This is the last stop on the trip before we go to Orlando, FL to complete our around-the-world expedition. We had a very busy day today. We are staying at a Sofitel Hotel which is inside Medina, the ancient part of the walled city. Medina is a maze of 1600 streets, some of them no wider than your shoulders. There are residences. Some people are impoverished while some of the residences are quite elaborate although you wouldn’t know it just by looking at the door from a narrow street.
What really characterize the Medina is the shops and craftspeople that work there. You can buy just about everything. There are numerous food shops with vegetables, fish, freshly butchered meat, sweets (Muslims aren’t suppose to drink alcohol so they are heavy on the sweets). There are numerous textile shops, places to rent elaborate seating for a bride’s wedding, shoe shops, and places selling leather goods. A lot of weaving and tanning of leather goes on in there. While the origin of the Medina is before the 10th century, somehow they have been able to install an infrastructure to provide electricity, water and sewage. I even saw an ATM built into a wall which really surprised me.
Also inside the Medina are many mosques, madrases and a university. We were told that the university is one of, if not, the oldest universities in the world. Fez was an intellectual center in northern Africa. The guides stressed that although Morocco is a Muslim country they are very tolerant. Very few women wear the full burka. There is a small but distinct Jewish population. About 1% of the country is Christian. Morocco is a monarchy and the current king is the first one to have his wife make public appearances. They are quite content with their government and have avoided the recent turmoil of other Muslim countries.
Moroccans are quick to point out that Morocco was the first county to recognize the United States as a sovereign nation. (They were in a dispute with Great Britain at the time.) They are proud of the fact. They are a gracious people who made us feel welcome. Still, it is evident that their Muslim religion is an important force in their life.
In the afternoon we visited a tannery, a place where they were weaving fabrics, and a rug co-op where they claimed that the rugs were handmade and provided by rural women. Of course it was mostly a sales pitch. This late in the trip most of us are jaded to the concept of buying, much to the consternation of those trying to make a sale. The tannery/store was especially troublesome in a way. We could see where the hides were having the hair remove and the skins were tanned and dyed. The store was full of leather goods. There were shoes, purses, attaches, coats, belts, wallets, ottomans and everything else that could be made out of leather. The problem was that it wasn’t fine leather. The price was right but the stuff they were selling isn’t something you would be proud to wear. The inventory looked a bit aged and I can’t imagine what the actual “turns” (a retail term) are for the store.
In the evening we had our last group cocktail hour and dinner. It wasn’t an elaborate blow-out like the evening in Jaipur. The flight crew was there for the cocktails which was nice because they have been a great group of people looking out for us.
Tomorrow we get our luggage ready for the last leg of an amazing trip. We will have circumnavigated the globe.
The Medina.
Shops in the narrow streets of the Medina.
A shop selling spools of thread for weaving.
A weaver on a hand loom.
The tannery in the Medina. The workers are paid on piece work. The white tubs are where the hair is removed from the hides. They use water, salt, lime and pidgin dung. The hides are then dyed in vegetable dye.