Casablanca, Morocco (Days 1 & 2)

Whew!  After 22 hours of flying and layovers going from Austin, Texas to Atlanta, Georgia to Paris, France, I made it to my destination in Casablanca, Morocco to visit my grad school roommate, Hajar!  Yahoo!  It was so nice to have her there at the airport to greet me... especially since I don't speak any French (in spite of my study abroad) or Arabic!  It took about 40 minutes to get to her parents' home from the airport.. there was lots of traffic since I arrived at the end of the day.  I was surprised to see lots of animals pulling carts on the road; that was new to me.  Also there seemed to be people out in any fields we passed that had livestock.

We got to her house and had a WONDERFUL dinner that her mom prepared (I said she needs to have a restaurant!).  We had a beautifully arranged tagine with prunes, almonds and sesame seeds, taktouka (tomato and paprika salad), zaalouk (eggplant), khobz (Moroccan bread), and olives.  Oh.  My.  Gracious.  I was so full, and then for dessert we had our pick from a platter of fresh fruit, including AMAZING oranges from Hajar's parents' garden!  It was QUITE the welcome dinner (and makes me want to eat it all over again just writing this)!!

The next morning I got to sleep in for a little bit thankfully.  When I started getting ready for the day, I almost put my deodorant on my toothbrush, and then followed that with trying to put a shoe on the wrong foot.. guess I was slightly jet lagged!  Oh well.  We had pain au chocolat (my favorite) and fresh orange juice for breakfast, and headed out with Hajar's mom to try to see some of Casablanca.

We got into some interesting traffic on our way to our destination!  I think we made a wrong turn and ended up in a street PACKED with merchants and shoppers!  A guy ended up yelling at people to move out of our way and had to escort our vehicle by foot all the way out of the area!

Outside of the palace in Casablanca

We tried to see the court in the city but there was an event going on there so we weren't allowed in.  Then we tried to see the outside of the king's palace in Casablanca, but there were guards who wouldn't let us by their post since we weren't with a group.  While we waited for a group that we could enter with, we went to a bookstore across the street and I bought a Cinderella book in Arabic as a gift, and Hajar's mom bought a Moroccan cookbook for me with all the dishes she'd prepared the night before.  A few minutes later, we caught a group and got to see the gates to the palace.

bread in the oven

From there, we walked to Patisserie Bennis Habous where I got to see Moroccan bread cooking and we bought some Moroccan cookies to have with tea.  Yum!

Moroccan tea and cookies

Something I've been surprised to learn so far is that tea is a big part of the culture here.  It's usually a green tea with mint, poured from a small teapot like in the picture here, into a small glass.  Its poured from a distance to produce foam.

Once we were done with tea, Hajar and I were dropped off at the Hassan II Mosque.  In between prayer times, they allow visitors to buy tickets to tour the mosque.  Wow.  What a beautiful building!  The construction of the building started in 1987 and lasted for six years, involving around 10,000 craftsmen and 2,500 workers.  It's the second largest mosque in the world, and I can't believe that construction was completed in such a short time.

Hassan II Mosque, over the ocean

Hassan II Mosque

A neat thing I learned about mosques is that they all have a minaret (tower that allows for the call to prayer), which makes it easy to spot them all over the city.  The minaret of this mosque stands 689 feet tall, and is considered to be the tallest in the world.  It has lasers that point towards Mecca at night.

Prayer hall of the Hassan II Mosque

We bought our tickets downstairs and then moved upstairs to the mosque's massive prayer hall.  After removing our shoes, we were allowed to enter.  The hall can hold 25,000 worshipers with 5,000 women in the balcony area and 20,000 men on the floor.  The plaza outside can accommodate an additional 80,000.  The mosque was built over the water because of a verse in the Koran that says that's where God's throne was built.

Prayer hall of the Hassan II Mosque 

The prayer hall has an incredible roof that can open in three minutes, allowing more air to enter the hall.  Through the middle of the hall, there is a stream of running water, and in the center of the room, there are windows where you can see down into Ablution Hall on the ground of the building, viewing earth.  With these three aspects of the building, one can experience the three elements of earth, air and water.

Retractable ceiling of the Hassan II Mosque

From there, we went downstairs and saw Ablution Hall and its 41 fountains, where people go to wash before prayer.  We also got to see a hamam (bath) in the building that hasn't yet been used.

Fountains in Ablution Hall

me and Hajar outside of Hassan II Mosque

From there, we grabbed some lunch and got to see Hajar's sister-in-law for a few minutes before heading back to H's home to get ready to go to a hamam, or public bath!  Woah.  Sooo I'd been a little nervous about the whole public bath thing.. but we'll skip those details (for a funny briefing of what it's like, visit this article).  We started off with a sit in the sauna, then applied a black soap to open up pores.  From there we had a fantastic mini exfoliating massage, at which point I told Hajar I was moving to Morocco.  She quickly translated my words to the ladies working there, and all the sudden they all broke into what sounded like a song (she says it was a chant)!  A little later we spread a mixture of henna and other plants on our skin, and then had mini massages where rhassoul (clay) was applied to our skin to make it soft.  At the end, we used rose water and eucalyptus essence to cool down.  Whew!  They need hamams in the states!

Rick's Cafe: goat cheese salad with figs

After that, we went to Rick's Cafe for dinner.  "The one from the movie, Casablanca?!"  Yes and no.  The one in the movie was fictional, but this one was built in 2004 to recreate the experience.  And yes, to my excitement, they have a pianist who plays "As Time Goes By" several times a night!  I had a DELICIOUS goat cheese salad with figs and the grilled swordfish with eggplant compote and pesto.  Yum!!

After dinner we headed home to pack for our upcoming adventure across the country.

Rick's Cafe

Rick's Cafe menu for 8/1/2014

The Trip Home (Day 51)

On Friday morning at 4 am, I took all of my bags down to the hotel lobby for my transfer to the airport.  Last time I hope I ever have to get up that early for a flight!  I had a flight from Athens to Madrid at 7 am.

When I got to the Madrid airport for my flight to Dallas, I was waiting at my gate and my name was called to come up to the desk.  My name had been randomly chosen for special security.  They escorted me (and a few others) to another area where I was questioned about my checked luggage.  She asked if anyone had given me anything to put in my luggage, a bunch of other questions similar to that, and then ended with asking if I had anything sharp with me!  After that, they sent me over to an area where I was patted down and then they went through both of my carry on bags.  Once they finished all of this, they escorted several of us back to our gate and had us sit in a little area behind a rope while everyone else was boarding the plane!  Crazy.  One-by-one, they pulled us out of the area and let us board the plane.

After a 10-hour flight, we landed in Dallas.  After they checked my passport, I went down an escalator with my carry on bags.  There was a lady standing at the bottom with a beagle that would smell everyone who walked by.  When I got to the bottom, the dog smelled my bags, looked excited, then sat down and looked up at its handler!  The lady asked me to step over to the side, and asked if I had any fruit.  I had an apple!  She wrote on my customs form and then let me go.

From there I went on to grab my checked bag to continue the journey through customs before I could go on to my final flight.  Customs ended up sending me to a special line that was about a mile long.  When I finally got up to the front, a customs officer did a hand search of both of my carry on bags and my checked bag.  Once he cleared me, I gave my big bag back to the airline to recheck it, and then I had to go back through security where I was sent through the body scanner!  Go figure.

Boarding for my flight from Dallas to Austin was delayed around 40 minutes, but the flight itself was only 30 minutes long.  When I got to Austin, I ran into the U.S. representative who I had interned for in DC in 2009 at the baggage claim!  We talked for a few minutes, and when he left, I realized my bag hadn't ever come.  I had to go into the American Airlines baggage office and tell them my bag was missing, and they couldn't tell me where it was.

I went home with my dad and the next morning when I woke up, my bag was waiting for me outside of my bedroom door.  Dad had to pick up my mom, aunt and cousin at the airport about two hours after he had gotten me, and by then my bag had arrived at the airport, so my mom grabbed it for me.  When I opened it, I saw why it had missed my flight.  They went through it AGAIN!  In the bag, I had wine and mustard that I had bought in France for gifts.  All of it had made it untouched in flights from France to England, England to Italy, was carried in my bag across Italy and Greece and then flew from Greece to Spain, and Spain to Dallas, Texas untouched.  After U.S. customs went through my luggage and cleared me, the airport I guess wasn't satisfied and they went through my bag, unwrapped the mustard that had been wrapped in the store in France when I bought it, and moved one of the bags of wine from the side of the bag where it was protected, to the TOP of everything the bag where I'm so grateful it wasn't smashed!  I'm also grateful they didn't take anything.  But truly.  What list am I on?!