March 22nd, 2016
Our second day in Marrakech was also pretty wet. We met our guide, Akmed in the lobby of the hotel. He had a large taxi waiting for us and we set off for our tour of the Medina or the old city. It was really exciting walking through the souks and wondering if we would ever be able to find out way back if we accidentally got separated from our guide.
First Akmed took us to a huge cooperative where they sold all different kinds of arts and crafts. It was amazing, so many interesting things to look at, just like stumbling into a Cave of Wonders. I should have been more cautious, as it was the first shop we visited in the medina, but it's so difficult to not buy something. They never tell you a price, they just ask you what you like and then they quote you a really inflated amount for everything together. Then the bargaining begins, I wanted to buy a Moroccan tea set and a few cushion covers. I think the first quote was 250€. I was shocked because I thought it was pretty high. When I said no, the salesman wanted me to name my price. I said 80€. He said 225€, I said 100€, he said 200€, I said I didn't want it and was prepared to walk away. Finally he said 150€, but he would have to ask permission from the head boss. I think Bob was probably fed up with the whole bargaining process and told the man that it was fine. Of course when he took the stuff to the boss so we could pay, the boss didn't say a thing, but very quickly wrapped everything up before we could change our minds. So just like that, we spent 150€ in our very first shop!
Of course, I didn't learn my lesson and proceeded to pay too much for pretty much everything we bought that day, jewelry, tea, scarves and wooden boxes. Also on the recommendation of our guide we ended up eating lunch in an over priced restaurant. Oh well, it's all part of the experience and at least we are supporting the local economy. If there were no naive tourists, a lot of people would be out of work in Marrakech.
I hope that our guide was somehow profiting from our purchases too, because we only had to pay him 200 MAD (less than 20€) to take us around the entire morning. We enjoyed our tour so much, we hired him to take us around again the next day.
After lunch we ventured out on our own to see the monkeys and snake charmers in the Jemaa El-Fnaa square. We paid quite a lot of money to have our picture taken with some snakes, always best to negotiate the price before you let them wrap a snake around your neck.
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| walking into our first shop |
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| Amazing doors |
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| masks |
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| The narrow streets in the medina |
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| Berber woman processing the argan kernels |
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| learning about the benefit of Argan oil |
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| Touch Down! |
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| Cool treasure box |
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| Cool treasure chest |
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| Rainy day in the souks |
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| Akmed showing us some perfume bottles |
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| Young man showing us how to carve wood with his feet |
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| Same young man managed to sell us a wooden box |
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| Bargaining with the man in the jewelry store |
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| Cole with the geode |
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| The metalworks souk |
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| One of my favourite pictures, colourful lanterns |
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| learning about how they dye material |
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| Here is the scarf store where the shop keeper dressed up the kids and managed to sell me two scarves |
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| Rylan digging his new scarf |
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| Cool doorway |
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| trained monkeys in the Jemaa El-Fnaa square |
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| Everyone gets to wear a snake |
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| Dancing cobra |
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| Everyone gets to hold a monkey |
