Morocco through the lens

I’ve been in Morocco on a photography tour for nearly two weeks now and I think it’s safe to say that I won’t be going anywhere near tagines, couscous or skewered kebabs anytime soon! It’s been great while it’s lasted, but it’s definitely time for a more varied diet… will be interesting to see what the rest of Africa has in store…

We started in Casablanca, which (perhaps unsurprisingly) was nothing like the movie. It’s a modern, bustling city – the largest in Morocco apparently – and, but for the layer of dust that seems to cling to everything here, it’s remarkably clean and litter free. The highlight of our whistle-stop tour was the Hassan II Mosque – it’s the third largest in the world, with space for 15,000 people inside and another 65,000 in the grounds out front. It has loads of beautiful arches, incredibly intricate plasterwork and mosaics, and is partly built over the sea because according to a passage in the Qur’an, “the throne of Allah was built on water”.

From Casablanca, we went to Meknes – via the medina and kasbah in Rabat. I’m not quite sure why I thought places like Casablanca, Meknes and Fes would have a village like feel – they don’t! The cities sprawl, and even the old parts of town are massive – to give you a sense of size, the old medina in Fes is apparently the largest urban car-free area in the world which, if the poor overloaded donkeys are anything to go by, makes for a tough time when you’re moving house! Fes medina has over 9,500 narrow alleyways and our local guide (who’d lived there for over 30 years) reckoned there are still parts of it where he’d get lost!

The medinas and souks in places like Fes and Marrakech assault the senses – you can pass through food markets, where the butchers have camel heads hanging out front to show you the type of meat up for grabs; leather tanneries, where you need to hang on to springs of mint because the stench can be so overwhelming; metal work and carpentry zones where the sound of construction in all the little stores briefly drowns out the sounds of shop-keepers trying to attract your business; communal bakeries, where woman hang out gossiping while the bakers bake their home-made dough; and pottery and clothing sections where stopping to admire something is a sure fire way of kicking off a conversation with someone who’ll want to sell it to you for a “good price”.

The medinas are also home to the merdersas, which are old religious schools that fell out of use when the French arrived in the early 20^th century and changed the education system. These buildings, like many of the riads, look completely unprepossessing from the outside, but inside are amazingly beautiful and have internal open courtyards that offer a calm place of refuge from the madness of the medina.

We got off the beaten track a bit on our tour as well – heading to places like Imilchil, Dades Gorge, Ouarzazate (film capital of Morocco and coolest city name ever), Ait Benhaddou (photo op for some impressive star trails) and Imlil in the High Atlas Mountains. The pace of life in these places was much slower than the big cities, and the people (especially the kids) didn’t seem to mind having their photograph taken nearly as much as the urbanites.

While we were on one of our many long cross country drives, Issam our guide told us the story of how the Atlas Mountains got their name – supposedly Hercules was sent to North Africa to get the golden apple. But that region was Atlas’ territory (he of “world on his shoulders” fame) and when Hercules arrived, the two fought. Hercules tried to hit Atlas but missed and hit the ground, thus creating the Mediterranean Sea. Meanwhile, Atlas’ foot slid back along the ground as they were fighting and pushed back the dirt… and that’s how the Atlas mountain range was formed. Nice.

In Morocco, as in places like Tunisia and Cuba, you get people trying to guess what country you come from as a means of engaging you in a conversation… which will hopefully lead to a sale. I got all the usual suspects, like Spain, Italy and Brazil, but was also frequently told that I looked like a Berber and than my Moroccan name would be Fatima. I’m guessing they say that to everyone though as I’m pretty sure that Elly – my lovely (blond and blue-eyed) Scottish partner in crime – was told much the same thing… we ended up naming her stuffed camel Fatima in tribute to the memories!

Easily the highlight of our tour was the trip into the Western Sahara. It’s kind of hard to take photos from the back of a moving camel though! We camped under the stars in the desert for a night, and then hiked up a massive sand dune for sunrise the next morning. A few of us then opted to walk back to the pick up point on the edge of the desert – fortunately it only took 3-4 hours, including stops for sunrise and photos, so not as hardcore as I’d been dreading! Interestingly (perhaps), I discovered that it’s actually a lot easier to walk along the ridge of a dune (even if it’s up hill) than it is to try to walk across the slope of one. Obviously running down one at full pelt and trying to keep your balance is the best though!

If you want to see more of my photos from Morocco, you should be able to check them out here: http://photobucket.com/neena-morocco. Tomorrow morning I head to Nairobi with Megs and Tim for our African adventure. I’m not sure how much internet access I’ll get along the way, so it may take a while to post any updates about safari exploits and gorilla encounters… life is so good right now!