Rage Against the Riad

"An Englishman teaching an American about food is like the blind leading the one-eyed." - A.J. Liebling

 

Early morning helped along by the call to prayer. Fes has over three-hundred mosques, and they each have their own tinny, fuzzy, sparky speaker system. When the muezzins sing, it sounds like a thousand radio stations tuned to separate channels all switched on at once to tell you someone scored a goal.

Had breakfast on the terrace and read Between Meals by Liebling. Fun to read about the glories of classic French cooking in a former French colony. I ate shriveled olives, drank strong coffee, and spread cheese on some sort of charred flat bread. 

Ali brought me tea and reeled off pleasantries. He spoke English very well, but it was like he learned it at a finishing school for diplomat's wives. A little French was mixed in with his speech as is common here. 

"Will monsieur take his tea on the balcony or is it his pleasure to remain here? Here? Ah, oui, excellent choice, as the view here is parfait, ah, very beautiful."

Have the terrace removed, Ali, we no longer require it. 

Then it was a ramble through the gameshow for lunatics they call the old medina. It's like parachuting out of a battered seaplane and landing in Mos Eisley spaceport. You turn and dodge and duck and walk for what seems like blocks to discover that rights are lefts and seeming dead ends suddenly open up into active slaughterhouses.

Everywhere colorful slippers and tin lamps and ceramic pots and scraps of tile and men sewing silver thread into belts. Leather bags and prickly pears. Pigeons in cages, donkeys laden with propane tanks, the Hand of Fatima, and endless cries for your attention in all languages.

Hola. Bonjour. Hello. Ah, hello. English. You are lost? You are lost. The medina is big place. There is no shame for you. Follow me, I am your friend. You would like to see my shop, just to look and not to buy. Just to look, to see. My brother work here and he will take care of you, he is my family. Leather bags, fine rugs, silver for your sweetheart." 

They can probably do it in Finnish and Klingon.

The hard soft-sell is everywhere, the long con is in effect. Plots within plots, wheels within wheels. Everyone is a trained actor, everyone is a Decepticon, everyone prays five times a day to Fraud. If you would like to feel what it's like to be a woman drinking alone in a bar, go to Fes and walk around for thirty seconds.

Hello. Come here. Yes. Yes. Free. Mixed in with sudden cries of "Belek!" which either means "look out!" or "donkey!" because they shout it when a donkey is coming down the corridor to crush all in its path.

They load them with everything. Gasoline cans, soccer balls, water tanks, rubber tires. Probably other donkeys if I waited long enough. It's donkeys all the way down.

When you hear, "belek!" you and the women in headscarves and the Australians with hangovers and the tired men with battered briefcases all throw yourselves against the walls or, too often, into shops. Ah, have some mint tea and look but just to see not to buy unless you like to buy. I have best price in medina.

At one point I ducked into a wide, open area with piles of wool ten feet high and man with a long-ass knife was slashing up sheep skins. It was like some kind of horrible reverse fairyland, like the vision a wizard shows he hero of what the world will be if he is not successful in his quest.

The air full of dust, the scraping sounds of post-slaughter, the smell of dead animals, a sad horse tied to a concrete post. It was a production center and very interesting to see, though certainly outside of my experience and, almost, my comfort zone.

A boy came up to tell me his father worked in the tannery and would I like to see it. No, but it is very impressive to see the tannery where my father works, but I see you mean no, so please follow me to my cousin's shop to see something very interesting.

The something interesting is: purses.

Beggars sit on busted cardboard boxes with their hands cupped. The men try to look as miserable as possible. The woman usually have messed-up kids in their laps and bright yellow cards saying Certificate of Malady hanging around the child's neck.

I met my doom outside the purse store. 

Hola, bonjour, hello. 

"I'm just exploring. But, thank you. Thank you. Shukran."

Is no problem. Is no problem. I take you to the tanneries. You want to go to tannery to see Moroccan tradition, Moroccan leather, best in world. Come see for your sweetheart. You are my friend.

I was tired and gave in. And I did want to take photos of the famous tanneries. "Ok. Listen, though, I don't have much money. I am only looking around."

Yes, yes, just to look. Just to see Moroccan leather. Not to buy. Only to see. If you like something, good. If you like something, I give you Moroccan price. I give you friend price.

Ok.

"Ok. On the way, I will take you to meet my family. You wish to see Berber family? Very friendly,
 very beautiful home."

Um, I don't want to be rude, but I am very tired, and...

"Ok, I take you now my family."

Just the tannery, please.

"Oh, here is misunderstood. In Morocco, families live where they work. My family lives in the tannery. You are my friend, and they will meet you. Moroccan leather is best in world."

Ok.

"I am Muhammad. I am your very good friend."

You learn quickly that there is no such thing as a "museum" in Fes, unless a museum is something where everything is for sale. Nice collection you have here. I'll take two of them Starry Nights and if you throw in that Manet, I'll take them Elgin Marbles. You ship to the US, right? Wrap 'em up real tight.

Muhammad took me to rug "museums" and wallet museums and metal-lamp museums. There was no ditching him, and when he did leave me, it was to attach me to one of his family members. 

I learned quite a bit about the leather industry. An old man, one of Muhammad's six or seven fathers, told me leather should never smell because human skin doesn't smell. He stank very badly, but I understood what he meant. No chemicals in the "biological" leather of Fes. 

The tannery is decently interesting. Medieval-looking pits filled with men and dye. Dudes stomp skin down into pits full of liquefied mint to make green purses, pureed poppy to make red shoes, mertilized indigo to make blue Trapper Keepers, etc. 

The dude I saw flensing before was scrapping loose wool off, because he deals in wool, and would send the skin over here to be trampled in a saffron-stuffed hole until it transformed into a yellow backpack.  

It was quieter and less smelly than usual, since people were still on vacation for Eid. I missed the mass slaughter, but I was seeing the beginnings of the afterparty. 

At one place, fatigue and the endless pressure began to work on me. There was a camel-skin messenger bag with "old" coins sewn all over it in a fun random pattern. I love old coins, and the bag was wide enough to hold record albums.

I began to imagine myself walking into a club like some kind of Jim Morrison (when he was fat), my coinbag full of dance hits. I let the salesman start to talk me into it. It was around $300, which is a lot of money for a dumb bag. I guess it was worth it, but it probably wasn't. And I didn't need it. I'd been spun around in circles and squeezed for about an hour. Dizzy. Vulnerable

It was getting pretty advanced. Once they get their hooks in, it's psychologically difficult to back out. But, praise be to Allah, at one point, he was bragging about the quality and how it would last forever and how the coins were triple-stitched and would never come off, and I saw a little patch on the bag where a coin was missing. 

The thing probably had two hundred little studs and sequins and coins on it, and I'd been looking at it for a long time before I saw the missing one. It broke the spell, thank god, and I was able to be like, "Hey! You said they would never come off, and look at this!"

He was furious, not with me, but with god, the world, fate, Bill Gates, the universe. It was a legit excuse for me to back out. Like, if he was going to play up the fantasy of the bag being made of starstuff and assembled by mermaids, I could play up the fantasy of being a prince who demanded perfection. 

He was like, "Maybe the artist... did this on... purpose." I was like, "Thank you, good day!" and got out of there. He gave chase. "We can fix. I have thread here." 

I'm sorry. I no longer want it.

He probably stomped through the floor like Rumplestilskin and forcefed loose change to the shop's tailor. 

 

 I had an idea this incident would let me also scrape Muhammad off my sandal, but he was waiting outside. He had a knack for being around corners, turning up like a bad dirham. 

"You not buy? This is terrible. Was it quality or price?"

I'm going home now, Muhammad. Thank you for everything. 

"I will take you first to the Bab Boujloud."

That was the thing from yesterday! The words the driver made me memorize. What could it be? If Muhammad wanted me to see it, it was probably a giant gumball machine or a factory that prints your name on key chains. 

I agreed, but he took me to see his "brother" at another purse store. Motherfucker. His brother seemed to agree with my assessment, because it got strangely aggressive.

"We are here, my friend. This is Abdul. Abdul will show you the terrace and everything to see. Abdul, this is my friend, Simon."

Abdul grabbed Muhammad violently by the collar

"Simon is not your friend now. Simon is MY friend. Go far away. Simon has new friend."

It didn't look like he was kidding. He released him and Muhammad smoothed his clothes and said he would see us later.

"You like joke I make Muhammad? This is how we are here Morocco. Jokes. Jokes with family. Now what I show you? Bag for sweetheart? Bag for you? Your bag you have is terrible. Do you want to know why our bags do not smell? Natural. Your own skin does not smell. Smell it. There is nothing, no smell, because natural."

God. God. He led me up some stairs to see "something special." It was the same tannery from a different angle. Amazing. You think you're far away, but you've just been going in circles. I was as polite as possible, and when Abdul was momentarily distracted by a busload of Israeli tourists, I fled.

Muhammad found me as if I'd had a tracking device taped to my camera bag. He asked me why I didn't buy anything. I told him I was done for the day. He said he would take me to the Bab Boujloud. I told him to leave me alone. He said he wanted money for being my guide. I gave him ten dirham and he went crazy with grief. I gave him forty more so he could turn the gas back on at his house.

I went the direction he pointed, but it was hopeless, turning around, surrounded by walls, hassled by donkeys. A boy came up and asked where I wanted to go. I gave him five bucks to leave me alone. I figured better to pay now then be led on another tour of the finest wallets and coin purses the nation had to offer.

Found the Bab Boujloud, which was a massive (and famous) entrance to the medina. The Blue Gate. It was cool. Nearby, a slewth of cats waited patiently for a butcher to toss them some scraps. Had some coffee at Cafe Clock.

Found my way back to the riad and collapsed in a heap. In addition to being hot, this place is emotionally exhausting.

The riads are, usually, mansions that had fallen into disrepair and were bought and restored by European investors. They clean them up and turn them into hotels and make a fortune. Grand old places with massive wooden doors, exquisite tile columns, and bird-filled courtyards.

The locals seem to hate them, because the riads offer everything. They change money, arrange tours, etc. Some sell spices and bags. They have a restaurant inside. So, when the touts in the street come up and ask if you want something, and you say you got it taken care of at the riad, you can see the mask of politeness slip. They almost shake with how much they hate them.

They tell you not to trust them and if you can return anything the riad gave you, they'll give you a better price. It was the first sense I got of the kind of resentment that leads to revolution. Like, the official colonization was over, but the French (and English) were still sort of flexing a kind of economic control.

I sympathized, but I wasn't going back out into that bullshit again. I had a delicious tajine of chicken, olives, and preserved lemon peel at the riad cafeteria. Ali was very happy to serve me on the terrace.