I'm writing to you from my freezing apartment on a sunny Sunday afternoon. I've spent this weekend sleeping in, going to the gym, and watching Real Madrid get their arses kicked by Barcelona. All this down time has me reflecting on my travels to sunny Morocco of last weekend. What an experience! We left bright and early on Friday at 7:45 a.m. We reached the port at Tarifa and boarded the ferry. It was a pretty unpleasant journey up to that point on account of my sea sickness, but I felt a lot better when we arrived in Tangier around 1 p.m. Our program had warned us that Morocco would be a very different country in terms of what we were used to in Spain. They were definitely right. Our guide met us at the port and we went to lunch first at a beautiful restaurant. The decorations were incredible and the food was great! We started off with vegetable soup (sick me very much appreciated this) followed by lamb meatballs, chicken over couscous and vegetables, ending with baklava and mint tea. After lunch, our guide took us on a short tour of the area before ending the night with a bit of shopping. One interesting thing is that when shopping, you must bargain. Growing up and traveling, my mother was always the bargaining champ and I remained quiet in the corner, always mystified by the necessity of the exchanges. In Tangier, the people were very aggressive about selling you something, well anything really. I had to buck up when an attendant approached me about a purse I was admiring. He started off at 45 euro, I walked out of there having payed 20 -- success! We also were able to attend a mini-class on the different remedies and treatments that are made with all-natural ingredients. The shop explained to us the importance of Argan Oil (hair and skin benefits) as well as some others. After a long day of traveling and absorbing a new culture, I was more than happy to arrive at the hotel for the evening. Also there are a lot of pictures of cats, simply because. The second day waking up was a bit hard. We all started reading about what had happened in Paris the night before and were all very somber. We had a couple friends there so we made sure they were okay and those of us contacted our families that were worried. After a big breakfast of traditional pastries and cheese, we set off on a long bus ride to Chefchaouen. It is known as "The Blue City" and was extremely beautiful. The medina was pretty empty and the long, narrow alleyways offered cool shade out of the hot sunlight. We explored and then ate a lunch of beef tagine (traditional stew-like dish) before hoping on the bus again to Tétouan. Unfortunately a few people became sick on the bus ride in between the cities so we cut our time in Tétouan short. We did manage to walk through the (very crowded) medina and find our way to a rug shop. While it was interesting to see all the beautiful rugs, no one in the program was in the market for a 700 euro rug to lug back home with them. Everyone was pretty tired by that point so we took the bus back to Tangier and then headed out to a different (much nicer) hotel for dinner. We ate some more tagine and watched a belly-dance performance! It was so much fun and the dancer was in stilettos the whole time which was mind boggling. I woke up Sunday still feeling a bit sick from my lagging cold and was ready to go home but tried my best to make the most of our last day in Morocco. We took a bus tour around the city of Tangier before climbing up through the wealthy area to a vista point. It was amazing to know that I had seen both the Mediterranean sea as well as the Atlantic ocean on this trip. Luckily it was a sunny day and the views were amazing. After a while we headed down the coast line a bit and encountered some camels! They truly are incredible creatures and it was my first time seeing one up close. They have this interesting way of folding their legs underneath themselves that would make the most talented yogi's jealous. We had the option of riding them but I felt a bit bad after watching them get up and down dozens of times to let students ride on their backs mostly for the sake of a photo opportunity. After that we got back on the bus and headed to the town of Asilah, which is also on the coast. The original gates are still intact there which was interesting to see. The medina itself was fairly empty and clean. It was comprised of white buildings and blue accents. It was incredibly beautiful. We had some free time, so after lunch I walked down to the beach with a few people. It made me a bit homesick for my university back in Santa Barbara, but the realization that I was spending my Sunday afternoon in Africa dipping my toes in the Atlantic ocean made me feel better in an instant. We returned to Tangier and were on the ferry home by 7 p.m.
Our program had warned us that Morocco would be a very different country in terms of what we were used to in Spain. They were definitely right. From the bright colors of the markets and exotic food, to the haggling salesmen and unwelcome comments from passerby, I left Morocco feeling incredibly grateful for all of my experiences I've had so far.
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Hey hey hey This post has been a bit delayed for a multitude of reasons, so I do apologize! I just finished up a long week of midterms and being sick. But that is all over and done with (besides to stuffy nose) so time to celebrate! This weekend I am heading to the mystical and intriguing continent of Africa! My program is taking a weekend trip to Morocco and I am pretty darn excited. Hopefully I will have that post up soon after I get back (no promises). I visited Portugal a couple weeks ago and have all the pictures here so take a look! We left on a Thursday afternoon and were lucky enough to fly out of the Granada airport. I did manage to snag a psl in Madrid during the layover but way slightly disappointed when it tasted more like eggnog than pumpkin. We landed in Lisbon around 8:30 and caught a taxi to our hostel located in the downtown area. Kudos to Meghan for choosing an amazing hostel! We walked in right as they were serving dinner and everything was so warm and cozy with the homemade dinner smell wafting everywhere. I quickly fell in love with the place. The living rooms were all decorated by a local graffiti artist and I got to sleep in a bunk bed (hello freshman year of college). We spent Friday exploring downtown, visiting an archeology museum, and visiting a castle!! The best castle I have ever seen hands down with the most beautiful views (and I have seen a few castles by now). The sun managed to come out for the tour and having wild peacocks roaming around definitely helped me slip into a royal state. Cool fact: The castle has been the site of many excavations that you can go and see if you manage to catch one of the tours. We were able to see old layouts of the priests' quarters, private residences, and three different levels of roads (see below).
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Amani P.Last fall I took off for a year abroad. Now I'm back in the states, trying to figure out this crazy thing we call life! Archives
February 2017
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