I had planned to get out of Marrakesh and see some more of Morocco, but I just didn't have the energy. I slept for about 14 hours straight. It was fabulous. I decided to go with my current theme of being lazy and I lounged around my room watching Scooby Doo and eating the rest of the fruit from the night before.
Eventually I got my act together and wandered around the hotel trying to find all of the different amenities. The pool and the gardens were amazing. Eventually it was time for the free bus to the downtown area and I took advantage of it.
By the time I arrived I was very hungry and very much in need of a bathroom. I practically ran past all of the performers. I also ran past a guy with a monkey. How could I have done that, he had a monkey, what could be more fun?
After my quick lunch of pizza I was determined to find the palace and the tombs. It wasn't long before I was being tailed by a guy who wanted to “practice” his English. At first I said ok, but then he wanted to take me to the Jewish Souk, down a dark thin alley. That was the point that I said no. He kept telling me that tourists go there all the time and that it was the right way. I say no and asked him to go away. He did, of all the crazy things.
I decided to try and wander a bit more. I ended up finding the Jewish souk on my own and it was definitely not down a dark thin alley and there were not any tourists there. It's better to walk around the non-tourist areas. It wasn't a beautiful place by any means, but it was real. I ended up finding a really nice little spice stand and buying some tea for my mom. The vendor gave me some black soap (for a hamman) and I took a picture with him.
I wandered a bit more and saw two guys taking pictures in front of La Koutoubia, this partially ruined tower thing. I wanted a picture of myself in front of it too so I offered to take a picture of them. I often do this, its a good way to know that your camera won't be walking off. After they took the picture I found out that they were from Casablanca. They also wanted pictures with me and my phone number. I let them take the pictures.
Now that I wasn't hungry I wanted to try and find the guy with the monkey. I'm willing to pay for a picture with a monkey. The square was packed. There were far more people there than had been previously. I didn't find the monkey guy but before I knew what was happening I was posing for pictures with snakes, there was even one around my neck. That was a little scary. I know that these guys try to rip off tourists and that he would want money. I was fine with that and more than willing to give him about MAD 20 (US $2.80).
Snake Guy (SG) (while shaking my hand with two hands): Good luck, good life good fortune, now give me MAD 200 (US $24).
Me (loudly as there were other tourists around watching): That's extortion, that's ridiculous, I won't give you that!
SG: Shush, shush (I guess that my yelling was bad for his business) ok, MAD 100 (US $12).
Me: Yea right, I was going to give you something but now you get nothing!
He was holding my arm but still I turned and ran away. I forgot about the monkey and just weaved through the crowd, not even noticing the women following me and asking if I want henna tattoos. I just wanted out of that place. I couldn't take being followed and approached constantly any more. And part of me felt bad. I almost felt like I stole those pictures from him. I feel better about it now, he shouldn't have been so unreasonable. If I'm going to do this thing, travel around the world, then I really need to not feel bad when things like this happen. At least I got away with (hopefully) great pictures for free. That can't be bad!
The nice thing about travel is that even after some guy tries to rip you off your reminded about how good people can be. When I asked the first cab how much the ride would be he charged me MAD 60 (US $7.50), less than half of what I've paid before. With the good comes the bad, the good always out weights the bad, and the bad almost always makes for a good story.
No comments:
Post a Comment