Day 2

We made a commute from our hotel in Casablanca to Rabat to view the program center (where we would be taking our classes in mid-February), to access the bank, and to eat lunch. At the program center, we met two students that attended IES Rabat last semester and were coming back to complete a full year. The students were Toshi and Jake. Both were American and had spent the winter break in Morocco or traveling. Afterwards, we made our way to a house in Rabat and had a large lunch with a family. The food was excellent and was done, for the most part, by hand. Of course, when I say hand I mean the right hand. After all, the right hand is the clean hand. I shoved my fingers directly into the couscous and felt them burn. Woops! The food was delicious and quite messy, but I guess that is the way for eating in Morocco.

From there, we took a bus from Rabat to Fez. The 3-4 hour journey was not a bad ride. In Morocco, it is very difficult to own a car and be able to afford the gas to put into it for long journeys. Therefore, there were few cars on the road and little traffic. We saw the Moroccan countryside complete with donkeys, wanderers, and workers. Cindy, my chica from Mexico/Texas and I had some pretty intense conversations along the drive and I knew that the experience with different Americans would be very informative and outstanding.

In Fez, we were brought to the Grand Hotel for the night. There, I was given a room with Ali, a student from Dayton University in Ohio that would also be living with me in the home stay in Fez. We were instructed to come to dinner at 7 PM that night, and we went down to meet students to take a walk at 6:30. Apparently, we missed the train to walk around Fez before dinner and we went out together to walk the streets in search of our fellow students. As Ali and I walked down the street, a nice man came up to us…

Man: My friends, hello! Do you speak English?
I didn’t say anything.

Man: Parlez Vous francaise? Come on!!

Ali: Non merci

Man: Do you want some hash? I give you the good stuff!
Ali: No merci.

Man: How long are you here? Are you students?

Me: Just the night. No Thank you.

Man: Come to back alley and I will give you hash for free!

While I am always up to a new experience, I said La Shukran and he understood and left us alone. So, we met up with the IES students soon after. Apparently we walked the wrong direction, but our offer for hash was basically the big welcome I was expecting. In the USA we have people trying to sell fake watches and purses, in Fez, we have sketchy guys calling us their friend. Well, at least he was friendly!!

We had some food at the Hotel restaurant for dinner and then decided to make our way out to a Sheeshah Bar for a sort of evening desert. For those of you unaware of sheeshah (hookah), it is essentially tobacco smoked out of a large water pipe that is shared between friends. In this situation, roughly 12 of us went to the bar and shared 3 types of flavored tobacco. I am not one for smoking tobacco, but “When in Rome”. We sat around and smoked the sheeshah as someone might drink alcohol, coffee, or smoke tobacco at a bar/café.

That night I slept like a rock.