Amadou and Miriam at the Fes Sacred Music Festival

Festival Venue: The Bab Makina (Door of the Machine)... Beautiful!

The tanneries in the old Medina of Fes (the hides are steeped in bird poop to make the leather more supple... it smells pretty bad)

View from the balcony of the Hotel of Bab Boujloud (we slept on the roof here)

Gardens in Fes

 

 What a city. Seriously. Fes is absolutely awesome, from it’s laid-back vibe to it’s unique beauty and ambiance. Walking around the old Medina (city), one finds themself in a true labyrinth… but happily so. My experience in Jerusalem had prepared me for a fascinating walled city, brimming with souqs, merchants, smells, food, animals, tourists, students, locals, cafes, hotels, donkey carts, and everything else one could imagine, but Fes surpassed my expectations by far.

Walking around, you pass a ruin of a kasbah, adjacent to an impeccably kept, white-washed riad, before rounding the corner (avoiding the herd of cats tangling up your feet, meww-ing for food) to face a beautiful tiled archway serving as the entrance to a medival religious institution. A stroll down-hill into the souqs becomes increasingly stimulating, as the streets narrow whilst simultaneously accruing more goods for sale, more people hawking them, and more potential customers. Walking straight through is not an option, as you dodge humans, cats, cobblestones gone askew, or donkey carts carrying anything from traditionally woven sheeps-wool rugs to large containers of Butane gas to boxes of onions. It could be described as a beautiful kerfuffle, and wandering your way to the tanneries (via a co-operative with a climbing staircase granting access to its rooftop terrace) allows a sweeping view of the entire, gorgeous mess from above (mint-sprig in hand to ward off the pungent scent of bird feces in which the  hides are steeped to make them more supple).

Definitely one of those travel experiences where something lives up to and exceeds your expectations in what could be a cliche way (in that Fes is everything I would have dreamed a Moroccan city would be like), but isn’t cliche at all. The old city is a diversely jumbled pile of new, old, well-kept, derelict, historical, re-furbished, rotting, forgotten, overly-photographed buildings…. and they are all topped with a satellite dish, as a finishing flourish.

We came to Fes for the weekend as there was the Fes Sacred Music Festival on, starting on Saturday, and we wanted the opportunity to experience the city during this cultural and musical event. And boy did we experience it. Serendipitously, we ended up with tickets to a concert on Saturday night held at the Bab Makina, headlined by a couple from Mali named Amadou and Miriam who play African music with incredibly fun dance beats. The show was fantastic, and the venue was beautiful. We also had time to wander the old city a fair bit, and lose ourselves in back alleyways and the small courtyards, brimming with the unlikely combination of palm trees, bougainvillea, olive trees and gorgeous stretches of green grass and tropical flowers (set to a backdrop of intricate “zleej”- tile work). Our work to integrate into Moroccan culture was apparent due to the excessive amount of time that we spent at Cafes, sipping coffee and various fresh juices, only leaving to be equally Moroccan in buying sandwiches bursting with vegetable and meat fillings from street vendors. Sandwiches usually the size of my face.

Speaking of sandwiches, we have cultivated a niche for ourselves in the 3-4am slot of Fes nightlife on what I like to call “sandwich street”. After dancing for hours on end, and en route back to our hotel, we collectively decided that sandwiches were a good idea (I may or may not have been the most adament supporter of this) and were taken to sandwich street by our taxi driver. Making my way to the closest possible sandwich stand, motivated by hunger and the promise of a face-sized vegetable, egg and hot-sauce snack, I proceeded to shoot the shit with the staff of the sandwich stand shop I selected, who were good sports about my sputtering Arabic. I’m not sure how this became our joke, but at some point they asked if I wanted hot sauce (soos har) and i responded “soos har BZAAAF!” (a LOT of hot sauce!), before being handed a sandwich practically dipped in the hottest hot sauce i’ve ever eaten. The rest of my evening was spent focusing intently on that sandwich.

So, why am I telling you this story about sandwiches? Well, the next night, when we inevitably made our way to sandwich street, around the same late time, and we decided to walk across the street to visit our friends from the night before, we were not only welcomed into their sandwich stand, but welcomed with WIDE OPEN arms while we were still approaching and about 50 meters away… My hot sauce friend from the night before shouting “KAWTAR! MARHABA!” (Caity! Welcome!), and we hung out with them for a little while, while I waited for my sandwich with “soos har l-wsd” (“a middle amount of hot sauce”…. my enthusiasm for the sauce from the night before might have been a little misguided, as I ended up crying it was so hot).

And so, sitting here back in my souq town in the internet cafe, reflecting on my weekend of “culture” in Fes, I am happy to have attended a cultural event and danced to some amazing African music, but also to have established myself on Sandwich street in Fes….  I think my Californian friends and family (at least those of you who love Mexian food) can see the greatness in all of this: hot sauce bringing people together, bridging cultural gaps, and facilitating familiarity with a strange city and it’s fabulous community of snack-food vendors!

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