December 20, 2005

03:33:18 am Monday, December 19, 2005 - Marrakech and Casablanca, Morocco, Lisbon, Portugal - Overcast, mid 50s in Lisbon.  

Two flights, Marrakech - Casablanca, Casablanca - Lisbon, on Royal Air Maroc to get to Portugal, our final destination of the trip. Portugal is the 65th country we have set foot in this year. These are our 101st and 102nd flights of the year. Two more flights to go--Lisbon to London and London to Chicago in three days time.

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December 19, 2005

03:54:42 am Sunday, December 18, 2005 - Marrakech, Morocco - Sunny, mid 60s.  

We walked to the Museum of Marrakech, which had an exhibit of items hanging on the wall, pretending to be art. The building was nice, full of the standard Moroccan mosaic tile pattern in green, gold, blue, and black colors. Next door was the Ali ben Youssef Medersa, another remarkable building full of mosaic tiles. In the afternoon, Kamal, whose father owns the Riad Kniza, drove us around to see other sites such as Jardin Majorelle & the Museum of Islamic Art, Jardin Menara, and the Saadian Tombs. This may sound like a lot, but actually, we continue to be lethargic--sick with colds and low on energy and motivation at the end of a long trip. While Deanna has been sick many times throughout the trip, for me this is only the third time--I have had colds in Cusco, Peru; Tibet, China; and now the end of Egypt/and all of Morocco. Each time I have been sick, so has Deanna--I'm just generous that way. I've been lucky to never have food poisoning--Deanna had this once in Punte del Este, Uruguay--other than a number of funny tummy incidents not serious enough to note.

I have to amend my Casablanca observation--Moroccan vendors in Marrakech do in fact know how to chase you down in the street. Still, it is not as annoying as in Egypt. Taxi drivers in Morocco know well the art of ripping you off by either overcharging directly or agreeing one price and then asking a different price at the destination, pretending there was a misunderstanding. Islamic cultures are funny this way. You can walk in the streets at nights, with never a concern for your safety, but beware the person you deal with face-to-face--they will rip you off without any remorse. You can debate the merits of each culture--would you rather have to watch your back or would you rather not be able to trust anyone you deal with? Actually, the winner of this debate would be Japan, where you don't have to worry about either. For Westerners, though, the bazaar mentality of Islamic culture is disorienting--what you have to fear is the opposite of what you learned in your own land.

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December 18, 2005

04:48:38 am Saturday, December 17, 2005 - Marrakech, Morocco - Sunny, mid 60s.  

We toured the city with a guide the hotel provided as part of our room package. The design and decor of the buildings is extremely ornate, enough so even for me to notice! We both have colds, I'm on day six, and Deanna is on day two, so we aren't too lively right now. It's warm here in the afternoon, but cool at night--40s--and Moroccan homes and buildings tend to be open air and full of stone, making it hard for us to get comfortable. We've run the heat in our room full blast and had a space heater brought in. The thought of much colder weather in Chicago is not appealing right now. Still, we are very ready to be home, having been gone since January.

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04:46:52 am Friday, December 16, 2005 - Casablanca and Marrakech, Morocco - Sunny, low 60s.  

Casablanca is a large city with a famous name and nothing to see. So we did not stay. We flew on Royal Air Maroc to Marrakech, where we will stay three nights at Riad Kniza. Statistically, Egypt and Morocco have the same per capita GDP, between $1300 and $1400, but you would never guess this by what we have seen so far. Morocco seems well ahead of Egypt--more development, better roads, and less poverty. I walked around outside our hotel on the streets of Casablanca for 20 minutes and not once did anyone approach me to sell me something I did not want or to beg for money. No "Hello, sir" or "Bonjour Monsieur" here! This welcome silence would not have lasted 20 seconds in Cairo.

I read about the Riad Kniza in a travel magazine in the UK. A riad is a house with a courtyard, and the Riad Kniza is a seven-room hotel run by a family. Two years ago, they renovated an old riad, turning it into a fabulous boutique hotel, with intricate Moroccan decor and--importantly--wireless internet access for Deanna's last minute Christmas shopping needs.

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04:40:09 am Thursday, December 15, 2005 - Cairo, Egypt - Sunny, Mid 60s & Casablanca, Morocco.  

On our last day in Egypt, we toured sites in Cairo: mosques of Mohammed Ali (ruler of Egypt 1805-1848) and Sultan Hassan, Khalili Bazaar, and panorama of the 1973 war with Israel. The latter was not part of our standard Abercrombie itinerary but something we requested be added when we drove by it earlier in the week. It was a propaganda exhibit to extol the heroics of the Egyptian Army and the commander of the air force, Hosni Mubarak, now president. The panorama left out some key details, such Egypt losing the war! By linking the war to a later negotiation of a peace treaty between Israel and Egypt--where Israel relinquished control of the Sinai Peninsula in exchange for Egypt recognizing its right to exist--the panorama made it seem that Egypt's invasion of the Sinai in 1973 was successful. Never mind that the invasion was quickly repelled in a few weeks.

I read where the Egyptian government guarantees all college graduates a job upon graduation. The result is educated people employed in jobs they are overqualified for, with many times more people than needed assigned to certain roles. Overemployment like this pervades Egyptian society. Nevertheless, employees ignore certain basic tasks, such as keeping public facilities clean, preferring to sit around chatting, smoking, and drinking tea.

We flew Egypt Air on the 5 1/2 hour evening flight from Cairo to Casablanca. We stayed one night at the Le Royal Mansour Meridien in Casablanca because there was no late connecting flight to Marrakech, our ultimate destination.

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