Second Hand Virginity

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Mohammed wears djellabah and tarboosh but inside is as westerner as the group of pale English tourists I have joined by mistake in Algeciras. We are in Ceuta, Spanish enclave in Moroccan territory, and Mohammed is our guide. He’s tall and of slim constitution only corrected by the presence of a round shaped belly, clear sign of economic well-being. He’s got thick moustaches and wears a pair of old “smoke black” sunglasses that makes him look like a pimp from the seventies. I hate organized tours in general and I hate tour leaders in particular. As general norm, After the second or third embarrassing question, guides hate me too.

Truly enough, Morocco didn’t enter in my plans of travel, but in Cadiz I had discovered that the ship heading to the Canary Islands only sails on Wednesdays and that there weren’t places available until the following week. Hence I found myself with a full “free” week and at a stone throw distance from Morocco. A chance not to be missed. In Algeciras, then, I had fallen in the trap for chickens set by a certain Javier and therefore, in return for 40€, here I am, forced to endure the tasteless, obvious Mohammed’s jokes and the not less insipid answers of two dozens little sheep who, in the meantime, take pics by the tons despite the coach glass windows.

The border crossing is a summer breeze. Five minutes are enough to open the boundary barrier up like the waters of Red Sea at the passage of Moises. Evidently, the 40€ included a “tip” for the incorruptible Moroccan border guards. From the air-conditioned comfort of our bus we can appreciate the hectic effort of thousands of Maghrebins, women and men alike, that cross the frontier in both directions, engaged in a continuous black market, that so black is probably not, given that is carried out right under the eyes of custom officers.

Tetouan is our first stop. In one hour bus ride, Mohammed has had time to properly indoctrinate its flock and we are therefore ready to follow him in these bazaars chosen in our best interest and without any personal gaining for himself, so to avoid swindles, thefts and -Allah protect us- death, in case we would decide to ignore his advices. A meal included in the price links Mohammed fate to mine for the time being. I’ll say farewell with a full stomach. The lunch consists of a veggie soup, lamb ribs covered by a greasy, extremely spicy sauce and the ubiquitous cous-cous, Moroccan national dish. Everything great. Time for goodbyes.

Finally alone, I call Tim, a German engineer friend of mine who lives and works in Casablanca and we set an appointment in the railway station of that city. Now, a white man, alone and lacking in djellabah shepherds doesn’t pass unnoticed in Morocco, believe me. And so, hordes of hasslers approach me trying to sell whichever thing they happen to possess, hashish in primis. I refuse every offer in a less and less friendly manner and I ask myself why, when we talk about racism, we only consider the one of white men towards “the others”. Isn’t this a form of racism? If my skin was darker here nobody would even dream of disturb me. I finally find a travel agency and buy the ticket to Casablanca: 7 hours journey, 120 dirham (ca. 12euro). My finances take some air.

I seat in a café frequented exclusively by male customers and drink an over sugared mint tea while waiting for my bus (the closest railway station is two hours away by bus from Tetouan). A young Moroccan walking with the help of crutches approaches me and asks for permission to sit at my table. I invite him to sit despite my initial diffidence. At the end of the day, I can’t spend a week suspecting of the intentions of every human being who approaches me, what sense would travelling have? My new table mate is called Abdullah, has lived in Spain during two years and his proficiency in spanish is quite enviable. A group of very young Moroccan girls dressed in traditional outfits walk in front of the café and Abdullah praises their beauty as well as their “seriousness”. I ask to explain himself better and Abdullah decides to lecture me about racial superiority and starts unfolding the tale of how easy Europeans girls are. He talks about “his” Spanish woman with revolting irreverence. Then begins the obvious, much dreaded praise to women virginity. Once ended his monologue, he asks me if I would marry a woman who’s not virgin anymore. I answer that in truth I had never consider the issue inasmuch as I have not considered the idea to get married itself, but that, in case I should change my mind, the number of previous lovers the bride have had would not be my business. Flames coming out from his mouth at hearing this: “So you would marry a girl who has already been with other men? And then, while walking hand in hand with her maybe you meet her former fiancèe along with his buddies and all of them would laugh at you remembering when she used to suck his… ” he’s literally yellowing this in my face and I can’t understand the reason to get so hot about it. I mean, If I had insinuated to have touched her sister tits, for instance, he would have probably cut my throat open before I could pronounce the second “t”. Fortunately, the bus arrives and I can therefore get rid of the presence of this poor devil.

The trip to El Ksar el Kbir station offers a landscape of barren sadness, the lot made even worse by the presence of endless plastic bags littering roads and fields. We stop at a resting area. It’s made up of a gas pump, of a kind of café where an exclusively male crowd follows open mouthed Steven Seagal evolutions on a small, detuned television and of a counter with shoe boxes containing home made cookies literally besieged by countless flies. The customers raise the cardboard lid, touch, negotiate with the bartender then sometimes buy sometimes put the cookie back in the box. I opt for an industrial manufactured snack. “3 dirham” the bartender says in rrench. “Combien (How Much)?" answer I. “2 dirham and 50 cents” shoots he back. It’s funny, I had asked the price for a second time because I do not understand French too well, not to bargain, but such is their habit that he probably interpreted likewise. Sure enough, given the speed with which he came down to 2.50, I must suppose that a local would have paid almost nothing for the very same snack.

Casablanca offers a totally different aspect. Girls dress in jeans and T-shirt and even those who cover their hair with a handkerchief make it in way to attract attentions, not to repel them. One day, right in front of Humphrey Bogart’s famous film bar entrance, I meet Sari, a girl with black skin as intense as mahogany, rendered even showier by the immaculate white shirt she’s wearing. Her hair is uncovered and collected in hundreds tiny locks. And she’s absolutely beautiful. Before going away, she gives me an appointment in the nearby kasbah at 9 o’clock that same evening. I torture myself all day long trying to choose between: a) going to the appointment and maybe ending up next day on the papers first page as “Another victim of the ill-famed kasbah’s organs dealers gang” or b) not to go and maybe leave one of the most beautiful women I ever met waiting for me during hours before sadly returning home muttering to herself something like “My mum had warned me about men”. I have dinner with Tim and ask for his advice: “Do you thing is a genuine invitation or risk I to wake up in a bathtub full of ice?” “What?” -I always forget that Tim is German- I translate: “It is a true one or it’s just a trick to attract me in the Kasbah by night?” He answers that even police doesn’t enter the kasbah by night. One more love dead on being born.

On my last night in Casablanca, saturday, Tim and his friends take me to “Etoile de Marrakech”, a night club with live (Arabic) music, beer and shishah. The inner furnishing is, according to Anne, like the typical Moroccan house, no tables and no chairs, replaced by a myriad of pillows. There are a good number of sexy dressed girls and I ask to Anne if they’re customers too. Not, they are allurers, 300 dirham (ca. 30euro) per night and, she adds, “if we weren’t seated together, they would have already come to offer themselves”.

Among Tim's wonderful Moroccan friends there was one in particular, Abdil, who very little had to share with the retrograde ones I had met in the north. Once I asked him why, in his opinion, Moroccans seem to be so concerned about female virginity. “Because I live in a Country of lunatics who refuse to use their brains. Here in Casablanca is full of clinics that “reconstruct” a woman virginity before a potential wedding, you just need to pay. And everybody know it here in Morocco, nevertheless…”.



ITALIANO
La versione italiana di questo blog la trovi sul sito Vagabondo.net
Link: Verginità di Seconda Mano

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Comments

[Tim S.]

Interesting!!!
Hey marco, another great entry...hope you have better luck with the ladies, and I'm looking forward to the next adventure.