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Published: July 24th 2023
We discover that the activity of choice for young Tangierians at 5am on Sunday mornings is to tear up and down the main drag outside our waterfront hotel with their hands more or less constantly parked on their horns. At least now we don’t need to worry about our alarm clock not going off.
And whilst on the subject of clocks and time, what time actually is it? I’ve got three “devices”, and at the moment they‘re displaying three different times. My iPad’s synced to the hotel wifi, so we think that’s probably right. Our phone company doesn’t do roaming in Morocco, but our phones occasionally detect a network across the water in Spain, and when they do they revert to Spanish time, which is an hour ahead ... and my Fitbit … it’s always been a bit its own “person”. It‘s supposed to sync to my phone, and it does indeed manage to do that … about twenty percent of the time. At the moment it thinks it’s two hours ahead of where it should be, which is a bit strange because it was correct when we left Spain, and we’ve never actually been anywhere on this trip that’s
two hours ahead of where we are at the moment. All very confusing, and we’re sure it’s only a matter of time until we miss a tour … or a plane.
Today we’ve signed up for a full day tour to the “Blue City” of Chefchaouen which is a bit over a hundred kilometres south-east of Tangier up in the Rif Mountains. Our driver introduces himself as Mohammed, and we’re joined by Amy and her teenage son Nico from Los Angeles, and a Moroccan family of three. We head off and wait for Mohammed to start his commentary … and wait … and wait. And why hasn’t he started his commentary; well it seems he only speaks a few words of English, which is a bit inconvenient given that that’s the language of choice of more than half his guests. We do however manage to somehow learn that he speaks French and Spanish, as well as his native Moroccan. I’m not sure why, but I foolishly tell him that I speak a few words of Spanish (who am I trying to kid?), so he tells me that for the rest of the day I need to translate his commentary
for Issy and the Americans. Huh? What? I didn’t sign up for this. Do I get a discount?
There’s no shortage of livestock along the route - sheep, cows, donkeys, chickens and camels ... and they must all be very faithful to their owners ... there are no fences, so they’re all just roaming free either in the paddocks or along the roadside. Flags seem to a big thing here; there are Moroccan flags planted everywhere along the roadside. And the local police are out in force. Mohammed tells me that they’re permanently stationed at the entrances to every town and village for security purposes … well I think that’s what he told me; he could have told me anything really. The police never seem to stop anyone, they just casually wave us and everyone else through. I’m somehow feeling a bit safer for them being there, but on reflection I’m not sure why. I wonder if they ever stop anyone, and if they do, how they know that they’re stopping the right people. They don’t seem to have computers loaded with pictures of known terrorists, or scanners connected to sophisticated face recognition software. They do however have whistles,
and impressive looking uniforms, so I guess that’s at least got to count for something.
We stop for a short drinks break at a restaurant with a “vista panorámica” over one of a series of three large dams which we’re told provide Tangier's drinking water.
The Rif Mountains look a bit rocky and bare. We’re told they’re up to 2,450 metres high in places. It’s a lot hotter here than it was back in Tangier, but the mountains are apparently covered in snow in winter, which somehow feels a bit incongruous.
We reach Chefchaouen and are handed over to our local guide … who speaks English. I breathe a heavy sigh of relief. I’m now free of my stressful translation responsibilities and all the many inaccuracies that most certainly went with them. We’re led into the Medina. As seems to be the case with all Medinas, this too is a seemingly never ending maze of narrow winding alleyways. This one’s on the side of a mountain so most of the alleyways are steep, in many cases involving steps, and, as we’d been led to expect, most of the buildings are painted blue. It is all ridiculously cute.
We learn that the village was established back in 1471 to accommodate Moorish refugees from Spain who’d been driven out by the forces of the Catholic Monarchs in the final years of the Reconquista. So the obvious question on everyone’s lips is why are the buildings blue? Well it seems that this wasn’t always the case. We‘re told that all of them are at least 300 years old, and when they were built they were white, like most of the buildings in virtually every other village in northern Morocco. Then about thirty years ago, one of the residents decided they wanted a bit of colour, so they went down to the local hardware store one morning, bought a can of blue paint, and painted a blue strip about a metre or so high along the bottom of the front of their house. Hmmm, thought the other residents, that looks nice, and hey presto, before too long the whole place was painted in various similar shades of blue. The town had never been a real tourist attraction, but that then all changed virtually overnight. (We learn later that this is only one of a number of versions of the story
of how the town came to be painted blue. All very mysterious....)
I can’t help but think that the residents must have been rubbing their hands together when all the tourists started rolling in. The value of the buildings must have skyrocketed virtually overnight; every second building here is now a hotel or a restaurant or an Airbnb. We’re pointed to a small house that was bought recently by a lady from Chicago who comes here for a few weeks every year and rents it out for the rest of the time, and that’s apparently far from an isolated example. As we drove into town it was a bit hard not to notice local guys standing on the side of the road waving sets of keys at us. Mohammed told us that they’re local residents who want to rent their houses out to tourists. I guess that‘s one way of cutting out the middle man.
We head out through the other side of the Medina where there’s a small stream cascading out of the rocks into a ravine. It’s the weekend and the locals have set up sets of tables and chairs in and around the ravine, where
they’re enjoying a spot of lunch while the youngsters swim.
We’re guided into a rug “factory”, where we’re shown a loom, and then encouraged by a young Moroccan man to buy rugs. He does an excellent Aussie accent; “‘'ow yer goin’ mate” never sounded quite so genuine. Why is it that no one here ever seems to want to call their establishment a “shop”? A bit further on another gent encourages us to visit his “school” where he teaches students how to make local handicrafts. He insists it’s not a shop … it’s a school ... that clearly does its best business … on a Sunday … in the middle of the school holidays.
We’re told that there’s an Islamic Koranic conference in progress here at the moment. And there do indeed seem to be a lot of gents wandering around in centuries old traditional flowing robes …. often supplemented by Nike sneakers, Ray-Ban sunglasses and baseball caps ….
As we wait to board our chariot for the ride home, Amy casually drops into the conversation that she’s half Peruvian. Huh? So I’ve been spending the morning stressfully translating Mohammed’s commentary, under his instruction I might add,
to somebody who’s half South American, and speaks fluent Spanish? She tells me that I looked like I was trying so hard, and she just didn’t have the heart to let on ...
As we near Tangier, Mohammed tells us that we’re going to take a slight detour to another “vista panoramica”. It seems that this is where the well to do of Tangier reside, in a large newish looking estate drowning in fancy apartments and hotels. It all overlooks the Mediterranean, and we can see the Tangier port in the distance across the bay. It’s Sunday and the whole place is teeming with people. We thought the beaches in Spain were crowded but this lot make their Spanish counterparts look deserted by comparison.
We’re tired so we eat in, and tonight’s tagine is the genuine article, and very nice it is too. We were starting to question our taste in cuisine last night. We found out, rather belatedly unfortunately, that we’d eaten at, according to one of the reviews, “the worst restaurant in the whole of Morocco”, with a stunning 2.2 stars out of five. That “tagine” had replaced everything that was supposed to be in it
other than the meat with …. well good old French fries … I wonder if they were Moroccan French fries? We were wishing we’d read the reviews before we went, but better late than never I guess - “They put Moroccan gastronomy to shame! … Crooks!”, “Not to go except to spoil your evening.”, “The whole thing needs to be shut down including the owner who is no different than a crook who is cowardly enough to run off.”, and my personal favourite “I would have preferred to break my leg than to eat in this military canteen. Mediocre food, unpleasant staff with face like a prison door.” Hmmm.
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Home and Away
Bob Carlsen
Blue...
When visiting Tunisia, we were told that doors and windows were painted blue to keep the flies out.