Moroccan Recipes for Eid Al Kabir

Eid is fast approaching and you may soon have a lot of lamb left over - so it is time to make M'rouzia. A good M'rouzia has a perfect balance of spiciness and sweetness and is a stunning way to present shoulder neck or shank of lamb. For those who happen to have goat meat, the recipe worked just as well. The key ingredients are Moroccan Ras El Hanout spice mix and saffron.

Photo courtesy of http://www.guide-az.com/

M'rouzia.

There are a couple of ways to prepare M'rouzia. The traditional method is to simmer for two hours, however, using a pressure cooker halves that time without altering the flavour at all.

The recipe below is suitable for six servings. Total cooking time using the traditional method (including preparation) is two hours and forty-five minutes.


Ingredients:

1 You need 1/2 kg of lamb cut into 7 centimetre(3 inch) pieces
2 medium sized onions, finely grated
3 cloves of garlic, pressed and finely chopped
2 cinnamon sticks
2 teaspoons Ras El Hanout
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon of crumbled saffron threads
1/2 cup unsalted butter
3 cups water
1 1/2 cups golden raisins
1/2 cup honey
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup blanched almonds

Preparation:

Before preparing the meat and spices, soak the raisins in water and set aside.

Mix the meat, onions, garlic and spices and place in pot or pressure cooker. Add the butter and cook (covered) over a medium heat for between ten and fifteen minutes. Stir from time to time.

If you are using a heavy-based pot rather than a pressure cooker, add the 3 cups of water, cover, and bring to a simmer. Cook for about 2 hours, or until the meat is tender.

Next, add the honey, cinnamon raisins and almonds. Replace the lid on the pot and simmer for another 20 to 30 minutes, until the raisins are plump and the sauce is reduced to a syrupy consistency.

If you are using a pressure cooker - add the 3 cups of water, cover, and cook with pressure for about 40 minutes, before adding the raisins, honey, cinnamon and almonds.

Arrange the meat in centre of a serving dish, and distribute the raisins, almonds and sauce over the meat. Or alternatively, fried almonds can be used as a garnish.

Mechoui-style Roasted Lamb Spareribs

Ingredients:

3 slabs of lamb spareribs
4 tablespoons soft butter or for a more authentic taste use smen
4 garlic cloves, pressed or finely chopped
2 or 3 tablespoons chopped fresh coriander
1 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons honey (optional)
salt
cumin

Preparation:

Preheat an oven to 160° C (325° F).

Combine the butter or smen with the garlic, coriander and spices. Make a number of cuts in the slabs of spareribs, and spread the butter mixture over the surface of the meat, rubbing well into the cuts.

Place the ribs in a large roasting pan. Cover the pan with a foil tent, sealing the foil tightly to the pan, and roast in the oven for about three hours. Occasionally baste the ribs with the juices. Make sure you reseal the tinfoil every time!

After three hours take off the tinfoil and increase the oven temperature to 220° C (425° F). If you decide to sweeten the dish with honey, now is the time to spread it over the meat.

Roast the spareribs uncovered, for another fifteen minutes and baste a couple of times until the ribs are nicely browned.

Serve with side-dishes of of salt and cumin on the side for dipping.

ENJOY!

See all our Moroccan recipes here

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Carpet Auction in Morocco's Middle Atlas

A carpet auction is a vivid and theatrical experience to onlookers and an economic necessity to those who produce the carpets. Suzanna Clarke visits the one held in the Middle Atlas town of Khenifra.

Red is the colour primarily associated with the Middle Atlas town of Khenifra, 165 kilometers from Fez and 300 kilometers from Marrakesh. Not only is it the vibrant hue of the hills and escarpements of the surrounding Meknes-Tafilalet region, but it is also the colour of the blood spilt during the many battles fought by the proud Berber tribe of Zayane, who are the main inhabitants.

The name Khenifra comes from the Amazigh (Berber) word Khanfar which means "attack ". A vital staging post on the trade routes, during the twentieth century the region was fiercely resistant to French colonisation. It wasn’t until 1920, after numerous bloody battles, that the Zayane and neighbouring Berber tribes with whom they had united, were forced into submission. However, they were never entirely subdued and popular uprisings followed.

Nowadays, the palm tree-lined streets of the city, with their pink toned buildings, are clean and relatively affluent. The main street features a sculpture of a Berber clasp, or fibula.

A short walk away is the central carpet souk. Here, the colour red also predominates in the hand woven rugs on sale in the small shops around the fringe, and there are also other vivid colours along with white and black.

In the centre of the souk is an open area, with benches on the side, which is regularly used for carpet auctions. It is here the women from the villages in the region come to sell their wares. These carpets represent months of work by groups of women, who make styles and designs distinctive to their area. Usually, the two senior women of the village go to the souk, carrying their bundles, to do the deals. Naturally, the price they can achieve will have an impact on the kind of winter they and the rest of their village will endure.

The women gather at the souk hours beforehand, to await the other players in the process – the dallal, or auctioneers, and the carpet dealers, who have small shops around the fringe.

When the auction starts, it is like the opening of a play. From the wings come a line of wiry, weatherbeaten men – the dallal, lugging carpets that look almost as heavy as themselves. The carpets are unfurled with a flourish, for the appreciation of the attentive audience. An opening price is called and the auction is on. The dallals are in constant motion: as well as displaying the carpet to the crowd, they ferry it around the carpet dealers in the shops, who may also bid. The bidding begins when the first bidder shouts “Oukha” or “okay”. It’s done in the colonial currency of reals, in jumps of 100 reals at a time. (The equivalent of five Moroccan dirhams, or 63 US cents.)

The women from the villages watch with a mixture of patience, wry amusement, and delighted smiles as their carpet reaches the hoped for price; or anxiety if it fails to sell despite making the rounds repeatedly.

When there is only one bidder remaining, then he - and it is usually a man - is declared the winner, and the money is handed over directly to the seller. Both parties then give a small commission to the dallal.

Some women choose to sell their carpets straight to the dealers. They may achieve a higher price at auction, but they run a risk if it fails to sell, as a dealer may see it as an indication that the carpet will be difficult to move.

Interested buyers also flock to the auction, to get the pick of the carpets. The dealers pass the carpets on to the big carpet shops in Fez and Marrakesh. So a carpet for which a group of women may have received less than a thousand dirhams (US $125) can end up selling for many times that by the time it reaches its final destination.

If you would like to see the regular Khenifra carpet auction in action, contact Michele at Yomikha Travel on  +212 (0) 642 704 601 or chriftrans@gmail.com. She can tell you when the auctions are held and arrange transport.


See also: Guide to buying Moroccan Carpets

All Photographs: Suzanna Clarke or Sandy McCutcheon

Text and photographs copyright The View from Fez 2011
Please ask permission before reproducing.


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Russian Language Courses in Fez

Close observers of the Fez Medina will have noticed that these days there are many more Russian tourists. We have always been amazed at the way young Moroccans who work with tourists are able to muster a great number of words in half a dozen languages and Russian is now included.  Back in 2005, King Mohammed VI sent a message, via Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, to the Russian President, Vladimir Putin, offering Russian citizens visa-free entry. Putin responded by giving strong support to the move and issued a message which said in part, "The decision will definitely encourage tourism and business contacts between our nations".

Now the influx of Russians has reached a stage where even more language skills are required. So a Russian language course has opened at the International Institute of Tourism in Fes, to train specialists for the country’s booming hotel and tour business sector.

The organizers say that the number of Russian tourists coming to Morocco is slowly but steadily going up and hope the course will encourage mutually rewarding business ties between the two countries.

See our story: The Russians are coming.

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First Rains Bring Hope For Large Wheat Crop

While tourists who only have a few days in Morocco may not enjoy the wet weather, farmers and grain merchants are smiling. Rain over the last couple of days has set the scene for what farmers are saying could be a bumper year. Reports from the agriculture sector suggest that farmers are planting larger acreage because of the conditions.

Reuters are reporting that the rains came just at the right time and that farmers would have considered sowing for crops other than grains had the rainfalls taken beyond the last week of October to show up.

"These rains will be very important because they will encourage farmers to sow more land," an Agriculture Ministry spokesperson said.

Morocco's weather forecast service said western plains, such as the major Gharb and Doukkala, were the first to receive rainfalls on Monday. The rain clouds will then move east towards the central and eastern plains which include Saiss and Moulouya.

Rainfalls are expected to abate on Tuesday before resuming on Thursday, the service said in remarks carried by the official MAP news agency.

Wheat is a key staple in Moroccans' diet and agriculture is the country's biggest employer and accounts for close to 15 percent its Gross Domestic Product.

Because the majority of wheat-planted areas are small properties owned by farmers who use the harvest for their own subsistence, a bad farming season often means social problems such as migration by thousands from the countryside to cities to search for jobs.

It also means growing pressure on the state's current account deficit from increased imports.

Morocco's grains harvest reached 8.8 million tonnes in 2011, which is 18 percent above the year-earlier period.

With last year's harvest of 7.46 million tonnes, Morocco ended up importing 6 million tonnes of cereals over the 12 months to mid-June, up 47 percent over the previous campaign. The figure included 3.22 million tonnes of soft wheat.

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Join Us For The Fez Festival Of World Sacred Music 2012

The View from Fez is hosting a wonderful tour to Fez from June 6-17, 2012 for the Fez Festival of World Sacred Music, together with a registered travel agency. As well as festival events, there is a choice of activities, including Moroccan cooking, travel photography, yoga, visual art, tours around the Medina and talks on architecture and culture. Day trips will also be held to places such as the Roman ruins at Volubilis.  

To find out all the details please visit: JOIN THE VIEW FROM FEZ FOR THE SACRED MUSIC FESTIVAL!

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USA to Build New "Green" Embassy in Rabat

B.L. Harbert International is a company that specialises in building embassies around the world.  According to reports in the US, B.L.Harbert have the contract for a new $140 million U.S. Embassy compound in Rabat. The contract was awarded by the US State Department. Insiders say that, like recent buildings by the company, it will make full use of the latest green technology.

Harbart will design and build the U.S. embassy, with work to start as early as next month. The company says that the project will take three years to complete.

Recent work by the company has had a strong environmental slant. The US Embassy building in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, bagged the LEED Silver certification from the Green Building Certification Institute. The building has employed a host of green features. Presence of occupancy sensors and daylight harvesting add to the sustainability by reducing energy consumption. The facility uses solar energy for providing hot water and incorporates variable frequency drives. It is expected that the Rabat Embassy will also be a "green embassy".

B.L. Harbert International has built or is building more than two dozen U.S. embassies around the world, including the $734 million embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan, now under construction. The Pakistan contract is huge, with a site that will encompass numerous structures, including chancery buildings, ambassador's residence, three apartment buildings, recreation facilities, parking facilities, site work and others.

Embassy construction now makes up 100 percent of the company's international work and two-thirds of its overall business.

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Talk to the Hand

When travelling, beware of which hand gestures you use. They can get you into all kinds of trouble, writes Derek Workman.

A couple of years ago I was with a friend in the Medina in Marrakech. She’d successfully bartered her way to ownership of a very attractive rug, and was feeling pretty pleased with herself. The salesman was all smiles and compliments until my friend made a gesture which, to you and I would indicate that, “Great, everything’s fine, we done good!” She smiled and put her thumb up. Instantly the salesman’s jaw dropped and his eyes glared wide. He bundled the rug at her and sharply turned his back, much to the distress of my friend, who realised she’d done something wrong, but for the life her didn’t know what.

Imagine you’d stuck your middle finger up to an American; basically you are saying, ‘screw you’, ‘up yours’ or, as a Brit might say, ‘sit on that and wiggle’. That’s exactly what my friend had said, albeit unwittingly, to the carpet salesman. So, far from showing her pleasure at a deal well done, she was telling him to stick his business where the sun don’t shine. Best not to do it in Latin America and West Africa, as well as Greece, Russia, Sardinia, the south of Italy, either.

Travel certainly broadens the horizons and can provide a fund of uplifting experiences. Interacting with people is the best way to understand different cultures, societies and ways of life, but if you visit non-English-speaking countries and you don’t understand their language, you have to fall back on body-language and gestures.

The problem is that some gestures have a completely different meaning in one country than they do in another. Not only could your intended message get lost in translation, you could actually end up offending someone or getting yourself into a difficult situation.
Some simple everyday gestures that we take for granted can get you into big trouble elsewhere in the world.

Years ago, I was working in Athens at a time when the English football team were playing an international game in the city, on the same day that Greece was playing away elsewhere. England won 5-0, the Greeks got hammered. That night hoards of England supporters roamed the Athenic streets chanting, ‘Five-nil, five-nil’, and thrusting their hand, with the palm open and the fingers extended to represent the number five, in the face of any male Greek they could find.

When the Greeks started battering hell out of the visiting team’s supporters, the Brits thought they were just very bad losers. They might well have been, but the one thing you never do to a Greek male, whether you’ve just won a football match or not, is stick an open palm with fingers extended in his face. It’s known as a moutza, and is one of their most traditional insults, telling the recipient to ‘eat shit’. The gesture comes from Byzantine times, when people would smear excreta on the faces of prisoners as they were dragged through the streets.

Another gesture that doesn’t go down well in the Arab world is the A-okay sign, making a circle with the thumb and forefinger and extending the other fingers outwards. Like the thumbs up, we mean it to imply that everything is good, fine, okay, and is used to communicate between sub-aqua divers, when shouting, “Yes I’m fine, thanks,” isn’t really an option. But what’s good for the goose isn’t always good for the gander, as Suzanna, features editor of The View From Fez, found out when she wanted to show the workmen restoring her riad that all was going great. She made the A-okay sign, and was surprised when the men showed obvious shock, and not the smiles she expected. Without realising it, she’d told them they were all homosexual. The circular shape of the gesture is seen to represent the anus, with all the unwholesome connotations it brings to mind, and you would never, ever use the sign in Brazil, Germany and a number of Mediterranean and Arab countries.

There is the apocryphal story of President Richard Nixon arriving on an official visit to Brazil, which received an enormous amount of media coverage. As he stood at the top of the gangway he put both his hand in the air and made a double A-okay sign. While Suzanna only offended a handful of chaps, Nixon told the whole of Brazil that they were a set of poofters. History doesn’t record how successful his talks were. It’s also an insult in France, although not quite such a serious one, as it signifies something or someone as being worthless. Not a good way to show your appreciation after a delightful dinner.

The corna (making a fist and extending the fore- and little fingers) may be the thing to do at heavy rock concerts, but in Spain, Portugal, Greece, Colombia, Brazil, Albania, Slovakia and the Czech Republic, it’s seen as saying to someone he’s a cuckold and his wife is cheating on him – although residents of these countries seem happy enough to use it at football referees. Curling your finger toward you as a “come here” sign is perceived as derogatory in many South East Asian countries. This gesture is commonly used for dogs in the Philippines so when used for a person, you would be implying that you see them as something inferior. What’s worse, this gesture could get you arrested, and to prevent you from using it again, the authorities could break your finger.

Perhaps there might be a new guide book here. It’s unlikely we need another Guide to This That And The Other, or a phrase book that tells you everything you will ever need to know about asking for a postage stamp in Swahili. A picture book of offensive hand gestures might just save you getting your head kicked in Athens.

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What next for the traditional Moroccan house?

Future architects from Britain and Morocco converged on Fez yesterday for a cultural exchange with a difference. The 16 students from Manchester University were keen to hear from their counterparts at the l’Ecole Nationale d’Architecture Fes about traditional courtyard housing.

Architecture students from Manchester and Fez, with senior lecturer Dr Magda Sibley, third from left.

During the three hour seminar, held at the Arabic Language Institute Fes riad, the students and their lecturers had an animated discussion about the nature of courtyard housing in the Fes Medina.

“Courtyard houses are ideal for the climate and they are the backbone of the architectural heritage here in Fez,” said Shems Benyahia, director of the l’Ecole Nationale d’Architecture, Fes. (Below, standing.)

Dr Magda Sibley, Senior Lecturer in Architecture at Manchester University, said that the courtyard housing model was a versatile one. It enables families to mix together and individuals to overcome the sense of isolation prevalent in contemporary Western society.

“Although this can create problems with privacy”, she said.

The students formed into mixed groups to explore aspects of how this traditional Islamic style of house, originally based on an ancient Roman design, functions.

“In the past, courtyard houses protected women, who were considered a jewel,” said Ghislane Dhaidah, a third year architecture student from the ENA (below, right). “Now many families live that way because the cost of doing so is much cheaper.”

Several of the Moroccan students agreed that, while they enjoyed helping to rehabilitate houses with local artisans, they didn’t feel the communal lifestyle of the Fez Medina would suit them and preferred to live in the Ville Nouvelle.

Ms Benyahia said that for Fez locals, attachment to the Medina had changed with different generations. “My parents lived in the Medina and I often return to shop. Nowadays, the younger generation who live in the Ville Nouvelle don’t necessarily have that direct connection with it.”

Some of the British students felt that the lack of vehicle access in the Medina was a problem, “due to the increasing speed of the modern lifestyle”. This was disputed by Moroccan students, who pointed out that anywhere in the Fez Medina can easily be reached from the edges within about 15 minutes, by walking. In fact, one said, the lack of cars was one of the most desirable aspects of the Medina.

As an exercise, the Manchester students will design a project to rehabilitate a group of at risk houses in the Fez Medina.

“It’s about the problem of reconciling a more mobile population with an existing site,” said Dr Sibley. “How do you treat the gaps where houses have collapsed?”

Manchester student Rob Chilton asked the question on many peoples’ minds, “But what will the Medina be like in 50 years time?”

While it is impossible to more than guess the answer to this, the Manchester students plan to suggest possible solutions for adapting the courtyard house for the future. We’ll update you on the best of the proposals.

Story and photos by Suzanna Clarke.

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Travel Writing About Morocco ~ #32

Regular readers of The View from Fez will be aware that we run an occasional series on travel writing in Morocco. Many times we find the journalism patchy and the research less than thorough. However, back in June this year, we came across journalist Steve McKenna and gave him the "thumbs up" for his piece (see our story here Travel Writing about Morocco #31


Now McKenna has written another interesting piece on Tangier that is certainly worth a look. Here is an edited extract followed by a link to the original article in the Australian Sydney Morning Herald

Tangier - Photo Sandy McCutcheon

Idle time with legends

The Petit Socco square is one of Tangier's liveliest social hubs. A former souk fringed with ramshackle hotels and shabby-chic caffeine dens, artists, writers, wheeler dealers, gangsters, regular folk and tourists have long come here to while away the time.

This haven of lounging and people watching seems resistant to the gentrification that's affecting other parts of Tangier. King Mohammed VI is keen to jazz up and exploit the economic potential of a city at the crossroads of Europe and Africa, the Mediterranean and the Atlantic Ocean.

Unlike Marrakesh, Tangier isn't brimming with must-see sights. But, in its own raffishly charming way, it's equally as fascinating. Hugging the Strait of Gibraltar, just 14 kilometres from mainland Spain, the city's cosmopolitan allure has been shaped over 3000 years. Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Greeks, Romans, Vandals, Byzantines, Arabs and myriad Western powers have all invaded a territory originally home to indigenous Berber tribes.

Some say Tangier hit its zenith between 1923 and 1956 when the city became an International Zone, carved into sectors overseen by nine countries (France, Spain, Sweden, Belgium, Portugal, Italy, Holland, the US and Britain).

The Interzone, as it was known, drew a colourful cast of businessmen, celebrities, go-getters, smugglers, spies, artists and ne'er-do-wells and, according to expat American writer and composer Paul Bowles, it was a place where "you could get anything you wanted if you paid for it. Do anything too, for that matter. It was only a matter of price."

Petit Socco - one of their favourite hangouts - lies at the heart of Tangier's ancient medina, a walled labyrinth of narrow, shaded, car-free streets lined with creaking houses and hole-in-the-wall workshops, kebabaries, confectionery, carpet and jewellery emporiums.

Navigating the medina is a tricky treat. The confusion wrought by a series of dark alleys, arched passageways and dead ends turn what should be five-minute walks into half-hour ones.

I find children in faded football shirts kicking deflated balls and empty yoghurt cartons around, women shuffling along in black burqas and colourful tunics, evocative calls to prayer drifting from mosques and spicy smells wafting from kitchen windows.

The Ville Nouvelle is a different story. Surrounding the medina, this modern French-designed part of Tangier is full of multicultural restaurants and bars, European colonial buildings, wide, palm-lined streets and fountain-studded squares. It's this part of town that has seen big improvements in recent years, from myriad cosmetic changes to the redevelopment of Tangier's decaying old port into a yachting marina and cruise-ship terminal.

The revamped Cinema Rif, a hip art deco hub of movies on the Grand Socco square, epitomises the city's lively cultural scene, hosting January's National Film Festival of Tangier.

North of Cinema Rif, on Rue de la Libertie, Galerie Ibn Khaldoun displays paintings from Mohammed Mrabet, an enigmatic Berber artist and storyteller famed for his collaborations with Bowles.

Paul Bowles ~ photo by Jearld F Moldenhauer,

courtesy Dar Balmira Gallery, Gzira Fes Medina.

The pair worked to preserve classical Moroccan literature and music - a sign of the affection Bowles held for his adopted country.He spent 53 years of his life here and died in Tangier in 1999. The Paul Bowles Wing of the American Legation Institute for Moroccan Studies, tucked inside the southern tip of the medina, tells his story.

Near Ibn Khaldoun, the Institut Francais organises exhibitions at Galerie Delacroix - a spot named after the French painter Eugene Delacroix, who, like compatriot Henri Matisse, was seduced by Tangier's vivid hues.

Across the street, the five-star El Minzah Hotel is a polished Interzone icon and home to Caid's Bar, the model, apparently, for Rick's Cafe in Casablanca. Further on, Grand Cafe de Paris is arguably the most well-known of Tangier's estimated 800 cafes and patisseries.

Facing the crossroads of Place de France, the cafe was a hang-out of William Burroughs, Truman Capote, Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg, the so-called "Beatniks", Interzone-dwellers renowned for their subversive scribbles.

Paul Bowles, Allen Ginsberg, William Burroughs, Gregory Corso and Ian Sommervill in Burroughs’s Villa Mouniera garden, Tangier - July 1961

Tangier has inspired a prodigious output of literature - Samuel Pepys, Mark Twain, Gore Vidal, Samuel Beckett, Gertrude Stein, Paulo Coelho and Ian "007" Fleming have all written about it - so I'm heartened to find a good bookshop.

The newly refurbished Librairie des Colonnes is halfway down Boulevard Pasteur, past the delightfully named Terrasse des Parrasseux (Idlers' Terrace), where couples and friends slouch against old cannon and stare out over the hypnotic strait.

Burroughs, a frequent visitor to the shop, penned Naked Lunch in a nearby hotel, hidden down a side street sloping down towards the bay.

With sunset approaching, I hail a taxi to Cafe Hafa, a cliff-top mecca of mint tea and backgammon, close to the Kasbah, the fortified old sultan's palace.

Apparently, Burroughs, Bowles, the Beatles and the Rolling Stones all came to smoke hashish at Hafa and, judging by the smell, it's a habit that's not been lost.I order a Moroccan whisky and find my own space of fresh air on the cafe's terrace. In a city that's fast changing, simple pleasures like these are still among Tangier's top draws.


Read more in the SMH

The View from Fez sugests: If you intend to visit Tangier, make a point of checking out the fabulously scruffy beat cafe that still runs most nights - The Tanger Inn. The inn also has some stunning old photographs (such as the ones featured above) on their wall of the Beat poets and writers who visited the city in the 50's and 60's. For more information on Paul Bowles visit the official Bowles Website.

Also see our Postcard from Tangier which has information on restaurants in the city.

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Moroccan Cactus Industry Set To Bloom

Travel around Morocco and you will notice that the "prickly pear" cactus appears to be very common. When the fruit is ripe, the souks are full of trays of them and the sellers do good business. Now, the Moroccan government is to invest in more production.

The government intends to develop and expand the industry, following in the footsteps of Mexico, which is a global leader in cactus farming. The plan is to include cactus in a broad range of products from cosmetics to food.

A group of Mexican academics paid a visit to Ben Guerir, northwest of Morocco and shared their expertise on the topic in front of the Moroccan Association for the Development of the Cactus.

"The production of cactus in Mexico is very important now because this product is used in many ways as food for animals and human beings and also for cosmetic and medical uses. In Mexico, we make many products out of cactus and we export them to many countries abroad. This plant is very important for our health because it reduces cholesterol and also sugar levels for diabetics," said Mexican academic Dr. Ana Lila Vigueras during the visit to Morocco.

Abdelrahman Ait Hammou, the association’s director, says awareness of the benefit of cacti is crucial in stimulating demand which in turn affects farmers’ production.

The first attempt in increasing the cactus industry was six years ago, with the aim of generating job opportunities, especially for rural women. Currently, eight varieties of cactus exist nationwide and the fruit can be found in markets year-round.

Morocco plans to plant 300,000 more square meters of cactus plants over the next five years

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Photographic Portrait Workshop a Success

Back on the 19th of this month, we ran a story about a workshop to be held by the ALIF Photography Club. The workshop topic was "portraits" and the venue was the beautiful Jnan Sbil gardens in Fez. Thanks to Omar Chennafi, we can bring you a couple of examples of the work done by the students.

Omar Chennafi (fourth from left) reports some great results from the workshop students

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Eid Approaches and the Sheep are Coming

Observant Medina watchers have reported the first sightings of sheep in the Fez Medina. And down in the souk of the knife-sharpeners, business is picking up. Even those not aware of the reason for all the sheep and knives can probably deduce that lamb will soon be on the menu. The reason? Eid al-kabir - the feast of the sacrifice.

Eid al-kabir commemorates the Prophet Abraham's willingness to obey God when he envisioned that he was to sacrifice his son. Muslims observe this day by slaughtering an animal (usually a sheep) and then offering much of its meat in charity to poor people.

Photograph of  sheep on Mt Zalagh by Jearld F Moldenhauer,

courtesy Dar Balmira Gallery, Gzira Fes Medina. 

The sacrifice symbolizes obedience to Allah and its distribution to others is an expression of generosity, one of the five pillars of Islam.

Eid al-kabir (also called Eid al-Adha) is one of the two most important Islamic festivals, Eid al-kabir begins on the 10th day of Dhu'l-Hijja, the last month of the Islamic calendar. Lasting for three days, it occurs at the conclusion of the annual Hajj, or pilgrimage to Mecca. Muslims all over the world celebrate Eid al-kabir, not simply those undertaking the hajj, which for most Muslims is a once-a-lifetime occurrence.

Eid al-kabir will be celebrated this year on 7th November, +-1 day, depending on the country.

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In Praise of Moroccan Honey

Too often we turn up our noses at so-called traditional medicines. Yet, time and again, the old remedies turn out to be efficacious. Nina Martin had an accident with a teapot and some very hot water and, now recovered, tells a tale of burns and honey.

Nina's honey

The pain was shocking. I immediately pulled my hand out of the defective teapot, and ran some cool water over it from the tap and cursed myself for being so stupid, plunging my hand into boiling hot sugary mint tea. It was late at night, everything was shut, and I had to go into work the next day to pick up my class assignments. The Moroccan friends who I was making the tea for got ice from the freezer and asked me if I had any beldi (organic) honey in the house. I was sat down and made comfortable and when the ice was all melted they drizzled the honey over my hot, throbbing, intensely painful hand which was bright red and already a bit swollen. One fanned my hand to cool it and although it was very painful the honey was soothing.

That night I didn't get much sleep from the pain and the sheets had to be washed next day but I managed to keep the skin covered in honey, only gingerly washing it off when I bought some anti-inflammatory cream from the pharmacy so I could go to work the day after. My hand puffed up and I had to hold it up in the air – if I dropped it below elbow-level the extra bloodflow was just too painful. I remembered my mother telling me not to cover a burn so I just left it open to the air. The September sun was still strong enough to make it sting sharply, so vampire-like, I avoided any contact with sunshine. That was easy enough in the medina but tricky in the Ville Nouvelle.

Over the next two weeks I alternated between using the cream to go to work and the honey at home. My hand turned into a Hammer House of Horror hand, drawing stares from people in the street and fascinating my students who couldn't drag their eyes off the raw, red new skin and the flayed burnt skin peeling off all around after it had blistered. People were sympathetic and one or two showed me where they had burnt themselves with cooking oil or hot water, the small patches clearly visible because the skin was discoloured. What would my hand end up looking like, I wondered, with such a large area blistered and peeling? But, miraculously, by the end of the third week when I had to back to the UK it was impossible to tell which hand had been burnt, so completely had it all healed.

My recycled plastic soda bottle of beldi honey still has enough in it to cope with future emergencies as well as cough and cold remedies.

The teapot, however, has been relegated to egg-boiling duties.

 Lick up the honey and ask no questions.- Arabian proverb

Thanks to Nina for the story. The View from Fez welcomes contributions from readers. Go to our contact page for our email address

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A Present from The View from Fez

As our sixth birthday approaches, The View from Fez decided to celebrate with a whole new look. While we loved the old blog, times have changed and so have we.  So welcome to the bigger, better, brighter View from Fez.

Because we feature so many great photographs, we decided to go with a format that allows a much larger picture size. We have also simplified navigation by adding some "quick links" at the top of the site. This is a work in progress, so there may be some minor adjustments in coming days.

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Morocco's Vanishing Cinemas

Walking by the the Cinema Boujloud in Fez is a sad experience for anyone who loves old movie houses. This once bustling cinema is closed and used for storage of market goods. The seating was still in place in the auditorium when seen in 2006. Cinema Boujaloud is symptomatic of the Moroccan cinema market which has been suffering a severe decline during the past years. (See our story here.)

 The rich heritage of Moroccan cinemas is endangered, but those who care about the future of film and their architectural value are working hard to save them, writes Derek Workman.

Cinema Lynx, Casablanca

In 2007, Moroccan actor Tarik Mounim was in Tetouan waiting on a film set between takes. He was appearing in Goodbye Mothers,  Morocco’s entry for the 2009 Oscars in the Best Foreign Film Category - which tells the story of the Jewish exodus from Morocco in the 1960s. While he waited for his scenes to be shot, he looked around the Art Deco cinema Cine Español, said to be the most beautiful in Morocco. He got to chatting with the owner, of the Español and two other cinemas in the city. It might seem pretty good, owning three cinemas, the owner told him, but it is a far cry from the twenty-five that his grandfather owned throughout the country.

“Speak to any older Moroccan and they will tell you that the cinema was a major part of their life," Tarik says. "It was at the physical heart of a city or the neighbourhood, it was where people met and passed the time, it was where they learned about the world and heard new words. It was their encyclopaedia."

Tarik had spent seven years studying to be an actor and working in theatre in Paris, and had only recently returned to Morocco. As far as he was concerned, he was there to work, but he began to discover in just how parlous a state Moroccan cinema was; not just the production of movies, but the crumbling structures themselves, many of which had been built in the 1930s to 1950s at the height of the Art Deco period. (Miami is recognised as having some of the most beautiful art deco architecture in existence, but at it’s height it had only around five percent of art deco buildings that Casablanca had, many of the most beautiful of which were cinemas, and sadly, much of it now lost.)

Cinema Vox, Casablanca, in the 1920s

"In it’s heyday, twenty-five distributors brought films from France, Egypt, India, China, the USA, and Great Britain," he says. "It is the only country in the world with cinemas that had the capacity to hold 1,500 people; the biggest could seat 2,800. In the 1960s there were more than fifty million tickets sold a year, in 2010 there were only two million sold, and where once there were 280 cinemas operating throughout the country, now there are only thirty-seven, most of them showing movies from Bollywood.”

Cinema Eden, Marrakesh

It’s the story of cinema worldwide, but where many countries replaced the neighbourhood movie houses with out-of-town multiplexes, this didn’t happen as much in Morocco, as the entrance price was simply prohibitive to most people.

There’s now a whole generation that has no idea what it’s like to visit a cinema, to enjoy the romance, the spectacle, the sense of wonder that the big screen brings. Now they sit at home watching a bootlegged DVD.

In 2008 Tarik and a group of friends formed Save Cinemas in Morocco (SCIM) in time for the International Film Festival of Marrakech, one of the biggest events devoted to Moroccan cinema. They convinced some of the actors, directors and other participants to wear their distinctive black T-shirt with its deep red logo, and people began to take notice. To encourage local interest they began showing old films in abandoned cinemas during the festival so that people in the Medina could see what it was like to visit the local ‘flicks’. Entrance was free, and they played to packed houses.

“The first film we showed was on original equipment from 1956 and it was wonderful, just like going to the movies decades ago – although some of the seats were a bit uncomfortable after so many years! Everyone had a great time, and each year during the festival we do the same. We even have people who are visiting the official festival coming to watch.”

A film poster from the early 20th century

Even though there are only thirty-seven cinemas still showing movies on a regular basis, there are one hundred and sixty still in existence throughout the country, although most are now falling into ruin. But it isn’t just the buildings themselves that is the problem; a lot of the seats and fitting are now missing, and it is increasingly difficult to find projectors and other equipment needed to restore a cinema to working order.

Rialto in Casablanca

“We’re looking for help worldwide from people who can either help us with equipment or expertise," says Tarik. "We did a presentation at the Cannes Film Festival this year, which went down really well, and we’ve been offered help by Unifrance, a French film association. We’ve still got a long way to go, though.”

Cinema Camera, Meknes

Saving the architectural heritage of Art Deco is worthy in itself, but Save Cinemas in Morocco wants to go beyond that. Every cinema that is saved is a venue for a young film-maker to show his work. At a time when international producers are bringing fewer and fewer projects to Morocco, the Moroccan film industry is finding itself in almost as perilous a state as the cinemas it now no longer uses. Once hearts of the community, these could be a way of breathing life into the neighbourhood and give future Steven Spielbergs the chance to have their work flicker across the silver screen.

More info: http://www.savecinemasinmarocco.com/

Derek Workman is an English journalist living in Valencia City, Spain – although he admits to a love of Morocco and would love to up sticks and move here. To read more about life in Spain visit Spain Uncovered. Articles and books can also be found at Digital Paparazzi.


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A Visit to Azrou - the Tuesday Souq

The View from Fez reader, Javier Samaniego, recently visited the Tuesday Souq at Azrou and kindly sent this photographic record of his visit. Azrou is a favourite day-trip destination for visitors to Fez.

For more on the Tuesday Souq, see our earlier story here. Azrou Souq

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