Killing the fatted ram |
Crash Course in Culture
For the better part of my two years in Morocco, I lived in Oujda, a small city 6 Kilometers from the Algerian border. The Mediterranean was an hour North (by collective taxi) and huge, dilapidated lorrys brought fresh fish into the city every day. The women pictured here would set up each day next to the fish market and sell lemons, hot peppers, and little bags of water filled with humus (chick peas). I tried to learn to cook while in Morocco for several reasons: Sanitation was always a problem; by preparing my own food, I could ensure that it was clean and; I had the time to cook. Fresh, organic produce and meat were always just a quick bike ride away. It became routine to go to the market every day as I had no refrigerator, and though sometimes tiresome, this ensured that my meals were always fresh.
One woman in this picture is looking back on my friend, le fou (the crazy one) as he was called (seen here sparring one of his invincible and omnipresent enemies). I learned much from this man. In fact, I still do a little sparring of my own when life throws me a curve and I need to let off some steam.
Bread and Circus, literally |
Sook Al' Hed, or "Sunday Market" was one of my favorite places to shop. It was basically a huge flea market with a produce section. It was also my Sunday entertainment with performers, hustlers, and even the occasional snake charmer (though Marrakech's Jma El Fna [Artist's square] is the real voyeur's paradise). And, of course, there were great deals everywhere!
The man's long, woolen cloak in this picture is called a jelleba. It is de rigueur men's wear and a wonderfully useful item. There are women's jellebas too but they are usually silken and brightly colored. The signature pointed hood is where some wearers, devoid of pockets, keep their money, the Moroccan Dirham.
Going back to time, I found that there is always plenty of it in Morocco. No one is pressed, no one rushes (which was pretty annoying until I learned to avoid it myself). As it turned out, this was, unconsciously, part of the reason that I wanted to leave the US. There were things that I wanted to do and to learn but they took time (cooking was one I hadn't anticipated). I wanted to try my hand at art, music (which was a huge part of my life until college), and read all those books on my list. Spending a couple hours a day with a book or the guitar (purchased on my first visit to the Sunday Sook) was a good way to enjoy all the "free" time one finds in Morocco. The guitar, like Morocco, and like most seemingly innocent things I encounter, has changed my life.
One of my close friends, Lynn, lived about 250 KM South of me. From her house, it was an easy day trip in a rented land rover to Erg Chebbi, a huge dune (or series of dunes) that lay at the Northern edge of the desolate and massive sea of sand known as the Sahara Desert. The word Sahara, which means "desert" in Arabic is pronounced SAhara (emphasis on the first syllable), not saHARa (emphasis on second syllable).
In the Sahara |
"Perhaps the logical question at this point is: Why go? The answer is that once you have been there you can't help yourself. Once you have fallen victim to the spell of this vast, luminous, silent country, no other place is quite strong enough for you, no other surroundings can provide the supremely satisfying sensation of existing in the midst of something that is absolute. You will go back, whatever the cost in discomfort and dollars, for the absolute has no price."
--Paul Bowles, on the Sahara
I'd never seen such a desolate and fascinating place. The only creatures able to brave the noon-day sun were tiny, metallic-silver colored ants. Their shiny bodies must have reflected nearly all of the light and heat and we surmised that their main food source came from scavenging off the less fortunate, less wise animals that accidentally wandered too far from their dens in the extreme midday heat. We found it's an easy mistake to make.
After spending quiet, lonely days in the desert, I returned home and looked on my map: the dunes that we camped on were merely dime-sized dots next to Algeria's thousands and thousands of kilometres of sandy southland.
Algeriennes |
Living on the Algerian border meant having a first hand, unbiased look at the awful civil war that has been raging in that country over the past five years. Like many wars in far away, obscure lands, it is misunderstood and of little significance to the average American.
The Armed Islamic Group (GIA) is thought to be responsible for the deaths of over 60,000 people. They were killed in the violence that erupted after authorities, in January 1992, canceled a general election dominated by the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS).
These girls, in their traditional Berber dress (I don't know which tribe), were two of the many Algerians I met who had fled from the civil war in their homeland. As their mother explained to me:
"One day there was a knock on the door. Four men with machine guns were asking for my husband (an Algerian-born Frenchman). Luckily, my husband wasn't home. The armed men said they would come back later to speak to him and that is when we decided it was time to leave Algeria. God knows if we will ever be able to return."