April 2, 2015  Marrakech and Mon Riad and Words

Riad.  

A riad (Arabic: رياض‎) is a traditional Moroccan house or palace with an interior garden or courtyard. The word riad comes from the Arabian term for garden, "ryad".

These are views of the inside of our hotel MonRiad.  The one on the left is the courtyard and pool with the first floor balcony above.  The photo on the right is the view from my window looking down on the open courtyard.  This is the traditional style of home in this Muslim culture.  The life of the family was carried on inside the house, away from the street and from prying eyes that might assault the modesty of the women.

The growth of tourism has led to the purchase of large numbers of old home.  The buildings are then gutted and converted into commercial "riads" as small hotels or guest houses.

Medina. Souk. Kasbah

Medina. The Arabic word al-Madīnah (المدينة) simply means "the city"

The word souk  refers to Berber/North African traditional markets. (Arabic: سوق‎, Hebrew: שוק‎.

 The souks we saw did not allow cars inside.  The streets and alleyways are narrow.  That does not exclude donkeys, donkey carts, donkey carts pulled by humans or mopeds and motorcycles.

A Kasbah is a walled city or section of a city.

The airport is about 15 minutes outside of Marrakech.  The highways are modern, with traffic lights and controlled access.  The drivers are all madmen (and women).  Lights and lane restrictions are "suggestions"  and right-of-way is who-got-there-first.

Blue Gate    Bab Agnaou

As soon as we approached the walls around the medina, the exotic part of the country emerged.  There is a uniform color of terra cotta of all the walls around the city.  The walls are pierced by elaborate gates.  Marrakech has nineteen gates.  These were built over the years by sultans, by prime ministers and by wealthy citizens.  Each trying to outdo the other in size, color and beauty.

Our taxi entered through the Bab Agnaou.  It is  not the main entrance to the city but is the one closest to the kasbah of the royal palaces and to our hotel.  Once inside, the streets took on the geometry of pathways and alleyways and then played out altogether.  We stopped at a parking lot where our driver obtained the services of a porter and his pull cart.  We followed the porter and the driver and plunged into the souk.

souk street with a shop of goods

 all made from rubber tires

It was maybe a five minute walk from the outside of the souk down a confusing array of turns to the entrance of MonRiad.  We were soon to get very adept at finding our hotel, but that took a while and a few episodes of getting lost.

Were we safe?

Open Square   Note parapet of old wall

Before I left, I had several worried inquiries about safety in Morocco.  Morocco is a stable, safe country.   Things like ISL/ISIS cannot take root in a country that is stable, has an intact police and military and a confident government.  We were safe.  We were safe in the day, in the night and finding our way back to our little riad.  We were off the beaten path and not staying at an international hotel chain.  By choice.

The staff at MonRiad were courteous and kind.  Most did not speak English.  The reception staff spoke many languages including French, Italian, German, Arabic and English.  We surrendered our passports, registered and said, yes, we would like to eat dinner in the riad.

On the way to MonRiad

Journaling.

Marty and Paul were limited in what they could unpack because their major luggage was ---- somewhere.  I presented them each with a blank travel diary and asked/encouraged them to write in it daily.  It helps me to catch the details of a day.  As much as I hope and believe I will remember a special moment, I often do not.  It fades into the fabric of the entire trip, but sometimes you want that little detail.

No record of the wire transfer according to the office.  The transfer was confirmed by my bank and I had forwarded a copy of the confirmation to MonRiad.  They had no record.  Well, we will work on that. I think that they preferred to work in cash and in wired transactions to avoid the fees associated with credit card payments.  In fact, they offered a substantial discount for cash transactions.  I had brought with me both Euros and dirham.  

A nice room with a view.

Because these are converted private houses, the configuration of rooms is most likely going to be narrow, with tall ceilings and a window opening onto the central courtyard.  The courtyard were physically open to the sky but the ones we saw had roofs of vinyl or glass to retain warmth in the winter.  They had not yet been opened for the warm season.  So a window opening onto the courtyard is not necessarily going to get you much in the way of fresh air.  Our rooms had heat pumps that served as A/C as well as heat.  MY room, however, had a window that opened from the bathroom onto the alleyway where the entry door stood.  I was blessed with not only cross ventilation but also a place to hang my laundry so that it could dry.

The dangers of Moorish design.

The carved door is beautiful. The second photo is the view into the tiled bathroom and at the window overlooking the entry street.  But look at those projections of wood from the door frame.  Imagine how that feels when you walk through in the middle of the night, not quite awake, and smack into your head or face.

Supper in MonRiad.  

The riad offered optional prix fixe dinner to its guests if they let the kitchen know earlier in the day.  We were late arrivals but they were able to accommodate us.  Most dinners will feature a salad, bread and a main dish.  Couscous is central to the cuisine, with added meat, usually beef.  The breed of sheep in Morocco reportedly stores its fat in its tail, and so lamb and mutton do not have the pungency of these meats in other countries.  Seafood is around but we did not see much of that in the places we ate.  Moroccan bread is really good and every neighborhood has a bakery.

Tomorrow was to be a busy day.  We three travelers slept well.