Rocking the Kasbah...

...and we're back.  I spent yesterday morning at the Kasbah des Ouidaia (no clue how to pronounce that...), which was pretty cool.  Lot of blue-walled buildings, some great zellij walls (those tile mosaic things), and a nice view of the Atlantic.  It's funny because I've seen the Pacific and the Indian oceans so far on this trip, so I finally got that brief little taste of home when the frigid spray bounced off the rocks and into my face.

Spent the afternoon at the Chellah, which turned out to be some Roman and Muslim ruins.  Also a good time, though the weather was cold and this woman kept walking her fifty cats up and down the walkways.  She never asked for money or anything, she just sort of wanted to make sure I knew how many cats she had.  Mission accomplished, lady.

I was really starting to feel the isolation and the hardship of flying solo last night... I was cold in my run-down "hotel," had finished dinner/e-mail checking/time-killing cup of coffee by like 7:45, and I had nothing to do until I would let myself go to sleep.  There aren't really bars in Morocco because of the whole Islam thing, so I was resigned to my bed and my bidet (seriously... no toilet or shower in my room, but I had a bidet.  Go figure...) with nothing to do but sit around and think for awhile (on the bed, that is.  I left the bidet alone).  It really got me thinking about what I was doing here... I mean, I run around the world like a chicken with my head cut off, making friends and leaving them behind, resigning myself to a year of "Parlez vous Anglais?"s and "Do you know where the ... is?"s, a year of essential chastity, of loneliness, and of schlepping my own dirty clothes around on my back.  And for what?  So that no matter where anyone talks about for the rest of my life, I can say, "I've been there and it wasn't as cool as _____"?

But then I did what I always do when that feeling comes on: I walked down to the corner shop, bought a Snickers, and strolled around for awhile, thinking that practically nobody I know has ever been to Rabat, and they have certainly not done it alone.  Not every day of my Watson Fellowship is going to be the ass-kicking, life-affirming, drop-everything-and-come-see-this-place time of my life.  I had that blown-away feeling on the dunes in the Namib.  I had that at Franz Josef, and at the sunset in Denham.  I had that at the one-room schoolhouse in Venda, Nando's with good friends in Perth, and yes, at the Nomad's in Wellington.  If I've learned anything so far, it's to be skeptical of travel brochures showing people in exotic and wonderful places.  Don't forget: you also have to eat, sleep, and shit there too, and you have to drive there and back.  If 20% of your time abroad, you're blown away and loving your trip, then you're doing well.

I think it also helps to be busy.  Yesterday I was kind of idle, and it didn't help matters.  I spent most of today on the train to Fes, hanging out and chatting with some English kid I met along the way.  I was none too sorry to relieve myself of his company when we arrived, but at least it was Anglais for three hours.  Checked into the Hotel Royal around 3, and reaffirmed my notion that hotels in Morocco are more or less anything but what their name implies.  The Hotel Splendid was, shall we say, un-splendid, and I've got half a mind to ask the good people at the Hotel Royal exactly which criteria they were using to establish "royalty."  I've also learned that being condescending inside your own head can be a wonderful way to keep yourself amused.

So yeah, that's that.  Big day ahead tomorrow: full day medina tour (apparently you can't do it on your own or you'll get lost), get to see the famous tanneries of Fes and all that good stuff.  I've also managed to avoid the faux guides that Morocco is so famous for so far.  I've developed a system where I put on my worst broken English accent and ask them, "Govoritye po Russkie?"  I'm screwed once I find one that does, but I don't see that happening any time soon.

Das Vidanya.