Meknes, Fes and more...

a cybercafe; Fez, Morocco
workcamp day 14

• the last day, tomorrow morning I'm going to leave for Meknes
• afternoon - visit to Chellah - the site of first population at Rabat-Sale; after it was a fortress, then a necropolis - impressive ruins, a lot of storks
• tasted the eggplant - so delicious! and it exists in the Czech Republic as well; how is it possible I hadn't tasted it before (or that I don't remember it); definitely have to eat it at home
• saying goodbye - the thing that I've never liked

Meknes - the city of a 17th century sultan; very monumental, the sultan apparently liked to show off a lot

• perhaps the most wall city in Morocco - there's a lot of monuments that are directly connected to it (stables, granary, prison....)
• I lost some of my money, it seems as if it waned literally; it was not in a place, where someone could steal it and I had had more money there, that were still there - it was worth 20 euros, one could say not a big deal, but with my style of traveling, it is; furthermore, I feel like a stupid madman
• a few talks with Moroccan people; a lot about religion (though I always try to avoid the topic); they tried to convert me - I showed interest (not many religious people can understand that someone simply doesn't feel the existence of a god) - I got to know quite somenew things about islam; b tw the justification of their superiority over Christianity and Juddaism is very credible
• I met and talked with a Japanese tourist

Moulay Idriss - an important pilgrimage town close to Meknes; there's a mausoleum (non-muslim access forbidden) of a famous muslim saint (Moulay Idriss)

• the town is built around a hill - very picturesque
• I met there the Japanese again, we decided to go the nearby Volubilis ruins together

Volubilis - huge Roman ruins, on the list of UNESCO; some parts are really just ruins, some parts remain impressive even now; it surprised me greatly there remain still a lot of nice floor mosaics; btw large parts of it remain unexcavated

return to Meknes

• met a few youngsters so we started to chat
• some of them don't pray ; their explanation enforced my previous perception of the Moroccan volunteers (i.e. some people in Morocco may seem secular and "modern", but in the core, they feel bad about their secularity (one could say they're caught between "modernity" and tradition and can't mix it satisfyingly), feel very strongly about religion and their perception of women is still almost medieval (and they definitely want to marry a traditional, medieval-like girl, not a modern one); about the prayers - the gus almost begged me for support, saying they knew they were bad muslims, that islam was a difficult to follow religion and that they tried to perform as many good deed as possible to make up for their faults
• I spent the evening with them; they played the guitar (traditional Moroccan music and then some flamenco variations); we went to a cafe; they smoke marijuana and hashish extremely much - as if trying to the emptiness of everyday life (but they were not from poor families, rather from well-off ones, that's the worst on it) , I feared they'd smoke so much they'd die from it (judging from the quantities of hashish); no, it seems they're already used to it...
• I was invited to sleep in a house of one of them ( they were terrified when I told them that I'd sleep outdoors) - in the guest room, it was almost palace-like, the family was very hospitable and the mother of him most kind (even though she didn't speak French); she apparently took it as a matter of prestige to take care of the guest as good as possible

Fes - a big city, a huge medina, very confusing; even some of the more modern parts of the city seem as if from the Middle ages

• there's a plenty of traditional markets (reportedly in Morocco it's second after Marrakech) and artisans (the first)
• there's plenty of people offering a habitation; it's very very tiresome
• some parts of the city are really ancient and really nice
• even though there are more than1 million people, it's no problem to sleep outdoors -the city lies between two forested hills, and is therefore quite narrow; no problem getting to the edge