Tag Archives: medina

Marrakech — the medina souks

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Woo-hoo, one of my favorite parts of a journey–a visit to the marketplace!

I like being overwhelmed with sights and sounds and smells and textures–and the souks of Marrakech do not disappoint. They are huge, an unmapped maze of covered streets bordered by shops with overflowing and attractively arranged goods of every description. And shopkeepers eager to invite the wide-eyed tourist inside, where she can see and touch and try on whatever they can offer. And buy it, of course.

sm45 IMG_3685Dan walks purposefully past all the shops in order to avoid having to go in. I, however, like to linger and enjoy the richness on display. (No, I did not buy the beads.)

And even though it’s still early enough in the morning that some of the shops haven’t yet opened, there is indeed much richness on display, from fine jewelry and antiquities…

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…to affordable jewelry and ornaments…

sm28 IMG_0883…to lamps and other objects of skilled metalwork…

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…to (of course) food…

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sm25 IMG_0885…to, well, lots of other stuff.

sm42 IMG_0895And it’s not just the textures and patterns of the various shops that overwhelm the senses. Even the very streets are sublime.

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On a corner just outside the souks, the shops seemed more geared toward local clientele, perhaps neighborhood folk.

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Fes – shops

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Of course a person could hardly stay out of the shops in the medina if she tried. (I say “she” here because Mr. I-Hate-Shopping, a.k.a. Dan, did not seem to share this problem.) Everything was interesting, desirable, and infinitely photogenic. I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves.

Herbs and essences

Spices and herbs

Olives and pickles

Chickens and eggs. (So *that’s* where all the crowing was coming from!)

Camel’s head and other meats

Hand-loomed fabrics

The loom in the back of the shop, where some of the fabrics were made

Musical instruments

Antiques and odd objects. Cat not for sale.

Yes, of course, rugs. Beautiful rugs in a beautiful space. What’s a medina without rug stores?

Fes – streets of the medina

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What gives the medina of Fes such character are its streets. They are narrow and intense. And almost completely pedestrian. There was the occasional donkey delivering goods to the shops–“medina taxis,” the natives joked.

We hardly knew whether to look at the people, or the shops, or the wares arrayed attractively in the streets, or the architectural gems that appear here and there–or just to sink into the experience, the world’s complete opposite of a sensory-deprivation chamber, and enjoy everything.

This broad square is just inside one of the gates.

 

Here we look down from above at the texture of the light, the street, the wares, and the people.

   

Maybe these few examples provide a good idea of the beauty of the busy market streets. And it turns out that the quiet side streets have their beauty, too.

 

 

Fes – view over the medina

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On our second evening in Fes, and having discovered that with the help of our map, we were capable of handling the challenge of finding our way through the medina’s maze, we made our way over to the Sofitel Palais Dar Jamai to watch the sunset from the terrace.

Of course we were not quite capable of handling the challenge of fending off friendly medina residents who wanted nothing more than to help us get wherever we were going–with stops at their father’s shop and their cousin’s restaurant along the way. So somewhere en route we picked up a boy of maybe ten years old who knew enough English to be a voluble guide to the district, but hadn’t seemed to have learned the phrase “No thanks.” He did an admirable, if slightly roundabout, job of guiding us to the hotel that we were perfectly capable of finding on our own, and we paid him 2 dirhams for the assistance. And, frankly, for the delightful company.

The view from the terrace of the hotel was expansive, as the guidebook had promised. And the patterns of the rooftops and towers of the medina were entrancing.

What we hadn’t expected was the smog. We should have, of course. Even though no cars or motorbikes are allowed in the medina, the rest of the city is busy with them, and air pollution knows no boundaries. And the smog seemed to get worse as the dusk deepened. It’s sad, really, in such a beautiful city.

 

Casablanca, looking over the old medina

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We booked a luxury hotel in Casablanca (the Hyatt Regency) for our first night, using Dan’s accumulated points. Our excuse for this indulgence, besides for the fact that it was “free,” was that we were bound to be exhausted from our flights and wanted to immerse ourselves more slowly into Moroccan culture. We were given a room on the sixth floor looking out across the old medina toward the Atlantic Ocean, which could barely be made out through the haze. The view took in the famous Hassan II mosque as well as the working port.

 

Now maybe, like me, you’re focused on the main attractions–the mosque and the port–but maybe, like Dan, you’ve noticed something odd about the rooftops of the old city.

Have you ever seen such an array of satellite dishes? How are all these people in this (presumably) poor section of town getting the money for satellite dishes? Many days later we learned that there are organizations who will give satellite dishes to those too poor to buy one for themselves. As for a TV, however, the people are on their own. How many, we wonder, have them? Is that what our juvenile “guides” are saving their tips toward?