I found Tangier delightful, but Fès and Chefchaouen had been colossal disappointments. And so my opinion of Morocco as I neared the end of my trip was becoming increasingly unfavorable. I had hoped, perhaps foolishly, that Marrakech would serve as an ambassador of redemption for the country. Unfortunately, the “majestic” city did little to reduce my increasing disdain for Morocco; in fact, it exacerbated it.
And as I sit here on a flight to Paris’ Aéroport de Beauvais-Tillé, I’m for the first time in all of my travels, thankful to be leaving a country. Still, I wonder who is to blame for the colossal letdown. Is it the Moroccan people? Were the souk merchants too aggressive? Were the conmen too overt? Was it the endless amount of mediocre meals? Or the language barrier since my Arabic or French tongue didn’t exist? Or am I perhaps just in a bad place and the country really is as great as people make it out to be? I’m not sure.
Perhaps it was those before me who spoke so highly of the city, telling me of its magnificent and alluring energy. “Go to Marrakech!” they said. “It’s amazing. There’s no place like it.” And perhaps, for them, it is … but for me … a simple traveler with an open-mind, the country of Morocco and its most popular city, was disappointing.
Sure. The snake charmers were interesting to watch. I mean, that’s a really cool photograph, right? You probably aren’t going to see that same image on someone else’s Facebook profile. Suck it, Indiana Jones. But what you don’t see in the midest of my calm around the venomous serpents is the 300 dirhams the man who took the photograph asked for after snapping it. Mind you, he volunteered to take it after shoving a snake in my hand and making me sit there. And when I handed him 40 dirham, which was still too much in my mind for the five-minute experience, he scowled and walked off. As if to say, his photography merited $37 of my money. Clyde Butcher you are not, my friend.
This was the same attitude I found through much of the Souks as well. Not interested in paying exorbitant amounts of money for a fake Polo shirt, “Fuck off.” Get dragged into a shop you don’t want to go into, decline buying anything, and somehow you’re labeled as someone “from another planet” who doesn’t belong on holiday. This was, as I witnessed and experienced time and time again, the Moroccan way. Maybe my friends who love the city so much are masochists. But I’m not, at least publicly. For me, travel is about human connection, meeting people and experiencing different cultures and learning about people’s various outlooks on life … and I guess that’s what I did in Morocco on some level … it was just a bit too sleazy and rude for my palette.
But that’s not to say every person in the country is obsessed with insulting or conning you. Take for instance Nadira, a young lady I met during one of my many walks around Jemaa el-Fnaa. I was enjoying a glass of fresh squeezed orange juice when she approached me and offered to give me a henna tattoo. We had made eye contact earlier in the day, so I wasn’t surprised when she came up to me later. As soon as I spotted her I knew she was photogenic, so I did the dance, got the tattoo and used it as a doorway to snapping some portraits of her.
She asked if I was married, offered to become my wife, then smiled through her eyes when I politely declined. She was charming. Much like the young man outside one of the many food stalls that insisted on calling me Obama and giving me a hug whenever he saw me. His energy was pleasant, his friendliness sincere, and consequently, I ate at his establishment. Incidents like these kept me from bailing on my trip early. I did give Morocco a fair shake before reaching my final conclusion.
Would I ever recommend a trip to Marrakech? No. La Paz, Havana, Siem Reap and even Tangier would be much better places to spend a few days. But if you’re ever there, the Jemaa el-Fnaa at night is a pretty magical place; I will give the city that. Grab a 4 dirham orange juice or an espresso from Café France and people watch. Eat some tajine from the terrace of one of the restaurants, or dine on goat’s head at one of the dozens of food stalls. Let the belly dancers, the snake charmers and the musicians entertain you … just make sure you bring money, because nothing in Morocco is free … not even a smile or henna tattoo.
