Am I in Spain?

I could’ve sworn I was back in Zaragoza as my Fessi host mother served my roommate and I tortilla de patatas, complete with caramelized onion and a heavy dose of salt. But the similarities between Spain and Morocco don’t end with the eggs and potatoes: the patios, plasterwork, and tiling are incredibly impressive and breathtakingly beautiful, but I have seen them before, in Spain. The minarets look just like the steeples of many Iberian churches, which makes sense as many were reappropriated mosques. The clothing styles of the young people are the same, except with longer sleeves and pants, and the style of the grandmothers is the same as well: pastel robes and a lopsided, but surprisingly fast, walk. The camels’ heads hanging in the souk stare out of empty eyes just as hauntingly as the pigs’ in Zaragoza’s mercado, and “indoor voices” are just as loud on both sides of the straight.

Obviously there is one huge difference: the language. After a year and a half of studying fusha (foos-ha), Modern Standard Arabic, I can communicate quite a few things in perfect grammar and limited vocabulary. However, the Moroccan dialect, or darija, is incredibly different. We had our first darija class today, and learned some basic introductions. Smeetee Amanda. Schnu smeetek? means “My name is Amanda. What’s your name?” in Moroccan dialect, whereas the same sentences in Modern Standard are Ismee Amanda. Ma ismutek? Many nouns are the same, for example, the word for milk. My host brother, who speaks fluent English thanks to participating in many activities at the American Language Center in Fez, stopped for milk while walking my roommate and I home from his friend’s birthday party (which we also got to attend – fantastic cake!). “You will find this strange,” he said as he stepped towards the milk stall. Two old men sat in jelabas, the heavy woolen hooded robes that are the traditional outfit for both men and women in Morocco, in front of five aluminum milk jugs, the large, old-fashioned kind. Our host brother said the magic darija words and one of the men pulled out a bag, a funnel, and a ladle, and opened one of the jugs. He scooped fresh milk into the plastic bag, tying it off at the top and handing it to my host brother. We were then on our way.

Our day started with an early alarm at the riad, or traditional guest house, where we were staying. The riad was originally a personal home for an extended family. Three floors of generously sized rooms with couches and bathrooms surrounded a large open courtyard, with gorgeous plasterwork and tiling. Our room’s stained-glass door opened into an area of low couches, perfect for reading our homework before bed. The dinner on Sunday night, served on elegant plates in the patio and accompanied by live music, was phenomenal. Myself and the two other vegetarians (one of whom is my roommate here in Fez, and who I know from my Arabic class back at the University of Chicago) had our own table, since Moroccan dining is based around sharing from communal platters. First came a delicious cilantro-spiced soup, with plenty of round Moroccan bread as well as thick fig-orange marmalade and shubakiya, a delicious sweet made with sesame and honey. Moroccan cuisine, as far as I can tell, is perfect for those of us with a sweet tooth, since most everything savory is accompanied by something sweet! The soup was hot, a welcome change from the outdoor temperature, which had dropped to about 40* but felt colder since the riad, like most Moroccan buildings, has no heat besides small space heaters. The flavors of the vegetables were fresh and the cilantro shined – I happily consumed my entire bowl, along with a generous number of the sweet and nutty shubakiya.

Our bowls were cleared and a veritable feast of salads came to the table: baba ghanoush, a sour spinach dish, sweet and cinnamony pumpkin laced with plump raisins, a dip of eggplant that had been smoked for hours to smooth and tasty perfection, lightly pickled beets, candied bitter orange rinds with cinnamon, and more. Armed with a basket replenished with more fresh bread, I set about trying everything. Although my eyes and taste buds tried to convince my stomach to finish every plate, the three of us only made a small dent in most of the platters, since the presence of yet another plate underneath this course’s foretold of more food.

And more food did come: a vegetarian cous cous, which although delicious lacked flavor in comparison to the vast array of salads in the mezze course. And even after the cous cous had been cleared – most of it still on the platter since our stomachs protested against another bite – we had still not finished. A generous basket of fruit was placed in front of us, shiny green leaves still attached to the oranges. I reached into the cornucopia and selected an orange, since it is currently citrus season. Anyone who knows me extremely well will tell you that I despise peeling oranges. The pith ends up staining my hands a strange white, and I feel the need to wash them for the rest of the day. I now, however, stand corrected: I hate peeling American oranges. Peeling this orange, on the other hand, was as easy as unwrapping a piece of candy – and the orange inside tasted just as sweet. Although I had long ago passed the point of comfortably full, I found myself reaching for a clementine as well. Earlier that day, on our guided tour through the souk in the old medina (the outdoor marketplace in the oldest part of Fez), numerous orange and clementine vendors tried to hawk us their produce, and the image of the wire carts filled with bright orange fruit and perky green leaves inspired my arm to reach out and grab a clementine. It was, I assure you, well worth it.

This morning, we left the riad after a delicious breakfast of fried pancakes and jam and made our way through the serpentine streets to the center for Arabic language studies where our classes are hosted during our stay in Fez. The morning lecture passed quickly, although the classroom was freezing; hopefully the heater will be functioning tomorrow! After the lecture we met our Fessi host families. My roommate’s and my names were called and a jolly woman in a jellaba and headscarf greeted us with kisses on the cheek. Labbas? she asked, and we replied Labbas, Moroccan Arabic for “How are you?” and “Well, thank you.” A lanky young man then appeared from the crowd to shake our hands and introduce himself, in his almost accent-less English, as our host brother, who also happens to be the same age as us. We followed him back through the maze of narrow streets to the riad to fetch our luggage, and then rolled it to our house, at the end of a particularly skinny street about 4 minutes from the classroom center. After climbing three flights of stairs we walked into our temporary home, where we were greeted by our two younger sisters, ages 7 and 10. “Greeted” is perhaps a misleading verb – they met our eyes, giggled, and returned to their private game. During lunch – the aforementioned tortilla de patatas, perfectly salty and sweet from the onions, as well as potatoes with an addictive spicy tomato sauce (also reminiscent of Spain’s patatas bravas) and fresh juicy cucumbers – I tried to speak with the girls, but they reacted to my broken and overly formal Arabic with more giggles and scampered off to their private make-believe.

Our afternoon dirija class, also two hours long, passed quickly since we were eager to pick up the essential tools of communication. Not that we need them with young people: at our host brother’s friend’s birthday party, everyone spoke to us in English. And good English at that. “Moroccans are very talented,” my host brother explained, as he introduced each friend along with the activity he knows them from: choir, photography club, performance art, or just a shared love of Café Clock, the location of the party. “It is Fez’s most famous café,” he assured us as we passed a vendor with over 15 kinds of dates, a counter lined with goats’ heads, and a cart with freshly roasted nuts on the way there.

We managed to resist all the delicious street food in anticipation of a home-cooked dinner. Once again, a hot soup warmed our chilled bodies and was perfectly flavoured with fresh herbs and vegetables. I was elated when our host mother brought out a plate of shubakiya, which she had made herself. “I want to learn how to cook everything Moroccan,” I told her. Luckily she understands fusha perfectly fine, although I can’t always understand her replies! A plate of dates completed the meal, and their sweet stickiness lingered on my tongue as I went back to my history reading. In fact, the strong sesame flavour of the shubakiya is still there too even now as I go to bed.