Morocco- Tanger and Fez

I must say that we left Sevilla reluctantly. It was such a beautiful city with friendly people, and overall the lack of planning from Capree and I was not much of a factor in us enjoying ourselves. We took the three hour bus ride to Tarifa and boarded the ferry for a 35 minute ride to Tanger, Morocco. Our trip there got off on the wrong foot from the start. We failed to have our passport stamped by the police officer who was on board the ship, which we only realized after getting to customs in Tanger. We had to re-board the ship, and after seeing that the officer was on break, we waited another 15 minutes for his return. Immediately after we left the boat we were approached by someone from customs, who directed us where to go for security. Not knowing the language there, French and Arabic, it was a relief to hear someone speaking in English. This man did come off as a bit strange as he escorted Capree and me through “security,” which meant walking by the customs officers, x-ray machines, and metal detectors. He assured us that they could see we were not terrorists, and safety was a priority in Morocco. This couldn’t have been farther from the UK, Spain, and U.S., where at least 30 mins were spent waiting to go through customs. The man claimed to know where our hostel was, which turned out to be on the edge of town, and he even offered to drive us there. Eventually he started talking about charging us 50 dirham, to which Capree and I agreed to lose this guy ASAP and figure out what we were thinking coming to a developing country without any foreknowledge or preparation. When the man began to pick up on our skepticism, he seemed offended that we did not trust him, and eventually we left him cursing us out in the city center, where we booked a cheap hotel. We did learn from the “customs official” that it was the month of Ramadan, the holiest of Muslim months. People do not eat during the daytime, businesses are generally closed until nighttime, and as we had arrived around 6pm it was actually time for peoples’ first meal of the day.
While Capree and I looked Moroccan in appearance, we were easy prey for locals trying to take advantage of tourists. There were moments where we felt our safety was threatened, but fortunately we arrived back at London with everything we had packed in our bags, including our passports, credit cards, and ID. It was interesting, though, to see remnants of the Islamic empire that preceded the Spanish in Nothern Africa and southern Spain during the 13th century. In Fez, a 6 hr bus ride from Tanger, the Medina was still contained in the same walls originally laid there in the 9th century. We could see the Muslim influence of mosaics and architecture, which were similar to structures we had seen in Spain just days before. On the other hand, we also experienced Moroccan hip-hop, which was showcased at the park in Fez during a music festival. We toured a tannery, a textile shop, a herbologist store, and a pottery commune where they made mosaics. It was refreshing to be in a country 90% Muslim, where architecture, food, weather, and culture were entirely different from the English culture I’d been learning about for the last month. If I could do anything different I would have done more research beforehand to understand the culture, the significance of Ramadan, and been better prepared as a tourist with maps and travel guides: even the tourism information centers close during Ramadan.