The Failures of Documentation

An inexcusable lack of updates from Morocco. If you follow this blog at all, you may have wondered, "Did he fall off the continent? Kidnapped by Berbers? Lost in some haze of a hash dream?"

No. The real answer to "Where have you been?" is probably just "Around." I don't know how to describe my lack of any creativity in the six weeks I've been in Morocco. I've had unprecedented access to the Internet (well, unprecedented for someone who's spent the last two years in rural, sub-Saharan Africa.) Perhaps one of the best explanations is my inability to find the time to write is this: for the previous six months, I've traveled in places where bedtime is around 8:30 pm. If you have a headlamp, that can get extended to about 9:30 or whenever you feel like you can't function solely by the light of an LED anymore. In Morocco, I've regularly been up until midnight or later. The biggest difference is Daylight Savings Time, which Moroccans hate and which, frankly, makes little sense in a Muslim country dominated by prayer calls attuned to the sun. Well, that and I've noticed that Moroccans don't really get going until about 9 in the morning. For someone who's used to getting up at 7, this leaves me with about two hours of boredom and wandering around deserted streets. (It just occurred to me that maybe I should use that time to write, and this thought has now destroyed my attempted apology regarding a lack of communication. Well...damn.)

I think I'll use the time I have today on the train to Tangier to pound out a couple of blog posts that I can hopefully post in the next few days. For those of you who know your geography, you know Tangier as the "Gateway to Africa." It sits just right across the Strait of Gibralter from Spain and has been known as a seedy, character-filled transit town for generations. Think of the cantina scene in Star Wars. Now replace Obi-Wan with a grizzled, heroine-addicted William S. Burroughs, Greedo with Paul Bowles, and the alien band with the Rolling Stones. Oh, and while we're at it, the bartender is Truman Capote. Why not. I haven't been there yet, but that just sounds fun.

And it's only by writing some of this out that memories come back to me from some of the other famous Moroccan cities I've visited already: Fes, Meknes, Rabat, and, of course, Marrakesh. I've been running around so much lately, as well as looking to a return to America in the next few months, that I haven't seen the places I've been. I don't mean I've been sleepwalking through these places. That's almost impossible to do when you're traveling by yourself and you have to manage all of your own meals and accomodation. But, the time has come for some serious reflection, which means finding a low-impact city and taking some time for myself in a cafe. Not sure if I'll be able to find that in Tangier. My bet is no. However, for now, I have a train to catch and pages and pages to write. Watch this space: there will be new mind-expanding entries here shortly. 'Til then.