by Paul Bowles
Night life as we conceive it is not a part of the mores of the land; what little is provided has been arranged specifically for tourists, and is therefore not of much interest. Entertainment with dinner, however, is another matter. Often one can find some of the best Moroccan musicians and dancers at the large tourist restaurants of the Medina that specialize in local dishes. The Gharnatta, the Ksar-el-Hamra, and the Dar-es-Salaam are spacious, elaborate establishments where the accent is on atmosphere and entertainment rather than food.
Moroccan cooking is at last beginning to be known and appreciated by Americans. Every gastronome who comes to Morocco should learn during his stay how to make at least one Moroccan dish. In any case he will want the experience of tasting the most delectable samples of cuisine marocaine to be had anywhere, and he will find them at La Maison Arabe just inside the huge arched gate of Bab Doukkala. He must remember to make his reservation at least a day in advance, and he must be so devoted to the art of eating that he is not disturbed by the severity of the patronne and the almost monastic atmosphere.
The Djemâa el Fna in 1963 (PB)
The resident expatriate colony is smaller than reports might lead one to believe. The Comtesse de Breteuil lives in the famous Villa Taylor which housed Roosevelt and Churchill during World War II; this is the hub of what social life exists in Marrakesh. The Getty house is a brilliant example of the glamor that can be created by stringing together a number of old houses. Arndt von Bohlen (heir to the Krupp empire) has a large estate just to the west of El Gueliz, outside the city. Yves Saint Laurent a few years ago bought a beautiful little house which he uses strictly as a retreat from the rigors of life in Paris. The house was designed by its original owner, whose brother Prince Doan Vinh na Champassak recently gave up his quiet life as a painter here in Marrakesh to marry Barbara Hutton. Ira Belline, costume designer for Diaghileff and Jouvet, the niece of Igor Stravinsky, has lived for a good many years in the oasis, several miles out of town. The American writer John Hopkins has an adobe house among the palm trees on this property.
The most recent addition to the colony of homeowners is Pierre Balmain. There are American and European residents in hidden corners throughout the Medina, living quietly in their rebuilt Moroccan houses. The architectural transformations seldom affect the outer wall of a house, so that it is impossible to tell from the street whether Moroccans or foreigners live there.
The only Americans visible to the naked eye are the temporary visitors, who can be subdivided into tourists and those whom the Moroccans call the hippiya, (feminine singular with the accent on the second syllable). As might be expected, the natives here find the hippie phenomenon very difficult to understand. Their reactions, which initially were favorable, have been modified by several years of contact with members of the movement and are now at best ambivalent, and often frankly fearful. The authorities are worried that the attitude of disrespect for the law shown by some hippies may infect young Moroccans who fraternize with them. A good number of local youths now carefully cultivate the hippie look. There have been public campaigns against long hair and eccentric clothing with mobile guards roaming the cities, but these tactics have not had an appreciable effect.
Last year the large Café du Glacier on the Djemâa el Fna teemed with young travelers wearing beards, chains, parkas, tchamiras, djellabas, Reguibat rezzas, and a whole assortment of African accouterments. This year it is frequented only by Moroccans and stray tourists. The Friends of the World have opted for secrecy and have abandoned the big public places in favor of tiny, hidden stalls in the back alleys where the tourists are unable to find them. For, in the past years, the hippies have become a principal tourist attraction of Marrakesh.
At the age of 20, I was here in Marrakesh, without drugs and fancy dress, it is true, but living in very much the same fashion as the hippies live here today, showing scorn for that which was familiar and boundless enthusiasm for everything Moroccan. The principal difference between us is that they, traveling in numbers and having no self-consciousness, are not satisfied with being spectators; they want to participate. It is as if they thought that if they try hard and long enough, they will become Moroccans themselves.
Sometimes at night as you walk through the Djemâa el Fna you come upon a circle of seated, burnouse-clad figures. In the center there will be two or three Moroccans playing on drums. Upon examination one circle turns out to be composed of Americans, sitting in religious silence while their heads respond in spastic movements to the rhythm of the drums. Participation at such a basic level, while not likely to lead to further understanding between the two cultures, is a harmless enough activity, and certainly a more meaningful one than the tourist custom of sitting in a nightclub whose every detail has been planned in anticipation of Western tastes. Now Moroccan girls are being trained to become belly dancers – a hitherto unheard-of thing in Morocco. But since that is what tourists are said to want, that is what they get.
Inaccurate information is responsible for the disappointments of most travelers. I have known people to return from their first visit to Marrakesh and express surprise, if not chagrin, at finding the city so open and accessible. It had no mystery. But no one ever claimed that Marrakesh was mysterious, I tell them. During the time of the Protectorate, in their touristic propaganda the French were quite explicit about it. Assuming that “mystery” was furnished by such conventional items as winding tunnels, narrow alleys and eyes peering from behind latticed peep-holes, they reserved the word for descriptions of Fez. It was “Fès la mystérieuse”; Marrakesh was strictly “la Rouge.”
If one stays in a city for any length of time, one discovers that its general atmosphere depends largely upon the attitude of its inhabitants. The Marrakchis themselves can be quite as baffling to the visitor as any succession of tunnels and alleys. They love to engage in strange little games with foreigners – games in which often they have nothing whatever to gain, unless it be the expressions of bewilderment and frustration they can call forth on the foreigners’ faces. For the visitor, Marrakesh is a constant confrontation with the unlikely, outlandish and absurd.
For example, I enter a restaurant not far from the Djemâa el Fna, sit down and ask for the carte and the menu. There are no prices mentioned on either. I call the attention of the waiter to the oversight. He says airily: “You order what you like and I’ll charge what I like?”
I am sitting in a café in Gueliz. A taxi drives up, and a little man gets out. He is about three feet high, with a huge head and practically no legs. He pays the driver and comes tottering directly to the terrasse of the café, where he begins to go from table to table asking for alms. I am wondering why he took no pains to hide his mode of arrival, and I ask him about it. “I always take taxis,” he says proudly. “I have plenty of money.” Perhaps he sees incredulity in my face, for he goes on. “I have three houses and a store in the Medina.” It takes me a moment to digest this information. “But then,” I begin hesitantly, “why don’t you just sit at a table like everyone else?” His hand is still out. “That’s no good,” he says. “I want to know what’s going on. I go to all the cafés.” I give him the coin I have been holding in my hand, and he waddles on.
For those spending the season in Marrakesh, the two most popular places to visit nearby are Essaouira and Oukaimeden, where the activities are respectively sea-bathing and skiing. Essaouira, 125 miles due west of Marrakesh, is on a spit of land jutting out into the Atlantic. It is one of the most attractive small towns in all North Africa, as yet unspoiled, with a wide sandy beach that stretches south as far as the eye can see.
Oukaimeden, at an altitude of 8,399 feet, nestles below the peak of Djebel Toubkal (13,665 feet) and advertises the highest ski lift in Africa. (I am curious to see the list of African ski lifts.) The drive through the valleys and gorges is beautiful, and the food is excellent. Skiers often stay on until April.
From Notes Taken in Thailand
Prose, Spring 1972
ISOON LEARN
ED not to go near the windows or to draw aside the double curtains in order to look at the river below. The view was wide and lively, with factories and warehouses on the far side of the Chao Phraya, and strings of barges being towed up and down through the dirty water. The new wing of the hotel had been built in the shape of an upright slab, so that the room was high and had no trees to shade it from the poisonous onslaught of the afternoon sun. The end of the day, rather than bringing respite, intensified the heat, for then the entire river was made of sunlight. With the redness of dusk everything out there became melodramatic and forbidding, and still the oven heat from outside leaked through the windows.
Brooks, teaching at Chulalongkorn University, was required as a Fulbright Fellow to attend regular classes in Thai; as an adjunct to this he arranged to spend much of his leisure time with Thais. One day he brought along with him three young men wearing the bright orange-yellow robes of Buddhist monks. They filed into the hotel room in silence and stood in a row as they were presented to me, each one responding by joining his palms together, thumbs touching his chest.
As we talked, Yamyong, the eldest, in his late twenties, explained that he was an ordained monk, while the other two were novices. Brooks then asked Prasert and Vichai if they would be ordained soon, but the monk answered for them.
“I do not think they are expecting to be ordained,” he said quietly, looking at the floor, as if it were a sore subject all too often discussed among them. He glanced up at me and went on talking. “Your room is beautiful. We are not accustomed to such luxury.” His voice was flat; he was trying to conceal his disapproval. The three conferred briefly in undertones. “My friends say they have never seen such a luxurious room,” he reported, watching me closely through his steel-rimmed spectacles to see my reaction. I failed to hear.
They put down their brown paper parasols and their reticules that bulged with books and fruit. Then they got themselves into position in a row along the couch among the cushions. For a while they were busy adjusting the folds of their robes around their shoulders and legs.
“They make their own clothes,” volunteered Brooks. “All the monks do.”
I spoke of Ceylon; there the monks bought the robes all cut and ready to sew together. Yamyong smiled appreciatively and said: “We use the same system here.”
The air-conditioning roared at one end of the room and the noise of boat motors on the river seeped through the windows at the other. I looked at the three sitting in front of me. They were very calm and self-possessed, but they seemed lacking in physical health. I was aware of the facial bones beneath their skin. Was the impression of sallowness partly due to the shaved eyebrows and hair?
Yamyong was speaking. “We appreciate the opportunity to use English. For this reason we are liking to have foreign friends. English, American; it doesn’t matter. We can understand.” Prasert and Vichai nodded.
Time went on, and we sat there, extending but not altering the subject of conversation. Occasionally I looked around the room. Before they had come in, it had been only a hotel room whose curtains must be kept drawn. Their presence and their comments on it had managed to invest it with a vaguely disturbing quality; I felt that they considered it a great mistake on my part to have chosen such a place in which to stay.
“Look at his tattoo,” said Brooks. “Show him.”
Yamyong pulled back his robe a bit from the shoulder, and I saw the two indigo lines of finely written Thai characters. “That is for good health,” he said, glancing up at me. His smile seemed odd, but then, his facial expression did not complement his words at any point.
“Don’t the Buddhists disapprove of tattooing?” I said.
“Some people say it is backwardness.” Again he smiled. “Words for good health are said to be superstition. This was done by my abbot when I was a boy studying in the wat. Perhaps he did not know it was a superstition.”
We were about to go with them to visit the wat where they lived. I pulled a tie from the closet and stood before the mirror arranging it.
“Sir,” Yamyong began. “Will you please explain something? What is the significance of the necktie ?”
“The significance of the necktie?” I turned to face him. “You mean, why do men wear neckties?”
“No. I know that. The purpose is to look like a gentleman.”
I laughed. Yamyong was not put off. “I have noticed that some men wear the two ends equal, and some wear the wide end longer than the narrow, or the narrow longer than the wide. And the neckties themselves, they are not all the same length, are they? Some even with both ends equal reach below the waist. What are the different meanings?”
“There is no meaning,” I said. “Absolutely none.”
He looked to Brooks for confirmation, but Brooks was trying out his Thai on Prasert and Vichai, and so he was silent and thoughtful for a moment. “I believe you, of course,” he said graciously. “But we all thought each way had a different significance attached.”
A page from Bowles’ Thailand notebook, with drawings of local instruments
As we went out of the hotel, the doorman bowed respectfully. Until now he had never given a sign that he was aware of my existence. The wearers of the yellow robe carry weight in Thailand.
A few Sundays later I agreed to go with Brooks and our friends to Ayudhaya. The idea of a Sunday outing is so repellent to me that deciding to take part in this one was to a certain extent a compulsive act. Ayudhaya lies less than fifty miles up the (Chao Phraya from Bangkok. For historians and art-collectors it is more than just a provincial town; it is a period and a style – having been the Thai capital for more than four centuries. Very likely it still would be, had the Burmese not laid it waste in the eighteenth century.
Brooks came early to fetch me. Downstairs in the street stood the three bhikkus with their book bags and parasols. They hailed a cab, and without any previous price arrangement (the ordinary citizen tries to fix a sum beforehand) we got in and drove for twenty minutes or a half-hour, until we got to a bus terminal on the northern outskirts of the city.
It was a nice, old-fashioned, open bus. Every part of it rattled, and the air from the rice fields blew across us as we pieced together our bits of synthetic conversation. Brooks, in high spirits, kept calling across to me: “Look! Water buffaloes!” As we went further away from Bangkok there were more of the beasts, and his cries became more frequent. Yamyong, sitting next to me, whispered: “Professor Brooks is fond of buffaloes?” I laughed and said I didn’t think so.
“Then?”
I said that in America there were no buffaloes in the fields, and that was why Brooks was interested in seeing them. There were no temples in the landscape, either, I told him, and added, perhaps unwisely: “He looks at buffaloes. I look at temples.” This struck Yamyong as hilarious, and he made allusions to it now and then all during the day.
The road stretched ahead, straight as a line in geometry, across the verdant, level land. Paralleling it on its eastern side was a fairly wide canal, here and there choked with patches of enormous pink lotuses. In places the flowers were gone and only the pods remained, thick green disks with the circular seeds embedded in their flesh. At the first stop the bhikkus got out. They came aboard again with mangosteens and lotus pods and insisted on giving us large numbers of each. The huge seeds popped out of the fibrous lotus cakes as though from a punch-board; they tasted almost like green almonds. “Something new for you today, I think,” Yamyong said with a satisfied air.
Ayudhaya was hot, dusty, spread-out, its surrounding terrain strewn with ruins that scarcely showed through the vegetation. At some distance from the town there began a wide boulevard sparingly lined with important-looking buildings. It continued for a way and then came to an end as abrupt as its beginning. Growing up out of the scrub, and built of small russet-colored bricks, the ruined temples looked still unfinished rather than damaged by time. Repairs, done in smeared cement, veined their façades.
The bus’s last stop was
still two or three miles from the center of Ayudhaya. We got down into the dust, and Brooks declared: “The first thing we must do is find some food. They can’t eat anything solid, you know, after midday.”
“Not noon exactly,” Yamyong said. “Maybe one o’clock or a little later.”
“Even so, that doesn’t leave much time,” I told him. “It’s quarter to twelve now.”
But the bhikkus were not hungry. None of them had visited Ayudhaya before, and so they had compiled a list of the things they most wanted to see. They spoke with a man who had a station wagon parked nearby, and we set off for a ruined stupa that lay some miles to the south-west. It had been built atop a high mound, which we climbed with some difficulty, so that Brooks could take pictures of us standing within a fissure in the decayed outer wall. The air stank of the bats that lived inside.
When we got back to the bus stop, the subject of food arose once again, but the excursion had put the bhikkus into such a state of excitement that they could not bear to allot time for anything but looking. We went to the museum. It was quiet; there were Khmer heads and documents inscribed in Pali. The day had begun to be painful. I told myself I had known beforehand that it would.
Then we went to a temple. I was impressed, not so much by the gigantic Buddha which all but filled the interior, as by the fact that not far from the entrance a man sat on the floor playing a ranad (pronounced lanat). Although I was familiar with the sound of it from listening to recordings of Siamese music, I had never before seen the instrument. There was a gradated series of wooden blocks strung together, the whole slung like a hammock over a boat-shaped resonating stand. The tones hurried after one another like drops of water falling very fast. After the painful heat outside, everything in the temple suddenly seemed a symbol of the concept of coolness – the stone floor under my bare feet, the breeze that moved through the shadowy interior, the bamboo fortune sticks being rattled in their long box by those praying at the altar, and the succession of insubstantial, glassy sounds that came from the ranad. I thought: if only I could get something to eat, I wouldn’t mind the heat so much.