El Jadida

Repeat after me:

I will never again take more than the recommended dosage of Moroccan cough medicine in a silly and quite ridiculous attempt to sleep through an entire ten hour bus journey.

Nightmares and fitful sleep. I think that the lady next to me thought I was crazy. I was moving so much trying to get comfortable. It was even more difficult than it usually is.

I got a bit teary eyed yesterday after the bus attendant handed me back my ticket. I knew that I was really leaving Errachidia, a place that has become very important to me. I know that I will return to see all the wonderful people that I met there, but it was sad nonetheless.

I arrived in Casablanca this morning at seven am, bleary eyed and still fuzzy and woozy. I gave all the taxi drivers and touts dirty looks and walked to the side to sit and clear my head. I had forgotten what a big city was like. One week of slow living and the cars were already too much for me.

I sat down just in time to get a perfect view of a large woman chasing a skinny man that had apparently snatched her pocketbook. I tightened the straps on my backpack and guitar and caught a cab. To hell with Casablanca, I wasn't ready for so much.

I got the Eight fifteen train to El Jadida and within two hours was lying in bed in a nice hotel. Oddly enough, the hotel has a television, which is not so common here. I get three channels, and one of them this morning was showing a terrible American film that I just saw a few months ago.

I drank my third espresso of the day and then took a nap for a few hours. When I woke up, I was still blurry, but coherent enough to take a walk and get a view of the city and take a dip in the ocean. This is a nice place, a small city on the water about an hour and a half south of Casablanca. There is a pleasant beach; although the lifeguards are truly a pain in the ass and seem to only let people swim in certain very tightly packed areas. It is quite weird and really annoying to hear them blow the whistles all the time.

I plan to call this guy at the University today and set up an appointment to meet with him tomorrow. I could see myself living here. I hope that it works out.

Still having problems getting pictures up. Hopefully I will get some up soon.