“We’ll Always Have Paris”: Casablanca, Morocco, November 19, 2023

I was trying to use a line from Casablanca in my title, and that’s all I could come up with on short notice. And we were just in Paris, so it kind of works. The movie Casablanca wasn’t even filmed in Casablanca. It was filmed in 1942 on the Warner Brothers set in Burbank, California with some scenes shot at the Van Nuys Airport. According to Husain, our tour guide for today, there is a popular restaurant here called Rick’s Casablanca, which was opened by an American on March 1, 2004. The place was designed to exactly replicate the bar made famous by the movie. Well, actually to replicate the bar made famous on the famous movie set, or something like that.

Casablanca is the largest city in Morocco with a population of about 4 million people, so it would take more than the one day we had to spend here to get a real feel for it. It’s definitely a multicultural city, with the children learning Arabic, French, Berber and English. When we lived in South Carolina we had a friend from Morocco, and he spoke Arabic, French and English. Not sure about Berber. We certainly don’t teach languages on that level in the US.

One of things we saw today was the Hassan II Mosque, which is the largest functioning mosque in Africa and is the 14th largest in the world. The minaret is 60 stories high. To give you an idea of the scale of the mosque, the prayer hall can accommodate 25,000 people, with a possibility of 85,000 being outside on the grounds. So, needless to say, it’s quite large.

We also walked through the Medina, or old town, near the port. The Medina is essentially a large bazaar, where you can buy spices, leather goods, shoes, linen, fish, seafood, vegetables, flowers and so forth.

Next up on our whirlwind tour was the Royal Palace of Casablanca, which was built in the 1920’s and is the main residence of the King of Morocco, Mohammed VI. A weird thing happened in front of the palace. There were several guards with different types of uniforms at the entrance and on the grounds, but the one who seemed to be in charge was a large, imposing man in a black uniform with red trim and a red beret. I looked it up, and I think he was a member of the Royal Guard, because a red beret is part of their uniform. (We were instructed to not take pictures of them, and believe me, I would have been scared to try it). So, Husain was rambling on about the architecture, etc. when the guard yelled at him something mean sounding in Arabic. Then he came up to Husain and Alef (Husain’s sidekick) and a loud argument ensued. Eventually, we found out that he simply wanted us to move along so other people could enter the courtyard. For a minute there, I thought someone was going to be thrown into the royal jail.

I know it sounds both strange and ironic, but our tour guide, Husain, was blind. His young assistant, Alif, led him around and told him when there was a step, a hole, etc. So, each time Alif gave Husain instructions, he would repeat them to us as in, watch out for that step, be careful of that hole, there’s a bump right here. It sounds kind of annoying, but it was really rather sweet to see the good care Alif took of Husain.

Several of our female fellow travelers asked Husain some pressing questions about how Muslim women are treated in Morocco and he seemed a little bit defensive about the subject. He mentioned that women are not allowed to sit outside at cafes and when one woman questioned that, he said they did not like to sit outside anyway. Also, he said that although polygamy in Morocco is still legal, it is very uncommon due to restrictions that were introduced by the government in 2004 that mandated financial qualifications a husband must meet in order to marry a second wife. Now a husband must have written permission from his current wife before marrying a second wife and be able to provide proper household and financial support for both wives and the children of both wives. Then Husain declared proudly that he has only one wife and three children, unlike his father. Some things run deep.

Last night when we were going through the Strait of Gibraltar, Doug was out on the deck and said, “Ann, come look! It’s the Rock of Gibraltar!” So, I raced out there to look and cracked my knee on the low wood-like table. But, don’t worry. I didn’t get too upset. I was a like the rock of Gibraltar.