Morocco and Mauritania (part 4)

If you are reading this its not really happening but you can still get captivated by the tension - just use your imagination i suppose! hehe!

This time I headed south my mind made up to go to Mauritania. It had been a plan before but some pangs of doubt had made me dither. The plan was to sell the car but the length of the journey and the insecurity of whether we would get a buyer made me think twice. But buoyed by the film success and the confirmed company on the trip of Mohamed and Henry who had arrived recently from Germany, the adventure was on.

Leaving behind the civilization of Agadir and after another memorable stop in Taroudant to see Khalid, we set off south soon getting to the gate of the Sahara, otherwise known as Goulmime. From there we set off through the immensity of the desert plains through Tan-Tan where Med showed us that he was a keen footballer as well as a stoner. I don't think me or Henry had ever seen him move so fast!! We then ate some harira soup and headed south. We stayed with Med's cousin in Laayoune a night, filled with army personnel and secret police. I am told the UN base there is fully tapped and that their work is altogether hampered by Morocco. (Historical Note. Morocco occupied the territory peacefully when 300,000 people walked into the area in what has been called the Green March. Ten years of war ensued with the unofficially elected government of the Western Sahara, the Polisario being backed by Morocco's neighbour, Algeria. An uneasy peace was reached under the tenure of the UN and still holds to this day, though 200,000 refugees in Tindouf and increasing human rights violations by Morocco on the native Saharauis have the Polisario on the brink of war again).

We rode the next few police checkpoints where the cops ask you your job to check if you are not a journalist (as if you would tell them at all!) and also to make sure you don't die in the desert. We never had any real problems and getting to Dahkla at night a fruitless search for a hostel for 2 hours led to us sleeping at the beach outside town. Some drives around town and a day more at the beach and soon it was time for the guys to head back to Ouarzazate. We embraced and I headed south, alone...

Obviously I am not as good a timekeeper as I would like to be and I soon found that out to my chagrin as I got to the last filling up station a bit too relaxed!! My casual style showed me up as I decided I would have no time to reach the border where I was to sell my car. I then decided to visit a nearby fishing village which was prettily endowed with colourful fishing boats straddled on the seashore and its own cute little harbour to shelter it from a passing storm. Soon. I started chatting to the local nurse and he got me in touch with the naval officer in charge of the port. Between them they furnished me with a sizey fresh fish and a homemade barbie. I put them to good use outside my car and put up my tent, staying right beside their quarters and overlooking the beach. Cooking the fish, which I ate with bread and oil, I thought how lucky I was and soon was in deep sleep again.

The next morning I awoke and having said goodbye set off for the frontier, but not before a long walk over the dunes which was fascinating apart from the rubbish strewn across them unfortunately habitual along Morocco's coastline. After stopping to check a few more things and getting offered more money I drove to the frontier arriving there with an hour to go before they shut the frontier for the night. That meant I ended up chatting to some of the taxi-drivers and getting invited to tea as I started to gel in to my surroundings and find a spot to sleep for the night. I thought if I gave myself the whole day it would bode well for selling the vehicle in the no man's land and then returning.

It was then that I met a really cool French couple who had just come from hitching through Senegal and Mali. I took to them right away, as I do quite easily with the French travellers, who are clearly the coolest, especially in Francophone countries, and soon we were chatting and laughing into the night as we sat eating some food donated to us by the Moroccan military at the border control.

The next morning I would have returned with them northwards if I had only sold the Clio at the frontier, for which I was immediately offered 5000 dirhams. I rose the price to 6000 after this endless tactic of just shaking your head and walking away only for the prospective buyer to come running back and offer you a higher price. It works both ways for buying and selling I suppose, except they are the ones who do the running all the time.

We carried on this process encouraged by a Senegal-residing French expat obviously making big money with a brand new humvee waiting for him at the frontier on his way to Marrakesh.

In the end we got stuck at 5000dirhams and I thought I would make my decision at the no-man's land itself as I awaited it with a mixture of apprehension and excitement. A land without law or identity seemed to encourage my furtive imagination but as I went through yet another control I met a Moroccan guy who was to change my direction altogether. Proposing I drive with him to Nouakchott, the Mauritanian capital, he said he would get me the best price. I was soon convinced and as we passed through the frontier he brokered the deal at 650 euros, at least a third more than what I was going to receive from the other guy. All we had to do was pass the frontier (itself a time-consuming process as these big black customs officers in army apparel badgered me about offering me a measly 300 euros for the car) and then drive to the capital. After driving through endless desert that spanned on all sides for 400km we got to the capital of the relatively new country of Mauritania.

Here we were greeted with machine-gun toting soldiers looking for escaped terrorists. Without insurance we were feeling awkward until our inside police contact met with us at the first of three checkpoints and in his long flowing white Saharaui robes indicated for us to follow him. Getting waved through the controls we were eventually led to a hostal where we were given the cash and had our passports confiscated.

Morocco part 3

I know this story is long but i think it has to be told!!

These sort of questions played upon us again as one of the Moroccans (there was a whole band from the local villages, most of them teachers posted there from the bigger cities and also a young, musical and open throng from Agadir and Taroundant) stole some stuff one night. I had been taking an unusual nap in my tent that evening and I awoke to hear much commotion in the camp. The main fire (central meeting and eating point) was vibrant to the sound of conversation and argument. Three backpacks had been stolen alright, but nobody knew who had done it. Suddenly a place we had felt so safe at was not so secure anymore, the eerie silence around us breaking our confidence. We huddled around the fire in defensive fear as the local Moroccan huddled around in their own version of a local inquest. Mohamed was eventually cited as the culprit as he had left earlier than everyone else and his house would be searched in the morning, the villagers agreed. Mohamed was one of those crazier locals who made a lot o

I was altogether relieved nothing of mine had been stolen as everything was in my tent, well ... except my car keys who I had left to my Israeli travel companion Kermit (yeah, poor girl with the name of the most famous frog in the world) and so I went to get them and guess what? Yeah, you guessed it. She had the bag stolen they were in. I was gutted as I had no spares. The next day we tried to get in and once we did started hacking away at my ignition with the help of a retired mechanic. After an hour of hacking with a knife the inevitable happened. The villagers with some Rainbow family came back from Mohamed's home with most of the stuff and the keys themselves. We tried the keys and of course, the mechanic had broken the ignition beyond recognition. He reassured me and said in the name of his honour he would repair it successfully. I meandered off unable to stand it any longer. Sneaking a few peeks I saw them dismantle the steering wheel area until all that remained was a huge hole where it used to be. I winced and inside could see them coming to me with typical Moroccan apathy saying that they couldn't fix it. Maybe they were even working in collaboration with the thief... With my stomach all over the place and my thoughts driving me to the point of delirium I returned an hour later to find the car back in a perfect state with only the steering lock disabled. I was eternally grateful as his reluctance to charge for a few hours hard work showed me there are good people in Morocco too.

I left a few days later with some other guys but Mohamed struck again not longer after. Returning to the fire remorseless the night after his antics he was welcomed with hugs and conversation I found it hard to conjure. But around a week later he took another bag I was told later. This time he stole around 1000 dollars in travellers cheques and taking it with him to cash them in Agadir was tracked down and had his bus stopped in the mountains got headbutted by a Rainbow guy, (lightly they say) and then stripped down to nakedness where they found the cheques in his underpants. He was clearly a screw loose because after all he did he went to the police to say they had assaulted him. Of course, everyone testified to Mohamed's crimes and the police decided to throw him in prison for a couple of years. His father tried to avert the family shame by paying the theft victim a large sum of money estimated to be around 1000euros but when they went up to the station the police decided to chuck him into prison anyway and the money was used to reimburse everyone that had stuff stolen and then still had enough to pay for a lovely mule for the donkey caravan across the Anti-Atlas which around 15 Rainbowers participated in.

By the time of the happenings I was in Agadir hanging out with Soufian and his friend. After a few nights of living with their kind families we drove to Imsouanne, a great little surf spot north of Agadir and Taghazout where most surfers hang out. We surfed though the swell was too big on the point and not west enough to empty into the bay, frustratingly enough. We didn't stay there long and knowing Cap Sim would be firing drove up to this fickle but high quality point break only to see it firing but being too exhausted to surf it, mentally and physically. I just sat on the hill above it snapping some pics which was fun as it was pretty crowded and I wasn't in form.

After that we headed to Essaouira with Soufian's relatives there and even a house his granny owned before she died. I stayed one more weekend in Cap Sim living in a cave with my friend Marc who I had also met in the Rainbow awaiting a big swell to surf the point again. On Sunday it worked again but Marc trashed his board on the rocks and I was still struggling with my fitness and antagonised by the cold Northerlies which kicked in a bit too early this year, ended up paddling out with only two people surfing perfect waves.

Driving south with the boys I soon ended up in Agadir again driving around with these two skaters like homies patrolling their neighbourhood. We surfed a bit and ate some good food including the excellent grilled sardines and it was good to be there enjoying the good life and sleeping for free while the sun shone merrily for us every day. After that I decided to go to Ouarzazate to see a friend called Mohamed I had met the the year before through couchsurfing. On the way I visited Taroudant where I hung out with ever so cool Khalid who I also connected a lot with. Pretending to be a beggar in the street, visiting his friends throughout the souk and slurping delicious avocado juices made my stop great fun and soon I was back in Ouarzazate with Med, whose intelligent conversation and observation kept me entertained, his brokenness after not being granted a visa for Europe and his dependence on hash making me wince. I squatted his dad's new house, with many times just me alone in this 3-storey monstrosity, his parents refusing to move out of a neighbourhood they knew. I hung out with Med's escapist friends whose French expat companions bought whisky at nights and laced with hashish spent evenings hidden away from the public eye under lavishly decorated shops selling lamps and fossils to tourists.

Then came the breakthrough I had been waiting for – a job in the cinema industry. It was only a day but it was so much fun dressed as a French soldier being ambushed by Berber raiders in the middle of the desert. They shaved off my beard but I fought them off when they tried to touch my dreads. They called security in as I fought the scissors with all my heart until they finally ceded and just pinned it all in under my standard issue French foreign legion hat. My uniform on we marched into the desert and I even was deemed trustworthy enough to carry a loaded gun, with blanks fair enough, but still heaps of fun. I fired and my spent cartridges went everywhere. All the realism and we could repeat it around 10 times. At the end I got a bit bored and with a French friend we swapped sides. That ended up being the final shot and I don't think anyone noticed our little switch.

Those French guys really made it special too. Their black humour had me in stitches when I caught it so when after the shoot they told us we would have to return in the afternoon for another go for more money I agreed without hesitating. More laughs and more antics eventually led to the evening coming and a healthy 75 euros being given to us. We smoked and talked that night and a couple of days later I was gone and never saw them again.

f noise but not much positive input.

morocco part 2

ok, my blog is living my past!! but here goes!

So there we were, four Westerners dragging a car in a very third world way. The girls responded marvellously and that is one thing I have to say for rainbow people. They don't complain much, adapt easily and can still smile through it all. Just as well, because before long we were stranded on the side of the road without lights in the middle of the night and still not starting properly. At the mercy of some Moroccans at this cafe, we sat resignedly inside the car, trying hard to just keep positive at this early stage of the trip. I even thought I saw fearless Anka frown with frustration. Help came soon, though, some of the people outside responding to our plight and after checking a few things found one of the fuses to be burnt out, meaning that the ignition plus the lights were impaired. With a small wire we were on our way, in awe that such a small thing could bring to a halt something so big. We stopped the first night at a rivermouth in Kenitra, the girls just sleeping their first night in the North African country outside on the river's side while I, cowardly expecting a swarm of masked pillaging midnight raiders, squashed in the backseat of the Renault Clio. In the morning a cool guy with a little overgrown rat of a dog, invited us to his house, where we ate some food and got some of the local produce. Then we moved on south to Safi where cool couchsurfer guy Hicham was waiting for us at his parents' abode.

It was good to be there with those three very independent and happy girls in a culture which barely recognises their rights on a an equal plain to men. They were always so keen to connect with Hicham's mum and another visitor from France that they made the whole 3 or 4 day stay go by really quickly with me even managing to score a pretty hefty session surfing lefts near Safi that left me feeling the need to get back into the water after nearly a whole year of surf inactivity.

The girls also attended a wedding celebration where they danced away with other guests, shopping around town for djellabas and making new friends along the way.

Soon, however, it was time to head to the rainbow and in a beautiful journey where it actually rained upon us and the girls played guitar and sang joyfully for the whole length of the trip we finally got to our destination after encircling through various windy roads, a militarily controlled dam and various impossible speed bumps that had us all squealing for pain as the undercarriage clanged again and again. Actually finding the rainbow was also a mini-miracle, our map being wrong and only a memory jog from Anka helping us to realise that what we were seeing outside corresponded to what we were headed for. The little village 16km from Immouzer with the bridge and the turn-off 200m to the left were all there and all we needed to do was take them. We did and arrived at a parking where some over-welcoming locals told us to confide the car in their capable hands. Reticently I followed them and soon found the rainbow family hidden deep in the valley.

For anyone who hasn't been in a Rainbow, they are normally unique encampments in the middle of nowhere with very little in the way of modern commodities and as plain living as possible, very little electrical use (mobiles and even torches are frowned upon) and water is normally drawn from a spring, with the nearest one here being around 4km walk away meaning a dozen of us had to trek off at least every other morning to fill our bottles and carry them back on our bare backs. Food was clearly cheaper than other places though we couldn't count with recycling of course which is sometimes an option in European rainbows. Buying en masse at Moroccan souks was a funny experience as few expect us tourists to be doing anything other than minor food purchases at most.

I think the French travellers just get on so well there as their home language is so widely spoken that they really almost run the show. It's a mischievous thought because I love those guys to bits but sometimes I feel they step into the colonial shoes of their forefathers who conquered most of West Africa. They have no fear, but just authority and the sort of short-tempered snappiness you would expect of a colonial master at times, treating the Moroccans a bit as if they were barking up the wrong tree. Maybe I read it wrong and its just confidence. Then again, everyone asked if I was French so I think I will pitch for this last interpretation. I suppose as Westerners among a people so dying to achieve the wealth and freedoms our forefathers fought so hard for which then we turn down so easily makes us feel kind of superior. How can we value individuals who seek what we have turned down and which for them is so easy to achieve if they were not so greedy in the first place. Or are we worse, seeking to devolve our way of life only for the sakes of environmental or spiritual reasons when we should just settle for our decisions?