Essaouira
This morning's trip to Essaouira began with a 3 hour wait for my bus. I wasn't too put out as I'm reading Richard Dawkins' 'God Delusion' which is doing a good job of distracting me from this wretched city. More slating later in this entry.
Two and a half hours later I arrived at the seaside town of Essaouira on the West coast of Morocco. As I so often do in new towns, I put my map into my back pocket and went for a random wander; on this occasion I got myself lost in the Jewish quarter, or the 'Mellah'. My experiences of Moroccan towns so far suggest Mellah is a byword for looking like a war torn, poverty-stricken ghetto, which is curious for a people often historically linked with lucrative merchant-trading activities.
I would say the Mellah in Essaouira is where I felt the most intimidated on my Moroccan trip. Imagine the scene (you'll have to because I was afraid to take out my camera!). Port town. On my right a 10m high wall. On my left a terrace of homes with the outer walls reduced to a pile of brick and rubble on the ground. No side streets (exit points!). The exposed rooms were filled with more rubble and waste. A frame of scaffolding without any flooring stood next to the detritus with children aged no more than 7 or 8 climbing 3 stories up without supervision. Further ahead a Obi-Wan-alike relieved himself in broad daylight. In each doorway small groups of unprivileged, beefy men stood looking menacingly at passers-by (ie, me). I walked by, under a bridge when 4 dodgy types stepped out in front of me. Upon seeing me, 2 of them looked across at one of the other chaps who shook his head. This prompted the guys to separate and let me walk through them. Now who knows if anything might have happened, but it was intimidating nonetheless. I suspect they were intimidated by me - parting out of fear of the repercussions I might unleash unto them!
Not much else to report on this town. It's a working port. It's a beach. It's a surf Mecca. Unemployed young men sell 'space-cakes'. A place to waste Euros: EUR 240k for a 3-bed apparently! What, are we meant to haggle over the price of property too?
Every time I leave Marrakech, well, the old town or Medina in particular, I feel a weight lifted from me. It's just such a shit-hole. On paper it should be a delightfully charming experience: the exotic smells of the spices, the exotic street performers (snake charmers, dancers etc) and the myriad of competing sounds of the musical bands and stall keepers. It should be a great place to pick-up authentic furniture or accessories for the home at a reasonable price. In short, it should be a place to experience a truly foreign culture in the safe confines of the tourist framework encouraged by the King of Morocco.
However, all the potential of these positive experiences are marred by the incessant attempts at scammers making money out of you. You can't walk about the souks or 'La Place' without being harangued into buying or looking at tourist clat. If one stops walking to look at something there is a financial price to pay, take a photo and you may as well get your credit card out to pay - especially if you fail to agree the price a priori. There are beggars everywhere and they follow you about until you pay up or bark a loud, firm 'non' at them.
I understand why they do it. They are the 'have-nots' and perceive me, you, a westerner as a 'have', but the extent of the begging / blagging behaviour is enough to come close to ruining the experience.
Now looking at the flip-side, maybe the begging and blagging IS the culture of Morocco. Maybe the problem is not with the locals, maybe it is my personal beef with having to almost be in a state of paranoia wondering when then the next scam is coming from. Ok, so that is an exaggeration, but I certainly find myself being wary in any transaction situation.
I got chatting to a fellow Pom last night. A nice guy called Nick, clearly in the midst of a mid-life crisis who tries too hard to sound youthful and positive. He said he felt intimated just walking around the city: with its dark narrow streets and disorienting layout. He spoke of sensing several occasions where he came close to being pick pocketed or robbed.
His experiences did not correspond with mine - I feel blithely confident walking around the city for the most part, it's only when they start talking or selling do I get tense. Now he seemed to be an intelligent chap, but he spoke of the locals with a tinge of racism in his tone. In his view the locals were all poor, made dangerous by the their situation and constantly having to battle an internal conflict of being tempted into making a fast buck - by robbing, scamming etc. I suppose this way of thinking is a consequence of the age we live in. The west is essentially at war with the extremists of the religion followed by the majority of Moroccans. With TV shows like 24 and the news (!) encouraging us to associate Arabic or North African looking people with criminal activities, is it inevitable good people get tarred with the same brush? And maybe, uncomfortable as it is, maybe there is a kernel of the prejudice possessed by Nick in me that causes me to be so cautious of the beggars and blaggers of Marrakech. It's that or common sense!
In a country that feels like it has a larger army of fit, able, 20-something shoe-shiners than soldiers, is it surprising I'm suspicious of the fat kid wheeling about in a wheelchair with a hand outstretched? This country appears to be racked with unemployment. On every street there are groups of bored looking youths loitering, kicking rubbish about, smoking and horse-playing. Shop keepers spend endless time chatting to buddies in their shop. All very inefficient. How much economic value can one extract from sand dunes? So given the choice of doing an honest days work for a pittance or ripping off wealthy tourists, what would I do? Get unwashed and wheel myself around stupid tourists with a hand outstretched, probably!
