Double Barrel

So the main event this week has been a double barrel: arriving in Morocco and meeting Mum here. Needless to say that the compliment of each on the other has vastly improved both.

Welcome to Morocco

I arrived in Morocco to be met by Haddau and Mum and Dad.

As a side note, Haddau is pronounced “How-DO.”  Dad happily (although with a  sly simle) told me simply to think How do you do? And proceeded to spell out the importance of leaving off the “you do” at the end.

Hassan Tower 

One of the first things they told me was that Mum had bought a carpet. Which turned out to be a lie. She had actually bought six. Because we all know that one, two, three, four or five carpets are never enough. I have no idea what she plans on doing with six carpets. I highly doubt that she does either.

Carpets in Morocco

In addition to buying six carpets, she has also taken photos of me, declared the picture to be heinous before thinking it appropriate to send it to the entire family and informed me that I have no friends and that I am a terrible person. It is only day one.

A rather attractive building

Speaking of day one… We did rather a lot… So much that none of us can remember where we have been, what we have seen or what anything is called. It was a blur – an incredible blur – but a blur nonetheless.

Ancient Roman ruins

When we arrived at the hotel and were mulling over the events of the day one of our company (who shall remain nameless) stated that while the day had been incredible, there had a been a few too many mosques for this particular individual. How many mosques you ask? One. Just one. But that was one too many, according to this team member.

One too many mosques

You may ask why I put a rhetorical question in the above paragraph and again here? Well, I’ll tell you. This is a skill that our guides seem to have mastered. Asking partial rhetorical questions, looking around smugly at the dismayed and slightly awkward tourists (who have no idea about anything Moroccan), waiting longer than a comfortable amount of time, before proceeding to tell us the answer.

Having a nap by the road side

The answer, by the way, is never anything that we could possible guess, because usually it is Arabic. Or French. Or Berber. Or anything other than English. Which, personally, I’m not so good at guessing.

Islamic Arch

In order to avoid this as much as possible, I would wander off and take pictures of the creatures that call Morocco home (they don’t ask questions, or usually want money):

King Cat at the Mosque

Kitten asleep in a flower bed

Horse at the King's stables

A snake