Moroccan your world.

Day 1

Waking up early to watch the sunrise was rough. I was completely exhausted, I knew I would regret if I hadn’t decided to get up. So I manned up and headed up to deck seven. It was beautiful. It was still dark out, but you could see the lights from the city of Casablanca twinkling in the distance. As the sun began to rise, the sky was filled with reds and purples. I was with Ali, Nick, Farrah, and Jimmy. There were a lot of clouds, so we didn’t get to see the sun come up over the water, but we did get to watch it burst over the clouds. As it got lighter out, there was a school of dolphins who swam near our boat for a really short period of time, which absolutely made my day perfect. Right before docking we grabbed breakfast and got ready to leave.

I headed into Casablanca with Farrah, Jimmy, and Julie. Casablanca smells... awful. It smells like a dirty gerbil cage baking in 90 degree weather, for the most part. We overpaid an absurd amount for a ride to the train station (100 dirhams which is roughly $10. The same ride later cost us 10 dirhams, or about $1.10) We bought our train tickets to Marrakech for us and our friends, and then we had some time to kill so we walked around looking for lunch, which failed because in Morocco, food/lunch was not served at 11 AM. We walked back to the train to catch a taxi back to the ship. We didn’t want to get ripped off again, so we did a lot of arguing and trying to force people to use the meters. Everyone refused to, so we walked away. We actually wound up walking the whole way back, which wasn’t that far of a walk. We saw donkeys, children, and a lot of dead animals.

We got back to the ship and had lunch with Kevin,Veronica, Ali, and Sam. We agreed to meet up at 2 PM to wait for Andrew. When we got to the lobby, we found him and he told us that he had been mugged, which was really scary and made us all feel awful. We/he talked to the dean, and he decided to stay in Casablanca as opposed to come to Marrakech with us for the night so he could sort everything out. We grabbed money and took taxi’s to the train station just in time to catch a train to Marrakech. We passed miles and miles of farm land, and it was about a three hour train ride. We spent it learning bits of Arabic from a nice couple who was sitting with us. It was really cool because the woman had this beautiful henna tattooing all over her hands and feet, which means she was celebrating something, which we later found out was that she was pregnant. It was a really interesting cultural experience and language experience. “la” means no and “shukran” means thank you, which is mostly all that I was able to retain.

When we arrived into Marrakech, we began the frightening process of getting a taxi to our hotel for eight people. We split two taxis and got near our hotel, which was super sketchy because it was down a creepy alleyway. Apparently, creepy alleyways are like regular streets in Morocco. (don’t worry, mom, I was carrying my cuticle cutters in my hand ready to stab a bitch) We went up to the rooftop terrace to see the square from the top, which was absolutely beautiful. We also witnessed the call to prayer, which happens five times a day where people within Islamic culture pray to Allah. We went out for dinner and found this really cute place that had a beautiful ambience. I got chicken tangien with lemon which was interesting. Tangien is like meat with lots of diferent spices and vegetables and olives in an almost stew type thing. We also all ate bread that we’re thinking was drugged, because after we ate it we all felt like we had had a few drinks at the EXACT SAME TIME. But it also could have been a placebo thing. After figuring out payments, we went out to the markets which consisted of Sam sucking at bartering and Kevin winning. I absolutely loved it. We went and grabbed some orange juice because we all heard that it was an absolute must. IT WAS AMAZING. I don’t even like orange juice, and it was probably the most amazing drink I had ever had. So fucking good. Seriously. I wish there were more words. The market was filled with so many beautiful colors and scents and it was just all around amazing. I had a hard time sleeping and wound up going back up to roof with Kevin for a bit and witnessing a 3 AM soccer game being played in the square, which was pretty cool.

Day 2

Woke up to the sound of birds. Not in a cute way. Too many birds. I also heard the call to prayer at some random hour in the morning. We headed out of the hotel to grab a taxi to get to our meeting point for the camel trek. It didn’t take long to get there or for our tour guides to arrive, and ANDREW SHOWED UP! It was amazing because we weren’t sure what his situation was after everything that happened. We all went out to breakfast at this cute little cafe place, where I got a chocolate croissant and more orange juice. We then started the drive, which of course meant nap time. I’m not sure how long I was asleep for, but when I woke up we were in the middle of this beautiful mountain range. It sounds weird, but I finally felt like I was in Africa. We stopped for lunch, where I got beef tangien. Andrew made the decision to leave, which made me really, really upset because I hadn’t gotten the chance to spend time with him as much as I would have liked to.

We got to the camel trek after about 11 hours, which was much longer than everyone was expecting. Some girls freaked out and called the US embassy because they thought we were being kidnapped, which seemed to me like a gross overreaction. We got on the camels around 8:15 PM. I chose to name mine Allen and Kevin named his Steve. (Allen... Allen... Allen... oh wait, that’s not Allen... Steve... Steve...) We rode 45 minutes into the desert and we got to our camp which was large tents with mattresses in them, each for 5-6 people per tent. I was expecting so much less so I was pretty pleased. We got dinner which was soup, tangien, and melon. (PS- at this point I was pretttttty sick of tangien) After dinner, I decided to lay out under the stars for a bit, which was absolutely amazing. There was zero light pollution which made it the most clear and beautiful night sky I have ever seen in my life. After about 10 minutes, I decided to join the drumming and dancing circle that was going on around the fire pit with Ali and Kevin. It was absolutely incredible. There was this great community-type vibe which was amazing to be apart of. Ali and I danced around the fire, which then lead to us being offered the drums to play along. We played for about 10 minutes, then we walked up this massive sand dune/mountain where everyone was hanging out. We talked to Will for a while about stars, life, and other such things. It was amazing because I don’t see or talk to Will very often, so it was amazing to see just how close this trip can bring people. Will and Ali left, and I went to find more people. I ran into Skyler, Robin, and Bryan. We talked for a bit, but to my left I noticed a group of people sitting in a circle with several of the local Berber men, and I decided to go over to them. Kevin was there, so I sat with him and he told me much they had taught each other. There was so much singing and dancing, in both Arabic and English. They loved the song “OMG” by Usher, which was very funny. However, instead of singing “oh my god” they said “oh my gosh” which I found interesting. We also sang/danced to “Waka Waka” which seemed fitting, considering we are, in fact, in Africa. Then Hassin and I poured sand on each others arms, which is called a desert massage. He also buried Kevin and my feet in the sand, which was very warm under the surface. Kevin and I decided to head to bed, so we laid out a sheet behind our tents and slept under the stars, which was amazing and very cold. I had this moment right before I fell asleep where I just felt so inspired. I felt like I was in this beautiful place filled with friends I haven’t met, friends I barely know, and people I can already tell are going to be life-long friends.

Day 3

Woke up about an hour after I had fallen asleep because I was just that cold. I watched the sunrise over the mountain and noticed that I had fallen asleep about 100 feet away from all of the camels. We took a lot of pictures and got ready to head back out. I ate some bread with cheese for breakfast and packed up my belongings. This time around, my camel group decided we were going to be a band called “The Talibans”, so my camels name was T-Pain. He was kind of wild, so I was feeling pretty sore by the time we got to our van to head back. I slept a good majority of the ride back, waking up randomly. For lunch I had a kafta sandwich, which is like a meatball and it was amazing, possibly only because it wasn’t tangien. We arrived in Marrakech around 6 PM, and our bus to Casablanca was meant to leave at 7:30 PM. We walked incredibly quickly into the market to make some last second purchases. I got gifts for my mom and sister, as well as some more orange juice (because how could I not?).

At 7:15 we got back to our bus arrival place, and there was a bit of a language barrier to figure out which buses were for us, because one of the drivers only spoke french and arabic and the other spoke french, arabic, and spanish. Sam knows a small bit of Spanish so we were at least able to figure out that they were the right people. We loaded up two vans and made the three hour voyage to Casablanca. This also consisted of a lot of napping. I also played a game with the girls I was sitting with where you pick a letter and have to name a bunch of animals who’s name starts with that letter.

We arrived in Casablanca around 11 PM, starving and gross. I ate cup a noodles, a twix bar, and cheetos in about 30 seconds because I was SO hungry. We all took showers, I showered in Joe’s room because his shower is twice the size of mine. I went and met up with Kevin and joe in Kevin’s room, and we talked until fairly late about a lot of things, which was super intense and awesome. They’re both really cool people. I went to bed around 2:30 AM.

Day 4

I woke up at 12:30 because we completely forgot to set an alarm. We got ready and grabbed lunch super fast because we wanted to explore Casablanca and still be back on the ship at 6 PM, which was call time. Farrah, Jimmy, Jessie, Joe, Kevin, and I walked to Rick’s cafe to have a drink, because it’s kind of one of those things you have to do while you’re in Casablanca. I tried some gin and tonic, which I very much did not like. I ordered myself a strawberry daiquiri and a shot of vodka, which were both super good. We left around 3 PM and headed to Old Medina, which was super cool. It was like a back alley filled with outside vendors. Farrah and I each got a really cool scarf, hers in black and mines in white. After that, Farrah, Jimmy, and Jessie headed to the boat but Kevin, Joe and I wanted to stay out for a bit longer. We took some random turns and wound up in an area that was clearly not often visited by tourist, which was really awesome. We had about 100 dirham to spend, so we went to a little corner store and got a thing of orange juice and ten candy bars, which was assumed would use up all the money. Turns out it only cost 22 dirhams. We then walked around some more and stopped at several other stores, buying a ridiculous amount of candy, jam, and tea to bring back on the ship. We headed back at 4:30 to get on the ship, and we stored all of our belongings in Kevin’s refrigerator. Once back on the ship, we all hung out with a bunch of people, swapping stories and enjoying dinner. The ship left at 8 PM, and it was so surreal watching Morocco disappear just as quickly as it had come. I had this “a ha!” moment where I came to the realization that this was my FIRST port. There’s 10 more ports, thirteen more destinations. I felt a significant difference in myself after four days. I experience that much of the world after one country. And this is only the beginning. I cannot wait to see what the next countries have in store for me.