Sea Views!
A quick 360-degree video of the view from the Kasbah (yes, that thing you're supposed to rock) des Oudaias. Out the other end of the terrace are the quiet little streets of the kasbah, painted blue and full of cats. We also spent a fair amount of time in the medina, and one nice vendor even let us play with a "magic box" that has not only a hidden lock but a hidden key, so you have to find the key and then la serrure before you can open it. Very cool. Okay, so watch the video!
And this morning I went to the hammam with my sisters. Oola. Two hours of scrubbing, rinsing, and covering myself with henna goop, then clay - both of which totally bring out the four year old in you. There was also an interesting moment when a woman just passing by helped me rinse my back.
The thing about Morocco is that there are very specific spaces that have been set aside for men and women. For me, seeing a dozen outdoor cafe tables with only men sitting at them is something subtly but deeply unnerving - I know that I'm not welcome, that particular cafe is not my space. But the women's hammam, while more welcoming of me, is just as deeply coded to be unwelcome to men. I'm also puzzling out what might be a close equivalent, space-wise, to the hammam I was at today. My experience with American spas and nail/beauty parlors is far from extensive.
(Speaking of coded spaces: Just wait until I've done my research on gender in the physical space of the mosque. Weeley weeley weely! [that's darija for Oooolala!])
Squeaky clean Chiara signing out.
2 comments:
Thats really pretty!
The henna mud bath sounds.. interesting.
More pictures! :)
You ought to take a sunset photo from up there... by the looks it would be pretty.
I spent a few minutes in an OTB parlor in midtown once. There was not a single woman there. All of the bettors and all of the tellers were men. And in our culture, there is no apparent norm that accounts for it in any straightforward way. That was just the way it was.
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