Morocco: Where the Mans and the Womans are Equal

I've always been a little skeptical of organised tours, where guides force some cliched aspects of the local "culture" upon you, often at inflated expense, while you slowly drown in post-colonial guilt. Morocco, as I expected, was no exception.

I've been on quite a few organised tours because they're easier and take the hassle and stress out of the equation. I would not, for example, fancy driving in the Atlas Mountains; I wouldn't know how to say "my car has fallen off a cliff" in Berber, for a start. So, after two days of being hassled into oblivion on the crowded and frankly not especially inviting streets of Marrakech, a city which seemed to have deliberately honed an atmosphere of chaotic, eclectic authenticity to inauthentic perfection then thrown in a Club Med and the ever-lingering prospect of catching e-coli for good measure with, I feel, unappealing results, we headed off into the Ourika Valley.

We were a strange and no doubt depressingly common convey – seven four by fours full of lobstered tourists in embarrassing sunhats, hurtling conspicuously along in a country where every second hand Mercedes in the world has gone to die, been painted beige and turned into a taxi.

Our first stop was a pottery, seemingly in the middle of a field surrounded by bored-looking goats. Inside the sole potter made a very small pot while we all stood and watch obediently. “In Morocco,” our guide said, somewhat out of context “All the mans and the womans are very equal. In Morocco,” he elaborated, as though he felt we needed a concrete example, “We do not have the polygamy.” He beamed proudly. The potter finished his pot and added it to a pile of identical pots probably made for identical group of tourists. “Now you shop,” said the guide, an order rather than an offer. The potter got some Tesco bags ready, and the sunhatted lobsters began to haggle enthusiastically while we loitered by the minibus. “The man is very sad,” mused the guide, making conversation. “He has nobody to leave his business to after he is dead, as he has no son, only daughter.”

Village in the Atlas Mountains

We headed on up into the mountains in a scene worryingly reminiscent of the final few moments of The Italian Job, skidding heart-stoppingly close to the edge of a sheer drop as the driver steers with one hand and texts into an old Nokia with the other. Our next stop was a small village high in the hills. “Here,” our guide said, as we clambered out of the cars on wobbly legs and check all our limbs were still intact, “We go to genuine Berber house, and you meet genuine Berber family.” We looked over to where a large group of tourists were traipsing out of the Genuine Berber House, being waved to be people I assumed were the Genuine Berber Family. They got into their Genuine Four By Fours. “That is a dog,” the guide said, unnecessarily, pointing to a dead labrador and clearly feeling that, as a guide, he should do as much guiding as possible. “Here is genuine Berber kitchen,” he announced, and we all peered into an unassuming kitchen where a Genuine Berber Woman posed for photos while holding a Genuine Kettle. “And now, we have tea!”

“There is tradition of hospitality for Berber people. If you come to visit Berber family they will invite you in and they will make you tea and food. This is central to Berber tradition.” We trudged into the back yard where, as if to prove his point, twenty seats were already set out, presumably on the offchance that some visitors turned up wanting tea. Miraculously, this Genuine Berber Family also had twenty matching glasses all ready for these unexpected guests. Then followed an elaborate ritual performed by Muhammad, a Genuine Berber Man, with copious quantities of fresh mint and water poured out of a series of highly decorate, ornate jugs. Our guide kept up a running commentary throughout: “Why you think Muhammad so happy? Why Muhammad always smiling?” Because he’s getting paid to show twenty gullible English people how to make tea? “Because he is not paying the taxes!”

Why you think Muhammad so happy? He is not paying any taxes!

After we’d drunk our thimblefuls of tea we left (some of us via the Genuine Berber Toilet) and headed back up the hill. As we pulled away another six four by fours arrived and as their passengers disembarked I thought how fortunate it was that they had happened upon this hospitable family, who fortuitously had twenty seats already set out and twenty glasses being quickly washed up on the offchance that yet another large group of people would pop round for a quick teabreak.

In other news, we saw this strange sight next to a layby just outside Essaouira: Goats in a Tree! The slightly left-field sequal to "Snakes on a PLane", I presume. I am told the goats climb up there of their own accord to eat the berries, and indeed a friend of mine who recently went to Cyprus confirmed that you can see the same spectacle there. I would believe this, except that the farmer was lingering in the layby and waved us in for a "photostop", for which he tried to charge us ten dirham each (that's about a pound.) Throughout this the goats looked on with bemused expressions that could only say "What the fuck are we doing up here?" I'll let you make up your own minds.

Goats in a Tree. The sequal to Snakes on a Plane