We got back from the airport at about the time my family was preparing for lunch. Which was very nice, since that had been much of what I'd been dreaming about for the last two or three days in Senegal. Cynthia's family had told her that when she got back, it would be Ramadan, so I was somewhat surprised but mostly delighted to find that wasn't the case.
The rest of the day was pretty quiet. I mostly read. My e-reader broke while I was in Senegal, and the only fiction books I had were in foreign languages. (Everyone else on the trip was in a similar position, only without the broken-e-reader part. I'd loaned Dubliners to Erika while we were boarding the plane for Senegal because she'd mentioned being out of reading material.) I had two fiction books waiting for me in Rabat (and Dubliners, once Erika finished it) and the library at the IES center once classes resumed. While in Senegal, I'd had to content myself with Le passe simple. I'd liked it a lot more when I was only reading 20 pages of it.
Dinner didn't come until 11:00. I was very close to asleep by then. I find it amazing that Ramadan will move the time of the evening up. (At one point in Senegal, we were trying to decide what time to meet for dinner. Nathan started to suggest 5:30, but then realized that wasn't really a valid suggestion for Moroccans. Nisrine confirmed that. “5:30? That's not dinner, that's lunch!”)
The next morning I woke up at 10:00. I took a shower (I'm not going to say that I missed that shower, but I do have a newfound appreciation for some aspects of it. Like no winged yarn-eaters, and plenty of hot water.)
I'd thought breakfast was awkward enough when it was just me eating across from two people who didn't really speak English or French. It's so much more awkward when it was me eating across from two people who couldn't eat, and still couldn't communicate for more than basic “How are you? Did you sleep well?” questions.
But mmmm. Bread roll, cheese (my earlier description of the cheese as “the kind they serve on airplanes,” while accurate physically, is a terrible indicator of taste. I tried to have some on the flights, but the bread was too dry and the cheese was terrible.
Lunch was a lot like the lunches I got packed for school. Which makes sense- there's no point preparing an entire Tajine for one person. Specifically, lunch was the philo-like-dough-wrapepd chicken (in two shapes: triangle and circular) and the potato and onion dish. And that's how I learned that the potato dish was supposed to be served cold. (Nathan: “It's potato salad. Why would it be served warm?” Me: “It's potatoes and onions. That could easily be supposed to be warm.”)
I finished lunch and started to head to the beach. Nathan hadn't texted me back, so, just in case, I checked Sidi Fata. Megan was standing there alone. I joined her. “No one else is here yet?”
Nathan had shown up, relayed my expeced-lateness to Megan, and then gone back to change. A few minutes later, Natasha and Cynthia would text that they were running late, so should we just meet up at Casbah? We agreed, and when Nathan showed up we all went to the Casbah, and then the beach.
The beach was much less crowded than it had been the last time because it was Ramadan, and Muslims aren't allowed to swim. And without that option, it becomes a lot less fun. (Nathan's host brother: “I'd go, but it's hot.”) And dehydration becomes an issue then. As Natasha pointed out, this meant that we were swimming with sinners. Or just non-Muslims, but the first sounded much more exciting.
There was one guy who kept staring at us. He was lying down, and had sunglasses on, so he could have almost passed it off as just sleeping. But no. You could clearly see his eyes over the sunglasses. He also moved his umbrella not just once, but twice. The second time, we reacted by moving our towels slightly farther away, and we decided that if anyone asked, Nathan was the husband of all of us. We could do that because we were Zoroastrian. (Cynthia: “Does Zoroastrianism actually allow polygamy?” Natasha: “No, but I don't expect them to know that.”)
At one point, he rather conspicuously started doing push-ups. “Observe the male mating dance,” Megan commented. (Someone else closer to the ocean later dropped and did some push-ups. He had terrible form, and we joked about going over to correct him.)
I was also worried about the young children. One of them was pouring sand around (not making a sand castle. Even when the beach was full of Muslims and non-sinners, I hadn't seen anyone making a sand castle.) while two young men were kicking a ball around. The ball never came that close to hitting the little boy (though I was worried) but one of the men almost kicked him in the head.
Apart from those two things, though, the beach seemed much the same as the week before, or as any other beach. I think there was a higher concentration of life guards than normal, and I wondered if some of them were Muslims who were keeping Ramadan. If they only went into the water if someone was drowning, it would probably be religiously acceptable. The dehydration would still be an issue, but there's nothing against just sitting on a sandy area for a decent amount of time.
The beach has a a long stone walkway. We went down it to get a “better view.” (The view of the ocean wasn't that much different than before.) Motorcycles were also there, of course, because this is Rabat, and the only places I have never seen motorcycles is physically inside or on top of a building.
The walkway was surrounded by giant stone blocks. Blocks that were essentially shaped like puzzle pieces, only ever single one had the same semicircle carved out of it. Directly next to the walkway, they were laid there pretty evenly., placed together in just such a way that if you fell down the circle (and you could,because it was big enough to fit a person) you would not be getting out again.
Outside of the hole-infested-but-otherwise-flat raised walkway, the stone blocks were thrown together at diagonal angles. We couldn't decide if they'd been deliberately placed that way, or just kind of ended up like that. It did stop waves from splashing too much, but it wasn't that visually appealing.
“Is this like modern art?” Megan asked. “Or is a disaster area? I can't tell. When we'd given up on trying to answer that question, we went home.
