Tangiers January 14, 2012 - Saturday

(The new Train Station in Tangiers)
   Woke up at 5:50 to an annoying alarm clock, and made our way to the train station, grabbing some warm chocolate filled croissants on the way from a small road side stand.  Managed to check some e-mails using the free Wifi at a small café in the train station before the train arrived, but didn’t get much time, as it was pretty punctual. 

   We met up with some pretty interesting people on the train during the 3.75 hours that we had before reaching Tangiers.  For a good chunk of the time we chatted with this Idriss, who ran a small print business in Rabat and was on his way north to visit his family in a small town just south of Tangiers.  The others were a group of guys, some of who were in a band who were headed to Tangiers to buy guitar strings or something. With their bit of English mostly Stephen’s French and my universal hand signals and lots of smiling, we entertained ourselves for the rest of the trip. A couple of the guys even offered to share their weed with us when they hopped outside quickly at a stop to smoke.  We kindly declined after watching him crush it up and roll it with hands that looked like they hadn’t been washed his entire life. Arriving in Tangiers we started walking towards the city center but ended up taking a taxi about half way cause my bags got to heavy to carry anymore. 

   We had a bit of difficulty finding a place at first in the medina of Tangiers, but with the help of one of the guys we had met on the train who randomly showed up we finally managed to find a room for the night.  I think he was hinting at us letting him sleep in the room with him for the night, but we feigned ignorance of what he was saying in his Arabic and very limited French, smiled and thanked him and left him at reception before heading up to the room to drop off our bags. 

(Fully packed fruit markets in the medina of Tangiers)

(More different types of olives than I've ever seen)

(One of many alley ways and small streets we wandered around in for hours in the Tangiers Medina)

   We then headed into the maze of small alley ways and little streets that wound every which way through the medina, driving you in circles and bringing you to random little cafés in the most unexpected places for a couple of hours.  I had one slightly awkward encounter when I was taking a picture of one of the entries into the medina and an old lady with thick glasses who happened to be in the general direction of where I was aiming my camera starting waving her skinny little arms and screeching, probably bringing curses down on my head and my children and grand children’s heads to come, telling me she didn’t want her picture taken. (I assumed that part, but I think that’s what she was saying) I got the hint and decided it wasn’t worth it and moved on to one of the other numerous entrances into the medina to take my picture. 

   Got a number of unintentional tours and from a couple of old guys who made it their business to inculturate us in the ways of the medina.  Rashid turned out to be a painter who was slightly senile I’m sure told us all about the his paintings and brought us to all his favorite restaurants and cafés around the medina while telling us about his trip to Canada and how awesome Canadians and Dutch were, sometimes repeating himself over and over again.  I think he was slightly put off when we didn’t end up staying at the place he had chosen for us to have lunch at, but we finally managed to say good bye and be rid of him.  We found our own little cook house to eat in and had some delicious soup, with some kind of lentils and little noodle things in it that was really good, and chicken kebabs with a tomato sauce all served with bread along with water with lemon juice in it.  Slightly better alternative for 30 Dh than the 180 we would have been charged at the last suggested place.

(Stephen and our painting tour guide guy Rashid)

   Our next tour was from Coca-Cola this old guy with a slight hump back and hook-nose, who wore a purple took on the top of his head pulled down low over his eyes, and walked with both arms clasped behind his back bouncing slightly with each step.  Knew excellent English and explained that he had gotten his nickname because everybody knew who he was, which we learned was not an exaggeration over the next hour or so. 

   Coca-Cola showed us all over the medina, parts of which we had already been over, but also explained a lot of the history, which parts were older than others and which had more significance to the majority of the people. He took us to a small café near the entrance to the Kasbah, where the Rolling Stones had once enjoyed a few full pipes of kif, (hashish) along with a bunch of other supposedly famous people from years ago that I had no idea who they were.  We ended our tour down on a terasse near the gate to the port where we parted and I paid him a couple of Dh for his services.  He wasn’t exactly happy with the amount I gave him, but took it in the end when I threatened to take it back again. 

   We checked out the port area a bit, but then headed down towards the beach to find some ice cream. Got a couple more offers to buy some hashish along with some help from another person on the street who claimed to know where he could find us ice cream, but when he started taking us somewhere into town away from the beach we decided to abandon the ice cream, not wanting to walk too much further.  Almost as soon as we had left him, a van marked with “National Security” on it pulled up and one of the guards pulled him inside before driving off again.  As they pulled him into the van, we heard him shouting that he was only showing us where to buy ice cream, and guessed they were taking him away for trying to sell us hashish or something.  No idea what happened to him, but thankfully they just ignored us and we went and sat on the beach for a bit like we had planned, sadly without our ice cream though. Maybe we will be more lucky tomorrow in the ice cream hunt.

   Back at the hotel we both passed out for a couple of hours on our beds, only waking up when we got cold to get a couple of blankets, but we did end up going out again after sleeping a bit more to find something to eat for supper around seven or so.  We found a snack shop selling chicken shwarma, burgers and fries. Stephen’s words ”it was nothing out of the ordinary” but I was quite content with it.  We then headed to the Grand Socco, where the entrance to the medina was and found a small café with wireless Internet that we could use and checked up on the rest of the world while drinking sweet green tea with mint leaves.  Stephen commented that his tasted kind of funny, but we attributed it to the cup not looking like it had been washed in a while, or that the leaves had already been used in someone else’s cup and he drank it anyways.

   Got a couple more offers of hashish on the way back to our hotel, bringing the days count up to eleven, which took longer than it should have, because we got lost, but we eventually found it with a little help, and made it safely into our beds.