The lights in the garden below my balcony were shrouded in thick mist and, yet, I could see a trillion stars as I gazed up into the indigo sky. The silence was broken by the muezzin of the nearby Koutoubia Mosque crying "Allah hu akbar", which was followed by the voices from a thousand other minarets scattered over Marrakech. The sacred cacophony had beaten my alarm, which merrily joined the off-key and yet strangely harmonious male choir greeting the dawn of a new day. I dressed as fast as I could as we had to be out in the plains in an hour for a ride in a hot air balloon; something I would not have missed for anything.
The travelling companion who had been operated in Ouarzazate the week before was convalescing satisfactorily, yet, still not in a position to gad about in hot air balloons 1,000 metres into the bracingly cold sky. She had crossed the perilously high hairpin bends of the Atlas Mountains only the evening before, strapped down in an ambulance. We were joined by a couple from Wales and a Japanese lady from Napa Valley and after hopping into this large straw basket we were up and away, trees looking like tufts of green cotton wool and flocks of sheep swirling in unison like a swarm of white ants.
Our navigator, a grizzly Frenchman, gave us a running commentary as we spied the salmon pink walls of Marrakech in the distance. He is married to a Moroccan and has an undoubtedly bipolar relationship with his country of adoption despite its dyed-in-the-wool Frenchness.
His annoyance with the wishy-washiness of the authorities was matched by his undoubtedly genuine love and respect for people like the poor woman who had many years before been abandoned by her husband and whom he had selected to give us tea and cakes for breakfast after the ride to gain some extra money.
I was gradually getting used to the Moroccan pace. After the trauma of having one of our number undergoing emergency surgery, the assurance that recovery was imminent was enough to restore our holiday spirits, especially after the Famous Five were reunited in this most beautiful and luxuriant riad, the Villa des Orangers, a Relais et Chateaux listed paradise a stone's throw away from the World Heritage site Jemaa el-Fna. Hidden behind bland and almost featureless pink walls, the Villa des Orangers is a haven of peace; a hidden place that one enters through a discreet arched door flanked by vulcanisers and mechanics off one of the busiest streets in Marrakech. Once down the long dark hall and in the reception, one can peep at the wonderful courtyard full of the orange trees that give the hotel its name.
In the five days we stayed there, our peregrinations out into the real world became fewer and more selective as we basked in the attention and enjoyed the type of pampering that we felt we richly deserved after the misadventures in the eco lodge. Jemaa el-Fna is a must. It is the living heart of Marrakech.
The souks that surround it are mere tributaries to its ever-changing and overpopulated lake of dazzling opulence coloured by water sellers in their odd Peruvian-looking hats, snake charmers who take liberties and dangle a brace of writhing snakes around your neck before you can actually say the word. Rows of shoe shiners try to persuade you that the lustre of your shoe has been hidden for too long under grime and dust.
Jemaa el-Fna is enormous. It sits in the centre of the city with rivers pouring out of it, fast flowing wide ones carrying heavy traffic and a maze of meandering narrow and slow ones clogged by the enormous souk with all those shops selling swathes of Berber rugs in geometrically placed lozenges, galaxies of star shaped lamps, hillocks of saffron, cumin and the fabulous Ras el-Hanout, cascades of multicoloured striped and shiny scarves woven from an extract of cactus fibre, plus, wherever you look, battalions of the brightest coloured slippers one can imagine, which cover every available space. Whether plain, hand embroidered or embossed or merely decorated with beading, these slippers epitomise Marrakech.
This is a man's world where the only women you will see, apart from those that are hidden under veils, are other tourists. You will never bargain with a woman. Whether you are buying argan oil, sandalwood, camel bone boxes or cotton jellabies it is with a man who, speaking volubly can sell the hind leg of a donkey, you will deal with.
He will tell you which colour suits you best and how much nigiri to place on your pastry, how to wear this or that particular scarf and where to apply the magical argan oil that has to be extracted once those famous tree climbing goats have defecated the kernel intact.
There are the annoying men who demand money for a mostly unwanted and trivial service like showing you how to get to the exquisite Mederssa Ben Youssef, which lies at the heart of a labyrinth within the Medina. These are the people who undermine Morocco's image. On the whole, the people one interacts with are utterly delightful, genial and secure under the guidance of their young and handsome king, Mohamed VI, who gazes down at you in different uniforms or in the country's various tribal dress whether you are in your Relais et Chateaux hotel or in a grimy smithy looking for iron corkscrews!
One can never get enough.
kzt@onvol.net