0183. The Musical Family (Mor 032--new)
At the Tit Mellil grand taxi stand I came across a 10 year old ticket hustler wearing thick dark glasses. "He's the son of the owner" someone muttered as he collected our money. At least he wasn't driving.
Had to take to cabs to get to Ben Slimane--a fairly quiet town at the edge of the "Great Forest"--the largest forest in Morocco that stretches from here to Rabat. Ben Slimane locals like to rave about it--but don't get your expectations to high...no offense, but forests are not Morocco's strong point...
Ben Slimane clearly had ambitions at one point to be a garden city--with little plazas and would-have-been gardens scattered about--most of which haven't been maintained in years. There is one very nice park though--but it still hasn't been opened to the public.
"Yeah--cost me 300 Dh down at Bab Marrakech in Casablanca"
We jammed a little bit there on the sidewalk--then he invited me to meet his family. Turned out to be a fascinating encounter.
His father, Hajj Mustapha, is an engineer who works for city hall--but he's certainly not your stereotypical Moroccan bureaucrat. He invited me to sit down--then he brought out his lute and started jamming a few tunes. Now with two guitars and a lute we had a full sized jam session going. It was a beautiful and unusual experience--you don't generally have two generations of Moroccans playing music together.
A great family--spent a really nice afternoon there. I was tempted to accept when they invited me to stay the night, but in the end decided against it--I don't like to impose myself too much...
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