Rachel Sarah Thurston portrait, events, travel and wedding photography and travel/lifestyle writing

Tales of Morocco II: Beware the Moroccan Mafia

Fez, Moroc
In a very cold cybercafe late at night
January something....15th?

And now for the past 24 hours....I'll try not to sugarcoat. Last night, after receiving some disturbing news, Mama Chihuahua and I comforted ourselves by stuffing ourselves with handfuls of dried cranberries, turkey jerky, chocolate, and boiled potatos before crawling under the covers of our beds beside a cheap space heater. Most buildings here don't have central heat unless you're at a fancy hotel so we raided the reception area at around 2 in the morning and MoM wrapped herself up in a sofa tapestry. As we shivered away in our twin beds I had a gruesome vision that we'd wake up in a ball of polyester flames beside the little space heater.

I'm not sure why we travel like this. Is it worth saving money to freeze our a***s off like this? Or is there just an undaunting stubborness that we cling to in proving to ourselves that we can tough it out? Not sure.

Onward.
Lesson #1:
All is not as it appears when traveling. Especially in Morocco.

We often befriend people on our travels and have long considered ourselves good judges of character both at home and on the road.

In Morocco we have encountered wonderfully helpful people who have given us directions, sold us oranges and nougats, and give us advice. On the train from Casablanca to Fez, we enountered a nice, mellow young guy from Fez who was in our same compartment. Serendipitously, Karem was on holiday from his work with the office of tourism in the city and invited us to stay near him in the medina (the old part of the city that dates back to the 14th century). After he took us to a beautiful little hotel away from the craziness of the tourist area, he invited us back to his home for tea.

Moroccans are known world-wide for their gracious hosting and Karem's family lived up to their national reputation. We sat on blue and silver embroidered pillows, sipping on hot mint tea, and munching on homemade fry bread seasoned with onions and spices while Karem's brother watched "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" with Arabic subtitles. Another surreal experience in the world of globalism. The light rain tapped away on the glass roof overhead and all felt good in the world. We were exactly where we needed to be in the world and grateful again for the serendipity that travel affords.

That evening he took us to an opulent restaurant and arranged for us to have dinner there at one fifth the price of the menu. Mom and I dined on dishes of spicy eggplant, carrots with mint, cubed potatoes, "pastilla"--deep fried pastries filled with rice and covered in confectioners sugar and cinnamon, moist coucous simmered with vegetables and beef, and a chicken tagine in a sauce of lemons, olives, and prunes. For dessert we drank more mint tea and ate slices of oranges and apples dusted in cinnamon.

Before going to bed, Karem also helped us buy a phone card to call a potential guide in the South and he helped me find an internet cafe to try calling my baby love on.
Around ten o'clock we parted ways with him. He was reluctant to leave us and warned that the medina could be dangerous to be lost in at night. We promised him we just wanted some fresh air
and would return to our hotel after a short walk.

We bid him goodbye and made agreed to meet him in the morning for a walk around town to see the tanneries, mosque, and to do some shopping for handicrafts.

On our way back to the hotel, we came upon a little cybercafe and decided to check our email.
Thirty minutes later an old man in an over-sized jellaba showed up in a chain-smoking whirlwind and offered us fresh fish...plopping it down by our keyboards and chatting along in rather good English. He is a Moroccan with dual American citizenship. He has been living in Chicago for many years selling handicrafts and trying to combat the American stereotype that all Arabs and Moroccans must be terrorists. He seemed a bit eccentric and quite friendly and I took most of what he said with a grain of salt. Whatever the case, this guy had seen some hard times and was happy to meet some friendly Americans and he wanted us to have a good impression of his country.

At some point, he asked us how we were enjoying Fez and we cheerfully explained that we had met a wonderful man from Fez on our train and that he had introduced us to his family, shown us around town, and was taking us around the medina the next day.

Mohammed shook his head cynically, took another puff of his cigarette, and said, "Look, you don't make friends at the train station. Not in Morocco."

Oh, but our friend was different. He was on the first class train, worked at the bureau of tourism,
had introduced us to his family, was on holiday for a few days, was mellow, gotten us several good deals for dinner, and hadn't tried to sell us anything.

Mohammed hooted at this. "Look, this guy's a hustler. This is what they do. They all say that they work at the Board of Tourism and they'll take you home to his family to encourage to trust. He got you all these deals today because he's just getting you ready to be fleeced tomorrow. The hotel he took you to, he got a commission. Tomorrow he'll show you some cultural sights and then start taking you into stores...he'll get you to buy rugs and textiles and he'll have an agreement with all of the shopkeepers-"

But what about the train? How was it that we met him on first class in our compartment?

"The hustlers ride back and forth on the train....he probably didn't have a ticket...they slip away and pay off the train attendants."

Mom and I didn't want to believe it. Not "our Karem" whose mother had the sweet face of an angel and who baked for us and served us pots of mint tea. But a few things began clicking for us....how he had mentioned carpets after dinner...how funny it was that we were in the same train compartment, and how he had slipped away a couple of times.....did he really ever have a ticket or was he paying off the train attendants who came around every few hours?

I began to feel nauseous and a bit flushed...a mixture of disenchantment, shock, and embarrassment that we were being duped. We're both savvy travelers and have come across dishonest people and had also managed to avoid aggressive touts, guides, and rude hotel owners (more an exception than a normalcy) but this guy was different. He was nice, not smarmy, trustworthy, helpful without seeming desperate, and overrall easy and comfortable to be around. If he was indeed a hustler, this guy was good. He had gotten us veritable deals all day and was truly taking his time to garner our trust. Mom had said to his mother several times what a good boy he is and she had beamed with the universal look of genuine maternal pride.

And then Mohammed said one thing that shifted our thinking for good.

"This 'friend' of yours....is he about your height with curly hair, a kind face, and good English?"

Yeah, but so are about a million other young guys around here."

Mohammed persisted....on a personal mission to prove to us that he wasn't just full of hashish and Moroccan lies. "His family lives around the corner near your hotel? He has two brothers and his family just recently bought their house?"

Shit.

"Ahh!" he said excitedly, as if winning a furious game of bingo, "It is Karem! His name is Karem. I know this boy!"

Shit. Shit. Shit.
Mom and I sunk back against the wall inside the internet cafe. Both of us shocked and embarrassed.

"Look," said Mohammed. "At least you know now."

He asked us not to tell Karem we had met him or else there would be bad blood for him and his family in the neighborhood. We went back to our room feeling disenchanted and a bit thrown...someone we had come to trust was using us. But most of all it shook the faith that I have in the people we meet and made me feel as if we're walking dollar signs at all times. And who can we trust?

We went to bed beneath our mountain of tapestries and blankets beside the cheap space heater hoping we wouldn't catch on fire in the middle of the night.

We slept until the early afternoon the next day. Mom left a note for Karem the next day letting him know that we wanted to sleep longer and that we would contact him if we needed anything.

When we appeared out on the street around 3 pm, Karem was waiting for us with a big warm smile. I was proud of Mama Chihuahua. She was restrained and gracious with Karem, thanking him for his help the previous day and letting him know that we would prefer to be alone today. He looked bummed but let us go asking where we were headed.

In the internet cafe, our friend Mohammed warned us that Karem had spoken with a few more guys and that they would be following us through the medina. He described exactly what one of them would look like.

Sure enough, a guy that met Mohammed's exact description began following us a bit further along one of the medina pathways. It seemed we would never be quite free of "the Moroccan Mafia" and Karem's little neighborhood...a neighborhood with eyes.

We made our way through the little streets with our new shadow detail....at first politely asking him to leave us alone.

Finally, as we sat eating a late lunch of aubergine and potato pancakes and he appeared again in front of us, Mama Chihuahua had had quite enough and gave him a few sharp words. Restrained but sharp.

We haven't seen him since.

After Mom had her sharp words with him and had returned to her soup, the souk stall owner grinned broadly and gave her a thumbs up. "Very good" he told us in Arabic. "Say 'no' to hustlers!"

And so we head back to our room tonight after a hustler-free day on our own and without getting lost.
In shallah!

Rachel and MC

*Just spoke to my baby (who's at an ecolodge in Costa Rica) and am elated! I think that, next to my water bottle, canon 20d, and bank card, that Skype is one of the best inventions of the 20th century!