Gingerbread City

We've come to Marrakesh to see the Djemaa el Fna at night, a dark and chaotic square alive with storytellers, snake charmers, acrobats, musicians, and dancers who compete for the attention (and dirhams) of the ever-shifting crowd. We float along with the current, collecting bits of conversation and fleeting images. A holistic healer points at an anatomy chart as a young man listens intently. A woman weilding a henna-filled syringe beckons to the ladies who happen by.

A persuasive young man guides us toward a smoky food stall and urges us to sit and eat. The white smoke is heavy with the scent of grilled meats. We've just eaten, so we let the pulsating crowd carry us away. The constant stream of faces, shadowy in twilight, and the carnival surroundings lend a medieval atmosphere. The slightly surreal feeling is reinforced when a little person with a big attitude storms through the crowd and demands coins as we weave through with our camera. We drop a few dirhams in his hat and leave a strobe of flashes in our wake.



During the day, Marrakesh is a gingerbread city with ginger-colored buildings, shops, and hotels. The high walls that surround the city look as edible as graham crackers. The witch from Hansel and Gretel must have a vacation home here.



The Djemaa el Fna square that raised our pulses the night before is quiet during the day. The food stalls and acrobats are replaced by orange juice stalls and water sellers dressed in colorful costumes with traditional leather water bags and metal cups. However, as peaceful as the square is during the day, it can't escape its dark past. In fact, "Djemaa el Fna" means "gathering of the dead" due the public executions that once took place here. In spite of its past, people still gather here to meet friends, enjoy entertainment and refreshments, and to visit the labyrinthine medina at the far edge of the square.

Deep in the Medina

We are deep in the old quarter of Fez, letting gravity pull us down toward the center of the medina. The high walls and narrow streets look very much alike. To help us find our way back through the maze, we take note of our surroundings: A shoe shop with a litter of kittens dozing on the floor, a ceramics stall displaying traditional "Fez blue" pottery and colorful tagines. A man with a white skull cap is slicing large blocks of pink nougat at a table in the street, food stalls are heaped with fish, olives, and jars of savory meats packed in fat. Over the wall a carpet is drying in the sun...



And then we pass another shoe store and then another, more food stalls heaped with fish, olives, and savory meats. Later, the kittens will be off playing, the man slicing nougat will have moved to another location, and the carpet would be dry and no longer a landmark. The Fez medina is built in a small valley, and we learn that going downhill takes you deeper into the city, while walking uphill almost always takes you out. Knowing "in" from "out" is important in a place where high walls, narrow streets, and ever-changing landmarks can be disorienting.



Suddenly, a young woman grabs Jonathan’s arm and asks, “Are you American?” The woman, Kate, is a volunteer nurse for Operation Smile. She and a team of medical professionals have successfully operated on two dozen children with facial deformities. She hasn’t seen other Americans here, so she wants to chat. After visiting Morocco, Kate and a few friends are going to Pamplona to run with the bulls. She's surprised to hear that we're also going to Pamplona for fiesta and that we have friends who live there. Eager to hear the local perspective, she suggests we all have dinner together.

That night, the six of us follow a guide through the darkened streets of the medina to a traditional Moroccan home. Passing through a nondescript door, we find ourselves in an elaborate courtyard with a table set just for us. We have a fabulous dinner of Moroccan salads, chicken tagine, kebabs, couscous, pastille pastry, and sugary mint tea. After dinner, we all caravan by taxi to our hotel to enjoy a surprisingly good Moroccan shiraz on our rooftop terrace. With the Muslim call to prayer echoing around us, we sip wine and soak in the view of the old quarter and the fort lit with floodlights on the hill above us.

Jonathan and I offer advice on running with the bulls and share fiesta highlights. Although our itineraries differ, we exchange contact information hoping to meet again in Pamplona. Jack, one member of our group, mentions that he is Russian and from Whittier, California. I say that my best friend from high school is Russian and grew up in Whittier. It turns out that Jack knows my friend very well, and I've met his sister. We look at each other with amazement, never expecting to be sitting here sipping Moroccan wine on a rooftop overlooking a thousand-year old medina, and finding someone so close to home.