The medina More *Tanger*! ¹. We drink more mint tea, hang around in bohemian coffee houses built in the tradition of Paris or Vienna. Claudia an me stop at every tape vendor’s stand and listen to the music. Sometimes we ask who is singing, and at the next stand we ask for some music by the same artist – the tape vendors like that, start to smile, play some tapes for us. We start haggling for the price. They want 15 Dirham, but Claudia saw one of them buy four tapes for 50 Dirham, so the haggling begins. It is not for the money – after all, 10 Dirham are about €1, it is a matter of pride.
Music The Moroccans expect it, they like it, and we like it, and it is an excellent way to get to know them, because soon the vendor’s friend appears, talks to me while Claudia haggles some more, then two girls appear and start flirting with the vendor while Claudia waits, then another friend appears, starts hitting on Claudia since he doesn’t notice me, until I start laughing and exchanging looks with the Moroccan girls, then the vendor notices what is going on and gives his friend a kick, who sees me, and blushes... All while the first friend tells me about his sister owning a travel agency and he’d like to meet us later, at 5pm, at the *Café de Paris* – to which I reply, “Perhaps, we don’t know yet” and says “Inshallah!” and grins, and I also say “Inshallah!” and we go on to the next shop... (Claudia manages to buy four tapes for 50 Dirham.) More alleys
Once, as we were sitting at the café accross the *Café de Paris*, police starts dribbling in, and suddenly nobody is allowed to cross the main road, and a few minutes later police on motorbikes and black limousines start driving by, and then the king himself, standing in his car and waving, the people also standing, waving, and applauding.
At the end of the day, we are still interested in buying tapes – we end up with 6 or 7 tapes that day... We take pictures with the vendor and promise to send him copies, but he tries to avoid writing down his address, and Claudia guesses that he can’t write in the first place and the Joel writes down his address, and while haggling a friend brings mint tea and it tastes good and it is getting dark and all the people here are friendly and smiling...
I love it.
