Moroccan Beach Groove

---

Essaouira! I have found one of the most beautiful cities on Earth. If you come to Morocco you MUST go to Essaouira! With its white washed city walls, its sprawling beaches, its bustling medina packed with some of the most inspired examples of Moroccan craftsmanship, and a history so long and tangible that you can see it and feel it all around you, it is one of the true gems of a country already filled with many marvelous sights. Best of all, Essaouira (pronounced Ess-u-air-ah) is the home of Gnaoua (pronounced Gn-ow-ah), a style of music that is, in its roots and its rhythms, truly African. Originally it comes from the nations south of Morocco, such as Senegal and Mali, but it has found its greatest venue in Essaouira with the Gnaoua Music Festival that takes place every year in June. Marked by the loud clattering of black, double disk hand symbols and an underlying melody created with a bass made from a gourd and animal skin, Gnaoua has a style and energy all its own, instantly recognizable by its legion of fans. The uninitiated might have trouble finding the beat but once the mind has soaked it in the urge to dance and clap and sing along becomes irresistible. This, combined with the theatricality of the performers who jump, crouch, dance, kick their feet, wave their arms, and sometimes seem to fly across the stage, makes a Gnaoua show one of the best ways to experience the indigenous culture of this continent.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. The week after IST, I spent about eight days in Essaouira, only the last three of which were dominated by the festival. Following the training a bunch of us took taxis up the coast for a nice summer vacation on the beach and a chance to hear the aforementioned great music. Arriving several days before the festival gave us the advantage of finding the few remaining cheap hotel rooms and the chance to really explore the city before the real fun started. Essaouira isn’t a particularly large city and the advantage of this is that the medina one of the easiest to navigate. Still, there’s plenty there to see and having a week gives you the chance to shop around a little and compare prices which is much harder to do on a quick visit to a larger city like Fes or Marrakech. We also got to know some of the locals, shop vendors and waiters at cafés we went to on a regular basis. This is always nice because it makes you feel like you actually got to know a place rather than just see it.

On our second day there we were wandering around when I heard the sound of a guitar and a drum and walked over to the shop it seemed to be coming from. Inside I found an older white man with a large bushy moustache playing a classical guitar, accompanied by a young Moroccan boy on a drum. I stood in the doorway listening for a few minutes and then, noticing a small 12-stringed instrument (possibly a ukulele but I could be wrong) I sat down and started playing along. I’d never played the instrument before but the tuning was easy to figure out, and soon we had a nice little jam going. They didn’t seem to mind my intrusion, and after a couple of songs we were joined by another Moroccan man who was working in the shop. He started playing the same kind of bass used in Gnaoua music and instantly we had an impromptu band. As clichéd as it may sound, music truly is an international language, allowing people from all over the world to communicate without words. As it turns out the white man did in fact speak some broken English, so I was able to learn that he was a Belgian who had come to Morocco many years ago, found that he loved it, and ended up staying here. He had opened up this little shop to sell the wares of the local craftsmen and on the side he taught music lessons, hence the young boy in the shop. I thanked him for letting me play with them and, after my friend politely bought one his hats we moved on.

That night we ate dinner at the open air fish market. They let us pick out our fish from a big rack and then we all sat down at long tables while we waited for our individual dishes to be prepared. I ended up sitting across from a married couple who were friends of the Moroccan friend of one of our PCVs. The two men were from the same village in Morocco but the one I was sitting with had moved to New York City where he had married an American woman and lived for twenty years. They had just recently moved back to Morocco, giving me the chance to meet them and have great conversations with them about music (he’s a musician) and education (she’s a teacher). It’s simply incredible how you can meet people that you really connect with in the most roundabout way, but somehow our paths just happened to intersect on this one particular night, and suddenly I had two new friends. After dinner, which was excellent, they took us all to a great little lounge where there was live Gnaoua music being played by one of the Senegalese groups that would be performing in the festival later in the week. We got the chance to sit right up close to them and hear and see everything, and the experience was similar to seeing a great band playing an acoustic set in a small, intimate bar or club back in the States.

The next day we went down to the beach to take a nice long walk and check out the surrounding area. We walked for a few miles, reaching a point where our path was blocked by vernal pools that had formed along the shore. Saltwater and seaweed had poured into rocks among the sand and created what was basically a swamp on the beach. This description doesn’t really give it credit though, as it was actually quite beautiful with bright green plants and little fishes that could be seen swimming in and out of the rocks and swallowing up the algae floating on the surface. Beyond this miniature marvel of nature we could see the town of Diabet set into the hillsides where Jimi Hendrix famously lived for a time, a nearby was the remains of an old broken down tower, part of one of many fortresses that have been built in the area over the centuries.

Essaouira and the islands around it were originally colonized by Phonecian traders and later the Carthaginians. Centuries later, the Portugese established a port there and finally, in the 1700’s, the Sultan of Morocco commissioned a French architect to expand the city into what exists today. Evidence of all these stages of construction is still evident when you look around the city today. The remains of the old Mogador prison are still visible on one of the larger islands and the old ramparts from the Portuguese fortress still stand, with the original cannons in place. The rampart is now one of the favorite hangouts of the city’s youth who gather each night to watch one of the most brilliant sunsets to be found in this part of the world. We were lucky enough to have a hotel right next to the rampart so each night we ate our dinner on the roof and watched the city get ready for another party-filled summer night.

We spent the rest of the week hanging out in the medina, looking at the fantastic crafts, hanging out on the beach, and even riding horses! As the festival drew closer, people of all shapes and fashions began showing up in the city streets. Europeans, Moroccans, Americans, Senegalese, Malians, and Rastafarians of all backgrounds filled the alleyways and squares. The numbers of kite surfers on the water picked up dramatically and it became increasingly harder and harder to find a café table for breakfast. Finally the festival itself began!

For 4 days and nights thousands of people packed themselves into the city square before the main stage. There were acts from all over Africa as well as Europe and America. There was jazz, rock, blues, and of course Gnaoua. There were friends to be made, dance circles to join, drums to be beaten, lights flashing, and all of if lasting all night every night. What a party!

It’s hard to describe such things in words so I’ll have to leave most of it to your individual imaginations. And eventually, of course, as with all things, the week came to an end. As I boarded my bus to Marrakech I felt a heaviness in my heart at leaving behind one of my new favorite places in all the world. There’s something more than special about finding a place where you feel instantly comfortable the moment you arrive. If I didn’t already live in one of the most beautiful valleys in Morocco, and if I had come to this country to live in a city rather than a small village, I think I can safely say that Essaouira would be the place for me. The problem with having many homes and many loves is that you only have one heart, and one day you’ll have to decide where and to whom it belongs. But that day’s not here yet, so I think at least one more trip to Essaouira might be in the cards. Maybe two 😊

---