Cultural Illumination in Fes and Ifrane

“The last stall is empty”, a woman’s voice echoed in the tiled bathroom.

I looked around to see where the voice was coming from. Brown eyes smiled at me from a small opening in a burka. I realized, at that moment, that I’ve never spoken to a woman in a burka. I mean, that makes sense, given that I live in Colorado, but yet it suddenly made me feel very naive.

“My grandmother is in the other stall, the last one is open”, she clarified. In perfect English. Just a woman helping out another woman in a bathroom. As we do.

Then out of the other stall emerged her grandmother, looking for all the world like a grandma from middle America. Dyed short red hair, a colorful sweater, reading glasses hanging from her neck. No burka, not even a head scarf. They both nodded at me and walked out.

Why did I find this strange? Again with the preconceptions. My traveling companions and I have been discussing other thought-provoking questions in the last few days – I’ll give you some examples…

Why do we not give beggars any money here? Our driver does – he gives a few coins to nearly anyone that asks. Part of Islam, he explained, is to give to others. To people, not necessarily to the mosque. We had been walking by and giving nothing. Why?

We’re conditioned not to, that’s at least part of why. It makes us uncomfortable so we just keep walking.

We can surely spare something, we are wealthy Americans who had been shopping in the souk all day. We are, all three of us, charitable and kind people. And yet. I bought four scarves but didn’t give a begging woman a few coins. That kept me up last night, as well it should.

We resolved to change that. We each have some coins in our pockets now.

I find Moroccans don’t much bother with middle-men. They want to help someone, they just help. They speak to each other and help each other readily and frequently, whether they know each other or not.

Here’s another…

Why do we assume women are repressed here? Just because it is a Muslim country? Are they?

Well, the answer is complicated. Not as much as I would have thought, but…

Some observations, and I’ll let you draw your own conclusion: it seems to me that about half of women wear headscarves. It is clearly a choice here. 24% of members of parliament are women, about the same as in the U.S., AND their goal is 33%. Several high level ministers are women. Our driver, Ilyass’s wife is a physician.

At the same time, it is only relatively recently that men can no longer take a second wife unless the first one agrees, OR if she cannot bear children, OR if she hasn’t had a boy. This sounds horrifying to a liberal feminist like yours truly, but consider the economic importance in an agriculture-dependent third world country of having children.

Interesting. As always, the collective stereotype simply isn’t one-size-fits-all.

I’ll lighten up to end this post… you’re welcome 😉

Fes is a fantastic city, and the souk is just amazing. There are 150,000 different vendors and over 9,000 alleys within it. We had a guide (thank you, Abdul!) who led us to the most interesting parts and kept us from getting lost. We would literally still be there now, lost, if it weren’t for him. Fes is known especially for its leather, and it did not disappoint.

This morning, it was on to Ifrane in the middle Atlas Mountains, known as Morocco’s “little Switzerland”. It’s a bit of a resort town for people from all over Morocco, they come to enjoy the snow in the winter, and it looks as if someone picked up a European mountain town and dropped it in Morocco.

We’re now on the road to Merzouga, where we will spend the night, and then head out into the Sahara. Tomorrow night we stay in a tent (I use that term loosely. You know me and camping. This tent, I am told, even has wifi) in the desert.

We stopped about an hour ago to meet a Berber family Ilyass knows who are nomads. The father welcomed us into his very simple home, a tent with a small ventilated wood stove, carpets and cushions over the dirt floor, and a small kitchen. He introduced us to his 10 year old son and 14 year old daughter, who were polite and sweet and as welcoming as their father. He served us tea and allowed us to see his simple home, and happily explained to Ilyass that the other six families in their community would be gathering there later to listen to Morocco vs Spain on the one transistor radio they have.

Simplicity, charity, kindness.

Illumination.

Isn’t that why we travel?

I’ll be taking away more than scarves from this trip.

More after the desert, traveling friends…

Cheers!

Traveling Girl