On To Morocco

We climbed down the stairs one last time at Charming Lavapiés, then rode the Metro to the aeropuerto for our plane to Casablanca. Grant, his suitcase, and I all made the trip easily. Now, three days later, and my suitcase still hasn’t arrived. I bought a T-shirt at the Rabat modern art museum but have resisted buying anything else, washing my underwear out each night, in the hope that my own clothes will show up soon. I am starting to loose faith.

To add insult, my glasses fell apart and are now held together with a staple until I get to an optometrist who can fix them.  Amazingly I found the screw. Plus my throat is sore, and my gut thinking about going down. Of course all our first aid and drugs are in my suitcase, now known to be in Madrid. As a woman on the tour said, “You really are a mess, aren’t you?” So true.

The Rabat Restaurant Cat  

But I'm glad we are here. Who knew there would be cats everywhere? We met the first one at the restaurant where we had lunch in Rabat, then noticed others all around the city. There were dozens at the Roman necropolis Chellah, cats waiting to be fed in the Kasbah, and cats sleeping in the royal stables. Traffic is amazingly terrible; lanes usage seem to be considered just a suggestion, people and cats walk everywhere, yet the roadside is not littered with bodies. It all seems to work.


 They seem to be cared for or at least tolerated. Somewhere between feral and house pets. Perhaps in the original cat role of rodenticide.
At lunch today in Meknès, a cat roamed around our table as we sat on the second story terrace. Waiters just walked around it as it checked to for any fallen food bit would have gladly taken hand outs.