Tangier, Part One

          We disembarked from our petit taxi in Grand Socco, and tried to figure out which street was Rue d’Italie. No matter what Moroccan city you’re in, locating yourself on a map is difficult. In Tangier, the situation is complicated by the sheer number of names referring to each street and square. Grand Socco, for example, was renamed Plaza/Place/SaaHa 9 de Abril, since everything that is labeled in Tangier is labeled in Spanish, French, and Arabic (and occasionally English too). The multilingualism is a vestige of Tangier’s time as an International Zone. During French colonization of central and southern Morocco and Spanish occupation of northern Morocco, the city was exempted from both foreign rulers and placed in the hands of the West at large – a committee manned by representatives from Spain, France, the United States, and (until the first World War) Germany. The architecture serves as evidence for the multicultural influence, if the place names weren’t enough. Art deco facades pepper even the medina, and traditional stained-glass and punctured-aluminum lanterns hang over intricate iron-wrought balconies. But the most beautiful part of Tangier was there before even the Arab army in 707: the sun shining in a perfect blue sky over the strait of Gibraltar, with fuzzy purple Spain in the distance and a far-away Moroccan slope filled with white rectangular abodes off to the right. It’s the same view that drew the Berbers, Phoenicians, Romans, Arabs, French, Portuguese, Spanish, the American beat writers, and now finally me.

            Back to Grand Socco, we walked under a horseshoe archway away from a particularly persistent false guide and discovered we were on the right street. “Our riad should be right up here on the right,” I said as we neared a steep hill where the sidewalks turned to steps. Luckily we saw it right at the base of the incline, although climbing it wouldn’t be difficult – we’d packed light with only backpacks for our one-night stay in the coastal city.

            The hotel, Dar el Kasbah, was charming and comfortable and modern. The front desk attendants spoke Spanish, the second language of many people in northern Morocco, so I happily collected our keys and we went up to our rooms. I usually prefer to stay in hostels when travelling short-term, since they are clean enough, great social hubs, and so wonderfully cheap. However, our trip was very last-minute, so we had to “settle” for an upgrade. The rooms were still marvelously inexpensive – the five of us had two doubles and a single and the bill came to about thirty dollars per person. The thick comforters and heavy knit blankets, plus the hot showers and big fluffy towels, made us forget we were travelling in the cold off-season.

            Our train got in around 1:30, so our first order of business after dropping our backpacks at the riad was finding somewhere for lunch. We found ourselves in Petit Socco, the small square in the old medina where the less-ritzy famous figures who frequented Tangier in the early and mid-20^th centuries drank mint tea and smoked local marijuana. Choosing to forsake both of those, we instead climbed to the very low-ceiled second story of a cheap café/restaurant overlooking the square. Perusing the menu, we decided what we wanted and signaled the waiter. “Couscous with chicken,” my friend ordered, since it was Friday and couscous is a Friday tradition. “I’m sorry, we don’t have that,” the waiter told us apologetically in Spanish. Putting a positive spin on the situation, he happily announced that they had sandwiches. “Salchicha sandwiches, vegetarian sandwiches, chicken sandwiches,” he listed. Realizing that the menu was of little help, we ordered what we could and waited for the cooks to surprise us.

            I was extremely pleasantly surprised by my sandwich: tomato, olives, cheese, and peppers stuffed into a baguette with spicy harissa on the side and freshly fried thick-cut potatoes. It was fresh, simple, and unexpectedly delicious. I’d been worried by the lack of décor, the lack of customers, and the lack of a menu, but the-café-whose-name-I-never-really-knew delivered.

            Our post-lunch destination was the American Legation, a United States owned building in Tangier’s medina and the only national historic landmark not in the U.S. Morocco and the states have a long relationship: the Sultan was the first head-of-state to recognize America as an independent nation, and the U.S.’s first diplomats were sent to Tangier. The Legation building is now a museum and a research center. The labyrinthine rooms, outfitted with classy upholstered furniture, display old and contemporary artwork depicting Moroccan markets and the “Barbary peoples”; letters between George Washington, the Sultan, and diplomats; antique maps where north is often south; and random collections of memorabilia of famous Americans who spent time in Tangier, such as author Paul Bowles. After learning a great deal about the United States’ long relationship with Morocco, we were about to leave when a man who looked like he knew what he was doing asked if we were students. We explained that we were, and he replied that he was the director of the Legation and insisted we come see the research library before we left. “It’s usually not open to the public,” he told us, “but since you are students you just have to see it!”

            Although the rooms are relatively new and lacking much architectural interest, we were treated to wonderful tidbits of history and news about the Legation and its sisters: TALIM and a literacy program for Moroccan women. The director lamented some cut funds but was proud of the impressive programs the organization still had to offer, as well as the vast resources, the extent of which are still unknown. My friend, a geography major, asked about the center’s maps collection, and the director told us that in a room upstairs were at least dozens of old maps, uncatalogued and disorganized. “We don’t even know the extent of our resources here,” he said with an excited gleam in his eye. The enthusiasm was catching, and we left on a historian’s high to explore the rest of the city. After a quick stop at the Jewish cemetery (the Hebrew inscriptions on the gravestones were the fourth alphabet we’d seen in one day, in addition to the Arabic, Latin, and Berber scripts) and the Instituto Torin, a disarrayed and under-labeled display of 19^th and 20^th century photos, we went in search of that famous view of the strait that has drawn visitors to Tangier for centuries.