Morocco - Sheep, Donkeys and Couscous

Morocco was incredible, unbelievable and altogether amazing. We spent ten days trekking from side to side of the country. We stayed in a Berber (indigenous people) village and danced with women around a fire, we climbed the Atlas mountains (by bus) and saw the snow covered mountains and we spent a night in the Sahara and walked the most incredible sand dunes. Every moment was awesome and a complete 360 from anything I had experienced before.
We started off the trip leaving Israel on a Monday night quite early. A tip for future travelers TurkishAir is always late. Always always always. We ended up arriving in Casablanca several hours after we planned and immediately went to a Jewish Museum. Our guide for the entire trip was this man named Rafi. Rafi is a Moroccan Jew who has spent the better part of his life investigating and learning about the Jewish population in Morocco and making sure that the public (Muslims) are also aware of the heritage and the presence that of the Jews in Morocco. The Jewish museum was the main point of that first day. We went to a Jewish club for dinner that night. No non-Jews are allowed there after an attempted anti-Semitic attack in which several Jewish clubs were bombed. The food there was great and especially after a ten plus hours of flying it was warmly received.
As you will come to see the better part of each day was spent on the bus. We had bus rides that ranged from 2 hours to about 8. So each day is not going to be as packed full of activities as one might expect.
That first day we visited the only Mosque that non-Muslims are allowed into. It is this huge incredible building that required donations from every single citizen in Casablanca (non-Muslims included) in addition to a huge sum from the monarchy itself.

The Mosque

In Casablanca we went to visit to a Jewish Orthodox school. There we visited several classes and were greeted by singing from all the students and then we met a man named Jackie (the director of the school). Jackie is another Moroccan Jew who has stayed in Morocco his whole life. Several years ago he was the victim of (another) anti-Semitic attack when someone came up from behind him and put an axe through his head. The attacker had intended the ax go through the center of Jackie's skull killing him but as luck would have it at the last moment Jackie turned his head to see who had approached and thus the ax when down the right side of his face. He spent six months in a hospital in France having reconstructive surgery done. He immediately settled back into Morocco, there was no doubt in his mind that he was going to stay. The most incredible part is that he doesn't hold a grudge. At the time of the attack he refused to talk to reporters with the argument that a story like this be a hot coal and would just increase the fighting between Arabs and Jews.

Children at the Jewish School

Jackie

After we headed to this old village called Teuradant. It used to have a vibrant Jewish population, but now there are no Jews remaining. We stayed in a hotel called the Palace of Peace, which really was a Palace. It was this incredible sprawling hotel right next to the old city. The point of this trek out to this small village was to be able to visit a small synagogue that Rafi had restored. During his quest to learn about the Jewish heritage he had come to this village in search of a synagogue that he had heard existed. After asking some of the locals he was told to ask for a man named Harim. When Rafi found Harim Harim pulled a key out of his pocket and asked Rafi "where have you been, I have been waiting for 45 years". The key was the key to the synagogue that Harim had been entrusted with by the last Rabbi when he (Harim) was 15 years old. He had held onto the key all these years in the hopes that a Jew would come looking for it. After visiting the synagogue we had lunch at Harim's house; our first traditional meal.

Views From the Hotel (The Palace of Peace)