Home again, and with pictures.

Well, the trip Marrakech and various other places through Morocco has drawn to an end and I find myself once again with a cat in my lap in sunny Kentford. I managed to get a lot of writing done while I was there, which I will posting throughout the course of the week, and an astonishing amount of pictures – ranging in quality from good to ‘fecking-awesome’.

Doubtless I’ll mention it again as I type, but I just wanted to say that Riad Marrakech Rouge is possibly the best hostel I have ever been to.  If you like the pictures below and fancy visiting Morocco then get in touch with these guys – I promise you won’t regret it.

Right… on with the barrage of pictures!

Mint tea at the hostel

Start with the important things – tea! The tea in Morocco is of the mint variety and whilst I am assured it’s incredible, I can’t say I share the enthusiasm, being a long time hater of mentha requienii. Don’t get me wrong, I could drink it when it was served without sugar – high praise indeed – however I much preferred the spicy coffee, something I normally detest.

Dad's sunglasses from 1989

In 2007 I drove up to Scotland, lost my sunglasses and grabbed Dad’s old ones off the kitchen table. They had been there for a good long while – after purchasing them in 1989, they were finally retired from his service in around 2001. They have been with me ever since, despite the fact S- believes them to be the most hideous things ever created by human hands. I love them. Here the are on a table in Place D’Jeema El Fna.

Speaking of which… here are some photos from Marrakech’s main market place.

Orange Juice Stand

The Place D’Jeema El Fna was filled with juice stands like this one – they don’t look all that impressive during the day, but at night….

Place D'Jeema El Fna after dark

Motorbike at Place D'Jeema El Fna

Place D'Jeema El Fna from a cafe terrace

More of the orange stalls

Food stalls

Food stalls close up

Situated off this incredible hive of activity – fortune tellers, henna artists, men with monkeys and snake charmers – you will find the souks. These are even more insane than Place D’Jeema El Fna. I have never, in my life, been anywhere louder.

The shopkeepers sales tactics are wonderfully simplistic – yell cultural references/insults as loudly as you can, then ask way over the odds for your goods. It is up to the tourists to haggle their way to a decent price, usually only a third of what they initially ask for.

TOP FIVE SALES TACTICS

1. “Gavin and Stacey, what is occurring?” How this man could possibly have known about Gavin and Stacey is beyond me. It’s such a peculiarly English cultural nod.
2. “Take care of your child, Mister. You get good baby.” Needless to say that after this particular heckle, S- stopped walking around with an arm protectively around my waist.
3. “You are starving.” This is a common call from outside the food stalls and there are numerous variations – usually directed at men, informing them they look scrawny.
4. “Thinner than Starvin’ Marvin.” Similar to above, but as the Southpark reference took my back to my youth, this appears to have made the list.
5. “You play games like the Jew.” This comment was spat at us by a man trying to sell carpets. The more times S- said no, the more violent the insults became until this little gem was hurled in our direction. Tom Lehrer’s National Brotherhood Week* song is indeed correct – apparently everyone does hate the Jews.

A wall of old cameras in one of the Souks

A real Aladdin's cave of things

Herbalist and natural remedy doctor

Still at the herbalists

Examples of wool in the souks

Some of the leather shoes on offer

I’ll be posting more pictures over the next few days, as well as a few things I wrote whilst I was there – stay tuned!

*If you don’t know this song, shame on you. I demand you go to youtube right now and search for it.

Remember, Remember….

… when boiling sugar always to keep an eye on it. Turning away for two seconds is long enough to set the hob alight.

In my effort to decrease my Christmas consumerism, I’ve been making marmalades (as I may or may not have said in my last post). Today I decided to try and combine said preserve with my favourite substance ever – tea.

To get a festive sort of flavour, I opted to use chai tea – a spicy, Indian variety that in recent years has come to be very popular in latte form. Basically, I just brewed a giant cup full, using a saucepan and sieve instead of teapot and strainer. I added some citrus juice to freshen it up a bit, and hopefully add a little pectin to help the jam set, and then poured in my preserving sugar.

There I was, diligently stirring away, when the phone rang. I gave my pot one last stir, noted the whole sugar granules, grabbed the phone and then turned round to-

- just in time to see a huge plume of smoke, towering out of my pan. In the few seconds it had taken me to turn round, the jam had not only started boiling, but had boiled over onto the red-hot hob. I had no idea what to do. I couldn’t remember if sugar fires are one of the ones that you can’t put out with water so in desparation, I prodded the saucepan out of the way and tossed a dampened cloth over what looked like a sticky, black honeycomb of smouldering sugar.

The jam, I am pleased to say, is fine*. As is the vast majority of my kitchen. The only real casualties of the incident were the hob – which now has a lovely matt finish – and my fingers. A small price to pay, I feel, for combining two of the more incredible substances in the world.

Another successful day of self-employment, though I’m not sure how much longer this will last in its current form.  I want to continue working as a freelancer, but perhaps not exclusively. I went to a job interview yesterday in a bid to earn enough money to justify having the ding removed from Charlie Micra’s bumper. I’ll find out on monday if I have it or not, but I’m crossing fingers.  I wouldn’t mind the little imperfection on by gorgeous car had it been central, or on the opposite side to the exhaust, but as it’s on the same side, the back-end looks a little off-balance and it’s bugging the hell out of me.

Anyways, I’m off to make stovies. For those of you who don’t know what that is, look it up and try it.  Just bear in mind that you should leave it cooking until the tatties disintegrate and form a grey sort of soupie stock. That’s how you know it’s done.

 

*The jam is something of a masterpiece, actually. It tastes like really sweet tea, and has the consistency of honey rather than conventional jam. I daresay a spoonful dissolved in hot water with a slice of lemon would do someone with a sore throat the world of good.