Chefchowan may be the most unique place we’ve been so far. On the way to Tangier, we decided to stop through a small rural area for the day. Chefchowan is about 100 km outside of Tangier and is a mountain town in the middle of nowhere. Let’s face it though “the middle of nowhere” applies to almost every place in Morocco. When traveling around it is really mind-blowing to think of who discovered particular areas, and why on earth people wanted to settle there. Practically every place is so hot and so dry that you’re sticky in an instant after you step out of doors.
When we pulled around the mountain and got our first view of Chefchowan it was late afternoon and the sun was low in the sky. The medina is nestled up against a hill (like so many other Berber cities) and it glowed blue and white against the green and brown backdrop of the hills. Chefchowan is unique because it is characterized by its buildings which are all painted indigo on the bottom and white on top. Although we have asked the question several times, there is really no discourse that explains exactly why these colors are chosen and used in this particular way. It appears that blue and white are just common colors used in the Mediterranean and the blue and white could symbolize sea and sky, or many other possible explanations.
The medina was beautiful and, like so many other medinas, remarkably cool once you began to make your way through the streets, regardless of how hot it may be outside the medina. The Moroccan plaster architecture and the fact that the towns are built on inclines enable cool breezes to make their way down the medina’s narrow streets, which makes a difference in the temperature inside versus outside the medina. Being it was early evening, many people were out and about, children were playing in the streets, ladies sat in the doorways watching passers by, and men sat in the shops and gathered in cafés. Unlike other medinas, the ambience and attitude in Chefchowan was very relaxed and peaceful. You could feel it around you. People seemed very content and happy to be out and about socializing with one another.
We walked through the medina and a man invited us into his house to use the restroom (after several hours on the bus, a few of us girls were dying). Thankfully he had a western bathroom (there is about a 50/50 chance of having to use a squat toilet here, which is a lot like Cambodia, but I am feeling a lot less adventurous on this trip than I was then. I’m going to chalk it up to old age ;).
His home was beautiful, done in a traditional Moroccan style with the skylight in the middle that connects all floors. I joke that this architectural aspect serves as the Moroccan intercom. You can be on the top floor and very easily convey something to the people two floors down by simply speaking down the skylight to the lower floors. I can imagine that it would be very hard to sleep in these houses because of the fact that you can hear everything that everyone says or does, anywhere in the house.
We walked through a beautiful garden (there are many private, walled gardens here, just like there are in Europe). In the garden, there was a French family celebrating a wedding, and they were all dressed in formal Moroccan dress. It was really very strange to see Europeans dressed in Moroccan traditional clothing, but they seemed to be having a great time and not worrying about how silly they might look. As usual, we did some shopping, and for some reason the prices were so much lower here than they were in other medinas. For anyone planning a trip to Morocco, Chefchowan is definitely one of the major places you should do shopping. It was great. After it started to get dark, we proceeded on to our hotel. Now, if the town of Chefchowan was in the middle of nowhere, then there are no words to express how far away our hotel was from civilization.
About thirty minutes after leaving Chefchowan, we arrived at what looked like a little old ranch house in the middle of nowhere. I was so surprised that it was where we were staying because we have stayed in so many nice hotels that this one seemed to be a total anomaly. But, sure enough it was, and it was very cute. It was a little old ranch house that was converted to a bed and breakfast. When I got upstairs to my room I laughed out loud because it literally looked like Barbie had come and done the decorating. Everything… and I mean everything was bright pink. That is, except for the fluffy gold metallic rug. It was awesome!
We ate dinner on the terrace, which was very nice. Very bug infested, but very nice. As a matter of fact, there were several insect-related disturbances during that meal come to think of it. Bugs in hair, in water glasses, down shirts, it was mayhem. I of course saw the opportunity as a perfect time to play a couple practical jokes here and there and reveled in scaring people. Mind you, I am the worst at two things: lying and scaring people. Not tonight. The buggy environment worked in my favor and I got a few good jokes in. Of course, everyone else had the last laugh when someone tickled me with a piece of lavender on my neck and I totally jumped. Hahahaha….. But after the bug adventure at dinner, I headed off to Fulla’s Barbie Pink Getaway and went to sleep.
No comments:
Post a Comment