Megarama

Word trickles through the expat community that a new movie theater is opening in Marrakech. For these two film fans, this is exciting news. We’ve seen films at the main theater in Gueliz, Le Colisee, but it’s got just one screen. The other theaters – there are a handful spread throughout the medina – are rundown old places that tend to screen Bollywood musicals. I found one ratty theater a short walk from our house, and went up to the projection booth to meet the manager. The middle-aged film lover had grown up in the theater as the son of the owner. He showed me the mostly empty thousand seat theater and a pair of British arclight film projectors dating from the 1930s. He’d upgraded to a new projector (so all the reels could be spliced together on one platter instead of requiring a change each eleven minutes), but the new projector was showing a bad Vin Diesel movie (is there another kind?), which I noticed looked oddly stretched. The film had been shot anamorphically (widescreen format), but the projector was missing the required lens and all the characters looked tall and skinny. The manager acknowledged the problem, but said that none of the poor neighborhood kids who pay 69 cents for a double feature really care. With pirated DVDs available throughout Morocco, he’s riding a downward trajectory of business. Eager to chat about movies, he invited me back to hang out in the projection booth whenever I wanted.



Taking a different approach to the situation is Megarama, the spanking new seven-screen theater 4 kilometers out Boulevard Mohamed VI next to La Pacha, one of Marrakech’s premiere nightclubs. The government hopes to develop this desolate strip of road into a bunch of clubs, casinos, hotels and condos in a sort of Moroccan Las Vegas. In our first week here, we spent one regrettable evening at La Pacha, an oversized Disney-fied version of Marrakech, and haven’t been back since. Late at night taxis line up and charge 100 dihrams for the 20-dirham ride back to the medina. But…. The opening of Megarama has tempted us to head back out Mohamed VI. We’re not sure what to expect, but we hear the new James Bond movie is playing. We’re confident that even in French we’ll be able to follow along. Sadly, the film has been dubbed in French, and while we recognize this as a chance to improve our fluency, we do wonder: Why do the French like to dub movies, when the rest of the world reads subtitles? Do the French secretly not know how to read? (Someone should look into this.) Where other theaters here offer potato chips (huh?), Megarama offers popcorn (yippee!)



Finally, the ushers lead us into the grand theater, and we find 1200 plush red velvet seats and a screen bigger than the Cinerama Dome in LA. It’s two minutes to show time and we’re the only people there. This is just the second day the theater has been open and in fact workers are furiously putting the finishing touches on the lobby, but still, where is everyone? James Bond is, well, James Bond, better than recent entries, and the projection and sound system are admirable. Afterwards, we ask the manager if there are plans to screen films in their original language. We think that with seven screens, they could dedicate at least one to original language with subtitles. With a straight face, the manager in her snappy blue vest tells us that French films are show in the original language, and that other films are shown dubbed in French. OK, then.



As we leave the theater in the late afternoon sunlight, we discover that the overpriced taxis we expected to find queued in front of La Pacha have yet to arrive, and probably won’t for another four hours. Taking in the snow capped peaks of the Atlas Mountains around us, we conjures plans to gt the Megarama to program films in English as we stroll the four kilometers back to the Place Jemaa el Fnaa as dusk gathers.

The Bull and the Lion

In Persian iconography, the bull and the lion symbolize dueling extremes of human nature: the base and the noble. And this week, the publishing world gave us a chance to ponder both. First, did you get that the bull represents humanity’s dark side, its underbelly, and that the lion stands for our nobler leanings? We didn’t either, but we took Mr. Elliot’s word for it as he presented slide after slide of Persian art, architecture and breathtaking landscapes during a presentation and reading from his recent book on Iran. Mr. Elliot is the author of two books, one chronicling his travels through Afghanistan and the more recent one on Iran. These are meaty tomes, well researched, but full, too, of personal anecdote. Mr. Elliot is a good old-fashioned British intellectual, the kind that digs into a subject until it has become part of him and he it. He spent a decade researching and writing his first book on Afghanistan (learned Farsi in the process) and about as long on his Iran history, with which, he says, he hopes to shed new light on Persia, beginning with a long list of things we owe to the Persians, from the Shiraz grape to the flying buttress.

We were invited, through friends, to a cocktail party to hear Mr. Elliot speak at the Palmerie villa of Maryanne and Gary. She’s a Senegalese-born designer, who is one of the true divas of Marrakech design, and he is an American ethnobiologist. Their villa and several maison d’hotes are some of the swankiest in Marrakech and we’d been hoping to get a glimpse of them after seeing photographs in various design books and magazines. Three or four times a year, Maryanne and Gary host a literary weekend in their villa. Paying clients enjoy writing workshops with the visiting author, and, in the case of Mr. Elliot, tours of Marrakech’s architectural highlights.

The lecture was lofty, the sepia-toned photographs gave us all instant wanderlust, and the smartly dressed group had plenty of thoughtful questions and interesting dinner table stories. And the villa proved even more beautiful in person than in photos. In all, a most lionine evening.

When we arrived home and hopped on our email for a late-night fix, we were greeted by headlines of the latest chapter in the Regan Books-OJ Simpson “If I Did It” scandal. The latest revelation was that a friend of a friend had ghostwritten the squalid memoir, as he has a number of Regan titles. It’s not to say that we don’t enjoy a bit of good smut from time to time – a quick peruse of US Weekly and other trashy magazines, for example – but on a night when books and the study of a culture had seem so elevated and refined, it was sobering to return to the low-brow razzle-dazzle that has the publishing world aflutter. What does it mean that Mr. Elliot’s book on Iran will sell, we imagine, in the meager thousands, while the Regan-OJ travesty has that many copies already “leaked” into the “right” hands?

Ultimately, who wins out, the lion or the bull? We’ll ponder this tomorrow as we shop for a Christmas tree and some lights for our courtyard – two more items we owe to ancient Persian culture, it turns out.

Thanksgiving in Africa

“Hey Samuel and Caitlin, it’s Rupert. I’m just calling to say happy Thanksgiving and to get your thoughts on Thanksgiving in Africa. Probably isn’t much different than Thanksgiving in L.A., right? It’s sunny and about 75 degrees here . . .”

Well, Rupe, you’re not far off the mark. Thanksgiving dawned a lovely sunny day (thanks #1) here in Marrakech. After a lazy breakfast of French toast with carefully rationed servings of real Vermont maple syrup (thanks #2), Stephanie and I packed up our bags and headed off to a much-anticipated half day at a European-style spa called Bains de Marrakech. We’d tried to go earlier in the week, but the spa was booked, so Samuel and Vladimir grudgingly agreed to shop for Thanksgiving fixings and we promised to channel our inner Iron Chefs once we’d emerged relaxed and sparkling from the spa. At the swanky spa, one hour enveloped in Eucalyptus-scented steam was followed by a slathering with black soap and then gommage, or loofah, that left our bodies shiny and smooth as a baby’s bottom (thanks #3-5). Seriously, never seen so much skin shed voluntarily. Quick reprieve for mint tea on teak lounger next to burbling, rose petal-strewn pool in spa courtyard (thanks #6), then on to hour-long massage tonique with argan oil (thanks #7) and then half-hour soak in grapefruit oil-doused bath. Flickering candles, soft music, girlie chatter from our tandem tadelakt tubs (thanks #8 and #9). Good, good stuff.

Meanwhile, in the Mellah, Vlad and Sam (eternal thanks) are doing some serious damage. Sure, we’d all voiced some traditional Thanksgiving must-haves over breakfast: mashed sweet potatos, pumpkin pie, cranberry sauce, etc. But. When it comes down to it, shopping here in Marrakech is catch as catch can. You never know if the vegetable stalls will have fennel, or Jerusalem artichoke, or leeks. Even mushrooms can be a challenge to find. At any rate, confronted with a fortuitous and stellar bounty at the markets, the boys went crazy. Despite, mind you, warnings that we were doing a low-key meal for four, not forty.

When we returned from the spa at a bit after three in the afternoon (worth another few thanks, come to think of it), the kitchen was strewn with black plastic shopping bags spilling over with beets, potatoes, fennel, leeks, rosemary, sage, yellow and red peppers, mushrooms galore, carrots, wild celery, frisee, endives, and on and on (thanks, thank, thanks). Not to mention a large, large slab of crimson beef. Albeit not the usual Thanksgiving meat, but this seems to be our year to break the rules (merci, shokran!!).

Panic set in at the sight of all that food and the dawning realization that we had just three hours to concoct before jetting off to a cocktail party in Gueliz before dinner back at Dar Noury. The boys cleared out (only because our kitchen is too small for more than 2 cooks; despite the fact that Vlad and Sam are both culinary talents), and the girls got to work. Within and hour, mushroom-sage soup was bubbling away fragrantly and Stephanie was turning out beautiful free-form apple and pear tarts. Given our lack of counter space, she rigged up a rolling station with a cutting board and baking sheet on the concrete floor of the dining room! Ingenuity (thanks squared).

Somehow, we managed to get the beef braising with fennel, rosemary, leeks, garlic, Jerusalem artichokes and wine, the table set, and our make-do version of cranberry sauce - a mixture of persimmon and pomegranite with clementines, clove and cinnamon – boiling on the stove. We even had time to change into festive outfits and “powder our noses,” as Vlad teased.



Off to Sandra and Josh’s chic apartment where we learned that Sandra’s straightforward Dutch-ness proved the perfect complement to Vlad’s Turets-like, rat-a-tat banter. Each of Vlad’s uncouth remarks: “That painting over there doesn’t really speak to me,” he said, pointing to a work on their wall, were topped by Sandra’s unexpected innuendos: Upon hearing that Sam and my bedroom shared an adjoining wall with Vlad's in LA, she raised a suggestive eyebrow at Vlad and said, "So, didya get much sleep." If there was a venue for stand-up in Marrakech, these two would have a good routine going. (Thanks for mixing company and finding a match!)



We almost regretfully retired to Dar Noury for dinner. Sandra and Josh (thanks for interesting friends in far-flung places) agreed to join us and we christened our new dining room table with a near-full house. A paucity of spoons (not to mention plates and saucepans and other essentials for holiday feast) had Sam and me surreptitiously sharing a spoon during the soup course. The mushroom soup lacked the depth of wine (we blame Vlad who proclaimed not to like things cooked with wine), the beef was under seasoned and overcooked, the pies flavorful but underdone and the hoped-for mint tea, a paltry lemon verbena tisane. Despite the gastronomic disappointments, and the chill that our double-thick velvet curtains couldn’t quite keep from creeping into the dining room, the evening was filled with chaleur – good friends, good conversation, and good things on the horizon as we toasted the arrival of Vlad and Stephanie’s daughter Iara. (THANKS!)

Fishy

We hired a car and driver for the day to take us on a day trip to Essaouira. Brahim taught us several Arabic phrases as we drove. Including yellah, sort of a “let’s go/move it!” and Waha. Waha means "yes" or "OK". What does it say that while the first word we learned when we arrived was la, or "no," it took us six months to learn the word for yes?

Not really waiting to hear if we were interested, Brahim pulled the car to the side of the road at an women’s cooperative that produces Argan oil. The Argan tree is native to the Essaouiran environs, and its oil, at about $175 per gallon wholesale, is reportedly the most expensive liquid in the world. The cooperative is run by divorced women from the area, and they make the oil entirely by hand. The tree bears a tough, nutty fruit, which is harvested by goats, which climb into the trees to eat it. Locals will stand on the side of the road and flag down tourists in the effort to gain a few dihrams from a photographer catching the sight of the horned beasts clambering up the branches with the dexterity of, well, kids. After passing through the digestive tracts of the goats, the Argan seeds are processed by the women by hand. As we watch them grind the seeds between flat round stones, we can’t help but think this would be a good way to make peanut butter. Of course, the tour ends in a small shop, where a multi-lingual woman explains how Argan oil, aside from being a tasty dipping treat, can cure virtually any ailment from high cholesterol to diabetes. Two afflictions the Dowe-Sandes have covered - we’ll see what happens as we consume a half a liter!
(Vlad took these pictures, and we'll post them soon.)





On our first trip to Essaouira, we’d discovered the delicate inlaid boxes of Thuya wood (a variety of juniper). We’ve been wanting a couple of pieces, but the costs are double in Marrakech, so we’d waited for a return trip to the coast to make some purchases. Before we can get to the wood we’re in need of fish – something that Essauoira’s fishermen provide in spades. Vlad takes a proprietary interest, as if nine years living in New Orleans makes him an expert. The rest of us indulge him as he picks out our meal and bargains over the price until we pay little more than double the going rate. Indulging Vlad becomes the order of the day, and we watch him try on attire that he’s thinking of bringing back to LA. Vlad and Stephanie buy enough Thuya boxes to keep the local merchants in mint tea for years. If they don’t give you a smart looking box on their return, then they really must not like you.

Vlad + Steph

Vlad and Stephanie have arrived, bearing cured pork from Italy as well as treats (peanut butter!) from the girls of Clifford PR. We all used the fact that Stephanie is five months pregnant as an excuse to take a leisurely approach to the mornings. As Mohamed, a local carpenter, stopped by to install some shelves and build a frame for our bucking bronco of a washing machine, Vlad took the opportunity to watch carpentry pre-powertool in action. As Mohamed shaved an eighth of an inch from the bottom of a leg to make the frame maizen, or level, Vlad shook his head and confessed he'd never be able to so effiently wield a basic saw. Perhaps this is what got him thinking the deep thoughts he posted yesterday.



Stephanie and Vlad agreed they were more interested in wandering the souks than in trips to museums, and this was fine with us. We were happy to show them our favorite place for olives in the Mellah. While we managed to resist the temptation of buying freshly cut lambs heads and feet that we found sold from a milk crate, others didn’t share our reservations. As the man pushed his bike down the street in front of us, he was stopped frequently for his wares.

At the Gate

The buzzing at the front door was insistent, but when I opened it I was still surprised to see an agitated man holding a pick ax over his head and yelling at me in Arabic. Out of the shadows came a second man, who attempted to translate the tirade to French.

Here’s the thing. Most houses in Marrakech are located on a derb, or street. A standard street address includes the name of the derb, the number of the house, as well as the neighborhood of the derb. By contrast, our address is simply 86 Sidi Ben Slimane; we have no derb. This is akin to having an address like 86 Greenwich Village, NYC, instead of 86 Jane St., Greenwich Village, NYC. In a word: confusing. Our derb-less state exists because our house is immediately next to the mosque that gives name to the neighborhood. For most of its history, the house belonged to the mosque and housed employees of the mosque. To try to clarify things for the mailman and others, it’s been suggested that we add the word Souikat to the end of our address. The word means “little market” and, though we’re next to a mosque and not a market, suggests the center of the neighborhood.

To enter our house, we first pass through a gate we share with the mosque. In the shared hallway are doors to the mosque, a kindergarten, the house of a retired Imam, and us. When we arrived, the metal gate had been stripped of its lock. Hamoud suggested we might like to replace the lock, and on our behalf confirmed with the neighbors that they were amenable. We liked the idea, but it never made much of a fight climbing our ever changing to do lists. That changed, eventually, as a group of teenage boys took to using the hallway late at night as a place to play cards and hang out away from the watchful eyes of parents. When it rained, the covered hall became even more popular. As the kids carried on, whooping and shouting till the early hours of the morning, we suddenly became much more interested in locking the gate, and we turned our “metal man” from other projects to this one. He bought a top quality lock and installed it, giving us the five keys included in the box. Over the next couple days, we left the gate unlocked, and gave one key to each tenant as we saw them.

Keys distributed, we began locking the gate at night, and the noise vanished. Each evening, the Muezzin locked the gate after the final prayer of the day, and opened it before the first prayer around 5 AM the next morning. A few days later, there’s a knock on the door, and I open it to find a jolly fellow. I’m not quite sure who he is, but he’s quite friendly, explains that he’s from the mosque and needs another key for the gate. I smile and give him mine. He pats my shoulder, shakes my hand and wanders off. The following day, as I’m returning home and passing the bakery on one side and the hamman on the other – both emitting lovely smells as ever – I hear shouting behind me. A man approaches and complains that the muezzin had overslept that morning and missed the call to prayer. This man was the backup, and as the Muezzin had the key he couldn’t get in. Until that moment, it had never occurred to me that a Muezzin could oversleep, and was happy to hear that it happens even to the best of us. I told him I was sorry the Muezzin had overslept, and that he should feel free to have the him make the keys for whomever he deemed needed them. As he agreed, he visibly relaxed, smiled and melted into the crowd. I asked Hamoud about the incident, and he laughed and told me not to worry, that it was the mosque’s responsibility to deal with the keys. Hamoud has warned us about neighbors asking us to pay for things, and already dealt with one angry man who was mad at Hamoud for not giving him bags of our concrete during the renovation. “It’s never one bag of concrete,” he told us at the time. “That’s just the tip of the iceberg, and once you’re in, they’ve got you.”

So, there I am in the doorway, and the angry man waves his pick ax. His translator tells me that there are four people responsible for the mosque, and that they need four keys. I try to avoid the conversation and give him Hamoud’s cell phone number, but he’s not interested. “You’re the owner of the house,” he tells me, “not Hamoud.” As the translator tells me that the man is threatening to break the lock off the gate (something that’s pretty clear from his gesticulations with the pick ax) my French, suddenly gets really bad. I claim I need Hamoud to properly translate for me, and take his number, promising to have Hamoud call them.

The keys, of course, cost about three dollars each, and it seems foolish to let any animosity develop over six dollars. I’m not sure what principle is at stake here. Hamoud has assured us that we only need to give one key, and that if we were Moroccan, they would never have asked for a second key, let alone four. Neither the kindergarten nor the other apartment asked for additional keys. If it was one of them or the man who’d asked Hamoud for our concrete, it’d be easier to ignore, but the angry tenant is a mosque. By now, the teenagers who have been robbed of their hang out have jammed our lock with broken wires, necessitating a couple of calls to the “metal man.” Is this more trouble than it’s worth? Are we being good neighbors? Are they? Can you ever go wrong being the magnanimous ones? We’re not sure where this is heading, and whether we really need the gate to lock. In the meantime, we bumble along.

The Dog That Bit Me - Guest Blog #2

Vladimir has been posting comments on the Baraka Chronicles since the begining. Now that he and Stephanie have come to visit us in Marrakech, we thought it only fitting that he do a post of his own. Was this to be a mistake?

"Writing takes something out of me. As I procrastinate on the Internet instead of working, my ego protects itself by likening myself to those Native Americans who eschewed photographs. Something like that, anyway. I create it in my mind’s eye the aversion to writing as a noble fear of losing my soul. It takes too long, I complain. It makes me think too much. All my calories get used up on… Let’s face it… Words. Most of them, empty. I crave to fill them with something. But what?

I am told that an audience of faithful Baraka Chronicles readers awaits (and/or dreads) my post. So as I sit in the courtyard of Dowe-Sandes’s Dowe-Sandified riad sipping their beer and listening to the soft sounds of French lounge singers murmur from Ipods unseen, I try to come up with something pertinent to say. Something a little less trivial than a say… a travelogue on Moroccan expat whateverness.

So let’s start with back-story. An appetizer, if you will.

Late September 2004. Venice, California. A dog bites me. A pint of blood is lost to the streets. Scars are formed. And my life is changed forever. One of those moments that you look at in retrospect and see as a fork in a road. (And no salad fork here. Large… Heavy…. Serving fork. Turkey or roast beef, anyone?) Why? A woman stayed instead of leaving (to take care of the wounds, you see). The wayward ego that is “I” allowed for love. And now look. A scant two years later, my life as I know it “c’est finis”. 41 in December. A visit from the stork in March. I spend my days in Marrakech in a fog of diesel weighing my options. There are the small questions of how many of my future daughter’s diapers I’m willing to sacrifice to a rug merchant or a punch metal lamp broker to weigh down my already overstuffed bags. And of course, there are the bigger life altering questions of direction. Direction, you ask? Then let’s change it. An aside:

A bit about our trip. It is a honeymoon-anniversary-let’s get out of town quick before the baby comes voyage. Italy first, Morocco last. Two continents. Western this… Africa/Middle East that. I could do a couple of paragraphs for an airline magazine on the comparison alone. But everyone reading is already ahead of me on this. Platitudes, really. I won’t bore you. Just… You know… Keep it in mind.




Italy. Euro robbery. But… Nice. Villa. Olives. A problem with the choice of gas to put into the rental car. But… Can’t complain. It’s Tuscany. The countryside alone! I mean, come on! A man could live here. With a wife and family. But Euros. Euros are a problem.

No problem. Catch the Marrakech express and there you are. The streets, as narrow. Cobble stones, a little newer. And I am, suddenly, what you would call a third world kind of guy. Maroc, Maroc. The royal we. The poetry of mayhem. And oh, those lovely Dirhams. Ahhhhhhh.

But, but, but, but… No matter where you go… You know the rest. Let’s change directions back. A hard left into the souks of my paranoia.

I am… From ersatz screenwriter to ersatz restaurateur to ersatz contractor to… What? Husband…. Father to be… I wonder if “ersatz” will follow me into these rather more important of my life’s pursuits. I sway adrift in possibilities. (A positive, I assure you. They ARE possibilities, these days.) What will I do tomorrow, and a week from now… Next year?

I fantasize. As does my wife. About adventure. Telling the landlady to eat my unwashed shorts and taking off. And I mean OFF! My friends live in Morocco! Why can’t we? Well… There’s the kid. And mumps. And slight impediments of lack of French. Then there’s the money thing. Play money turns to real the minute denominations shift from a hundreds to millions for a riad of our own (without the Dowe-Sandes touch at that.) And then there’s work. What would I? What would she? Would little one be mad at having to learn Arabic and French and English and a Russian word or two… Or would she just become a princess of the world who’d love us for a life less ordinary… Away from everything LA that never meant a thing to me. And then our friends. The families back home. What would my mother think of losing granddaughter to the four winds for a year or five?

Gee. I don’t know.

In any case... Direction. That’s the thing these days. It’s what I think about. And now I think about it as I shop for lamps. And Marrakech? It is the perfect place for someone who is relatively lost to think about these sorts of things. N’est pas?

The blog meanders, as do I. But there are possibilities galore. And that is lovely, in its scary way.

And so I raise my glass to Marrakech and to the Dowe-Sandes and their well-appointed lair. Salut!

To be continued. Surely. But for now…

Au Revoir"

-Vladimir Nemirovsky

Wired

This morning, we woke up to the sound of rain on the roof. Even though it was past 8 a.m., the house was still dark and rather gloomy. Rolling out of bed, we tossed on our new black wool djellabahs and pulled the hoods over our heads to cross the soggy courtyard to the kitchen for tea and breakfast. There’s nothing like a cozy djellabah and a cup of Earl Grey on a rainy day to make us think of one thing, or rather a sort of ultimate couplet: movies . . . in . . . bed. Our new bed arrived yesterday and we are finally installed in our own bedroom. A day in bed with movies seemed a nice way to celebrate.



At about 2 p.m., after watching the classic 1939 dramedy "The Women," starring Norma Shearer and Joan Crawford, whose glib cattiness and witty euphemisms we intend to adopt (like “She’s on the train for Reno,” meaning she’s off to get a divorce), we were startled by a loud bang and a crackling sound. We scrambled down the stairs to investigate and noticed that one of the city electrical wires that traverses our courtyard about 40 feet up was swaying dramatically. Figuring a bird had flown into it, we retired upstairs again. An hour later, as Samuel was reading aloud Martin Amis’ three-part essay in The Observer on Islamism titled, “The Age of Horrorism” (a fascinating piece and worth reading: http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/politicsphilosophyandsociety/story/0,,1868839,00.html), we heard a second loud crack and a whooshing noise like something falling. This time, when we reached the courtyard, a live electric wire was dangling over the edge of the terrace, hanging all the way to the courtyard floor . . . a very wet courtyard floor, by the way.

“This is not good,” we said in tandem, “let’s see if we can reach Hamoud.” Hamoud, we knew, was on his way to Casablanca to be the driver/guide for a German cycling team that is doing a week-long ride throughout Morocco. Fortunately, he had cell reception on the train and advised us to get on the phone immediately with Radeema, the city’s water and power agency (see Aug. 22nd posting “The Crush”). Given our previous dealings with Radeema, the seriousness of the situation, and the fact that Hamoud was on a train and unable to work his usual magic, we called in reinforcements. Our friend Craig, who is far more fluent in French than we are, graciously offered to come over to help. He got on the phone first with Radeema and then with some municipal office and we were assured that help was on its way. The three of us settled into the dining room with some beers and peanuts for the anticipated wait.


Within an hour, however, we heard a banging on the roof of our terrace stairway and found two technicians from Radeema inspecting the broken wire from the mosque roof. One jumped over to our terrace and reached up with a pair of pliers to touch the wire. Zap! He jumped back with a yelp and shouted to his co-worker, what we guess was a confirmation that the wire was live. They then called Radeema to have the current cut and proceeded to drag the wire out of our courtyard and then reattach it to the electrical pole from which it had dropped. By now, it was dark, but the workers refused our offer of a flashlight. As they were reattaching the wire –with just a pair of work gloves – a tremendous bang and bright flash of light sent our heart rates soaring. We expected to see one of the worker’s fried bodies tumble onto our terrace. Nope, they brushed it off and weathered a second nerve-wracking bang and flash before reattaching the wire to their satisfaction. Craig noticed that at least they’d been tethered onto the electrical pole with some kind of work belt, but still the maneuver seemed rather cowboy. We also wondered – more seriously than in jest – if they’d reconnected the wire with scotch tape, which is how much wiring is done here. At our house, the electrician had only used those plastic plugs to tie wires together when we stomped our feet and insisted.

As the Radeema technicians cheerily waved goodbye, we marveled at the efficiency of the service call. Back at home, we might still have been on hold with the DWP’s answering machine.

Cocktail Shakers

On Saturday night, we christened Dar Noury with long-overdue and impromptu cocktail party. The gathering followed a reading and almost-book signing at our favorite café/bookstore. The author on show is a British fellow who has written a book about renovating a palatial home in Casablanca. The palace is situated in the middle of a bidonville, or shantytown, and the renovation involved run-ins with bureaucrats, corrupt neighbors, a shady assistant, resident Jinns and three guardians that came with the house, part and parcel. We’d read the entertaining book before embarking for Morocco, but after having dinner with the author a month or so ago, we were anxious to hear the tales in his own voice. He’s one of those born raconteurs: funny, smart and self-deprecating. This, combined with his natural affinity for adventure – including some recent and harrowing ones in Afghanistan – assured an amusing afternoon. The event drew many of the city’s English-speaking expats and some faces that we’d been hearing stories about for months, crusty old-timers who moved here before the Getty-types made it chic. Marrakech is a city for the unwanted and the wanted, as one guest reminded us. Not unlike Monaco: a sunny place for shady people. As we’ve said before, the city’s expat community is rather cliquey and there were lots of raised eyebrows and stage whispers as the room filled and people settled into the café’s plush velvet booths.


Unfortunately, because of Morocco’s strict regulations and paranoia about pornography, the books didn’t make it out of a Casablanca customs office in time for the author to actually sign them. Undaunted, however, he launched into a performance that balanced readings from the book with extemporaneous stories and background details. He opened by saying that even though the room was filled with friends and familiar faces, he was daunted reading about his palace renovation in front of a crowd of people, many of whom have had very similar experiences as well as tales as hilarious and enlightening as his own. That might be true, but the fact that his are thoughtfully written and bound between two hard covers trumps the rest, in our minds.

One story that resonated, which I’d not remembered from the book, was an encounter the author had had at a local vegetable market in Casablanca. As he was shopping, he noticed a beggar woman with a basket filled with the most exquisite fruit and vegetables. As she made her way from stall to stall, the merchants would take pains to select the choicest piece of produce for her basket. When the author inquired of one the sellers why they were all giving their finest fare the beggar, he replied that just because a person is a beggar does not mean that they don’t deserve a lovely piece of fruit. Here in Morocco, he continued, we don’t treat our beggars like trash. Having lived in cities like New York and LA where the homeless are ubiquitous, we’ve become rather steeled to their entreating, glancing aside, even here in Marrakech, as we pass the arthritic, old homeless woman who begs on our corner. Since the reading, we’ve felt both shamed and freed to drop a few dirhams into her hands as we pass, even bringing her a hot dinner one night.

After the reading, a group of the author’s friends and some of our own headed back to Dar Noury for cocktails. One of us lit lanterns and pulled out bottles, glasses and ice, while the other fetched people from the nearby Riad Laarous taxi stand. In all, we were perhaps 20 people and the courtyard was a ablaze and abuzz for three hours before people disbanded for dinner. We headed to an Italian restaurant in Gueliz with a small group, including a couple whose acquaintance we’d only just made. New house, new friends, good stories . . .

Buying a House with Credit

Hamoud stopped by today with a leather folder and proudly whipped out a thick stack of official documents. He’s in the process of buying an apartment in a new complex under construction near the airport. He’d made an initial deposit many months ago, and has been waiting for the place to be completed. This week, he received notice that the building is finally finished and ready for him and his family.

We mentioned before the difficulties of obtaining a bank loan here (see post: Third World Construction) and that’s true for Hamoud, too. When he tells us proudly that he’s buying an apartment, he always qualifies it: “I’m buying a house with credit.” Of course, in Western countries, virtually all houses are bought with the assistance of banks, and all-cash offers are rare; the opposite is true here. But as Hamoud points out, only a small professional class receives paystubs from employers that can be verified. He counts teachers, doctors and policemen in that group. However, for the vast majority of Moroccans, establishing credit is not easy, so he’s quite pleased that his employer of six years has written letters (which have been notarized, legalized, stamped, and then stamped again) stating he’s been employed for six years. These papers are part of the stack he’s assembled and is off for his first attempt at a loan from a bank.

His enthusiasm is infectious, and we’re crossing our fingers that it all goes well. Given our knowledge of American mortgage lenders and Moroccan bureaucracy, we’re worried that he’ll have more hoops to jump through.

Red Carpet Arrival

We’ve grown quite fond of our quiet new neighborhood so we’re surprised to hear a racket outside as we’re cooking dinner. We wander out to the street to investigate and find quite a production. A beautiful path of red carpets has been laid along the cobblestone street. An acrobat does back flips on the carpets. The noise we heard is the acrobat trying to keep a hoard of kids off his performing area – with little success. The kids are happy to take in the free entertainment and roll giddily in the plush carpets that have for the night replaced muddy streets.



We follow this path of red carpets from just in front of our door through several twists and turns to one of the better local restaurants. (We haven’t actually tried Dar Zellij yet, so we can’t speak to the quality except by reputation.) These are not the thin rubber-backed “carpets” that only add to the cheese factor of Hollywood premieres. These carpets, laid end to end, are thick and gorgeous in all manner of reds, and we aren’t the only people looking. The spectacle had brought most of the neighborhood out to the street. The acrobat is not alone; he’s joined by a fire breather and musicians standing in three groups of six or eight between the restaurant and the taxi stand.





For the most part we ignore the entertainers and studiously walk up and down the carpets.
“What do you think of this color?”
“Have you seen that pattern before?”

We ask one neighbor if this is for a local wedding. Much less interesting, he tells us it’s for some tour group planning a special dinner at a Dar Zellij. The hired performers are to guide them through the maze of streets. Just then, the group unloads from a bus and the entertainers begins their dramatic work. Neighborhood kids fill in (OK, so do we) – free extras – and make the night seem even more festive.


It’s an odd mix of exciting spectacle and also a “Morocco-light” packaged in an easy dose for foreigners with cameras ready, a reminder that most of the economy here is based on tourism. We rush home to make sure we aren’t burning dinner. Thinking over the hundreds of carpets, we shake our heads with envy. Now there’s a red carpet arrival.

Royal Theatre

We entered the grand front door of the theater at 8:30 last night just as the concert was meant to begin. The stairs up to the auditorium were blocked off and there was nobody around. In one hallway, tables were set up for what looks to be a dinner for fifty people. But we’re here with Josh and Sandra trying to see the National Philharmonic Orchestra of Morocco for the first concert of their 10th anniversary season, and we’re not sure where to go.

Wandering past many signs proclaiming “off limits to tourists,” we followed a couple of people heading out a small side door exit. There, a ticket taker points us around the back of the theater to an outdoor garden area where members of the orchestra are smoking cigarettes and tuning their instruments in the night air. It’s a bit strange to find ourselves “backstage,” but at least we’ve joined a group of a few other equally confused concert-goers.

High over the stage, workers hastily strung blue tarps and we realized first that the concert was open air, and second that the tarps do not cover the audience. For the past week we’ve had brief showers each evening - not a lot of rain, but enough to prompt us to remove the cushions from our courtyard. We’re a little surprised that this Royal Theater has the concrete risers of a high school football stadium rather than actual seats, albeit with cushions, and we sit down to look over the program of Beethoven. We check the names in the orchestra, and see among the 75 musicians about ten women, and perhaps three Europeans.

We’re used to going to concerts in the States where a large part of the audience is highly musically educated. You can feel the energy coming from the front of orchestra seating, and know by the coughing or lack thereof how they’re responding to the performance. There’s no such sense here, where a brightly bedecked and enthusiastic European woman encourages her fellow-audience members to rise to their feet and claps between movements.

Midway through the second piece, a violin concerto featuring soloist Patrice Fontanarosa, we noticed a cat slowly descending the stairs to the left of the stage. Cats are all over Morocco, so this should come as no surprise, and the feline sauntered out onto the stage, weaving its way between the musicians. It wasn’t until he rubs against the leg of one of the second violins, that he seemed to have any impact on the musicians.

By this point, the sky had started to spit. One woman came prepared, and opened an umbrella until the people sitting behind her complained that they couldn’t see. We were spared the few fat drops turning into actual rain, though the gusts that pass through the theater managed to send one cellist’s sheet music flying from the stage.

These missteps never developed into a fiasco. The performance itself was solid, if not spectacular. The orchestra seemed to have a hard time remaining focused, and crisp, beautiful passages give way to muddle. There were a few times we thought we saw a brief look of frustration cross Fontanarosa’s face, but we were excited to be sitting among expats and Moroccans (we waved hello to a shop keeper from the souks we’ve come to like) taking in the music.

Between November and June, the orchestra travels each month for concerts in Casablanca, Marrakech, and its home base of Rabat. For less that the cost of a movie at The Grove, we’ll happily attend more, but as we’re heading into the wet season, we’ll bring raincoats and hats next time.

Risky Business

Tarte Citron, the saucy neighborhood girl that we reported on several weeks ago, has beaten down our resolve with her persistence. Every day, make that many times every day, she’s at our doorbell, ring, ring, ringing with her cold little fingers. When we open the door, Shayma – her real name – always plants a chilly kiss on both cheeks before making the day’s case for food, money, a visit. For a few weeks, we’ve had her wait at the door while we hurry to the kitchen for some snack, usually an apple or some bread and cheese.

The other day, though, she begged to come in, promising to sit quietly while we worked at various projects. And she did, for awhile at least, perch patiently on a black café chair in the entryway, swinging her legs back and forth, peering at Samuel as he worked on his computer in the study and at me painting the downstairs bathroom. “You see, it’s not very interesting, here,” I said, thinking she might take it as a cue to hop on her bike and find some friends her own age. It’s a sunny afternoon in Marrakech, after all, school’s out, what’s the appeal in hanging out at our house? Oh . . . right, I remember.




After about 10 minutes, her attention becomes unnerving and I turn on some music, curiously compelled to please the little urchin. She smiles and bobs and sways on the chair in time to Bob Dylan and then The Kinks. “It’s good,” she says, of the foreign tunes with lyrics she can’t understand. There’s a gameness and a buoyancy about her attitude that is compelling; you get the feeling that she’s the kind of sprite that will give anything a try and make the best of it.

Soon, Shayma’s at my side, offering to help with the painting. She dabs solicitously at my paint smeared arms with a turpentine-soaked rag and tells me I really should visit the hammam tonight for a proper cleaning. I have images of burly women sloughing off not only the paint, but several layers of my epidermis as well. Thanks, but no thanks.



Once I’m done, I offer her a cup of hot chocolate; I’m determined to warm her up with something. She’s never had hot chocolate and watches me curiously as I add cocoa powder and sugar to a saucepan of hot milk. She offers to take a cup to Samuel, whose name she can’t get her tongue around, instead just calling him “Monsieur”. She slurps her cocoa hungrily and asks if we have any bread to go along with it. A half baguette and a few pieces of La Vache Qui Rit cheese later and she seems sated. Several times she offers to refill our mugs and jumps up and runs to the skink to wash them out as soon as we’ve finished. We tell her to stop, she’s our guest and she’s not to clean, but she’s very insistent, demanding Tide, the catch-all cleaning product here in Morocco. When I show her the liquid hand soap and Palmolive, she’s incredulous, washing her hands four times in the course of a half hour and sniffing them with pleasure.

This becomes our routine: A knock on the door around 4:30 p.m. each afternoon and a break from whatever we’re doing for hot chocolate with Shayma. Now, she asks for music herself when she arrives and she likes to have Sam pull up photos on his computer. She’s especially keen on the one of herself that we took a few weeks ago, but nods appreciatively as we tell her the names of various friends and family, which she repeats back to us as if memorizing them for an exam. Conversation is minimal, but we piece together little bits with a mixture of French, Arabic and gestures. At one point, when the two of us are alone, she gestures to me and then Sam, making an “O” with the index finger and thumb of one hand and then pushing the ring finger of her other hand back and forth through the “O”. At first I’m a bit taken aback by what I take for a rather crude sexual gesture, but then when she points to my bare ring finger, I realize she wants to know if we're married. I haven’t been wearing my wedding ring, or any jewelry for that matter, so her confusion is perhaps warranted. Marriage is a big concern for this eight-year-old, perhaps because she’s being raised by a single mum, and as we sift though the pictures on our laptops, her first question when we come to a new female face is: "Is she married?"

Today, when Shayma asked to watch a movie with us, the only thing I could come up with that seemed appropriate was Bridget Jones’ Diary, which of course isn’t appropriate at all but given that she doesn’t understand a word, all the bonking jokes went right over her head. When she tired of Bridge, we practiced counting in French until it was time for her to leave . . . with a kilo of bananas to take back to her family.

It’s almost impossible for us to leave the house without Shayma spying us and skipping along as far as the taxi stand in front of the mosque that marks the edge of our neighborhood. I’ve become accustomed to her cold little had in mine on the three-minute walk from the house to the taxi stand. It’s risky business letting this one cozy up to us, we know, and this evening, as if to illustrate the point, no sooner had Shayma closed the door on our taxi and waved good-bye than we saw her prance after the two Brits who’d just exited the cab we’d hailed. She was smiling and chattering away at them, charming them into some purchase or other, I’m sure. I can’t deny being a bit stung by her capriciousness, but what do we really know of her or her motivations. Maybe the visits to our house are a diversion from her daily life. Maybe we’re just meal tickets.

Hotelier

So the American owner of the first riad we stayed in (when we grew tired of the particular charms of the Hotel Tachfine) has returned to Marrakech. As you might remember, we found his riad through Hamoud, who’s been, essentially, its manager for six years. The riad, with its six bedrooms, has served primarily as a vacation house, though it is licensed as a maison d’hotes, or boutique hotel. We enjoyed the small pool in the courtyard, the kitchen and dining room on the terrace, and the quiet street less than a 15-minute walk from the Place.

After hearing various stories about the man from Hamoud off and on over the last several months, it was nice to finally meet him. Quite the raconteur, he told tales of his years in Bangkok, and his dealings with Southern Baptists and Brazilian thieves. Now, though, it seems he’s ready to sell his house in Marrakech. He’s been coming less frequently, and hasn’t bothered to market it at all as a hotel, so the guests are few and far between.

This is odd, given the fact that hotels with any sort of visibility are constantly booked. And this hotel for sale gets us thinking: might it be nice to buy this riad, give it a makeover, and open it for business? We hear every day about the growth in tourism, and the fact that the airlines are complaining that Marrakech doesn’t have enough hotel rooms to house all the people who are booking tickets to fly here. We’ve spent some time with an interior designer from New York who’s in the process of redoing a maison d'hotes himself, and many of the other expats we’ve met are involved in hospitality here, sharing the humorous ups and downs of the industry.

It seems that this riad could be bought for about $420,000, including closing costs. Based on our experience with Dar Noury, we’re guessing another $80,000 and 4-6 months would have it redecorated and ready to open. A conservative 50% occupancy rate would generate over $100,000 a year. The King has made taxes and fees minimal to encourage foreign investment. Labor costs are low. Our math is fuzzy, our knowledge limited, but still, this is intriguing. Even a challenge. Could we design a chic hotel? Could we market it properly, put up a beautiful website, and get written up in the design and travel press? Would we want to? Hmm. Is there anyone out there interested in investing in a hotel in Marrakech?

Cult-cha

Before we left, LA, we loaded up our iPods with our entire CD collection, so we’ve not been at a loss for music while in Morocco. However, except for the Gnawa Music Festival in Essaouira this June, we’ve not seen any live music. Okay, we did hear a few classical guitarists one night at a restaurant in Gueliz, but it was a long time ago. We’ve been a bit starved for the excitement and energy that accompanies a live performance. There’s something about sitting with a crowd of strangers witnessing artists at work on stage. Fortunately, Marrakech’s fall season is bringing with it a welcome dose of cult-cha. While the Marrakech Film Festival, which takes place in early December, is the highlight affair, leading up to it, we’re excited to find some musical events and even a Fulbright Conference.

Last night, we went to the Eglise de Marrakech in Gueliz, the city’s only Christian church, for a concert to benefit the restoration of the church’s organ. Of the mind that organs are, for the most part, better left defunct, i.e., they always look much nicer than they sound, we are wary about the contribution, but happy to support this first public concert. On the program are pieces by Handel, Mozart, Verdi and Strauss and guest appearances by a Spanish soprano, Valeria Florencio, and the first violinist of the Avignon Opera, Cordelia Palm. The violinist is quite sublime, standing above us in the organ’s nave, wearing a black strapless gown. Her bow dances across the strings, filling the room with emotive notes; it’s incredible the expressive power that a single instrument can wield.

But when the African Students Choir of Marrakech took the stage midway through the concert, we thrilled at the power of 20 clear, young voices. The group was lead by a lionine student conductor, who directed with graceful undulations of his body and arms and muscular pounce-like punches; at one point, he twirled around to face the audience and sang out himself, something we'd never witnessed from a conductor. The group opened with a fresh interpretation of a Bach classic, and followed with a tam-tam piece, or more typical African drum-led music. We were sorry to see them parade out in their blue and white robes after just two short numbers. The choir performs regularly at the church and we might consider going back to see them again.

The Eglise is a non-descript concrete place that was built in the 20s, and when we arrived, just ten minutes before the concert was meant to begin, we were sorry to see the audience pews largely empty, just a few couples and groups scattered on either side of the aisle. By the time the performers took to the “stage,” the room had filled up, mostly with older European couples. There was a whisper of excitement as the city’s major walked in with his suited retinue. They took seats in the far rear, which might have been for security or privacy, or merely to save the mayor from craning his neck to see the performance as those of us sitting closer endured. Some commented that it was significant to have the mayor attend a performance in a Christian church. As Samuel pointed out, he’s mayor of the whole city, even it’s small Christian population, and in our minds, it would have seemed more significant for him to stay away.

Spilling out of the church after the concert, we were greeted by warm, orange blossom-fragranced air. Not bad for our first night of Marrakech cult-cha. Next up, an evening of Beethoven with the Morocco Philharmonic on Saturday.