The Imam and I

It's Saturday morning in Casablanca, Morocco. 4:30 am local time.  The city is quiet as you would expect any city to be at this time, except for the lonely, haunting voice of the Imam, calling faithful Muslims to prayer.  Unfortunately for me, this is the first good sleep I've had in three days, but that's on par with the kharma of this adventure so far.  The "highlights":

Great flights from the US on American and Iberia Airlines into Madrid.  Unfortunately, the agent in SFO that checked our bags did not check them all the way to Casablanca.  We had to enter Spain in m\Madrid, claim our luggage, and go back through immigration and security.  The Madrid airport was apparently designed by Escher, it is a labrynth of escalators and elevators that raise and lower people for no apparent reason.  Maybe the mayor has a brother in the elevator business.

The flight to Casablanca was fine also.  The region is experiencing some heavy duty thunderstorns, and the thunderheads above the cloud base were spectacular.  Fortunately we left the rain in Spain when we got on the plane (hey, its 4:30 am people, cut me some slack).

Dave's luggage is lost.  I'm sure they will find it but I think its back in Madrid.  EU security was tight yesterday because of the pope's visit to England.  Sevaral people missed the flight to Casa, and so security threw a bunch of bags off the plane.  I think Dave's got caught up in the fracas.

We arrive in Casa around 10:30am local time.  I quicky made aware that this was the end of Ramadan, and muslims who had been in Mecca were returning from their pilgrimage.  Baggage claim was chaotic and symphonic at the same time, a mixture of north African cultures polietly yet insistently moving thier belongings around on poorly maintained luggage carts.

Taxi!

"We need space for 5", I said.  "Sorry, no parlo Francais"

"OK come on", he said.  We were shuffled over to a 1970's vintage Mercedes Benz sedan with four-on-the-floor.  A crowd of guys gathered around and shoved a mass of five fat guys into one car.  Mike was almost sitting on the gear shift.  Off we went like teenagers after the football game.

The cabbie, after playing 12 kilometers of Muslim chants, dropped us off at the Hotel de Paris.  Sounds good, thank you, please let me out of the car.  Unfortunately for us, we wanted the Hotel PRINCE de Paris, which is another hotel a few blocks away.  Fortunately for us, a local picked up on our confusion and helped us find the proper hotel.  Shukran, baksheesh.

The hotel PRINCE de Paris had our reservation.  Unfortunately for us, they were full and had transferred us to another hotel a few blocks away.  Uor luggae was piled onto a luggage cart and we were led up one street and down the other (in the street mind you, luggage carts roll better in the streets than on the sidewalks).  The guys were lagging way behind the bellman, who walked at a spry pace up to the Ramada, a nice comfortable hotel if a little long in the tooth.  Oh, and "The PRINCE" wants us to return tonight instead of staying here for both nights...

I ain't seen nothing yet.  No, really.  All I've done so far is move and sleep.  Today we see the sights of Casa, and tomorrow we are off to Marrakech on the famous "Marrakech express".

The prayers are over.  Car horns anre honking all around the city.  Casablanca perpares for the light of another day.