Washington to Boston. Boston to Madrid. Madrid to Casablanca. Casablanca to Rabat. After way too many hours of travelling and sleeping in awkward, uncomfortable positions for 1 hour segments, I have finally made it to my new home. Given that I don’t speak any of the languages in Morocco (French, Arabic, Berber) I was a little worried about finding housing. I am a seasoned traveler and have lots of experience schlepping my bags in the extreme heat, wandering around without a map, battling cockroaches, taking showers out of a bucket, eating unidentifiable foods, opportune napping, haggling, and all the other skills one picks up along the road, but finding housing that is affordable and a good location is extremely difficult, even in DC.
My internship offered me no assistance in the housing department, so I said my prayers to Buddha, Allah, Jesus, and the like, and set off for the unknown- homeless with hope. I had sent out a bunch of emails to friends of friends of friends who were living in Rabat and asked if they knew of anything or if they could possibly help me out. On my layover to Boston, there was a glimmer of hope. I checked my email on my ipod only to find that I had inquired at the perfect time. An English teacher from NYC was looking for a roommate to share her place with or she was going to move out in two days. This glimmer of hope turned out to be apartment gold as not only was it in the neighborhood I was looking to live in, but it is a 2 minute walk from my office and has a giant terrace. Thank you travelling gods, you have saved me again.
After collecting my bags in Casablanca, I was whisked through security with a big smile and without hassles and jumped on a 1st class train to Rabat. I normally don’t splurge for 1st class, but I was exhausted and cranky and the prospect of air conditioning sounded good. As I lugged my overpacked bags (pack rat’s curse), a friendly gentleman with an American accent asked if I needed help lifting them up onto the overhead bins. I of course did and happily accepted. While they looked Moroccan, it turns out the friendly gentleman and his wife were from New York and had bought a house in Fes and were en route to go back home. We became instant friends and for the next hour chatted about all things Morocco and swapped traveler stories. As I departed the train, the couple offered to let me stay with them in their house in Fes while they were there for the next couple of weeks and urged that I come next weekend for the Sacred Music festival. The idea has intrigued me and I am seriously considering the idea for next weekend, why not? You never know where your next adventure will take you…
When I exited the train station I was counting on the apartment of which I had never seen and from a girl I had never met. She sounded nice over email so I located the nearest teleboutique to give her a ring. She was teaching a class and suggested I call back at 5.I didn’t want to shell out the money to stay in a hotel for a night as they were fairly expensive, so I decided to call the other numbers that I had. I only knew one person who lived in Rabat personally, Youness, and I had only met him two days before I departed DC. Youness’s family was throwing him a graduation party that day so I was on my own. I called another number, a guy who had done a short consulting contract at my new office, and he said he was eating couscous in the Medina and give him a call back in an hour. The phone was quickly eating up all of my change so I decided to hop in a taxi and drop by my office. I, nor the taxi driver, had any real idea where I was going, but I did my best with the three words in French I knew and the shabby directions I had received to find it. I asked for the two people I knew who worked there and both of them were out to lunch. So I sat down to wait. 20 minutes later I was informed that they would not be returning from lunch and that I should try back another day. I convinced them to let me leave my giant bags and wandered out into the city. After an hour I phoned Alex, who had been eating couscous and he agreed to meet me for coffee. For the next hour I drank delicious Moroccan mint tea and picked Alex’s brain on Rabat, key Arabic phrases, food, dress, beaches, mosques, culture and everything else I could think of. Alex was great and answered everything I wanted to know. He tried calling my new possible roommate for me several times but to no avail. I went back to Alex’s large airy apartment, which he shared with other friendly expats, and collapsed on his couch.
Stinky and dirty from days of travelling, I asked if I could hop in the bathroom, and preceded to take the world’s more glorious shower. As I was cleaning up, my new roommate Jen showed up, and together we went back to her place. Within 15 seconds I said I will take it! The apartment is located in a newer building in Agdal, with white walls and marble flooring inside. Jen’s old roommates owned almost all of the furniture (including the hot water heater) which they had taken with them, leaving the apartment almost bare, I didn’t care. There were two beds and an amazing terrace that stretched the length of the apartment, so I was happy.
Jen and I went and got food and then headed to the Sofitel gardens to see the Mawazine music festival. The king’s gift to the people of Morocco was a free, week-long music festival. That night was Santana, which we jammed out to until 1 in the morning. Not a bad way to start off my first night. That night I slept like a baby until noon and finally got some much needed sleep. I woke up sore and achy again, but ventured off into the city to wander around. I had no map so I didn’t really go anywhere that interesting, but got my bearings a bit and tried to learn some of the streets in my neighborhood. When Jen got home from work we went to Marjane, a giant French megastore, kinda like Moroccan Meijer, and picked up some essentials- cell phone, sheets, a hot plate, silverware , pots and pans; etc. Jen decided mid-way through our trip that she wanted to go visit her boyfriend in Marrakesh so we rushed through the line and zipped into a taxi and dropped her off at the train station one minute before her train was supposed to leave. Jen is awesome and has quite the adventurous spirit- I think we are going to get along quite well. I came home and unpacked all the bags, washed the new dishes and tried to organize the apartment a bit.
Later that night I met back up with Alex and his roommates and we went to go see Sting. Sting’s voice was amazing, and he looked damn good for his age, but the show was a bit boring. He played a lot of slow songs I had never heard and he screwed up Roxanne( come on- its Roxanne!!). I gave it about a 7, but hey I got more than I had paid for (which was nothing) so I can’t complain. After the concert people were heading out to go dancing, but I had a stomach ache and decided that sleep sounded like a much better idea.
I woke up this morning and attempted to scrub the terrace (I kept tracking in muddy footprints all over the marble floor) and organized my giant heap of clothes. Today the plan is to wander around a bit and then head down to the ocean at 3 for some surfing lessons. Life is good.
So far so good, now I only need to learn French and Arabic and then life will be easy breezy (and maybe a fridge and hot water, but hey lets not be greedy!)
2 comments:
Good luck Kelly!!
How long are you gonna stay there for? What is the internship going to be about?
"En route" not "in root." You MUST be tired ;)
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