Eid Mbarak!

It;s eid al-adha and the party is on! It;s been a nonstop 6 days in morocco. the holiday has had a wonderfully calming effect onessaouira, the hissing and hassling transforms overnight into genuine greetings and invitations to homes. The blkood in the streets and matted hairballs of singed sheep hair are testaments to the celebrations of the morning. when not under this eerie spell of eid; the busy port city Essaouira is alive with energy; fishing boats putting out their nets; locals overly insistent on §helping you find a hotel§ (for which they usually receive a commission) and the ever-present shopkeepers displaying their crafts. like in all the souqs of the cities here; there are a hundred hidden alleyways with small cave-siwed shops squatting in the medina walls; narroa restaurants with ainding candlelit stairways and stone-arch entrances. some of it is obvious artsy tourist draw; but some also has a very real §Old World§ feeling. Essaouira itself has a really interesting history; having been switched around under the control of Phoenicians; Portuguese and many others; and was originally the main trading center for access to timbuktu! cool, huh§ Attached pics fromù essa include my first taste of snail soup and scenes of eid.

the first 3 days in marrakech were busy, but tiring. it;s a fatiguing place to be--constant sensory stimulation and attention--usually good-natured b ut often attached to a sale. I;ve come to terms with one thing very quickly: iu am a bad bargainer. i;ll admit it. im not terrible, but no amount of bargainig in any previous trip has prepared me for the intensity of price haggling here. its difficult to know what is sociually acceptable behavior; never mind knowing what is a socially acceptable price. but thats just it, isnt it. there is no such thing as a §socially acceptable price§...which brings me to this whole concept of fixed vs. flexible prices. the price of any given item here (as in many informal markets) can literally range from 10 to 200 dirham. Frankly it;s difficult to bargain when I;ve come from a culmture of fixed prices in which haggling is not only unecessary but looked down upon. in fact, having fixed prices is practically seen as a moral value. consider the strore owner or storefront person in the US who erratically changes his/her prices by the appearances, familiarity, language capabiulities of the customer. doesnt american culture portray this as being unethical, slimy, morally corrupt, etc.? thats not to say it doesnt happen. because it does (in particular; i;m recalling a news special i saw once that pointed out discrepancies in car price quoted by car salespeople to m en and woman--woman getting told and paying higher price s than men for the same exact car). as much as i know thaty this way of looking at price is not "true" b ut rather culturally taught; its;s still difficult to shake off the instinctual reaction of irritation when i know i am paying 5 times more what another person is.

it;s all about EQUITY, right? from one perspective, equity is having the same price for every single person, disregaring what their wealth or social class allows them. from the other perspec tive, equity is about appropriate relative value--the customer for whom the product is worth more (say, a tourist who thinks moroccan kaftans are really n ovel), pays more. If I am willing to pay 200 Dh while another would only pay 20; it;s right that the final price reflect the difference in scale. after all, that final price is agreed upon by both parties, seller and buyer, at a point where b oth sides are happy--thats pretty just. I guess you could say there are problems with both perspectives. But lets get back to m orocco.

as always, it;s hard to distinguish between the extremely open fr iendliness and the undwanted female attention--the one thing that makes this discerning process so much less stressful than usual is the fact that with the unwanted attention, it;s almost never dangerous. when the only thin g at stake is a little dignity rather than both dignity and physical safety, I can breathe much easier and i;m much much more likely to engage, which isn;t always the case when traveling. of course; whe im calling 'dignity' is defined b y different parameters everywhere and i cant claim a right to m uch of anything(minus things like the right to be free of bodily harm), as this is not my country and i am an intruding visitor. again i digress.

Food here is incredible, as anyone who ever passes through morocco says. meat is always tender, vegetables never bland, couscous is fluffy, tajines simmering...mmmm...i havent been dining in the best of the best, but so far, everything has been srumdiddlyumptious. i met a german woman a fezw days ago, Barbara, who teaches at a uni in portland, and we've 'invaded' the male-dominated cafes for moroccan mint tea a few times. it's veryt sweet, but pleasant. We're going to a hammam (public bathhouse) tonight!!

excuse typos, different keyboards here...

Beginnings

Welcome to Maria's Blog! This blog is exclusively for my postings regarding travel, although no doubt I will diverge from that at times. A proper homepage with other Maria-related things is forthcoming...

But first, a word from my sponsor...oh wait, I don't have one. So I guess just a word from the author of this blog, yours truly. I've decided that rather than depending on paper (or less reliable yet, my brain) to document my travels and my thoughts while traveling, I'd join the ranks of Interweb enthusiasts and start one of these things. Mostly it's a matter of convenience, because posting reflections on here is much easier than recounting the same stories in several e-mails to several people. But also, let's face it, having a blog is the hip thing to do. If you know ANYTHING about me, it's that I'm hip. I am. Really. I swear. Please post all manner of stupid comments, legitimate observations, challenging questions, snide remarks, enlightening critique, personal anecdotes, etc. Or just read until you're bored. Which is riiiight abooouuut....now.