Friday, December 3, 2010
Living in the Fes Medina....loved it!
Bazaar Guzzar
Butchers Souk (Guzzarine) by Omar Chennafi
BLOGGERS UNEDITED
Cafe Clock encourages writers to send examples of their work for Cafe Clock Online. The following piece by Colleen Cassar really captures the mood and madness found just outside Cafe Clock. This is the first unabridged, unedited story we are publishing. We look forward to receiving your writings, too!
Having settled now very comfortably into my rental riad down in what I call “the small intestine” of the medina, I happily make my way up the Talaa Sghira, amid a sea of umbrella clashes and incessant rain via a couple of cobbled kinks up to my social hub, culture hit, office desk and eatery that is Cafe Clock!
The most interesting stretch of my walk each morning is through the butchers souk (GUZZAR-funnily this moroccan word sounds like a cross between gizzards and bazaar-most appropriate!)…..where cats beg on their hind quarters like dogs for meat scraps, ducks unknowingly ready for the kill roam freely pecking any vegie scraps alongside the begging cats, small rabbits, hardly a meal, sit in cages pacified with sacrificial carrots, goats heads merchandised with all tongues facing left line up for boiling and bone picking, pigeons ‘coo coo’ ready to be coo-cooked!, chickens sit, feet tied as though sleepily awaiting a 3 legged race and the lonesome camel kill pensively looks down on this fantastic scene with heavy lids, coiffed eyelashes and puckered lips. Men and women shop in their warm woollen jellabas and little chocolate donkeys with ever obedient faces carry sacks of vegetables and herbs. Add to the collage of pink, red and maroon flesh more of my favourite colour, large strawberries lovingly placed so as not to bruise one anothers plump beauty atop slow wooden carts. As if this is not enough, mix into this soup of life, a very large group of beautifully dressed Spanish tourists humorously clad in plastic tablecloths knotted over their heads, giggling and poking fun at their collective ridiculousness and improvised attempt to keep dry.
I so so love this place…..the dedication, the simplicity, the hilarity and great inspiration for my pallette, although definately not for the squeamish! When are you coming to Fes?
COLLEEN CASSAR, Melbourne, Australia. – assemblage artist, writer, tour guide and dj!
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