Day 9A - 3/17/12 - Fez Cont... Shopping in the Medina

Can I just speak for a moment about a little bit of heaven?  A room with a bed that smells of cedar with a tiled mosaic floor in the colors of Fez. Three screened lanterns which cast lacy shadows on white washed walls and low cedar beams of my room.

A Berber runner from the high Atlas on the floor in muted tans and browns the same colors as the buiidings and walls of the medina, a small window looking out on the ancient medina, which is now quiet, but which we saw earlier from the terrace as the lights twinkled on and the stars came out and the rise of prayer resonated through the city from all quarters.

An enormously delicious home cooked meal of couscous with lamb and pumpkin and potatoes, a salad of oranges, radishes and fennel, the round flat breads we had seen baking in the medina and then wonderful conversation with Judy and Mort who are from Sweden and the rest of us finally together for a meal. Before dinner I had a shower in the room Hilda and I share, or suite really, with its own terrace. The shower is an entirely red tiled room,

Our red tiled bathroom

with nice hot water and a large container of argon oil soap and a window above the street where I first heard the enormous drone of the call to prayer as well as voices in the street below both French and Arabic. I am thinking now about the men who we have seen in the market heating the fires for the hammam, the public baths. They shovel pine shavings into a large clay dome like oven and these are probably from the wood shops around. This is a community it seems where nothing is wasted. It appears chaotic and unorganized, but it is clear that the medina as a community structure is highly organized and has been that way for centuries.  Even the garbage is swept up into little piles and into a corner.

Sacks stacked neatly along and alley way 

So Saturday morning after surviving our initial Fez disaster, finding our friends and having a wonderful breakfast, we gather with Idris our guide in the main central courtyard of the house, which is 600 to 700 years old. The ceiling rises about a 100 feet and lets the sunshine in from above onto ornately carved walls of stone, cedar, grillwork and wood panels bearing the original egg tempera painted geometric patterns.

Detail of original egg tempera panels on doorways

Becky tells us she has read Fatima Mernisi's book, "Dreams of Trespass" a memoir about growing up in a harem in Fez during the 1950's and what life might have been like for a little girl in a house like this. All the activity occurred in the center courtyard and then the women and girls were placed in rooms according to their status in the harem. The higher ranking women, the first wives, on the ground floor with the grand salons with the painted doors and those with less status, the slave girls or jaryas on the upper floors.  A man like the manager here, Mohammed, to be on guard to protect the gate and the  women, keep strange men from entering and escort the women to and from the hammam or public baths.  According to Mernisi (1994) imperial harems grew up under the flourishing conquest of the golden age of Islam, when Arabs moved across Spain and as far as India.   To prove their might the conquering sultans took as many slave women as possible from far away lands.  Imperial harems could number in the thousands of wives.   The last sultan in Morocco, Abdelhamid II was deposed in 1909 by Western powers - the French and Spanish, but the harem tradition carried on in the form of domestic harems, which were more like extended families.   They may still exist, but mostly with monogamous couples living together in an arrangement, which still keeps the tradition of seclusion of women.   No man may enter anothers harem without permission.  Muslim women are still fighting to have polygamy outlawed, but mostly male legislators say its Shari'a law - religious law - the word of Allah - and cannot be changed.

In her memoir, Mernisi, as a young girl, continually asks, "What is a harem?" because she is growing up in one.   As explained by her favorite aunt, Yasmina, the harem is both a space (which could be a house or a tent) as well as it is the people who live within the harem.   Haram means forbidden or proscribed in Arabic while halal is that which is permissible as in halal food.  Yasmina told her that as long as you understand the qa'ida or rules of haram and its boundaries or hudud, walls were not even necessary because the harem would remain inside you.

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Mohammed is by the way a very charming soul, who cooks a wonderful curried eggs each morning along with an endless amount of delicious breads and jam made from carrots and ginger.

Our tour starts in the house with an examination of the original contract for the house framed on the wall. (9A-6)

Idris, our guide is a real Fassi or born and bred Fez native.  He explained that this contract passed from owner to owner with new calligraphy and revisions in ownership over the centuries. We then go out into the market and he shows us the plain exterior doors and explains that in Islam it is important to keep a plain exterior and then have all the richness and beauty inside.

The character of the Muslim should be like that as well.  If you have wealth you do not to brag about it or show it publicly, but may display it lavishly in your home as we see in the Dar Seffarine.  It is more important to cultivate inner beauty than to display it outwardly.   This begins to explain for me why Muslim people, particularly women cover themselves with djellaba or why women cover their heads/hair or veil themselves.

Idris takes us to see the real medina, not just the tourist spots. We start in an open square where they seem to be making large pots for cooking, that are rented for wedding parties. This is Place as-Seffarine or Place of the Brassmakers.

Place as-Seffarine

The sound of the men hammering is distinctive.

We stop by several schools: one looking more decrepit and Idris says less well funded.   You can see it was founded after independence from the French Protectorate in 1953.

Another public school looks clean, well swept and light filled, painted white and turquoise green the color of Islam.

This one is funded by a neighborhood association. Just as in the states we have to support the public school privately in order to have it run the way we like sometimes.

Idris tells us, "there is one word I want you to know before heading into the market.  That is "Barak," or "Watch out there is a donkey behind you." And there are donkeys everywhere. Cars are not allowed in the medina so they are the major form of transport bearing loads of tanned hides, agave silk, wood, vegetables. We watch a mother in djellaba guide her toddler around piles of donkey poop. Sure enough soon I hear the call, "Barak, Barak," and we must pay attention.

Idris shows us the wall for election posters.  Each party must pay to advertise on this spot and they are only allowed to post their advertisements on this spot!   If only our politicians could live by such constraints.  We ask what the different symbols mean in the squares and Idris explains that if the symbol is a bus for instance, that party will promise that there will be a lot of buses and every one will be able to take a bus!   He wasn't as sure what the rose meant except it might represent the flower merchants.

Bas el Fes or the old Fez, remains much as it has been for 1200 years. Unlike the Rabat medina which is much newer, old Fez is a working and residential community. Some think the narrow winding labyrinth of streets is a mistake, but there is practicality behind the design. Homes in Fez remain well insulated both summer and winter because of the thickness of the clay walls, which impede on the walkways between them.

Fez has become a world heritage site and the buildings are now protected. During the French rule they allowed new types of building and didn't pay much attention to the history, but now buildings must be renovated according to the original design and use of materials, which explains why Dar Seffarine is so exquiste and lavish. There are scaffolds all over the mdeina as more and more reconstruction occurs. All told there are over 9000 streets and alleys in the medina.  This is when I ask Idris if there are any maps and he shakes his head and says, "only tentative."

We walk down an alley where men are carding, stretching, and dying cactus strands to make silk.

The soft sabra made from agave, which we see in the colorful silk scarves. A boy waves to me from his father's shop and I snap a picture. "Dhurham madame," he thrusts his hand out and he gets lucky as I have a ten piece in my back pocket.

After that I consider sticking to photographing donkeys. A young man stands against a long empty wall about 100 feet with cactus thread stretched out from a nail. He is hand winding it not a spool.

Agave "sabra" silk stretched out for spooling along a wall

We stop to admire a litter of kittens that seemed to make their home in a box on the side of an alley.   There were many cats all over the medina, much to Jennifer's delight as a real cat lover.

There are also numerous mederasa or religious schools in the medina as Fez and nearby Moulay Idris are the spiritual  and cultural heart of Morocco. We look into one which we are told was founded by a woman, Mederasa el-Attarine.   It is resplensdent with pillars and Idris explains that the teacher sits at a pillar with his students surrounding him - like pillars of knowledge.

Then we pay to go into the Mederasa Bou Inania which was founded in 1358. Idris tells us the requirement for entrance is that the student has memorized the entire Koran and is able to recite it. There is no age minimum for entrance, but most students are around 21. They will become imams or holy men. Women are not allowed to become imams, but they may study and become prayer readers.

Idris points out the tiny windows on the upper level shuttered with elaborate carved cedar panels. These are the students' rooms.

This is not only a mederasa but a complete mosque as well. The walls rise high to a roof which allows light to fall in and they are highly carved in marbles and decorated with elaborate mosaic patterns. In Islam it is forbidden to use figures as decoration so there are no human images, animals or even plants. The marble is carved with the scripture in highly stylized calligraphy, some of it Kufic which is  extremely complex and difficult to accomplish especially in stone.

These walls are nearly a thousand years old. Idris explains the colors used in the mosaic: green is the color of Islam representing Islam rising out of the dry desert as a symbol of growth. Blue is the color of the imperial city of Fez. Yellow signifies that man comes from dust and returns to it - dust from dust. Black represents the Shia and white the Sunni, but also signifies the darkness before Islam and the enlightenment that followed.

The five pointed star pattern which occurs in the mosaics over and over stands for the five pillars of Islam - beliefs, daily prayer, giving to the poor, fasting and pilgrimage.

Our "official" guide Idris

It is breath taking to stand in this spiritual space and the simplicity yet complexity of Islamic theology is very moving. We also peak into the mausoleum for Zawiya Moulay Idriss II who was the founder of the city and really of the basic infrastructure upon which modern Morocco is based. We watch people slip their shoes off, light a candle and go to pay their respects.

We also looked into the Kairaouine Mosque and University with its wide open courtyard all in white and central fountain with students washing their feet.

It is claims to be the oldest University in the world found around 900 by Tunisian refugees, surpassed only by Al-Azhar in Cairo as place of Muslim learning according to The Lonely Planet.

We walk down underneath the street to see the fires being stoked for the hammam (public bath) above.

We stop in to a baker to see him backing flats breads in similar round clay stone oven. Idris says this is for lazy women who don't want to bake their own bread! We are each hand some bread warm from the oven to try. Incredibly delicious.

Idris takes us through the food market: goat head, sardines and piles of silver fish, a giant mountain of huge strawberries, oranges everywhere and in great carts, sweets wrapped up n cellophane unlike the Rabat medina where they are left out and attract flies.

From here Idris says, "that was the fancy market and he turns down another lane, more narrow, less clean and the souks are very humble. This is where the everyday people shop.  Then he says, "we are passing into a very crowded part of the market, watch your bags.". We can barely move through it is single file and even then it is a squeeze. Numerous souks filled with sneakers and plastic shoes, many have Polo logos or, Nike or Chanel logos. Idris tells us that the medina is very affected by the influx of cheap products from China. These threaten the local artisans' economy. Rabat medina is more filled with these products.

Then the market opens out into a wider area filled with souks that have elegant djellaba and fez and sashes made with gold thread. Fancy cushions and ribbons and embroidered baboush. Idris explains that this is all for wedding parties and that there are women who will put a whole package together like a wedding planner. I ask about if this includes food and he says, "No this only for the bride!"

Bridal Shops

The next stop Idris has on our itinerary is a Caravanserai or Camel Market - traditionally where the merchants traveling in from the desert by camel ride with their wares would unload their goods, weigh them and spend the night before heading back for the long trek home.   No longer used for this purpose, the Caravanserai currently are often used for storage of the influx of good from China and elsewhere, but it seems the old traditional weights are still put to good use.

Caravanserai

weights

Abandoned inn for the Caravanserai

One can still imagine the courtyard filled with camels braying and men in long robes and turbans negotiating business - straight out of Indiana Jones or Lawrence of Arabia.

Idris takes us into a pottery shop next and says we can go see the factory if we like. Fez is known for its blue and white patterned pots and dishes. All five of us suddenly go into shopping frenzy mode at all the beautiful patterns and shapes. I immediately locate at least five items that I want including a mini tajin. The others decide to hold off waiting for better deals, but I know for sure I might never find this shop and be back again so I buy a few things and know that Idris will get a commission which he deserves.   I have to run to catch up with the others lest I be left to fend for myself in the winding maze of the medina.

Next: The tannery, the rug shop, and the weavers...how many art therapists does it take to buy a rug?