September 11 2010 / Atlas Mountains, Morocco

We had a 7:10 wake-up call at our hotel room, so after a little grumbling I went down to get breakfast.  Breakfast was out by a really beautiful fresh-water pool, and I sat outside to munch happily on my bread and butter, as well as yet another glass of orange juice.  There was a cat outside as well, lurking under tables and begging besides chairs like a dog for food.  I gave him a little piece of bread and gave him lots of head pets—he closed his eyes and got the hugest smile on his face.  It was pretty cute. 

We went out to the buses and climbed inside, though we had to wait for an extra thirty minutes because four girls had not gotten wake up calls and had slept in too long—they’re going to be hit with tons of dock time (three hours for every fifteen minutes D:) which sucks.  The girl next to me said that it was partially her fault that they’d been late, because apparently they were up until four in the morning at a club, which I can’t imagine doing the night before a big hike!  But anyway, we drove off and soon were outside of Marrakech.  The scenery quickly became very rock deserty again—the terrain that I have seen predominantly here is definitely a rock desert.  There weren’t too many interesting things around—there was a pottery “shop” (a shop as in all the poetry was just by the side of the road) that went on for like a half mile, and Steven joked that there was more pottery there than some countries had entirely.  There were also lots of buildings that were being built out of concrete, though there was no one working on it—I wasn’t sure if that was because of the holiday or if they had been abandoned projects, but many people have said that Morocco is on the rise, so they were probably still being constructed. 

After about an hour we stopped in a tiny town so that we could get out and buy gigantic water bottles for our hike.  I bought two of them for only 20 dirham and then wandered around looking at things.  There were great big huge meat carcasses hung up on hooks outside, what looked like lamb.  Flies and wasps were buzzing around and chewing on the meat as it dripped blood to the ground, signifying that it had been freshly killed today.  No one seemed to mind the bugs, though, and later I watched a man fling a torso of something over his shoulder as apparently he walked home with it—I could still see a little bit of spine.

We continued our drive into the middle of nowhere into the desert.  The blue mountains, the Atlas Mountains, were rising up before us.  But we stopped shockingly far away, in the middle of nowhere with just a small stone house and about ten donkeys and mules were all assembled.  We were instructed to take one water bottle and put the other with our backpack, which the donkeys were going to carry—I’ve never seen so much stuff placed on a mule before, but they looked fairly okay with it.  And then off we trekked through the desert.  It was almost entirely flat but very rocky.  We walked through dry creek beds, and besides very old irrigation ditches, which I thought was really cool (later, when we were in the mountains, I discovered that they were still in use!).  After an hour or so of walking, a guy on one of the mules asked me if I wanted a ride.  I said no because I thought he thought that I was tired, but when another girl got up on one and he offered again, I decided to hop aboard (which was really difficult, being as that there wasn’t really a saddle or stirrups but just a blanket).  I rode just about five minutes when we stopped for lunch near this field that was sparsely speckled with trees.  The guides lay down blankets and cushions for us to sit on, so we took off our shoes and flopped down.  Lunch was a vegetable salad, bread and cheese, rice, and canned spicy tun, as well as tea in tin cups.  Moroccans love tea.  It was actually pretty delicious but I was next to some Debby Downer woman (a really young lifelong learner with a superiority complex) who kept talking about how it was all washed with their water and that we’d “wise up after getting sick in Morocco and Ghana.”  Some guy told her that he was just going to try everything, which was a pretty polite “shut up.”  I don’t even know why you would be on this trip if you’re just going to act superior to everything and not try anything new. 

THEN IT WAS A POTTY ADVENTURE.  There will be lots of potty stories because in this trip, there were virtually no pleasant bathroom experiences.  But for this one, I wanted down a road until I found a large bush and got down to do my business, which just didn’t happen because I felt way too silly and awkward, mooning anyone who could come down that road.  When I finally left, some ladies hollered at me asking how it was.  When I said I couldn’t do it, they were just like “Well honey, you’re just gonna have to try again!” in their incredibly Southern accents, which was hilarious. 

Anyway, off we went again.  We split into three groups.  I was almost always in the first group, which was the fast group, which I both liked and disliked because we plowed through everything quickly but didn’t get any breaks.  We started going up hills towards the Berber villages at this point in the adventure, and there was a little kid on the donkey in front of us from the village we were going to stay at.  He didn’t speak any English and not much French, but he was really energetic and was definitely the leader of all the kids at the village.  We dubbed him Justin Berber. 

The villages we went through were incredible.  They were made of dirt and stones and frequently the cows/chickens/donkeys/whatever were in the same houses that the people were in.  They were very run down but occasionally would have a satellite on their roof, which I thought was kind of interesting.  The people would come out to stare at us as we tromped through, which I’m sure was an odd sight.  There were also lots of speckles of green fields of mint, I think, amongst the brown of the earth, which was pretty jarring to see. 

When we finally got there we were pretty relieved.  The town we were staying in was only a few houses along the dirt road we were travelling—a well, no cars, a couple of cows, chickens, and dirty dogs running around.  The next village was all the way across a valley, and we were nestled right at the foot of the Atlas Mountains.  The house we were staying at was some kind of traveler’s house—it didn’t seem like anyone was living there.  We discovered we could sleep on the roof so I immediately took my pad and ran up there to stake out a spot.  It was really cool because there was an opening from the roof to the first floor, so we could see what was happening. 

Dasha and I talked about boys for a while before she and a couple other people decided to go down the road for a while.  We ran across four little girls filling up a bucket of water from the irrigation ditch outside of their house and tried to talk to them—only the oldest spoke a little French.  We told them we liked their henna tattoos, and they ran inside and did it on our hands!  They ran out midway through my second one, so I have one and a half henna tattoos.  Their grandmother came out and greeted us, though she only spoke the barest of French as well.  We left and came back with little gifts for them from our backpacks—a rice krispy treat, some oreos, a blow-up globe, some bubbles.  The little girls told us to come inside to see their chickens, but to be quiet so we wouldn’t wake them.  It was crazy that they just lived inside with the people.

Meanwhile, outside Dasha was having difficulties.  Another woman had come up to her and taken her camera from her, hoping she could have a picture of her family (or maybe the camera, we don’t know).  It was definitely an awkward difference of haves and have nots.  But they otherwise were really kind people, and I felt incredibly excited that I had met REAL people, not people in the marketplaces. 

We went back to the house for some “donuts” (fried bread crisps) and tea.  Some men were preparing dinner, singing and creating a sort of drum circle with huge plastic crates and drums.  I didn’t know if I was allowed to but I did some music making with my tin cup and spoon because it was just so cool.  When they saw how enthralled we were with it they came out and sat around and sang while we clapped and danced.  The Arabic singing was incredibly beautiful and powerful—tribal but very refined at the same time.  I was glad to get some of it on camera.  On the roof later we placed some Mafia, and afterwards I went behind the house where Dasha and Steve were teaching some of the little kids how to throw punches and duck away.  It was like a little Moroccan Fight Club. 

Before dinner the girls decided to try the hamam, which is kind of like the village steam bath.   There is a really hot sauna room where you leave all your clothes, and then the second room has three deep trenches.  In one of the trenches there were two pits filled with very hot water, and the other ones were empty.  There was also a cold water faucet.  Unfortunately for us, the hot water pits were very low and when we scraped the bottom, we also got a good lot of sand as well as hot water.  So I did my best to wash my hair, but a lot of it was filled with sand.  However, I did exceed my own expectations by bathing at all on this trip.  It was definitely one of the most interesting bathing experiences I’ve ever had, as it was sort of a mash of communal nakedness and not so much bathing as dripping sandy hot and freezing cold water on you.  I loved these rocks that you used to scrub your skin, making it feel smooth and soft. 

Dinner was pieces of lamb—I don’t remember eating too much, even though I had been walking all day.  There was the most tiny black cat wandering around though, a very thin kitten.  The people in the Berber villages don’t really feed their animals that are “pets” and just sort of let them fend for themselves.  I stole some pieces of fat and lamb and threw them outside for the dog—the dogs here get no love.  They just get stones thrown at them from the kids.  I coaxed one over to me and gave him pets and he tried so intensely to cuddle up next to me.  It was a little sad that they don’t get more love, but I guess everyone has to work so hard the pets kind of come second. 

Speaking of pets, by the time we went upstairs to the roof at nightfall (a good 80% of people were on the roof, if not more.  Also, Berbers tend to just go to sleep when the sun sets, as they get up when it rises) I was feeling really anxious, because I kept forgetting to ask my parents about how my dogs are doing.  The more I fixated on it the more anxious I became.  I knew it was a dumb thing to get stressed out about, but I couldn’t help it.  Still, I curled up under my wooly blanket nearby Steve and Hans and Dasha and just stared up at the stars.  I don’t know if I have ever seen stars more beautiful than that night—there was just no light pollution, so we could see the milky way perfectly.  I thought about home and all the people there, and wondered if they ever looked up at the stars and thought of me… it’s strange to think that we all stare at the same stars, even halfway around the world.  It was a little lonely and I wanted to give my parents a big hug.  But as I was tired, I eventually let myself drift off to sleep.