Monday, February 23, 2009

Chefchaoen, Some Bargaining, Sufis and Ancestors


Our last day started lazily, since we had until noon to visit the town, and could therefore wake up when we wished. I woke up at 8:30, ate breakfast, and headed to the museum. It was a really simple museum inside an old Kasbah, but the view from the top was amazing and the garden inside was gorgeous. The actual museum only had some traditional clothing and instruments, but it made a nice addition to the beautiful Kasbah. Outside we went to the shops, which unlike other Moroccan cities sold woolen goods and straw goods (I bargained for a straw bowl for my family). After wondering around a bit we were off again to Ouazzane. In Ouazzane we went to the house of Farah, the organizer of the CCCL (the place I'm studying). There, after a wonderful meal, we got to see an olive press in action. It was especially awesome since we had seen part of the olive press in the ruins of Volubilis the day before. Farah told us a bit about Sufism. Ouazzane has 8 shrines to local saints, and a Sufi brotherhood. In the olden days, within the walls of the Sufi brotherhood one could seek asylum and work for one's keep. Ouazzane had been marginalized by the monarchy, because the monarchy saw the descendants of the saints as a possible opposing power. Farah herself had links to the Ouazzane saints, her great great grandfather was one of them who had moved to Tangier and married an English woman in the 19th century. The stories she told of her grandmother (who had still considered herself "blessed") were very interesting. After a visit to the saint's shrine and the place of the brotherhood, we boarded the bus for the last time and went back to Rabat. The excursion was over, I was tired, but I had fallen in love with Morocco.

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