Our first stop this past weekend: Chefchaouen.
I fell in love! Everything in Chefchaouen is blue. Our hotel was blue, the houses in the old medina were painted blue, the sky was blue. Our tour guide told us that the people paint their houses blue to stay cool. I also noticed that the people in Chefchaouen were beautiful! (The closer we got to the Mediterranean Sea, the more spanish/mediterranean looking people were). They women also dressed a bit less conservatively.
We only spent one day in Chefchaouen, but that was enough time for us to...
- hike part of a mountain to see a Mosque and get a "picture-perfect" view of the city.
-visit a community center where we met young Moroccan kids and tried our our Arabic speaking skills with them, play chess, and draw.
-spend 5 hours at one restaurant
- explore the souk a bit at night.
Everybody that we met there was happy... they call Chefchaouen the "weed capital of Morocco".
Second stop: Tangier (Tanger)
Despite the fact that half of our group was sick, the majority of us had a great time in Tangier.
The great thing about Tangier is that it's next to the Mediterranean and the Atlantic, and the beaches were much nicer than those in Rabat. The sand was smoother, they weren't crowded, and it wasn't scorching hot. In the morning we spent a few hours at the beach and at cafes alongside the beach, and in the afternoon we were given a guided tour (from an extremely happy older man wearing a white djellaba). He showed us the kasbah, (the palace of Tangier), the kasbah museum, around the city, and Hercules Cave.
And of course, there were many stray cats roaming the street as usual. I went into a pet store in Tangier, and the cats in the store looked like they were in worse condition than the cats on the street. The stray cats are actually cute! They lounge around in the sun, and nobody bothers them. They live a good life.
Side note: Although I won't be fasting, Ramadan starts this week, and while all the other muslim Moroccans will be up late into the night eating and then sleeping in, I still have school. I'm not really sure how this is gonna work out, because my host parents will be eating when the sun goes down, then at 2 a.m. and then again for breakfast at 4 a.m.
When am I gonna sleep?!?!?!
I fell in love! Everything in Chefchaouen is blue. Our hotel was blue, the houses in the old medina were painted blue, the sky was blue. Our tour guide told us that the people paint their houses blue to stay cool. I also noticed that the people in Chefchaouen were beautiful! (The closer we got to the Mediterranean Sea, the more spanish/mediterranean looking people were). They women also dressed a bit less conservatively.
We only spent one day in Chefchaouen, but that was enough time for us to...
- hike part of a mountain to see a Mosque and get a "picture-perfect" view of the city.
-visit a community center where we met young Moroccan kids and tried our our Arabic speaking skills with them, play chess, and draw.
-spend 5 hours at one restaurant
- explore the souk a bit at night.
Everybody that we met there was happy... they call Chefchaouen the "weed capital of Morocco".
Second stop: Tangier (Tanger)
Despite the fact that half of our group was sick, the majority of us had a great time in Tangier.
The great thing about Tangier is that it's next to the Mediterranean and the Atlantic, and the beaches were much nicer than those in Rabat. The sand was smoother, they weren't crowded, and it wasn't scorching hot. In the morning we spent a few hours at the beach and at cafes alongside the beach, and in the afternoon we were given a guided tour (from an extremely happy older man wearing a white djellaba). He showed us the kasbah, (the palace of Tangier), the kasbah museum, around the city, and Hercules Cave.
And of course, there were many stray cats roaming the street as usual. I went into a pet store in Tangier, and the cats in the store looked like they were in worse condition than the cats on the street. The stray cats are actually cute! They lounge around in the sun, and nobody bothers them. They live a good life.
Side note: Although I won't be fasting, Ramadan starts this week, and while all the other muslim Moroccans will be up late into the night eating and then sleeping in, I still have school. I'm not really sure how this is gonna work out, because my host parents will be eating when the sun goes down, then at 2 a.m. and then again for breakfast at 4 a.m.
When am I gonna sleep?!?!?!
