D-Dog’s Blog

I know that, at this late stage, any farewell post from me will seem unnecessary or irrelevant. To be honest, anyone who views it as such will have my full support, if indeed anyone views it at all. In truth, this post has been created more out of a sense of duty than out of any real need to inform. Duncan has more or less “filled you in” on what the trip was all about, and I have rather little to add, sharing as I did with my companions the whole experience. Morocco is an amazing country, though, worthy of a second volley of praise, at least. The calls to prayer, the roof terraces, the macaroons, the jus d’orange, and “Hashish? Hashish? You want smoke? Make you fly to the moon! Smoke? It’s good quality, dog’s bollocks!” all made the trip a really great experience. But what really cemented my wellbeing was the company. It might sound a little strange, coming from a source such as this blog, a forum which has seen much lip-licking and hand-rubbing, and lasciviousness over the ups and, importantly, downs of our relationship (I jest), but I had a fantastic time, and I can’t thank Morocco, so I suppose I’ll just have to thank the two friends who accompanied (and, let’s face it, guided) me through the whole gig. Even if Frank’s insults have turned me into a nervous wreck, constantly checking over my shoulder for the supposed source of the next barbed quip. Really, though, when you spend a month with only two people, you develop a sort of special “group dynamic”, as the nice Californian chap we met in Fes called it. I believe he meant that we didn’t really talk to each other. Still, we learned lessons and arsed about and things, and generally had a good time, and I would do it again, exactly the same. Call me a bailer all you want, I’ve come back, I’ve had a drink and two packs of deep-fried pig scrapings in the Locomotive, wasted a load of money in the Itbox and put The Smiths on the jukebox, so I’m past caring. Farewell Morocco, hello Cool Britannia a.k.a. Sh*t Island, and roll on the Great British Summertime!

Ddogsblog has now moved to thehashmark.com under the title “Frank’s Travels.”

Well, here it is, the end of the line; Pascoe and I are ‘bailing.’ I use inverted commas because I do not entirely agree with the use of the word in this context. While Frank, whose obscene bank balance is allowing him to continue onwards (probably south, I’m sure he will go into more detail), has been besmirching my good name to you all, I have kept my silence so as to maintain the fragile peace. But no more. I am ‘bailing’ because I’ve run out of money. I checked my balance today, and I have, before subtracting the money I owe Pascoe for the flight (about a hundred quid) £203. Enough said. Honestly, I’m not altogether saddened by my enforced departure; I’ll have thehashmark.com to work on, and I’m looking forward to seeing everyone over Easter. Of course, I’m not speaking for Pascoe – I’m sure he’ll explain himself of his own accord. But two months is no measley amount of time to be travelling; the trip, for me, has consisted of: one night in Paris (wahey!), two in Marseille, four in Barcelona, four in Valencia, four in Seville, two in Gibraltar (known as ‘Gib’ to the Tommy Saxondale look-a-like we met in Tangier), six in Tangier, nine in Chefchaouen, twelve in Marrakech, three in Essaouria, three in Casablanca (by this point we were making up time after our extended stay in Marrakech), three in Meknes and six in Fes. I’ve spent over £2000 (god knows how – even HSBC seem a little vague on the subject), eaten about twenty chickens (perhaps more), been in an earthquake (okay, so it was tiny, but I hardly think that’s the point), caught a cold, been punched, grabbed and gestured at by mentalists, been conned (well, almost), hustled, gotten lost on HUNDREDS of occasions, travelled god knows how many miles by train and coach, heard the call to prayer five times a day for six weeks (I’m going to really miss it), met Americans, Canadians, French people, Italians, Spaniards, a bloke from Chile (or ‘Tsile’ as he pronounced it), an Argentinian, some Slovenian missionaries and an 85 year-old Cornish anthropologist who cares for his 105 year-old father in between trips to Morocco and long-winded speeches about ancient Mesopotamia. I’ve been soaking wet, freezing cold, scorched by the sun, bored (only occasionally) and anxious. I’ve stamped on cockroaches (so satisfying, especially when you grind them into the ground), enjoyed cold showers (not so satisfying) and had the worst smelling feet I’ve ever known anyone to have.

Frank may be bitter about me leaving (I can understand why – perhaps I should even take it as a compliment) but I have no regrets. I’ve enjoyed pretty much the whole trip, and am enjoying home, peace and quiet. I’m sure at some point someone will ask me which part of the trip I enjoyed the most, so here goes. I’d have to say Fes is probably the most impressive city, but I think I enjoyed our stay in Marrakech more. I wish we’d spent longer in Essaouria and less time in Casablanca (okay, two regrets). I’d say Valencia was the European highlight. So, it’s been good. Back to civilization, 70p Guardians, expensive coffee and buses, surly public officials, subdued hawkers and the cold, cold weather. The journey home was nondescript, we got all of our connections blah blah blah. Flight was short, ferry choppy (at one point one of my ears quite literally went BANG and I couldn’t stand up straight. I had a good sit down and I was fine. Until I was sick). I’m going to miss a lot, and I can tell that within a couple of days I’ll be bored again, but I’m not bothered.

D-Dog has left the trip (although Frank is going to keep posting, so as of this point I suppose he should adopt the title seeing as you can’t change the name of the blog). Keep reading.

 duncan (the traveller formerly known as D-Dog).

To all who frequent this travelog, I apologise for the delay in the writing of this post. I have, recently, been distracted by the hearty cries of “bailer, bailer” coming from one of my traveling compadres, possessed, as he is, by the demons of his own contorted fury. But the lateness is my fault; I would have done it last night, but I was too busy drinking expensive alcohol and watching Pascoe run amok with a broom handle to get to an internet café. Before I begin proper, a recap of Meknes: nice, but not overly so. Nothing to write home about, but a welcome change from the sordid hole that is the biggest city in
Africa, Casablanca. Fes, I think, is the nicest place we have been on the entire trip. The medina is simply breathtaking in its scale. It beats everywhere else hands down; the streets are narrower, longer, more festooned with goods and more interesting. Plus, there seem to be fewer hustlers, which is a bonus. Actually, the medina is almost too big; when walking through it, I am plagued by fears that I will get lost and never find my way out, and will have to spend the rest of my life walking in circles around the shops selling fake pairs of Ray-Bans (a pair of which I am tempted to buy). This morning, for example, I was walking along a route I have come to know quite well (I’m not going to lie to you, it’s a straight line leading from the hotel’s front door to a spot near the local cash machine), when I decided to excite my sense of adventure and turn up a hill to the left. I was shocked to turn straight into an enormous group of souk-shopping locals; I was the only westerner in view, and the crowd was drawing in. I was approached by two guys who, amazingly, had managed to remain stationery amongst the waves of people washing past. They asked me the usual questions (“English? Lost? Hashish?”), but I was horrified to discover that one of them was frisking my pocket. Well, I thought, I’m damned if I’m going to let the bastard find the tiny pocket (you know the one – I’ve never found a use for it before) in my jeans where I keep my healthy, heavy wad of money. Defiant, I turned and briskly paced away. Another victory for prudence.  I’ve said it already, but the streets here are phenomenally narrow, twisted and winding. Coming from the wide open expanses of South Devon, I sometimes find it hard to breathe, suffocated by the proximity of people. Yesterday, we had coffee in a café that can only be described as Kafkaesque; we were directed up a tiny spiral staircase to a first floor with a ceiling so low that I struggled to stand up straight. Each wall was adorned with a mirror; to our left was a group of thick-tashed Germans, who, when the lab-coat wearing waiter enunciated the words “ice cream”, would laugh with typical Germanic heartiness. The layout here is like Hampton Court maze but without the careful structuring, if that makes sense. Essentially, it’s just a maze. The only way to ferry in the goods is by horse, donkey, mule or half-breeds, cross-breeds and no-breeds thereof. Fully aware that a kick from an angry horse would do more than simply prematurely end my trip, I try and steer clear, but sometimes it isn’t that easy. This morning I followed a poorly-shod horse up a three hundred metre, near forty degree slope and kept my silence as it grunted and whinnied in distress. Tragic. Incidentally, we have yet to buy the hats that made the town famous, but I’m sure that at some point in the next couple days we will do so, and it will brilliant. Look forward to a cheesy group photo.  I think I’ve missed out a description of last night. Well, desperate for booze, we journeyed into the heart of the ville nouvelle by taxi and finally found a well-stacked shop. Pascoe, as you will have gathered, joyfully got stuck into the Heineken. Craziness ensued, but I sat back and observed. It was fascinating, and I think it may be a perspective I will adopt in the future. We meet some people from various parts of
Europe and someone from California, and delighted in watching the mentalists on the street below tussle with each other and drunkenly stumble and shout. It all turned a little sour, however, when the police arrived and dispatched a bit of rough justice, especially to a particularly manic character in an orange top. Some may say a firm clip-round-the-ear works wonders, but it wasn’t all that pleasant to watch.  

Anyway, I think that’s all that needs to be said for now. To anyone who is interested, Pascoe and I are returning on the evening of the thirteenth, while Frank (or ‘rich boy’ as he has been known since he found out his bank balance) is staying on longer.

duncan

We seem to have been rushing along at quite a speed recently. I think it’s because of the relaxed pace of life in this country, three nights never seems enough. That’s what I thought until I went to Casablanca, anyway, where three nights is at least two too many. The place is dull and unattractive, covered in big puddles of piss, there’s nothing to do, the children attempt to knife my friends, and it’s full of drunks, all of which amounts to a taste of home that’s too much to bear at present. As Frank said while we were conversing over coffee at one point, “It’s like Paris would be if you took the people out of Detroit, put them in Paris and left it for twenty years.” It is a hole. We did hope, however, that we would find some shred of charisma in the form of the tallest building in Morocco, the Hassan II mosque. Under construction since 1980, the building is the jewel in the crown of Casablanca. But, sadly, it’s shit. For one thing, it’s not very tall, and, although it’s an imposing sight, surrounded as it is by a huge, flat plaza, and the tiling looks great from a distance, up close, it looks like my dad did the grouting. Except he might have done it more neatly. The whole thing is disappointing, the paving is bumpy and chipped, the flowerbeds have no flowers in them, only weeds, there’s grass growing in all the corners of the cloisters which border the square, and there are large piles of rubbish and construction detritus gathering pools of stagnant green seawater, plain for all to see if you look over the sea wall at the square’s edge.

We left Casablanca endowed with a sense of jubilation, to be honest. It did nothing to dampen the mood when the bus journey here (to Meknes, that is), despite taking a good four hours, seemed to fly by. Plus the petit taxi driver* drove us straight to the hotel’s very door, and didn’t even charge us over the odds, which you normally expect when wearing rucksacks. Our new room is clean and ant-free, and has separate beds, too! Dimly lit, though, which for a hack like me is slightly bad news. Anyways, first impressions of Meknes were gained with a stroll around the souks, and through the meat-market, which was pretty bloody disturbing (bloody being the operative word – I swear I saw a rhino head minus horn), which was all good, despite the stalls being rather more practical than I’m used to. By this I mean that in Marrakesh, for example, you can’t move for swords and hookahs, whereas here it’s all phone chargers and “FAT PHARM”(sic) clothing. Anyway, the place looks okay, despite the fact that the bloke next to me in the internet cafe as I write is playing Akon and nodding! Oy vey… At least this place is cheap. Am I right or am I right? Sorry. And sorry for this post’s atrocious title. It’s supposed to be a play on “Mike and the Mechanics” but I don’t think I pulled it off. Once I thought of it, I had to use it. Anyway, the next post could be from here or Fes, we just don’t know yet. Keep tuning in, and keep tuning in to The Hashmark at www.thehashmark.com. Yes, that’s right, we’re a dotcom now!

Keep watching the skies,

Pascoe

*= The taxi’s petit, not the driver. He may have been, but that’s not what I meant.

Since leaving Marrakesh, much has happened. Our whirlwind visit to Essaouira turned out to be as pleasant as it was brief, our journey to Casablanca turned out to be as unpleasant as it was long and Casablanca itself has turned out to be just as thoroughly unpleasant as we were told it would be.

 Essaouira is a charming gem of a town, surrounded by high sandstone walls, the cosy medina has a satisfyingly complete feel, its shops are relatively hassle free and walking about you feel safe and at home. The vast walls are dotted with a series of ramparts, which, while being medieval in look, are only a few hundred years old, built by the European colonisers who left behind hundreds of cannon, which decorate every gate and sea wall in town. Of these ramparts, the most impressive is the northern one, which faces out toward the Atlantic Ocean, from it you can sit mesmerised, watching huge Atlantic swells throw themselves over the little islands being battered half a horizon away. Once you have drawn yourself away from the views, you can explore the craft markets, which seem to be the most authentic I have seen in any town in this country. You may also indulge in some fantastically creamy Italian ice-cream before embarking on a walk across the vast windswept beach, which reaches out from the medina like a giant tick, flanked by hotels, bars and windsurfing shacks. If you are not too afraid of food poisoning (my lacklustre companions are), you can sample some fresh sardines fried over beds of dried wood which burst with oil and flavour.

Leaving Essaouira was something I did not want to do, but in order to keep to the tight schedule set by my fellow travellers leaving me, I had to. This involved a hot and cramped six hours in a coach.

We have been in Casablanca for half a day, the place has the feel of a European capital, only run down and filthy. Covered in sleazy bars, drunk people make the atmosphere jarringly unfriendly and for the first time in this country, I was mugged. It was about half past twelve in the afternoon and the sun was not too hot, so I decided to make the journey along the main road to the Hassan II Mosque. I was lazily making my way along the pavement, cursing the fact that they had built a six-lane road, destroying my view of the Atlantic, when I passed two kids doing the usual puppy-dog-eye begging routine, pointing at their mouths and appearing as destitute as they could. Looking at them and shaking my head, it occurred to me quite how odd it was to beg holding kitchen knives. As soon as this thought had completed its mental breath, one of them put a knife to my face, and the other a hand in my pocket. Stealing 400 Dirhams, they ran off laughing. The only person who does seem to have enjoyed this place is Pascoe. Using his pretty-boy looks, he attracted the attention of a Moroccan student on the coach.

Tensions are running high…video footage of one of Frank’s unprovoked attacks (sorry about the quality).

Duncan’s Note: The crash at the end is my retaliation. Enjoy.

Leaving Marrakech, after twelve days of macaroons, lazing around in the sun, ice cream and general laziness, was a bit of a pain. As the earliest riser in the group, it was deemed my job to make sure everyone was up in time to catch the eight-thirty bus to Essaouira. Despite my fears that it would prove difficult to rouse Frank from his often seemingly impenetrable slumber, we made our connection and soon found ourselves back on the coast, this time facing down the mass of the Atlantic. But accounts of uneventful journeys are, well, uneventful, so instead I’ll give a final summing up of Marrakech, the town that became, to us, Morocco’s answer to ‘the big easy’ (although, that makes little sense, due to the fact that the lax restrictions on alcohol that originally gave New Orleans its nickname clearly do not exist in Morocco, a Muslim country). Anyhow, I digress. During our twelve days we frequented the square and only the square; most of our days consisted of brief sorties into the outside world to procure ice cream and to use the internet (I am, after all, a busy editor). The ‘assembly of the dead’ could not be a less apt name for the enormous square that dominates the centre of Marrakech’s medina. There are the snake charmers, the con artists (according to some people one and the same), the henna artists, the orange juice sellers, the Berbers in their blue turbans who sell incense from rugs on the ground and the thousands of pasty tourists who throng in shorts and bumbags. Essentially, its a pretty lively place, especially once darkness falls when the tourists change into sensible cargo trousers and enter the fray looking for food. Needless to say, the residents of the square are only too willing to help, with thrusting offers of menus and phrases (directed towards the British tourists) like “it’s the dog’s bollocks”, “bloody marvellous” and “have a butchers”, all spoken through tongues more used to speaking throaty Arabic. And then there are the mobilettes, little bike-scooter hybrids that are surely the motorised equivalents of the weary mules they share the roadways with.

Speaking of the donkeys, after a long time spent witnessing their hardships, one cannot help but feel sorry for them. There’s something in their appearance which means they permanently look glum. Of course, the fact that they are literally worked until they die doesn’t help. In order to stop them running off, some owners tie their front legs together; others, so as to prevent them from scaring in crowds, put their eyes out. They are rarely fed, and only occasionaly complain with hee-haws and shrugging and bucking. Perhaps when I get home I’ll give some money to the donkey sanctuary. Hmm. Anyway, we rarely ventured beyond our comfortable surroundings, favouring instead to sit and read, drink and talk. Everyday but one the weather was marvellous, which made lying around even easier to justify to myself. Too long spent in the midday heat can cause you terrible problems. It’s true. Sunburn, heatstroke, melanomas. Do you think I’m going to go out there and risk DEATH? You must be a mentalist. No, instead I’ll sit here, sip from my jus de banane and read Doonesbury (do you read a cartoon? It’s like eating soup, it just doesn’t make sense).

Yes, Marrakech was good. Perhaps too good, for the place we have just checked into is shabby, and the roof terrace poor at best. Upon further inspection I discovered that there is NO ROOFTOP CAFE (!) and that some negligent person has dumped an old bed up there, complete with the customary mangy bit of animal hide. We shall have to see how Essaouira measures up. Seeing as I don’t surf, I shall have to find other things to occupy my time. Actually, I haven’t read today’s Doonesbury yet (has anyone else noticed that the Guardian is recycling old Steve Bell cartoons? I’m not happy – not that I ever really understood what the man was talking about). So there it is (was), the first post from Morocco’s Atlantic coast. Expect more tales of lazing about, ice cream, donkeys and Doonesbury.

Today is expected, at the time of writing, to be our last full day in Marrakesh, and at this point I realise that we travellers have told you folks at home almost nothing about this fine city. This is chiefly because our activities within it have been limited, for the most part, to lazing about on our roof terrace, eating ice cream, taking a few walks, going to the internet café, stabbing Duncan, and, on my part at least, being beaten on the posterior with a twisted-up newspaper (thanks for that particular piece of advice, Jimi). However, there are some truly wonderful things about this city that have largely been ignored in previous posts. The architecture is imposing, particularly the Bank Al-Maghreb and the mosque(s), and the place is littered, here and there, with flashes of greenery which, outside the medina at least, help to maintain the impression of cleanliness and modernity that makes up exactly one half of one’s perception of the place. There is a lovely, shaded park area consisting of walkways among tall palms, the perfect place to get one’s shoes shined if one has shiny shoes that should be shined or shone or shiny for sure. Anyways, the quiet bits are nice, but the best part of Marrakesh, as in most Morrocan cities, is the medina. Marrakesh’s medina is different in structure from that of others. Whereas most medinas consist entirely of tightly-knit, labyrinthine streets, wherein lie the souks, markets, street vendors, dealers, hustlers and merchants that bring such colour to the Moroccan experience, Marrakesh’s medina is so populous, so thronging with tourists even during the quiet season, that there is simply not enough room in the rat-run of the medina per se to hold the mass of people. So the action is relocated to the Djemaa-el-Fna, the “Assembly Of The Dead”, the huge square that from the sky, or at least on the map, gives the distinct impression of a heart, pumping the droves through the veins of the medina’s tight, winding streets. The Djemaa’s openness is all that saves the atmosphere from being constrictive. So much noise, so many smells, so much noise, so much noise, one can hardly make out a single person in the humming crowd for more than a few seconds, and at night, the impression one gets is of the myriad shapes and noises moving as one, clustered in huge numbers around the dancers, storytellers, musicians (competent or no) and snake charmers that populate the square.

Venture north from the Djemaa during the day and you are entering the covered souks, where shafts of sunlight slash through the slats of wood and corrugated iron that make up the ceiling, where the shopkeepers attack you like hungry wolves if you are too ill to stop them, or so I have read, and hassle you like shopkeepers if you are fit and well, and where, if looking for a bargain, all but the most competent haggler would do well to avoid. Purely as a sight to see, though, a few circuits are certainly worthwhile, in order to soak up the scent and colour of the medina, as potent a spirit here as anywhere else.

All this can be read in the most basic and traditional of tourist guides, though, and what’s the point of sending a correspondent if all they’re going to give you is old material? Some of the best things about Marrakesh, for me anyway, cannot be discovered in the pages of any book I have read. I have already mentioned the macaroons (oy vey) and some of the interesting characters who filter down from the North, oh, and the weather (it rained like hell all day yesterday, but it’s back to glorious again today), but the one thing I have failed to mention, despite the definite impact it has made on me since I first arrived, is the call to prayer. Most of you will know what I am referring to, the call made from a minaret atop a mosque, calling the faithful to worship Allah. What you probably won’t know, though, unless you yourself have travelled to a Muslim city like Marrakesh, is the truly amazing effect that the call to prayer has when there are a large number of mosques in the area. The sound echoes from minaret to minaret, and the musical, mystic intonations of the words, rising and falling at different times, give the druggy, intimidating, frightening, cinematic, glorious effect of a whirling cacophony of sound. It lasts for a few minutes at most, but it will be one of the things I remember, and never stop telling people, about Marrakesh.

Pascoe

P.S. Read “The Hashmark”, our more widely-read partner blog, at www.thehashmark.wordpress.com

My enjoyment of Marrakesh has been severely dampened by the two or thee illnesses nature has sought to launch upon me since leaving Tangier Again. Yesterdays efforts to walk myself better resulted in stumbling, bleary eyed into the souks, my wits lost somewhere between my pressured, scratchy nasal passages and the bleary headache pounding against the inner walls of my skull. There are many reasons why one must maintain a nimble mind when confronted with the souks, they represent what can be compared to a slightly sinister Charlie’s chocolate factory, selling a vast multiplicity of objects that you neither need nor want. You find yourself at every turn being tempted, or thrust into the endless shops, all so similar that any but the most comprehensive navigator becomes immediately adrift upon a tide of startling noise, colour and movement. Comprehensive, I was not. It took me some time to realise first where I was, then that I had no idea where that was, all the time battling through the even present sensation that I did not like it. Shopkeepers here sense fallibility in a westerner, and as soon as they saw me, realising that I could barely see them, latched onto me asking if I was ok. Then offering to take me back to wherever I was staying, undoubtedly for a vast fee. I grunted and rudely swept by until one of them put his hand upon my back, and combining my flaccid momentum with a swing of his hand, flung me into his shop. As i turned around having nearly hit the back of the place, three men appeared at the front, two sat on chairs smoking, blocking the way out, and the third, the keeper himself, turned upon me. The ambush was complete. “Welcome to my shop, please look and maybe buy,” he said in a manner reminiscent of the Arabic villain “Jafar” of Disney’s Aladdin. It took me a while to sum up the situation, as I did, I gave off a mental shriek which, in my incapacitated state, may or may not have materialised. Then darted for the for the blocked exit, squeezing awkwardly through the smoking men, tripping up and falling into a puddle of what smelt like and almost certainly was donkey urine. Proving once and for all that every cloud does have a silver lining, this helped me become unapproachable, thus aiding my return to the hotel, which was, given the clarity adrenaline had brought to my thought, rather simple. Merely a matter of a few tuns constantly heading towards the minaret towering above and ignoring the strange looks that my bedraggled state was drawing.

This tale it in no way a condemnation of this city, indeed, since my recovery I have been enjoying it to its fullest, recovering my ice cream addiction and eating a lot of fantastic macaroons. I have also visited the Kasbah which seems to be mainly populated by hundreds of Storks who nest in vast, bushy sponges of recovered vegetation and refuse high atop the walls and roofs. All in all, with two days left here, the outlook it rosy and the bringer of my illnes, Pascoe, apears to have had his vile craft turned upon him and is coughing and siffing his way to bed. The only lesson must be that certain things cannot be achieved while you are desperately ill, a rather obvious end to a rather aimless post.

Francis