Some towns are sticky. They cling to your soul long after you’ve left. They are hallmarks of a traveler’s life – living touchstones that you think back upon when you need to find your happy place.
Chefchaouen will stick to us, I am sure. Years from now, when life is hectic and full of stress, we’ll find ourselves closing our eyes and thinking back to the little blue town in Morocco’s Riff Mountains.
Some towns are magic from the moment you step foot in them, and others have to grow on you. When we first arrived it was a blustery Friday afternoon just after the heat of the day. The kids who lived inside the medina (old city) had been cooped up all afternoon, and the weather was finally cool enough to venture outside to let off steam. And they were going absolutely berserk.
At every turn there was a tremendous racket, due in part, to Chefchauoen’s design and geography. The town is built on a hillside, and it is a small maze of twisty old streets, odd shaped buildings and absolutely no level ground. The clean cobblestone alleys are in essence the town’s playground.
When we travel, we often play the game, “how would be like growing up here?” In poor countries, more often than not, the idea is not appealing. But the thought of growing up in Chefchauouen was kind of appealing. Sure, things could be a little on the rough side – we saw more than a few squabbles and fights among the throngs of kids, but it’s also the sort of place where neighbors look out for one another. Entertainment is the soccer match on TV and sitting in your doorway watching the world go by. Without the constant drone of scooters and taxis belching by your door, the twisty lanes of the neighborhood would be a frenetic maze a kid could feel like they owned.
On our last night in Morocco, we sat on the rooftop of our hotel enjoying the warm air and listening to the melodic calls to prayer bouncing off the nearby craggy peaks. Below we heard shouting from a gaggle of grade school children We crept to the edge of the balcony and watched them in secret from three stories above.
It was well past 11:00 PM but they scrambled around like mice, shrieking with laughter and squealing. We try to decipher their games. An ancient woman in white who resembled an overstuffed nun shuffled by – they pretend she is a monster and hid from her (doing a poor job of keeping quiet). One boy then lined up his friends and attempted a parkour move – vaulting off them and spinning in mid air (or so he thought). They kicked a plastic ball as high as it would go, all the while dashing in and out of our view. At one point a hotel manager came out and chewed them out, and they stood against a wall for a minute and then giggled and guffawed their way to being rowdy once again.
The kids scampered up and down our alley a few a few more times, always being followed by someone’s younger sister who couldn’t quite keep up. But the little girl did have eyes for things the others did not. She alone spied us hiding on the rooftop. Hey eyes widened and she petitions the rest in Arabic, “Someone’s up there!” We ducked behind the railing before the others could see us and imagined their reaction.
“Stupid sister, nobody’s there!”
“But I saw someone, I swear!”
Of all the Kasbahs, mud brick buildings, markets and mind-blowing sights we’ve encountered in Morocco, it’s the simple memory of those kids playing among blue painted alleys in the middle of the night that will probably be one of my fondest. Kids are the same everywhere – it doesn’t matter if they’re rich or poor, brown or white, Christian or Muslim.
And some places are just plain sticky.
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