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Published: July 14th 2008
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Thank you for all the messages and emails that we received; It put a big smile on our faces.
Aaron:
We made it safe and sound to Marrakech, and are in an Internet cafe struggling with a keyboard with the letters switched around so touchtyping is impossible ... you even have to press the shift key to maken a period. If the punctuation or spelling is off, it is only because I couldnt find the right key.
Our flight from JFK to Marrakech went off smoothly. It was a big plane with a little BO happening, but thats all part of the journey. As we took off we noticed fireworks going off over Queens which was either q good sign or bad one. We were given Royal Air Maroc kits with socks and eyeshades.
After dinner service, things were just settling down when we hear two men shouting in Arabic...I mean really shouting. After September 11, this isnt the most comforting thing to hear on an airplane. I guess one guy had reclined his seat and the other guys son had pushed the seat back. One was in the right aisle; one in the left and they were leaning
In Casablanca...
...theyre waiting, and waiting, and waiting... over the three rows of passengers (and a baby) yelling at each other. The male flight attendant got them to calm down (5 minutes later).
We arrived in the morning in Casblanca jetlagged and having hardly slept. We were just in time for our connector to Marrakech when they told us the flight was cancelled and we were given tickets for the next flight to start boarding in 3 hours at 12:50pm. To add to the confusion, when we tried to get through security to get to gate 31 (as it said on our ticket and the Depqrtures monitor) they turned us away because they said Marrakech was at the original gate 5. We ended up waiting for over four hours at that area. The ironic thing was that the movie Casablanca is about foreigners trying their hardest to get a flight out of Casablanca. Here we were IN Casablanca, and we knew exactly how they felt (I always thought Cosmina looked kinda like Ingrid Bergman).
We made it safely to Marrakech and phoned ahead to our hotel (Hotel Immouzer), which has a riad style courtyard in the middle and is steps away from the main marketplace Djemma
el Fna and the souqs of the medina). The cost of the hotel was 120 dirhams ($17/night). We took a nap and then set out to conquer the marketplace.
Cosmina:
There was something completely magical about falling asleep surrounded by incense and spice aromas and the muezzin making the islamic call to prayer from the minaret. We woke up and set to conquer the central market; what we did not realize was that we were gonna be overwhelmed at the sights. There is something to be sold at every inch of the street , and when ther is no item on sale then the people try to make a buck by charging you for taking a pic with a monkey or snake; The central square truly comes alive at night with fantastic foods like snails, sheeps head and freshly squeezed orange juice. There are awesome knick knacks, clothes and local crafts being sold everywhere at the souqs; it is supposed to be a pedestrian only road but there are bicycles, mopeds and rickshaws dodging you every second; but i have to give them credit that they actually dont run into people. For dinner we ate at Chez
Bahia and had chicken couscous and tajine with beef (local dish with vegetables, potatoes in flaming hot broth). It was a simple restaurant with an added hollywood touch. There was a spice girls poster hanging on the wall and nothing else for decoration. Very cute!
The rest of the evening we kept ourselves busy without any to do lists and no deadlines. Instead, we lost ourselves walking aroung the numerous bazaars and small pedestrian alley ways. What a life! For dessert we shared a pastilla which was a flaky pastry adorned with powdered sugar. I enjoyed it until I tasted pieces of chicken and that caught me by surprise. For drinks we had very tasty sweet mint tea right outside in the central medina.
Tomorrow we are leaving Marrakesh and heading to the Saharan desert with the travel agency Itinerance Plus here in Marrakech. Its gonna take 2 days to drive to Merzouga and then well spend one night sleeping in a tent among the dunes.
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Jim Niedermaier
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Met
Have you met Humphrey Bogart yet ?? Don't forget to get an autograph !!