Another two-parter, again to break up the onslaught of photos. Marrakech was a destination that I’d been anticipating with nervous excitement. Morocco (or “Maroc,” in local parlance; isn’t it great when your bad puns need a primer?) was to be my first time in any part of Africa, and my first time since childhood visiting a predominantly Muslim country, so I was braced for a pretty big cultural shift. Furthermore, my comprehension of Arabic, their primary language, is completely non-existent, and my comprehension of French, their secondary language, is only marginally better.

Making things more stressful, part of our reason for the trip was syncing everything up with our visa. In a nutshell, the consulate had issued us the wrong dates for our visas and set them to begin two months after our initial arrival; it seems like they must have homed in on the start date of our SECOND apartment’s lease date in March, rather than the January date for our first apartment like we’d requested on the forms. As our request to amend the visa dates was refused, our best course of action was to leave the Schengen area (which comprises most of the EU) at some point and return on the start date of our visa to get a passport stamp we’d need to verify the date of our entry into the Schengen area. Marrakech had been on our radar for a while anyway, so off we went.

We touched down in Marrakech late in the morning, and after clearing customs, met the driver from the Riad Karmela Princesse. Riads are large, private residences built around a central courtyard, many of which have been converted to accommodate tourists like a hotel. A good number of these riads are fantastically designed to the point where they become part of the draw, and ours was no exception. The place was absolutely stunning, and it was a treat to return to every time.

Our riad was deep inside the medina (the historic, walled town center), and near the souks, which are what you probably picture when you think of Marrakech: eager merchants hawking their wares, labyrinthine alleyways with beams of light filtering through smoke and dust, colorful displays of spices, lanterns, and ceramics around every corner.

Like anywhere, there were good and bad sides to Marrakech (at least the medina; we did not spend enough outside the medina to have a good sense of what the more modern part of the city had to offer). By and large, our experience was decisively positive, but there were some elements that were worth being prepared for when visiting.

First off, it is still a developing nation; as chic as it may look in the fancy Instagram posts of some absurd woman splayed out in a beautifully mosaicked (I can’t get over how weird that word looks) pool, most of the time you’re walking the streets, you’re treading on dirty roads, passing by 100 motorbikes and mangy cats eating some chicken heads a butcher tossed to them. If that sounds like too much to handle, Marrakech may not be for you (I’m looking at you, American family we met complaining that it wasn’t like Valencia, Spain, where they apparently wash the streets every night). If you embrace it for what it is though, it’s not a problem. 

The second thing you need to be braced for is the hustle. Haggling, for instance, is part and parcel of the shopping experience; it’s expected, and you’ll wind up overpaying starkly if you don’t have sense of what the general markup for things are. The haggling isn’t a negative if you know what to expect, and can be a fun part of the experience. 

Where the hustle becomes problematic is the scams. It’s hard to get far in the souks without a “friendly” stranger offering to help in some way. Sometimes it’s just kids looking to mess with an out-of-towner by proffering bogus directions or false information; for instance, a group of boys just around the corner from the Bahia Palace entrance tried to convince us that it was closed when it was not.

Other times, there’s a more dubious purpose to the misdirection. Another scam we encountered, on a couple occasions, was a random guy on the street telling us we absolutely mustn’t miss the “Berber Color Festival,” that it was only today, and right around the corner, so we should follow him. After pondering it a few moments, we decided it was raising too many red flags, and we politely bailed on them. Sure enough, a quick internet search later confirmed our suspicions that a visit to the “Berber Color Festival” was the Moroccan equivalent of a trip to Fyre Festival: a disappointing con job that will part you from your money. Apparently, it typically leads to a meandering journey through the souks until you get dumped off at the leather tannery (a tourist trap that apparently reeks of animal urine and rotting flesh), where you’ll be passed off onto a series of locals who’ll try to shake you down at the end of your “tour.”

Dealing with cabs was another facet of the hustle. Our riad host explained to us that if we’re going somewhere within the city, we should simply get in the cab, and upon arrival at our destination, quickly hand them 15 dirhams, and leave. He said they’ll insist you owe them more, that they’ll get angry at you and yell, but to stick to your guns and just walk away. It felt a bit weird; 15 Moroccan dirhams is about $1.50 USD, and well below what we’d pay for an equivalent ride in Europe or in America. We had to assume that our host would have no reason to recommend we screw over the locals cabbies though. Even so, before taking our first cab, we asked if 15 dirhams would be sufficient for our destination. He responded very agreeably, “15? Yes!” I even clarified, “One-Five?” to make sure there was no ambiguity, and he affirmed it. Sure enough, we got to our destination, I dropped 15 dirhams in his hand, and his brow furrowed as he insisted it wasn’t enough, and that we’d agreed upon “Fif-TY” dirhams. He angrily demanded we pay more as we walked away resolutely, but eventually just drove off in a huff. A similar situation happened on our return cab ride, but not only did this driver try to change the terms of payment at the end, first he tried to drop us off at the Saadian Tombs, 10 minutes from where we’d asked to be dropped off, and kept trying to convince us to go there. Not entirely sure what that was about, but it couldn’t have been good.

Now with that all said, I don’t regret our time in Marrakech for a second. It was an intense experience, but that’s precisely what we had planned for. One of the reasons the above section is unfortunate is that in our experience, many of the locals were genuinely hospitable and happy to talk with us. We had to approach each interaction through the lens of, “What does this person want from me?,” but really, the answer was often, “To just be friendly and chat.”

So I’ve kind of dumped on some aspects of our experience; what was it that I liked about Marrakech? It is truly a sensory feast. The sights, the scents, the flavors, the sounds, the textures; everything gets activated. Furthermore, mixed into all that chaos is some truly stunning beauty, in some cases woven throughout the streets, and other times, isolated in little gems like the palaces, gardens, and riads that dot the medina. It’s so starkly different than America, and while there’s something to be said for visiting places that are right in your wheelhouse, sometimes you need something outside your comfort zone.

More on our time in Marrakech to come soon.