Dedicated to Srini

Srini was my partner in crime who offered me a life time opportunity of going to Morocco. Thanks to him, a very avid and passionate fellow traveler, all things that I thought would be impossible just came by so easily, agreed upon in a shake of hands, planned w/i a week, tickets bought, hotels booked, transportation in between TBD and there, on the evening of 12/31/05, we boarded the Air France and headed to Marrakech, Morocco, first-time African experience for both of us. We remained friends, in case you wonder, and came back from our adventure together in one plane.

-- New Year Surprises
Ten, Nine, Eight, Seven,...Three, Two, One, Happy New Year!!! When the clock turns to 2006, our plane has just touched ground at CDG, Paris. To our surprise, we are stopped at the passport checkpoint and not allowed to transfer via MAD(Madrid) to Marrakech since neither of us have a Schengen visa. We do not know within Europe we need visa to connect flights. The nice French man at Air France is kind enough to find us the next available flight to connect directly into Morocco, which our Moroccan visas permit, but to Casablanca instead. After five hours of waiting in Casablanca airport and our increasing anxiety about the delayed flight, I have my first impression of Morocco... Time has a different definition here. Maybe over sipping mint tea, an hour is simply only ten minutes passing. When we arrive in the dark Marrakech finally, we are welcomed by the second surprise. Where is the luggage? I have my makeup, camera and gameboy in my backpack, Srini has his camera and binoculars in his. Our entire trip is packed in our checked-in luggage, lost.

We decide we are still going to make it a night and carry on our plan to go to Chez Ali, a local restaurant/show where we see horsemen performance and belly dances; we head to the market first before all stores close for the night to buy one day worth of things including fake Diesel sweater and other stuff to keep warm; we have decided even if we have to replace everything to last us through the entire trip, we would not skip Merzuga and the sunrise at Erg Chebbi in the Sahara...

Throughout the trip, there were many more surprises and complications, some more inconvenient than just losing our luggage, but we made it and I would not trade any part of it.

-- The colors of Marrakech
Marrakech is a puzzle made up of colorful pieces. Everywhere we go I see colors. The vibrant pointy traditional leather shoes, dry roses and herbs in tender shades of pink and green, the refreshing combination of bold yellow and blue in Jardin Majorelle, and even the salad dishes before our tajine dinner at Maison Bleue presented various assortment of colors.

-- Camel ride to Erg Chebbi

Erg Chebbi means the sand dunes of the man in bare foot. We take a camel ride around 3 PM towards to camp ground. By six, the sunset starts to change the colors of the sand. All over the dunes, there is a transition from dark copper red to light orange. Our caravan casts long skinny shadows of the camel legs into the valley of sand. To my happy surprise, camels don't smell at all. Through the blanket under me, I steal the warmth of my trustworthy ride since after sunset, it gets instantly chilly. I can feel the soft hair on my ankles when exposed between socks and pants. Feeling the bumpy sands and my camel's knees caving in whenever going downhill, I am thankful that I am not the one doing this hard work and amazed how our guides, little Mostafa and his grandpa can walk the whole time in sandals.