Socks and Sandals

While nothing compares to the sight of British Pensioners traveling around Morocco with their socks and sandal combo, I've managed to come pretty close in terms of dorky attire. First of all, I've embraced the bandana, which is always tied around my neck with the knot under the neck of my t-shirt in a quasi-ascot. Secondly, I brought a red Minnesota Twins hat, only to find out I probably own the sole red hat (outside of those Fes hats, of course) in Morocco. Factor in my brightly colored t-shirts, sunglass clips (which I snap on over my normal glasses - admittedly very practical), $7.50 watch from Target, man purse - or "murse," if you will - and my high rise socks with shorts, and you hopefully have a prettty vivid image of me sitting in front of this computer in Akkari right now...
While nothing is egregiously dorky, and hopefully I pull it all off okay, I've hit at least one snag. Have you ever tried flirting with someone while wearing sunglass clips and a bandana around your neck? Take my word for it and don't even bother.

ps - http://www.sandalandsoxer.co.uk/

Essaouira for the Weekend

I'm off for the weekend to Essaouira, in the south of Morocco, for a weekend music festival - I'll fill in the details when I get back. Should be an amazing show, Youssou N'Dour is going to be there on sunday afternoon. Here's some more info: http://www.festival-gnaoua.co.ma/eng/programm-details.cfm

Akkari

Akkari, a quartier populaire, has become my second home in Rabat after our ridiculously overcrowded apartment in the nouveau ville. Akkari is situated outside the imperial walls of Rabat, and is termed a quartier populaire because of its smaller winding streets, and general character. The population is less well-off, and you don't see nearly as many cars off the main thoroughfare. You wouldn't exactly define Akkari as touristy in a western sense - ie: it doesn't fit into our romanticized image of Fez, Marrakesh, etc - but it definitely has a character of its own. As I've been spending more and more time here, I've managed to meet lots of the local kids through the reseau office, and it's a really great feeling to be able to walk down the main street and run into a kid that you worked with the day before. The shops are still pretty traditional, you have your average shops that specialize in odd individual products, like motors of dubious quality, or the cushion/pillow shop, which makes them while you wait. There's also plenty of hole in the wall places that sell pretty much the same things - bread, yogurt, bottled water, candy, and other relatively basic food (no supermarket by a long shot).
The best part about Akkari's less-than central location is that I am ridiculously close to the Atlantic, it's literally out the door, to the left, and down about 60-70 meters. There isn't a beach, it's more cliffs and craggy rocks, but it's quite the sight nonetheless. Nothing beats the guy with the snorkel and the scuba suit who tromps by the office everyday with his spear and his day's catch. One of these days, I'm going to venture down there and attempt to swim without being dashed on the rocks... wish me luck :/

Dirhams

The standard unit of currency in Morocco is the Dirham. It's not on any currency markets (as far as I know), and is controlled by the Moroccan government, ie: they set the exchange rate, you can't remove Dirhams from the country, etc. The exchange rate isn't bad at all, we're talking a little under 9 Dirhams to a dollar. It's pretty easy to get a meal for a buck or two - most round loaves of bread - although not huge, are only around 1.20 Dirhams. I just bought breakfast this morning for 8 Dirhams, which included a cafe au lait and a fresh croissaint. Lunch was closer to twenty, since I had a Moroccan-style Cheese Burger (read: small quantity of mystery meat, more veggies) with a small salad and fries, plus a bottle of Coke.
There are a large amount of western-style goods, from Gilette Mach 3 Razors to Pringles, and they're appropriately more expensive, pretty much on par with western prices, which seem astronomical here. This even extends to the lone McDonald's I've seen in Rabat, which is actually somewhat of a luxury dining establishment, given that McDonald's is about the same price - if not slightly more - here. It's pretty damn odd refer to McDonald's as any sort of upscale dining establishment, but here it fits the bill.

My First (attempted) Pick-Pocketing

I was taking the bus to Akkari yesterday, when I ran into a few snags - most notably a full-court press attempted pickpocketing by three unsavory guys on the bus. I had stupidly decided to carry my victorinox bag with the handy-dandy zippers that open extra-easy on the bus when I noticed that my front pocket was unzipped when I sat down. Looking around, i looked at the guy behind me who had brushed by me just a moment ago. Giving him a stern look, I closed up my bag and held it close to me. Just moments later, a guy sits down next to me, and starts fumbling with the window to the left of me. Soon, his "friend" stops by to help him out... all the while, i'm sitting there with tourist confusion written all over my face. Not realizing these guys were in on it too, I started to help them with the window after their prompting (keep in mind I'm on a bus alone in the heat, and slightly out of it). Soon, i felt pressure on my bag, and grabbed it towards me, hard. Although it was in front of me, they had somehow managed to unzip all the zippers sans sound and proceeded to rifle their greasy little no-good fingers in my stuff. Luckily, my stuff was arranged in my bag so that they hit a hat and a bandana when they opened up a main pocket. Same was for the side pocket, where I was stupidly keeping my Visa card. However, they managed to make off with nothing. After getting up and starting to make a scene, they left- a little too casually for my tastes, which left me going through my bag for the next hour, double- and triple-checking all my stuff.
Basically, it happened really fast, and noiselessly. These guys had been hanging out at the bus stop looking for targets, and, given my pale skin, I guess I made a ridiculously tempting target. Let's just say at this point, my vigilance has gone up tenfold. The biggest problem is that it's kind of shattered a lot of the artificial, or perceived security I've been building up over the last week and a half. I now case out the guys that board the bus, wondering if they could indeed have sticky fingers. I'm going to head off to the medina after reseau today and get a little purse that I can wear around my neck - and underneath my t-shirt - and carry less, just some dirhams and a copy of my passport.

Parking Attendants

One of the most visible parts of the large informal sector in Morocco are parking attendants. Clad in blue coats, they work on street corners where they provide unsoliticed parking help to anybody pulling in. With an air of imperiousity they wave the parker into the spot and tell them when to stop next to the curb. For this assistance, they expect a dirham or two. They also function as a quasi-enforcer for the neighborhood. Cafes often pay them a small stipend to keep the ever-present beggars away from patrons. They'll often shoo off stray cats and keep the neighborhood's gears greased.
The best part is that despite their official attitude, they operate entirely on their own enterprise. The blue coats are often bought in the medina, and carry no real significance. They'll often pick a street corner and even go so far as to set up a small plastic chair, while keeping a steady eye on the goings-on.