1st Day in Fes

The 1st day in Fes has been rather interesting and a little intimidating. 

Arriving in Fes just before night fall, I made my way to the hostel first via an airport bus, before switching to a taxi.  Unfortunately, the taxi driver seemed to have stopped me at a different location from where I needed to be dropped off, and I found myself lost in the narrow streets of the Medina.  It doesn’t make it easier when there doesn’t seem to be any street names in English.

I stopped a young couple to ask for directions, and we each continued with our way.  As I continued walking for about another 2 mins, the young guy who had helped me with directions, caught up with me and said he will show me the way instead.  So we walked and talked a little and found out that he was studying in one of the schools near the area. 

About 3 mins later, I arrived at the hostel and rang the bell.  Just before the door opened, the boy gave me his number and asked me to contact him if I needed to be shown around the town.  It was a surprising gesture, however I was not sure if this was done out of a gesture to show friendliness and welcoming foreigners to the country, or if there was an alternative motive behind such behaviour. 

The door soon opened and a British lady who was working in the hostel assisted me with my check-in.  Out of curiosity, I asked her advise about the behaviour of the boy earlier, and she shared with me a fair bit of the Moroccan culture and attitudes towards foreigners, and how they typically get close to foreigners because of their wealth.  She also shared that for locals to “hang out” with foreigners, the locals need to obtain a special license from the police, otherwise if they were caught unofficially with a foreigner, they may be fined or jailed.  Quite a harsh penalty!

After settling down, I quickly headed out to visit the town and also to get dinner.  While walking towards the main food square, a number of young Moroccan boys at different times tried to catch my attention by guessing if I was from Japan or Korea.  Correcting a few of them , I told them I was from Singapore, and just continued towards the restaurants where I settled down to order some typical Moroccan meal. 

A couple hours later, I started walking back to the hostel and was shock when quite a few people tried to catch my attention with similar opening lines such as “From Singapore yes? I spoke to you just now, remember?”.  The thing is I had never met some of them before, and I felt unsafe to reveal any more personal information, and made it a point to be more careful on what I say moving forward.

When I returned to the hostel, the owner of the hostel has upgraded me from a 4-bed dorm room on the ground floor to a private suite on the top floor.  Unfortunately there was a problem with the lock and I soon found myself locked in. 

Shouting for help, one of the staff climbed over the window and walked along the ledge, 3-storey high, to get into my room, and tried to open the door from the inside.  Still not being able to unlock the door, another staff ended up having to bang the door down from the outside, and I was moved to another private suite on the same floor. 

What a drama!