A weekend in Africa

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I spent the first weekend in November in Marrakech, Morocco, a city in the central(ish) part of the country. Even though I’d never heard of Marrakech before this year it is apparently the most visited city in Morocco by tourists which isn’t really saying that much because Morocco (of course) pales in comparison to the other countries I’ve visited (Italy, Greece, Turkey) as far as tourists go. Our program director, my grandma, and my senoras all told me it was necessary to have a guy accompany my girlfriends and me to Morocco and so we elected Kyle, a good friend of mine since freshmen year, to come. We caught our flight out of Madrid and were on our merry way.

The flight was actually a story within itself. My friend Becca and I plopped down in our seats and then a German guy around our age sat down and immediately asked if we spoke English. All three of us spent the next two hours chatting about Germany and the United States and everything going on in the world. It was so much fun. I really enjoy getting to interact with people from other countries, doing my best to get a head start on American diplomacy. At one point Becca asked what Germany thought of the United States. He laughed and said, “Do you actually want to hear the truth? You have to know that it’s not good. But the thing is a lot of Germans do a very good job of separating Americans from the American government. And even though your dollar is doing absolutely terribly right now we can’t exactly sit back and laugh because we depend on you guys to buy the goods that we export and if you’re not buying them because you have a bad economy then our economy won’t do well either. So don’t worry, we’re trying to figure something out too because we all depend on each other.” He gave us a good perspective that only helps our understanding of what people our age in other countries are like.

Once we landed we caught a cab to our hotel. At this point we didn’t realize that everything in Morocco is negotiable, including cab rides. Every single bulletin on the side of the road was a picture of the king.. kind of interesting. After we dropped off our bags we headed to the main square in Marrakech, the biggest one in Africa, for dinner. At night the square is filled with restaurants owners and juice and tea vendors. We had dinner at one of the hut-type restaurants for about $4/per meal. I only spent 55 Euros the entire weekend and that’s including a few souvenirs. After dinner we walked around the square and watched the performers and snake charmers. The next morning we met up with some friends we have studying in Morocco who were a huge help because even though we communicate just fine with French and English it was fun to be in a group with people who spoke the dialect of Arabic spoken in Morocco; they caught a lot of natives off guard. We saw the main palace and some decorated tombs after lunch. The next day we spent a lot of time at the Souks, which is basically a better version of the Grand Bazaar.

Since Turkey and Morocco are the only two Muslim countries I’ve been to I constantly compared the two in my head. There were a lot more women on the streets in Morocco, which really surprised me because I imagined Turkey to be more liberal than Morocco. More people practice the religion in Morocco, though. Also, the women that were out on the streets in Morocco were more covered and some even wore the most extreme Muslim dress then even includes gloves and a sheet to cover the face with a slit cut into it for a woman’s eyes.

Since Morocco’s water and sanitary system isn’t as good as the one us kids were used to we couldn’t eat any fruits or vegetables that weren’t cooked or drink the water. A slight inconvenience but completely necessary. The girls that we met up with down there who were studying there said that every single study abroad student they knew had gotten sick at some point because of food standards are so different in Morocco.

That wraps up my thoughts on my first visit to Africa and my first, third world country visit! I’d recommend Morocco to everyone! An interesting place with really nice weather in the fall— be sure to keep your shoulders and knees covered if you’re a woman!

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Comments

[KRISTEN NOVELLO]

DEC 9
SEE YOU THENNNNN LOVE YOU PS LET'S MOVE TO AFRICA SOUNDS GOOD

[Dad]

Marrakech??
Have not heard of Marrakech? Guess you don't listen to alot of Crosby, Stills and Nash.