Gerry's Morocco Blog - IBM CSC » Marrakech

Belly Dancing in Marrakesh

gerry.broennimann — Sat, 10 May 2014 23:54:50 +0000

For the evening we made a reservation at restaurant “Le Tanjia” which advertized Happy Hour and belly dancing. But first we went to the main square (Jemaa el-Fnaa) again and, even though we split in several groups, none of us could resist to taste the food from the stalls… I had a wonderful Moroccan soup, other were braver and had soup with… snails!

The restaurant thing started quite well and we got our belly dancing sessions soon. We were actively involved, too… I fear that several compromising videos exist on colleagues’ smartphones.

Also some of the long awaited beers were served, but then the situation became strange. Only warm beer for happy hour, and the fact that we did not intend to eat made the situation worse. We have to admit however that normally one reserves a table for eating, not just for drinking. Let’s blame the delicious food we had at Jemaa el-Fnaa! Anyway, we felt uncomfortable and thought it was time to get the bill, to leave and to find another good place to spend the evening / night.

With the “Kechmara” bar we indeed found a good pace to sit, unfortunately they would close at midnight. Dany resp his TripAdvisor app pointed us to a Karaoke bar, but on the way we encountered the “Level Five“, a disco / bar on top of a high building. Again, the IBM CSC troop opened the party on the dance floor. Party time till late!

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Exploring Hot Marrakesh

gerry.broennimann — Sat, 10 May 2014 13:54:49 +0000

The breakfast was served on the terrace, which means that the staff had to transport the food across three floors / staircases. For us it was soooo relaxing! Afterwards, Said helped us to mark the famous spots on our maps and we were ready to explore the city on our own, enjoying the summer-like weather.

Unfortunately the Royal Palace was closed, we did the “Saadian Tombs” and the “Bahia Palace” instead. After another meal on a nice terrace at the spice market we split; I was in the shopping- resp. bargaining group and visited the souks. We were more or less successful… well, I lost some good arguments for a made-in-morocco T-shirt when I showed my “Tangier”-shirt for 50 DH (US-$ 6) to the seller – unfortunately with the “made in”-label cut off.

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Marrakesh’s Medina Labyrinth

gerry.broennimann — Fri, 09 May 2014 23:46:15 +0000

We reached Marrakesh late in the evening. So far, so good. But we only had a rough idea where our hotel, the Riad Africa, would be. With Dany’s GPS we came close, but entering this part of the medina by car was not possible. Also, Google Maps sometimes only showed the Arabic street names, and some of them existed twice. In our naivety we assumed the hotel would be well known. We would discover soon why not. At the end, Said from the hotel came to pick us up and routed us through the medina’s alleys. Hmm… everything looked the same, every turn made us to feel lost more. There was no pointer or signs to our destination – only just before the unimpressive entrance gate. Anyway, Said and the British hotel manager Tim were very helpful, and before going out to the center they shared a simple technique to find the way back to the hotel: Exchange sign, then first turn, first turn, first turn, done! It works!

We had a good dinner and a first spot on the main square, the Jemaa el-Fnaa. Many stalls were just about to close however, but we still have another evening and two days to spend in Marrakesh, fortunately.

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