Morocco A Go Go – Casablanca!

I can still picture your face, Jarrod, when I told you I was bound for Morocco. An expression similar to that of a weary parent who’s sighing “I’m not angry, just disappointed…” I promise the places you’d prefer I visit (eg. New Zealand, America…) are definitely on my list, but this time the lure of mint tea, medinas and mosques won out.

We start our trip in Casablanca. I arrive about 10pm, and the taxi trip from the airport to the hotel passes in a jet lagged haze of wide streets lined with closed roller doors, and clusters of men standing about on footpaths. It feels like I could be on the outskirts of any big city after dark. And the views from the hotel balcony in the morning are similarly non-descript. Thanks though, to the lovely crow who so aptly demonstrates that if you Put A Bird On It, almost any vista is improved 🙂

Room with a view. We just didn’t specify what we wanted to view…

A crow without his murder

I’m traveling around Morocco with Leanne, whom you might remember from South America? That, and the time where we pretty much sprinted face first down the side of a building? (See: Rappelling Triumph from January this year).

We’re booked on the Intrepid Morocco encompassed 18 day tour but we don’t meet our group till 6pm, so we decide to latch onto two fellow tourists, and head out to visit the main attraction in Casablanca – the Hassan II mosque. Our lovely new BFFs Kathryn and Jasmine a) have maps and b) have a innate excellent sense of direction. I am armed with neither of those things, and as though wanting to INVITE trouble I actually remark out loud to Leanne as we amble down the street “I’m just relishing not holding a map and being able to follow these guys, with absolutely no responsibility for navigation!” There may as well be an ominous crash of lightning at this point and superscript FAMOUS LAST WORDS.

Casablanca streets. We are about to see an awful lot of them.

We can’t all get into the one taxi because the petit taxis in Casablanca can only take a maximum of three passengers, so we split into two duos – Those With Maps in one cab and Those With No Maps in another. I briefly wonder whether this is the wisest arrangement, but when we say to our driver “Hassan Two Mosque?” he nods confidently so we climb in, fears allayed. We drive for a good ten minutes and don’t seem to be so much as sighting a minaret which is 210m tall. I start to feel vaguely uneasy. This isn’t helped when the driver turns to us, speaks rapidfire Moroccan Arabic, and gestures do we want him to go left or right? We gesture back in International Sign for We Don’t Fucking Know Do We? (a bewildered shrug) and repeat Hassan Mosque again, only this time with a slightly more hopeful inflection. He starts shouting at us at this point before angrily accelerating to continue driving, muttering and glaring intermittently in the rear vision mirror.

This cycle repeats a few more times. At one point I mime praying but this only seems to inflame things. The window winders have been removed from the back doors so we can’t even call out to adjacent vehicles for translation assistance. Eventually we stop at a red light and I contort myself to call desperately out of the front passenger window. We enlist the help of a lady who doesn’t speak English but manages to say the word Mosque so that our driver understands it. He yells some more at us but he understands now so we only have another mutually furious ten minutes in one another’s company before he deposits us at the Mosque. Our fare is four times what Kathryn and Jasmine paid. But even then it’s all of $6 Australian so you know, lessons learnt and cut your losses etc.

So! Onto the Hassan II mosque! Well worth the very minor drama that we endured to get there.

Finally! We found you!

It’s the largest mosque in Morocco, situated right on the Atlantic Ocean. Apparently there are occasionally people surfing alongside it but while we’re there it’s high tide with waves crashing pretty violently into the walls, so this precludes surfing unless you’re a surfer with a burning desire to die doing what you love. That is to say, splattering your brains and other vital organs against bricks.

Location!

The mosque sports the world tallest minaret (210m high) – which is terribly impressive and all, but does make it near impossible to get a shot of it that will fit within the constraints of an Instragram frame. Pout.

Nothing mini about this minaret

All out of superlatives!

Another bird with a penchant for timely photobombing

Coz I’m all about mosaics, bout mosaics….

You can only go inside the mosque on a guided tour that costs 120 Dirham (around $16?) but it’s well worth the fee because the tour is terrific and the inside of the mosque is just BREATHTAKINGLY AMAZING. It has a capacity for 25,000 worshippers inside and another 80,000 outside.

Like every movie ever made has taught you, it’s what’s on the inside that counts

Understated, austere even.

Construction on the mosque started back in July 1986 and they were aiming to have it completed by the King’s 60th birthday, but it wasn’t completed until August 1993. Ahem, 4 years after the due date. Now I’m as guilty as the next person of not having a birthday gift ready on time and promising that “it’s coming, it just didn’t get here in time!” (Blaming ‘shipping’ with rueful headshake is practically my signature move). But FOUR YEARS late? In the last few years before completion they literally had men working around the clock – 1400 men by day and 1000 by night. Imagine the scale of it! 100 men working and 900 standing about, possibly leaning on shovels supervising!

If only they’d exhibited some attention to detail…

All the materials are from Morocco with the exception of the granite columns (Italian) and the glass chandeliers (also Italian, from Venice).

It also has a roof that slides open for natural ventilation – yes, just like Etihad Stadium here in Melbourne, but with fewer bogans eating meat pies.

This beauty slides apart. Form AND function

They’ve even got heated floors. As a cold bod who’s sat in one too many draughty cathedrals, choosing her position based on proximity to that little nook where people light their candles as offerings, you have to tip your hat to this sort of consideration.

What lies beneath is equally impressive. They have giant rooms for ablutions (the cleansing ritual prior to prayer)

Gorgeous communal washrooms

and also a big hamam (steam bath) which (disappointingly) isn’t actually functional/open to the public just yet.

Serenity!

So tempting…

It was however, open to a tiny little kitten who could be heard mewing loudly from a wall cavity behind a hamam seat. I’m fairly sure the only thing higher in pitch than the kitten was MY voice squeaking “ohmygodjustlookatitit’ssoadorablelookhowtinyitis!!!!”

Little hideaway HIGH PITCHED NOISES

I’d definitely recommend a visit to see the mosque while in Morocco. Whatever your religious affiliation, it’s most definitely something to behold. And there are cute bonus kittens in wall cavities. But it’s not just up to me, now, is it? Casablanca and the Hassan II mosque: Jarrod, would you go there?