I had heard from numerous people that traveling to Morocco would be two things:
1. Fine for a woman traveling alone
2. A total culture shock.
I would say that both of these were (in my case) wrong. I would not suggest women travel there alone, and for me, it was not a culture shock. I felt like I was back in the RMI more then anything -apparently 4 months there was enough to properly "shock" me forever ... No re-shock was necessary :) So that, at least was playing in my favor.
However, I was NOT prepared for the onslaught of attention I received as a woman traveling alone, based on people I had talked to who had traveled there I thought I would be hassled somewhat, but nothing too serious. Hugely wrong! I was non-stop hassled as I walked thru the Mendina (or really anywhere), men were making comments lie "nice ass" "nice tits" every three seconds and trying to bodily pull me into their stalls. It was extreamly uncomfortable and not at all what I was expecting. (I guess l was expecting some level of respect?)
Although this pretty much sucked, it did work out well in the end for me; because after about 5 seconds I realized I should not be out and about alone I actively looked for people to hang out with and ended up meeting pretty cool people as a result. (Im actually a pretty happy solo traveler and in no other city was I super serious about finding people to spend time with: that's not to say I didn't spend time talking with other people and doing stuff with them, I just didn't actively work to do it. If the opportunity presented itself, I went with it, of not I was fine by myself.)
On my first day, I ended up just finding a group of three nice looking guys who who looked like they spoke English (they did, they were from England!) and sat down at their table as they ate lunch. They ended up being super nice and I spent my whole first day with them, it was really chill and fun-
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| one of them even let me borrow an awesome sweatshirt because it was cold! |
It was interesting because whenever I walked with guys I was not only not hassled but no one spoke to me at all! It was awesome- they tried to get the guys to come in but in general did not speak to me... Which I was more then fine with. After wandering around the Medina during the day, we wandered around the main square to eat at night.
The English guys also wanted to try snails from the food booths that magically appear in the main square at night-
They were DISGUSTING. Seriously you could see the snails little face and everything it was so foul. And they were cooked in this salty nastyness that almost made one of the English guys vomit... ew ew ew. Can not say enough how it may have been one of the most foul things I have ever eaten. (Because yes I tried one, and yes I looked at it's little face before I ate it, and yes I also thought I was going to vomit.)
We ate other food too though, which was amazing and that we clearly devoured-
Then enjoyed the sunset from a rooftop-
Then they went skiing in the Atlas Mountains (SO JEALOUS), and I went to my amazing hostel. :) Still they were really fun and even had cute accents! So it was a day well-spent :)
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