Day 3: Adventures in Souq Land
April 13th, 2002
Morning juice sellers on Djemaa
The first thing on my mind when I awoke in the morning was to get back to Djemaa. But I was disappointed when I reached the square. Djemaa, like me, is not a morning event. There were a few snake charmers sitting under big khaki umbrellas, snakes still slumbering in their baskets. A few of the ridiculously clothed water sellers, with their big orange and red tasseled hats, goatskin water bags, and shinny copper bowls, vied for a few coins from camera wielding Japanese tourists.
Towards what I came to think of as the ‘top’ of Djemaa, more serious work was going on. A large man sat cross-legged in off-white robes in front of a spread of herbs, bones, feathers, and stones. A line of men and women patiently waited their turn in the strong morning sun. When he turned his attention to them, they would select a small bullet shaped amulet from the collection at his feet. He took it in his palm and deftly inserted a series of things into a small opening in one end. I recognized one of the odd substances as mercury and it made me flinch a little to see him holding a drop or two in his bare hands (guess I learned something from those 5th grade science safety videos).
After the quicksilver, he selected a few small red berries from a pile and used his Swiss Army Knife to stuff them in. Then went some brown or white powder, a few feathers from a small dead bird, a few leaves, and maybe a sprinkling of white crystally powder. I never saw any discussion of aliments or other chit-chat with his customers, but they all left with their amulet clutched in one hand looking satisfied, so I assumed he does good work.
I bought a large glass of fresh squeezed orange juice from one of the twenty or so stalls that ring the edge of the square. The proprietors yelled and hissed at prospective drinkers as they walked by. I guess with so much competition and everyone selling exactly the same product for exactly the same prices (about 25 cents), you do whatever you can to stand out. But the hissing made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
Colors of commerce
The main entrance to the souqs looks like just another store front. Only once you’re through the door, it seems to go on forever. The narrow alleyway was covered in a patchwork of palm leaves, plastic, and tin, making the light stream down in broken beams that prevent your eyes from ever quite adjusting. The goods lining either side in open shop-fronts and booths range from tourist schlock to indecipherable local goods.
A Friday was a good day for a first dive into Souq Land, as about half the shops were closed in observance of the Muslim holy day and the crowds were relatively light. The souqs extend for less than a single winding kilometer, and seemed like a good excursion for the morning. On my map taking a stroll from Djemaa to the Ben Youssef Mosque looked fairly straight forward; rue Souq Smarine to Souq el Kebir, then past the Souq des Babouches (cutely translated as the slipper market), and around the Leather Souq. A walk in the cliche park.
Souq Smarine was traditionally the cloth and clothing market, but nowadays with it’s proximity to Djemaa and the thin ant train of air conditioned tourist buses that stop there, it’s become a touristy free-for-all. Goods from all over the souq – and from all over Africa, India, and China – can be found in the first few meters. The prices and sales pitches were correspondingly high. But not every shop was Nike knock-offs and stuffed camel toys, the local market still ruled here. A more permanent version of the vegetable market I had seen in Casablanca existed in every alley off the main drag. Around one corner I heard the now-familiar sound of chickens squawking and I hurried on, not wanting any further education in the life-cycle of farm poultry.
The bright morning sun and the urban plain of Djemaa that I had just left seemed like another city. In the souqs it is always twilight and you are always on the edge of claustrophobia. The shops seemed to fall into a few categories according to the type of goods. The leather bag merchants stood before tall walls hung with everything from Gucci knock-offs to raw, hairy goatskin camel-packs. Every other shop was a kaleidoscope of painted dishes, bowls, platters that reminded me of similar bold patterns I’d seen in southern Spain. The lantern sellers took advantage of the perpetual twilight and glowed with a dozen different colored glass and painted leather lamps.
I spent some time trying on soft painted leather slippers. Sitting on a small wooden bench, I pointed at pair after pair and the good natured shoe guy sent his boy climbing up shelves and standing on tables to fetch them. The shoes didn’t have a right or a left to them, but the guy explained in Franglais that they would mold to my feet pretty quick. I actually liked the idea of slippers so lazy I didn’t have to tell one from the other – could save me some trouble first thing in the blurry morning. I passed on some of the flashier pointed toe pairs, bright red and gold sequins just wasn’t going to go with anything. I settled on a pair of light blue ones painted with intricate stylized loops of tan red and green. They wouldn’t go with anything either, but I’d never seen anything like them.
Souq twilight
The bargaining took almost as long as the selection process. I shook my head and looked bored, trying to convey my ambivalence towards the shoes I desperately wanted. The book had said you should start with an offer of one third their price, but the shoes were so lovely and the opening price sounded like a deal to start with, I didn’t have the heart to try for more than half. We settled somewhere in the middle, but closer to his price than mine, and parted each thinking we’d done well. That’s how bargaining should be.
Three or four times I came across small sweet shops, usually fronted by several scarf wearing women and a gaggle of sticky children. I was surprised when one of the sweet-shop guys leaned out to hand me a treat to try. He didn’t seem too concerned about whether I was going to buy anything or not, he just wanted to see if I’d like the flaky little nut and honey creation. It was really sweet and wonderful, but I could just see me stuck with a whole melting oozing box of them and making myself sick, so I passed on a larger sampling.
As shallow as it might seem, there’s a sort of equality that exists among shopping-zones everywhere in the world. Moroccan souq or LA strip mall, there are people there to buy and people there to sell, and few other distinctions made. For the first time since getting off the plane I felt happily anonymous. Safe in the bosom of commerce, just another face in the crowd. My trip started to feel just a bit more like an actual vacation.
I realized I’d been in the souq for well over two hours, and I’d been walking at a good pace, so I thought the Mosque couldn’t be far ahead. That last glass of orange juice seemed a long time ago and the souqs, while still dim and shady, were getting a little stuffy in the afternoon heat. I made a point not to wander from the main road into any of the tempting side streets – I didn’t want to get stuck in there all day – but recognizing the side streets from the main one got harder and harder. A number of Y and T intersections made it impossible to keep heading in the same direction, and the main lane had shrunk to the size of an alleyway.
The top of Djemaa and the beginning of Souq Land
It felt like at least another two hours later, the novelty of endlessly winding lanes was just growing seriously thin, when I spotted a patch of brightness around the next corner. The end of the souq and the plaza around Ben Youssef Mosque! Perfect timing, I thought as I stepped out into the light. It must have been dehydration or just the disorientation of suddenly being back under the sky, but it took me a few full minutes of scarf-covered head scratching before I figured out why Ben Youssef Mosque looked so much like Djemaa el Fna. Because it was Djemaa el Fna. I’d come back out where I started.
A bit baffled, I consoled myself with another glass of OJ, and then another. Defeated, but not all that disappointed about how the day’d been spent, I suddenly felt hot, dirty, and exhausted all at once. I wandered back through the slightly more active plaza, hardly noticing the crowd of characters, the ever-present snake charming music, and the addition of several dozen food stalls complete with blue wooden tables and chairs. I’d seen all my head had room for until I’d had at least a nap, shower, and three or four more tumblers of juice.
