HARD LANDING!

Well this isn't literally about a Hard Landing although coming into Lisbon was a bit of a white-knuckler. It was one of those landings where the you would swear that the wingtips were going to graze the runway. There was a bit of yaw too for added difficulty points. Puckering of certain nether regions, the stomach clenches, silent prayers go out, some deep breaths to unfurrow the brow - but the pilots stuck it and all was well. The plane lands quite a ways distant from the airport in Lisbon so one climbs onto a bus and is brought about half a kilometer into the terminal. It had been a restless flight so at that point we had been up about 24 hours. We had a 3-hour layover over in Lisbon and then a connecting flight to Marrakesh.

   700 fellow cattle

The real hard landing really occurred when we landed in Marrakesh and discovered that although we were happily together our bags were still back in Lisbon which was going to present us with a series of challenges. Baggage support staff stop working at 4:00 p.m. in Marrakesh so efforts to retrieve the baggage were frustrated by a series of misunderstandings and mischances: Sophie's e-sim card wasn't working and it was proving to be difficult to communicate with the airport without a telephone. (TAP = 0 STARS). Although the staff at the Riad were extremely helpful we really didn't make any progress the first day and that ramped up the old anxiety-ometer. I had packed underwear, socks, a shirt and medicine in my backpack so I was okay but Sophie was basically stuck with what she wore on her back and a change of underwear. We had no idea if or when we were ever going to see our luggage. On the third day, on a roll of the dice I took a taxi back out to the airport and indeed our baggage was there even though we hadn't received notice from the claims person that it had arrived.

There's really no way of describing the kind of frustration and stress one feels when traveling in a country where communication is difficult or impossible. Add to that about 36 hours of being awake - which is fairly disorienting for the ancient pumpkin I carry on my shoulders. Did I weep a little? Perhaps. Thank goodness the staff at the Riad were so cooperative and proactive. Tout va bien now. The food, the exotic sights and sounds excite the senses. One of my great joys when I'm traveling is that I can drink coffee. For whatever reason my stomach can readily handle the extra caffeine coffee provides. I truly enjoy the deep, rich flavor of coffee and Moroccan coffee is particularly delicious. Yum!

Speaking of communicating; I am facing some challenges here. I've been trying to learn Spanish for the past few years but a month or so ago I tried to dive back into French to prepare myself for Morocco. Somehow my idiomatic filing systems have become corrupted. I suspect there was a flood in the cranial attic that I hadn't noticed. My languages have all become intermingled. I might start a sentence in French and then move on to Spanish and conclude in English, (throw in a couple of inshallah and salaam alechem, ouch!). It does provoke some interesting facial expressions from the people I talk to but they roll with it. (Does this sound like Marj?). Tourism literature suggests that French is the lingua franca but the younger citizens of Morocco are equally conversant in English and in fact speak less French than English I am told. In any case I've had some lovely (fractured) conversations with taxi drivers and shop owners, vendors and hotel staff. In general we have found the people to be extremely polite, kind and helpful. There is a bit of contrast on the commerce side of things and dealing with aggressive shop owners and leather tanners has been a less agreeable experience. More on that later.

.  19th and 20th century transportation

.   Spice emporium