Memories of Fes

Fes must be the quintessential Moroccan town. The medina is expansive and alive. But straying away from the main paths leads you down some quiet alleys frequented only by locals and their animals. Make one too many wrong turns and you end up expelled from the medina into the underbelly of local commerce. First we pass through what looks like a flea market of clothing and housewares in the middle of an intersection. We walk to the top of the hill to get a vantage point and figure out where on earth we are - only to find that we have come across the wonderful combination of a flea market and dump all in one. It's the ultimate in recycling. Just like you see in the medina, people here have their offerings spread out on carpets or linens on the ground. But here, the ground is the edge of a dump and the items for sale are truly unreal. Just about anything that's been thrown away is available for sale here. We even found some Atari Super Breakout! The farther you walk down the path the closer the items get to be being truly unwanted trash.

But better than all this is the row of barbers in outdoor tents here. It just so happened that I badly needed a haircut and Mary was in the mood to risk my neck to Spanky with the rusty scissors. We picked the guy with the biggest mirror shard and the smallest jar of pulled teeth. No kidding. He didn't understand a word of English or our hack French so he waved his straight razor around and Mary used her charade skills to guess he was asking if it was okay to cut my ear, she nodded and got the camera out.