country, but some times you are being pestered so much that you don't want to do much of anyting. So after everyone returned we got back on the bus and headed for the Sahara. The trip up to this point had been nice but this was the part everyone was most looking forward to, I think. This is the part where we get to ride camels! So after a few hours of staring at shale covered dirt we finally see the dunes on the horizon. At this point our bus driver pretty much takes a hard left off of the paved road and starts driving over the broken pieces of shale towards the dunes. We get to the outlying parts of the dunes and there is a building. We disembark here. The camels are there waiting for us. We each grab a blanket and head for a camel. There was one psycho camel and the Pakistani guy got it. That thing was darker colored than the rest of the camels and made it know that he wasn't too interested in standing up. It was bellowing loudly and making all kinds of weird camel noises. We were all cracking up. A few of the the other camels had their quirks, but were for the most part normal. Now, a camel is pretty much sitting on the ground with its legs folded under it when you get on. Then it comes up about halfway on its front legs, all the way up on the back legs, then all the way up on the front legs and then all of a sudden you are way up in the air. Camel legs are really long and spindly. The camels were all tied together one in front of another. Off into the dunes we headed. Some of these dunes were huge, like sand mountains. One thing I discovered about camels and thieir hump is how unergonomical it is with the physiology of male. Uphill and level was fine but going downhill has the propensity to cause a bit of pain if you not situated just right. Other than that we were all having a blast, I mean, how often do you get to ride a camel on the continent of Africa in the Sahara desert? Some things are little hard to grasp the reality of. We rode the camels for about an hour to a little camp site among the dunes. There were tents set up. About 8 people to tent, nothing fancy, sand floors. For bathrooms, well, we had the Sahara as our litter box.more to come, BrianWe got to camp about 1hour before sunset. Our camp was right under a huge sand dune. Where else to go but up the sand dune to watch the sunset? The guide said the hard way was to go directly up the sand dune and the easy way was...... well i dont remember beacause we never go the easy way, so why start now. Linh and I took off of the dune-mountain. We were the first ones to start and we made it about 1/3 of the way up and we were ready to pass out. We attacked the thing full force and while we had to rest we has a few people pass us on the way up. It was like taking a full step forward and then sliding about half a step backwards. Well, after a few more rests and crawling on all fours we made it to the top. It was quite and accomplishment, I thought i was going to pass out at one point. So we get to the top and what do we see? Clouds! No pretty sunset tonight, but the view was outstanding. Dunes as far as the eye can see. The peak of the dune was cool, because it was a perfectly undisturbed line, it actually came to a really fine point, that is until we walked all over it. We found it really nice and Linh and I kicked around the idea of sleeping up there on the dune instead of in the ratty tent. Well, it got dark and it was time to head back down for dinner. Now, this part was fun, we ran full speed down the dune. Imagine for a minute being on top of a really steep mountain and then just runnning down full speed, and instead of taking two steps and tripping and killling yourself, every step you take sinks in about 8 or 10 inches, it was kind of springboarding down a marshmallow or something. Well we get down and all sit around on rugs laid out on the sand and wait for our dinner. Chicken tangine! and mint tea! We love the diverse menu of Morrocco. We sit around for a bit after dinner and then our guides pull out some bongo drums and flute/recorder wind instrument thing and proceed to give us a little Berber desert concert. After that dies out one of the guides says we should go with him back up to the top of the dune to look at the stars. Everyone groans and then he says he will take us the easy way, well, about half of us took him up on it. I mean, really, how often do you get a chance to do something like this? So, true to his word, we go a round about way that is twice is long and not nearly as tiring and we get to the top and lay there. We've looked at stars in a lot of places but this is probably the most I have ever seen in my lifetime. It was really awe inspiring, the milky way was just splayed out across the sky. Wow! Linh and I had the foresite to bring our sleeping bags up with us and one by one the other people decided to go back down to bed, we tried to talk them into staying, but I guess we just have a bit more of an adventurous spirit than most. Before long we had smoothed some sand out for to sleep and were looking up at the stars, no tent, no nothing between us and the sky. I even saw a few shooting stars. We fell asleep on one face of the dune with our feet pointed downhill and our heads right at the peak of the dune. It was a little weird because of the incline, almost like sleeping standing up, but it was really comfortable because the sand just conforms to your body. About 2 am the wind started to kick up. This kinda of sucked because the wind was blowing up one face of the dune and we were on the other face. That meant that the sand was blowing up the dune then cresting and coming to rest in my ear mostly. Well, I was in my sleeping bag and Linh was jsut in her djalaba which has a hood and good sand protection. My entire head was becoming covered so i woke her up and made her change sides of the dune with me. That worked really well and we slept peacefully until just before sunrise.6-13Woke up just before sunrise and then watched the sunrise as Linh slept. It was beautiful. I really loved the sights and the way the low sun cast shadows on the dunes was awesome. Well, after the sunrise, Linh woke up and we got to run back down the dune again. Camp was up and it was 6 am, time to get back on the camels and ride back to the bus. The trip to the Sahara was definately the highlight of the trip. Everyone absolutely loved it. We got back to where the bus was parked and had bread for breakfast. Then they tried to sell us some fossils. No takers. We backpackers are a tough sell. The rest of the day was mostly riding the bus back to Marrakesh. We tried to convince the bus driver(his name is Sayid)to fill up the gas tank more often, but he didnºt seem to think we need much gas to get around. Linh and her seatmates, Kai and Sally, talked for a lot of the trip and became friends. Really all of us on the trip ended up being friends which is a nice thing when you are stuck with the same people for three days. After 10 hours on the bus and a few stops we arrived in Marrakesh. We followed some of our tour mates to a cheap place to stay. We all decided to go to Essouira, a beach town, the next day. Come to find out that Kai and Sally and Claire and Garrison were heading that way too, so we all decided to hang together. After washing my hair about 30 times (the fine sand of the Sahara turned my scalp into 100 grit sandpaper.) we headed out to eat dinner. If you remember our first trip to the Souk(the central market) took place early in the day and the place was not very crowded and we got accosted by the henna women. That left a bad taste, so we hadnºt been back since. We were starving and it was after dark so we headed towards the Souk and Wow! the place was so alive! It was really crowded and we couldnºt even see the dreaded henna women. There were open air grills everywhere and as we were looking at one menu a competitor drug us over to his place and sat us down. They had all their food laid out and you could pick and choose what you wanted. They had so many different sides and seafood and we were so happy that we didnºt have to choose between cous cous and tajine. Everyone working at our booth looked so happy and seemed to be enjoying working in the market atmosphere. I told Linh "we seem to have the happiest booth around". Not long after I said that one of the guys bent down and took a huge hit of hash and then tried to sell me some. I politely refused and it became apparent why our booth was so happy. During the course of our dinner we also learned how to flip somebody off in Morroccon. The things you learn while traveling...After dinner we went back to the motel which had a nice rooftop terrace and hung out up there talking with Kai for a bit. Then we hit the sack totally exhausted.6-14 We woke up early because we had to catch the bus to Essouira. And buy our train tickets for tommorow nightºs all night trip back to Tangier. The six of us took a taxi to the train station, bought our tickets, took a taxi to the bus station, where there were exactly six seats left on the bus we wanted... whew! We rode for about 3 hours and arrived around noon. We went to this cheap place that was recommended by friends of some of the other people from our tour that had already been there. It cost about 10 dollars a night for the both of us. The bathroom was outside of the room, but that didnºt matter much to us. We dropped off our stuff and went to find some lunch. Claire ran into some people at the motel that she had met before and they told us about a cafe that had hamburgers. I donºt think I have had a hamburger since I left the states and with the previous few days limited menu, that sounded like heaven in a bun. We went there, Garrison and I ordered hamburgers and Linh ordered a steak. Well the hamburger was pretty much a meatball on a bun and the steak looked like it had been run over by a steamroller. Man, that is one thing I miss about home...big, fat, juicy steaks. After lunch Linh, Garrison, Kai, Sally and I took a really long walk on the beach. They had camels on the beach, they called them taxis. The beach was really, really windy and even though the temperature was hot the gale force winds and cool water temperatures kept us from going in the water. That was kind of disappointing but it was still relaxing. There were kite surfers and wind surfers everywhere. After the walk we relaxed and then ate dinner. We walked around the town center a bit and then went to bed.6-15 Happy 3rd year anniversary to us! We had kicked around the idea of staying in a really nice place last night but we figured we could do that anytime and we should hang out with our friends while they were still around. Friends are so transient while you are travelling. We did sleep in though and our big plans for the day were to go to a hammam. A hammam is a public bath where you can get a massage and someone will wash you down. We had wanted to go to one in Turkey but never did get the chance. Lucky for us, because in Turkey they tended to be really touristy and expensive. Here it was more a way of life for these people. Anyway the one here in Essouira was dirt cheap. Claire knew the way and just before we were about to leave she metioned that the hammam they were going to was for girls only. So, Linh and Sally and Claire took off in their own direction and Garrison and I werenºt really certain if we even wanted to go. In the end, we figured, what the heck you only live once and we got the hotel guy to show us where the guys hammam was. At this point in the story I am going to tell about my experience and Linh will tell her part about what she did.Guys hammam: Ok, the hotel guy took us down some back alleys to this little hole in wall doorway. It looked kind of sketchy. Garrison and I, being the men that we are, and not having another male wash us since we were babies, really debated whether or not we would go in. The people there didnºt speak english at all. We figured all the locals used this place, so what the heck we will give it a shot. And in we went. In the entry room you strip down to your skivvies and give you clothes to the baggage guy. We werenºt too keen on the skivvies part, so we both wore our board shorts. We were each handed a big rubber bucket and we headed toward another room where we saw some other people go. We eventually ended up in this all tile room with a heated tile floor. Some guy was doing some sort of yoga or something on the floor and another guy was scrubbing himself. We didnºt have any soap or anything and we didnºt know what the heck to do so we sat there and stared at each other across the room wondering what the heck we had got ourselves into. Eventually, this rotund guy in his briefs wanders in and we try to get across that we donºt know anything and he figures out that this is our first time in there. We gesture that we want the massage/bathing thing that we had seen some other dude get. He figures out what we want and then he grabs me by my hair and motions that i follow him to some faucets and sink looking things. He makes me squat down and then proceeds to pour 2 buckets of cold water on me. very cold water. The he tells me to go back to where i was. He calls in some other guy, who starts on Garrison. I am then made to lie down on my stomach on the floor. The guy grabs my left arm near the wrist and then some sort of twisting motion that causes all these bones i didnºt even know i had to pop. Same thing for the right arm. He pops my fingers. Then he starts on the legs. Pops my toes, then he bends my legs at some weird angle and nothing happens. He drops my legs then proceeds to straddle and starting pressing on and cracking my back. He did about a 10 second massage on my back then he was done. the whole thing took about 2 minutes, but dang, it was like i just went to the chiropractor. I look over at Garrison and his guy has him sitting up. The guy is behind him wrapping his legs around him and contorting him into some weird position. My guy came back and signalled it was time for a scrubbing. He puts on some sort of glove that feels like the hook side of velcro and procceeds to scrub the heck out of me. I saw huge rolls of dead skin sloughing off of me. It was really gross, but man, I guess I really needed to be cleaned. He seemed amazed at the amount of crud coming off me and he does this for a living. Soon enough he had scrubbed me clean and I was done. The whole process was a little bit bizarre, very professional, and not gay at all, thank goodness. We rinsed off with a few buckets of water and then found out they donºt have towels. We dripped dry for a bit, but it was so hot in there that we just started sweating. We put on our shirts and paid the massage guy and then hit the road. I donºt know if i would do it again, but i was happy for the experience. and the whole thing cost me about $4 US. Girls hammam: Kai was sick from eating something bad the night before, so Claire, Sally, and I went to the womenºs hammam without her. As we walked in, we saw 2 men...I was a little apprehensive about that, seeing as how it was a womenºs hammam. It cost us 59 dirham, which is about 6 US. The men didnºt go past the entry door, thank goodness. You know me and Muslim men...never know what theyºre thinking! We put our change of clothes in little cubby holes and took off our outer clothing, leaving our bathing suits on. The hammam is a bathing ritual for almost everyone in Muslim countries. Their religion requires them to be clean, and women and men almost never bathe together. Each gender has separate baths or separate days of the week where they can attend. Itçs a very important thing for the women since they have to remain covered up for most of their lives. when they go to the hammam, it seems to free them. The same stony-faced, or shy, women you see on the streets suddenly look so happy and carefree in the hammam. They rarely talk. They spend hours and hours just scrubbing themselves, completely engrossed in their own little world. The irony is the women arenºt shy about their bodies in the presence of other women. Some were completely naked. More often than not, thereºs one scrubber-masseuse lady who basically bathes you. It sounds so strange to us westerners, but itºs so clean and professional in there. Our bather was a pretty big women who was very sweet, but preferred to work in only her bottoms..no top, which is pretty standard practice. We had a room to ourselves and she washed out the room really well. She poured buckets and buckets of different temperature waters so we could rinse ourselves. We each had our own pouring bowl, soap, and glove. The gloves are really rough textured, almost like a loofah. We soaped ourselves up really well, she helping each of us in turn. We used a special soap called hammam soap which was all natural biodegradable, non-sudsing but smoothe. It was a really cool soap. I bought some to take home. After cleaning ourselves, she poured water all over us. Claire had brought in powdered henna and the lady made a paste out of it to use as shampoo for us. She applied carefully on our heads. Then I was the first one to get what they call a wonderful ritual of abuse...the scrubbing. She scrubbed every single corner of my body not covered up like I was a dirty, caked-on steel pot. Then she scrubbed some more. I didnºt know whether to feel exhilarated or to scream i pain...but it was good pain! She paid careful attention to every finger and limb. This took a good 20 minutes. Remember that henna tattoo I got? She scrubbed until I only had little traces left. So much for ´´i promise henna last one month!´´ Then Sally and Claire each had a turn. They mentioned the digusting blackness they saw when she scrubbed them. That was their dead skin cells being washed away. They told me how the masseuse pointed to all the skin cells while she scrubbed them and laughed at them. This is one of the rewards of all the pain, to see all impurities wash off the skin. I had paid attention and was hoping that when she scrubbed me, Iºd get to see all skin cells falling off, but I think because I scrub myself that hard everytime I shower, nothing really came off. It was a little disappointing. But then, the masseuse beckoned me to another room, made me lay down and started massaging me. She stretched, pushed, pulled, yanked and bent anything that would go. It felt so good. Then she got behind my head while I was sitting down to massage my neck. Note that she did everything very professionally and rhythmically, like sheºd done only about 8000 times. But I had to really stifle my laughter when she leaned over to massage my neck and I could feel her ample tahs tahs smacking against the back of my head! What an experience. I can tell why the people look forward to this bathing ritual. When we left the hammam, everyone was rubbing their skin. It was so smoothe and clean. We know now how it feels for a baby to be bathed by its mother.
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