Thursday, September 15, 2011

Marrakesh…the journey continues

on the train from Fes to Marrakech…encounters…

i am flattered by one and entertained by the other. in the first instance a young Moroccan strikes up a conversation, he connects and decides that in the fifteen or twenty minutes that he has he will focus on convincing me to get off the train, return to Fes, and spend two days with him…i am smiling, he does not look more than 23, he says he is 33…he misses his first stop, and the five minutes to his next stop he pulls money out of his pocket and says "i will pay you for your ticket"…Wow….flattery is hard to resist, and he is charming…he gets off at the next stop and we say goodbye…

Henna is studying Computer Engineering, in her last year and travelling home for two weeks. We get into some deep philosophical discussions. At the Casablanca stop, three men come on the train, and we realize that two of them were in our four seater section…we move, chat, and realize they are Indian descent, living in Riyadh, one of them stayed in Toronto for 12 years, for his medical degree…the next 3 hours are spent in conversation, switching between Arabic and Urdu, with some French thrown in…we sing songs…one of the men is charmed with Henna, and I say too him in urdu that she has a boyfriend…later standing outside the train station, he says he has fallen for that girl, and if she contacts me to please give her his email address…hmmmmm, here i thought Rancho Margot in Costa Rica is a place that supports the romantic liasons, maybe its travelling that allows one to shed inhibitions and enjoy whatever the moments bring…So Ayad, Amin and Khalid are really kind, they ask the taxi driver to take me to a hotel, and one of them accompanies me in my taxi. We see a hotel in Jumma el Fna, the centre of old Marrakech, but I shake my head, I don't feel that adventurous on my own…the safe bet is Novotel, and they drop me at the hotel, making sure I get the room and am not left stranded…real people, where kindness is present.

I spent yesterday meandering, in high temperatures, my body reacted…so today i succumbed to being a "tourist", on a red double decker, i spend about 4 hours seeing the whole city. Now the vision of this place has created many images in my mind…

some highlights:
raw dates on the palm trees...
on the bus i enjoyed chatting with the English couple
or giving my coke to the guy, who slipped off his scooter as he turned the corner, i was sitting at an outdoor cafe, waiting for the bus…
the salesman in Jemma, who turned the fan on, spoke to me very softly and said i don't have to buy, just look, how I distracted him by saying if he can do the tree pose for me, I will, and he did…
the place where i paid 100 Dhirams for pedicure including tip, how happy the girl was to see me eating peanuts and gladly took a handful…
how i was short of two Dhirams, and the storekeeper waved his arms and said "manana"
how it has been wonderful to practice speaking Spanish…
how the first words that come out of people's mouth when they discover that I am neither Moroccan, nor Spanish but of Indian descent, is "Sharukh Khan"
to Salim and Hafsa, and their love story, my realization that I know another with the same name
to Abdel and to his caravan…
Rabia and Aisha…
Abjuma, the Moroccan who is often mistaken for an Indian, he took me to the best sheesha bar in town
Jamal, for his help and for coming back to meet me with his daughter, Fatimah Zohra
the cleaning girl who reminds me of Maluka
To Ayad, Amin and Khalid…i hope they find what they come to seek
to all the hearts, may they beat as one….

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