Chapter Two: The Ancient City of Fez

I am thoroughly convinced that Disney found its inspiration for the movie "Aladdin" after visiting the city of Fez.

From a birds eye view, the city's winding maze of streets are completely hidden between thousands of ivory and sand colored buildings that flood the valley floor. Looking down at Fez with foreign eyes, the world's largest Arabic marketplace (known as the "Medina") is nothing but a cluster of indistinguishable buildings; the perfect hiding place for a handsome, princess-seeking convict - or in our case, a collection of aggressive and skilled salesmen, ready to welcome the parade of American visitors with foreign credit cards.





From the minute we stepped foot on Fez's hot, dusty, streets, it was clear that our presence was going to make a big stir across town. As we gathered outside our bus, children with cheap jewelry and key chains immediately ran up to us, saying "good price! good price!" and a large crowd of men gathered in the chairs out front of the nearby cafe, saying things like "hello beautiful" and "oh, the women. I can smell the honey coming...." to the girls as we walked by.
[In my video of us walking through the Medina, you can hear the man I pass by saying that, if you listen really closely.]

Even with a "traditional Moroccan" tour guide, as 75 young Americans, wearing clearly foreign and out of place clothing in the middle of an Arabic country, (women traditionally wear Burkahs in Morocco, so our jeans and long sleeve shirts were our attempt at being modest) it was absolutely impossible for us not to make a huge spectacle of ourselves.

Following our tour guide (who wore the traditional dress-like business uniform, but carried a brand new blackberry that rang to the tone of "I've got a Feeling" by the Black Eyed Peas) we entered the labyrinth of marketplace streets in a long, crowded line, and were navigated through the ancient maze of streets, into pre-chosen shopping locations throughout the city. (Check out my video of us walking through the Medina, below.)




Although we were given glimpses of the "real" marketplace - fish stands, fruit and vegetable displays, countless shops with handmade pottery and silverware, or freestanding stores full of nicknack's - our tour brought us specifically to several of the more touristy locations, where ready salesmen told us all about their preeminent products, and mentioned the word "discount," using every synonym possible. At every store, we were led to believe that the prices were completely subjective to bargaining with the help of our "guide," (who we later realized got commission, of course) so coming in with this naive trust, it took a few stores before we realized that there were clear tactics that the salesmen were skilled in, and ready to use on us.





The very first store we visited was incredible - a six-story leather shop, with purses, shoes, bean bag shells, wallets, jackets, and every item you can imagine in leather, hanging from the walls and ceilings. From the sixth story balcony, we looked out below at the sight of a famous National Geographic photo: the leather pools, where all of the exorbitant leather goods are made and colored by shirtless male workers, sitting in the hot sun, and working in pools of colorful dye. The man who owned the shop was young - not much older than us, (his father owned the business and recently passed it down to him) and he was dressed impeccably in freshly ironed Armani jeans, shiny leather shoes, and a black leather jacket. He pointed over the balcony, and briefly mentioned the workers - emphasizing more the quality of the dye, and clear intricacy of his store's handy work. I later asked our guide, and found out that the workers are paid by the day, not the hour, and work 12-14 hour days for a very low wage. (Need to confirm this, but the original estimate was about 1 to 2 American dollars per hour.)

That really put alot into perspective when I was sold (without being given much of a choice, after they quoted me a price then literally grabbed my credit card out of my hand) a handmade, tailored leather jacket, for what equates to nearly a week's worth of labor in these men's lives.

After the leather shop, we visited an apothecary, a linen and dress shop, and a carpet store, where we were given the most direct and obvious sales pitch of the day. The carpet store was huge, with giant carpets draping down from three stories up, and filling entire rooms. We sat down in the center of the building, and were handed super sweet mint tea (´an aphrodesiac´ they were quick to point out) while listening to the owner´s 20 minute sales pitch about why we should buy a carpet. Highlights include: how our parents would be so proud of us for making a ¨valuable financial investment,¨ how carpets are great for ¨the jiggy jiggy¨ (as he put it), how America and Morocco are good friends, (Morocco was the first country to officially recognize the US in1776) and my favorite: how women are financially equal, so we have just as much a right to buy a carpet as any man.