The Genie's Lantern

As anyone who visits Morocco will learn, appearances can hide many things. Colourful, opulent guesthouses nestle behind wooden doors and darkened doorways hide glowing lanterns and fabrics in bold, brilliant colours. By our sixth day in Morocco, I had learned to wait to see the genie before I judged its lantern.

Our final day in Morocco was no exception. Myself and two friends arrived exhausted and lost in Rahbat, a city I found disappointingly normal, with no plans of where we would sleep that evening. We found Medina Surfing Association with the night nipping at our heels.

The hostel was empty, except for three young men who seemed both pleased and slightly offended by our haggard appearance. The hostel walls, that stretched open to the sky, were a intricate mosaic of white and blue tiles. Lovingly framed and placed, surfing posters dotted the building, and it was explained that one of our host’s uncle was a professional surfer, and owned the hostel.

In the morning, we stuffed ourselves on chocolate pastries and peppermint tea, until our hosts threw wetsuits down on the table. They asked if we were waiting for the waves to come to us.

The dark wetsuits absorbed sun as we walked through the twisting, stone paths in the medina, eventually cresting a hill.

On our train to Rahbat, we had meet an American woman who spoke of a remarkable sight of surfers walking through a cemetery on their way to the ocean. I was intrigued, but somehow I doubted it could have been as odd as she claimed.

And yet, there I was. The gravestones stretched over a hill that rose away from the ocean. I imagined if the ocean began to swell, the dead would rise in return to protect the living, building a dam out of their carved, sun-dried tombstones. We padded through in our flip-flops, and I said a silent thank you to the resting masses.

The ocean’s salt made my eyes blur, and I slipped off my board into the cold water more times than I could count. Our instructor laughed often and taught us how to say ‘wave’ in Arabic. I didn’t realize how sore I was until we collapsed at the hostel a few hours later.

If you are going to Rahbat, skip the city life. Skip the modernity and clubs.

Morocco is famous for its deserts, but don’t forget the ocean. Find the surfers who walk through the dead, befriend them, and their life of opposites. This is sport of the young in an ancient city, who pass through the dead every day to their dreams.