Agadir

The trip to get to Agadir from Rabat on Wednesday was very, very long. We knew it would take all day to get there and back, but we had 5 days off so that’s why we chose this break to go all the way down there. The train from Rabat to Marrakesh was 4 ½ hours then we had to get onto a bus for another 4 hours to finally get to Agadir. We left Rabat at 7:45 but didn’t actually get to Agadir until like 7 pm because the bus was an hour and half late and then it broke down in the middle of nowhere and another bus had to come pick us up. Hahaha it was crazy, but that break down issue really didn’t end up being too time consuming. It definitely could have been worse. We also made a friend out of that epic bus trip. A man in his mid thirties was waiting with us for the bus and we began chatting with him. His English was great and we were talking about the US economy and the election and Morocco and, ya know, everything. He went to school in Geneva and now lives part time in Switzerland and part time in Morocco—in Agadir—running his own business. He helped us find a taxi and get to our hotel. We also got his digits and met up with him for a drink on Thursday night.
On Thursday we stayed in Agadir and just wondered and relaxed along the beach front. We talked and walked and saw a lot of Europeans in speedos. In many ways, it was the total reverse of what we had assumed to be Moroccan culture. The idea of us wearing a BIKINI in Morocco seemed absurd! But I was walking on the beach alone for a bit because the others had to go back to the hotel to get a few things and I didn’t get chattered at almost at all! It was kind of amazing. I’m very used to innocent, but nonetheless annoying “cat calls” because that’s just how it works here—and especially because we’re western, the girls in our program get a lot of unwanted attention. BUT the point being, in Agadir it was very different and kind of nice! So like I said, Thursday night after we ate dinner we met up with our new friend Saad and his other new friend, Ned. Ned was an English man who sails boats for a living. Currently he’s in a very long, worldwide race and he’s just stationed in Agadir for a few months before his crew then sets out for the Caribbean after hurricane season. He’s by himself right now living on the boat at the port. A true nomad AND he doesn’t like soccer or living in England! Hahaha anyway, I think it was nice for him to hang out with us and get to speak English and have some company. It was also nice for us to meet new people.
On Friday, our plan was to go to either the nearby national park or waterfalls but apparently neither one is easy to get to and because we didn’t have a car and didn’t want to pay a million dollars for a taxi, we ended up staying in Agadir and seeing the sights there. There were a few museums that were nice and we also wondered down the very southern part of the beach and saw all the huge hotels. The beaches were truly very beautiful and I can understand why it’s a hot spot for European tourists. It was very sunny and warm but nice and breezy so it ended up being a perfect temperature. We walked along the coast all afternoon and ended back up at the top. The water was nice and warm and with a beautiful view, Agadir ended up being a perfect place for us to have a relaxing weekend. Even after paying for the hotel, transportation there and back for the 9 hour, cross country trip and every meal, we only spent about 200 dollars in four days. No wonder Europeans come to Morocco for vacation…
Overall, the trip to Agadir was nice and relaxing and I got to see a part of Morocco I wouldn’t have otherwise been able to see. Like I said before, Agadir is the beach resort of the country and, especially during summer, it sees a host of tourists come through. There were sooo many hotels and restaurants. Along the boardwalk, there were truly at least 100 places to eat. Café after café just right next to each other. It was crazy. There were also lots of nicer, classier restaurants that you wouldn’t see anywhere else. Most people here spoke English which was refreshing. But still, although it was nice to be in a restaurant and in an area with menus and some type of organization to its chaos, I was glad to come back to “real Morocco.” Honestly, the fact that I could walk by myself down the street and hardly be whispered at was not the Morocco I’m used to, and honestly Agadir reminded me, in a sad kind of way, more of what it’s like at home—yet it wasn’t home, I was still in Morocco, and those are kind of conflicting feelings.
The hotel was very nice and ended up being a very good find. We had satellite TV (which consisted of only BBC and one movie channel in English) but I got to catch up on some news, for once, and got to lay down and watch a movie—a pastime I’ve come to dreadfully miss. But the one large lesson I learned on this trip was to be more and more careful and cautious about people ripping me off!!! It’s so hard because there are some very genuinely nice and good-intentioned Moroccans—like Saad or this other man who sat with us on the train ride back—who are very friendly and want to be of help to us and WANT us to enjoy our experiences in Morocco. BUT there are also those who want to blatantly rip us off or trick us into buying something we don’t want. This trip really highlighted the fact that both types of Moroccans exist and both are prevalent anywhere we go. First example came from taxi drivers. We took lots of taxis to and from our hotel over the trip and all the taxis had meters so we knew exactly how much to pay. And, because there were four of us, we always had to take two taxis because one taxi could only take three at a time. So on Thursday night, on our ride back to our hotel from dinner, the taxi driver tried to charge me and Madeline 50 dirhams for the ride when we knew (from having taken the same trip 10 times already) that the trip should be at most 15 dirhams. So we of course through a fit and we said absolutely not here’s 15 (which was plenty generous) and started to get out, then he turned off the engine and got out, too. Then Pat and Leah’s taxi pulled up behind us and we asked them how much they paid, and they paid 10! Then their taxi driver got out, too and we pretty much started a taxi driver brawl in the middle of the street. Kidding… there was no fighting of course, just a lot of yelling and us being very very upset. In the end, some other people joined the drama in the street and we ended up paying 30. They kept saying you’re American you’re American you can afford it. THAT’S NOT THE POINT! But also, our taxi driver was sooo upset, like on the verge of tears upset, like we were stealing from him or something!! I couldn’t believe it. But all we learned form this was to be untrusting of everyone which is also unfair because not all taxi drivers are jerks like that. (The next day Leah and I took the same route in a taxi and he charged us 8—we gave him 12 just because we were so happy he was so nice. As a rule, tipping generally doesn’t happen either so that was extra nice of us) So then the next day we were so scarred and untrusting we automatically replied NO anytime someone wanted to try to help us because we assumed they were trying to sell us something! And most of the time they were just trying to be friendly and helpful. So when we were walking on the beach on Friday, that’s when we ran into the doughnut man. Ugh… the doughnut man. So yes, there was a man with a tray of doughnuts walking along the beach by all the nice expensive hotels. We walked past him and he said hello then started speaking English, and I’m not really sure what happened but I turned around he had given Leah a doughnut she said oh no no and he said oh no problem for my English friends! Then he insisted we all take a doughnut even though we all really didn’t want one and had just eaten. But he pretty much physically forced them into our hands and we thought we were being polite. THEN he asked, they are good, no? insisting we take a bite. Hahaha I’m sure you all can guess where this was going but we were apparently oblivious. He then said ok 100 dirhams. ONE HUNDRED DIRHAMS?!?! That’s soooo much more then you would even pay in the states for some crappy deep fried bread with a little sugar sprinkled on top. But we had all taken a bite and we so overwhelmed and taken aback, I’m not even sure what happened but I think Madeline just gave in and gave him the money and we walked away. The doughnut was totally gross too…
But of course we got over those instances, as they weren’t life ending or really a detriment to the overall trip, just annoying! So we came back on Saturday and it again took all day to get back. The bus did not break down BUT it was still memorable. So we have been told, as a rule of thumb, not to sit in the back of buses if it can be helped just because it’s hotter and people tend to vomit (all types of driving, whether it be a little car or a huge bus is absolutely INSANE here and I’m not sure why people don’t die more often…its scary!). But of course the only opens seats on this bus were in the very very back where, believe it or not, there was already nice stench of old vomit waiting for us. I wanted to cry or vomit myself, but I knew that wouldn’t help so we wrapped scarves around our faces (which in Morocco turns heads less than not having a scarf around your head anyway) and just laughed and laughed. The whole situation was just so absurd and once we got going the breeze came through and the smell disappeared—thank god! I would not have survived 4 hours of that otherwise.
So the moral of this story is that I survived another week in Morocco… I think that’s 5 weeks down and 10 to go. October will go by very quickly though and it should be a very exciting month. We have one week of class, then a week long excursion in the south—where we will, at one point, be riding camels through the desert, get excited for those upcoming photos—then one more week of class followed by a weeklong village stay where we live with families in a rural village in the middle of the mountains. By that time it’s less than one month until the Individual Study part of the program where I’ll be moving away from Rabat to do by own research project for a few weeks. After that, I’m done! I can’t believe it really!
PEACELOVE