We’ve been in Marrakech, Morocco for a couple of months, enjoying the weather and (of course) the food. It turns out we like it here too, a lot! So we thought we’d post a few of our impressions. (Laurel had been here once, many years ago, John never.)
We Live Here Now: Marrakech, Morocco!
The flat is in Guéliz, the French part of town (i.e., it’s not in the old Medina). It’s much less crowded here, and easier to get around. So we are not living in one of those beautiful old restored riadhs. BUT: we are living in a gorgeous space, maybe the best one yet, with a Moroccan-style courtyard in the middle, two floors, and three bathrooms. The kitchen has great light, and we’ve been cooking up a storm.
What We’ve Been Up To
The flat, in fact, is so nice that it’s been hard to leave home. We had grand plans of seeing a bit more of the country, but why would you do that when you can have tea in your courtyard? We have done some sightseeing, as you will see from the photos, and have found those beautiful tiles we like so much here as well. This lot are more like those in Andalusia and less like those in Istanbul. But still awfully, awfully pretty, prompting covetous thoughts every time.
Another person who really dug Marrakech was the great French designer, Yves St Laurent; we’ve spent quality time at the Jardin Majorelle, the garden created by Jacques Majorelle and restored by St Laurent and Pierre Bergé (see featured image).
And we’ve spent a lot of time wandering around in the medina, making friends with shop owners and cats. Lots and lots of cats.
Things That Surprised Us
We think of this bit of the world as Arabic- and French-speaking. And it is, but not nearly as much as it used to be. On the one hand, there’s been a cultural renaissance by and of the Amazigh people (perhaps known to you as Berber), and official signs are now also in that language. On the other hand – and for some of the same reasons – French has been de-emphasised, and English wholeheartedly embraced. Nearly everybody we’ve run into speaks French, but they also speak English now as well, which was not true twenty years ago.
Morocco, and the Arab world as a whole, are known for their hospitality and friendliness. We knew that. But we did not expect the nurse who took Laurel to have an x-ray of her finger (not broken! just a clumsy dropping of weights at the gym) to hold her [other] hand the whole time, or to assure us that people had been so kind to us here because we are ‘good, very good people; I know it’. [I mean, we are, but …] We also did not expect that the single time we rode in a taxi, the driver would charge us ‘whatever you like’. Which was also the price of a shoeshine. Probably we overpaid both times, by a lot. But it was worth it!
We Eat Here Now Too!
It wouldn’t be us if we didn’t devote at least 30% of our attention and content to the food of Morocco. So, yes: we have been eating like kings here (sheikhs?). The local Carrefour is fantastic, chock-full of good stuff, including oysters, a wine cave, a cheese counter, an organic section, great veggies, and – best of all – a section right up front that mimics spice shops in the medina. We stocked up on preserved lemons, harisa, ras-el-hanout, and the like.
We were disappointed to find that the kitchen in our apartment didn’t have a tagine, but – nothing daunted – we have been making all kinds of stews: beef with prunes, chicken with preserved lemons. And, frankly, even first-day minestrone has become super-fancy. The kitchen, however, does have one of those battered old silver teapots, perfect for cup after cup of mint tea. They have this way of pouring tea here in which you raise the teapot sky-high and make a long stream of tea pour out into the glass – so we’ve been pouring our tea that way too!
John has been especially delighted because the Moroccans (unlike the Italians, whom he otherwise loves) are a breakfast-eating people. Nearly every restaurant in town serves breakfast, and although it can be just a coffee or tea and eggs, there is also the possibility of getting a much fancier feast, with jolly names like the Parisian, the Mediterranean, or even the British! The food is plentiful, and if it’s not quite up to the brilliance of Arya, it is nonetheless superb.
Our very favourite Moroccan dish deserves its own paragraph. Pastilla is a savoury pie with sweet elements ( think cinnamon, raisins, almonds), wrapped in a phyllo-like dough. And it is AMAZING! Pigeon is the traditional filling, but it also comes in a chicken variety. And – if you can’t stand sweet in your savoury – there’s a seafood version, with vermicelli, that is spicy instead of sweet.
So as you can see, Morocco has been very agreeable to us. Marrakech was not originally on our list of places we thought we’d be returning to, but it’s clear that we’ll have to revise our judgement about that. We’re leaving fairly soon, but it’s a good bet that we’ll be back – sooner rather than later!
