Camels, Monkeys, and Snakes, Oh My! (Morocco)

 Disclaimer- Too much to write about morocco, so here is a weird narrative from a few of my classes I put together and altered for you. Sorry it's long.

I walked out of our tent area to the water closets set in the sand a little ways off from our camp in the Sahara, somewhere near the boarder of Algeria. I think? By eleven the air FINALLY began to cool off–the sun set at like 10- and it felt good to be in shorts for the first time in Morocco. After wearing long sleeves and pants for hours while riding the camels, I was tired, already in my pajamas, and ready for bed. The lights were out at 11 but there was a huge full moon out and the desert had a blue glow.

Many of the girls in our group were wearing practically nothing to bed, so I figured it would be conservative to walk to the bathroom in running shorts and a long sleeve shirt. At all of our cultural meetings for SAS, they stressed how the ladies had to cover up all the time, 105° Sahara camel trek included. The whole trip I had abided by this suggestion and I thought, what could happen in a two second walk to the bathroom, right? Wrong. Of course. Rounding a corner I passed Mustafa, one of the young Moroccans who had lead our camels that afternoon. He was wearing the same blue shirt down to his ankles and black and gold turban from earlier.

I met him during the trek when we struck up an awkward conversation. Not awkward because of the language barrier, but awkward because how do you talk to someone on the ground leading camels while you are incessantly bouncing up and down on the back of one? We talked with a mix of English, French, and Arabic (what he attempted to teach me), so the conversation was slow coming. He stumbled on some of his words and seemed embarrassed, but I understood most of his explanations and questions.  He told me he was nineteen, owns three camels, and had minimal schooling, but wanted to learn more about working with camels. I don't know how much a camel costs but having three by age nineteen sounded pretty impressive to me. I can barely keep Gabe, my fish, alive.

          I haven't seen him since before dinner and I think he was surprised when I rounded the corner in the dark. He paused with a smile to say hello, and I asked him if he would be around tomorrow. He glanced down and saw my uncovered legs and he pulled his black turban up to his eyes and glanced away; a move I noticed him do earlier when he couldn't remember and English word and was uncomfortable. Yes, camel tomorrow, goodnight, he mumbled and scampered away. Perfect. I show my legs for two seconds and offend my one native friend. Just my luck. (Don't worry though, I made a point to say hello before we left the next morning and he was chill).

            The next morning we all got up from sleeping under the stars to see the sun rise from the top of the sand dunes. The haze over the desert allows you to see the whole sun as it rises up from the mountains and it was amazing. The desert was a soft red, and for what seemed like the first time in ages, there was actually silence. My friends in Colorado always told me how much they like the desert and usually I couldn't help but think, Why in the world would you opt to camp out in the desert. Sandy and boring. As it turns out, there is a lot of sand in the desert, but it's definitely not boring, more like majestic or some other fancy spiritual word.

            I think Morocco as a whole surprised me too. I didn't think the whole country would be sandy or boring, but I did have my notions of what it means to travel and what I would encounter. Morocco made me realize that words like "traveling" and "authentic" are very hard to define, and I may not really be experiencing either. What does it mean to "know" a country, or make a local "friend"? Does my status as an unfamiliar American female prevent me from being treated without bias? How much of everything I see and hear from the locals is meant only to please me because I have American money? I suppose I always had these ideas in my head before, but now, more than ever, I am always aware of these questions and analyzing the experiences I am having. I am thankful for these new perspectives and speculate they will grow and evolve over the semester. Guess that's what happens when you have a portable classroom, you can't just enjoy the desert, you have to ask questions like, "but what does it mean?". It doesn't mean anything. I just like the desert. 

 Now we are officially in the Mediterranean and off to Antalya, Turkey. Hopefully I can write a blog post about the ship before we get there. Peace.

P.S. the waves are reaching my port hole window and I keep thinking Titanic, Titanic, Titanic. At least the water is in the 60's, but i don't suppose washing up on the Syrian coast would be much fun…..

Kasbah in Quarzazate 

Under side of a tent Quarzazate 

At dinner in Quarzazate 

Zagora 

Zagora 

M'Hamed

M'Hamed

M'Hamed Mustafa 

M'Hamed

Sunset, M'Hamed, Sahara 

 M'Hamed

Sunrise in Sahara 

Marrakesh

Marrakesh

Marrakesh