Change In Plans

This post is about our final days in Tunisia and our trip onward to Istanbul, with some extraneous Carthaginian history thrown in.

Our time in Tunisia was short, but sweet. We had intended mostly to spend our three days on the beach, decompressing from Morocco, and letting the kids have some purely kid time. The beaches were beautiful from a distance, but were deserted and very dirty and neglected when we saw them up close. Apparently the “tourist beach” was about 6km away from us, in La Marsa, but we didn’t make it down there.

So we changed plans and spent a lot of time exploring the ruins of ancient Carthage, walking the streets, and catching up on school work.

The Tunisian government has done a great job in preserving and presenting the ruins of Carthage. By wandering the physical ruins, and looking at the drawings of what they believe the structures look like, we got a sense of what the city might have looked like as the Romans’ African capital.

The history of Carthage itself is incredibly interesting. It was founded by Queen Dido of Tyre (Lebanon) in about 800 BC, as she fled her murderous younger brother. Apparently, after only seven years, they had created the city, and set about building a great empire.

By the 3rd Century BC, the Carthaginian Empire controlled about half of the circumference of the Mediterranean, Sardinia and Corsica, the Balearic Islands, and a big piece of the Iberian Peninsula. The Carthaginians had the best navy in the world (and a great geographic position for controlling Mediterranean commerce), and had pioneered efficient production methods for shipbuilding.

The rise of the Roman Empire led to the first Punic War, which knocked the Carthaginians back. Led by Hannibal, 70,000 Carthaginian troops took the fight to the Romans in the Second Punic War, invading overland (famously on elephants through the Alps) from 218 BC. They occupied a lot of Italy for 15 years, before being beaten back to Carthage in 203 BC.

By 186BC, at the conclusion of the Third Punic War, Scipio Africanus burned the Carthaginian fleet in the harbor, razed and burned Carthage itself, and enslaved 50,000 of its citizens. This was before the Geneva Convention, I guess. Reading the story of Carthage aloud from my BlackBerry (thanks Wikipedia) , as we stood amidst the ruins, looking out at the harbor where the fleet was actually burned, was an amazing “history comes to life” moment.

The Romans created their African capital in Utica, about 30 miles from Carthage, at the mouth of Majardah River. Top-soil unfriendly farming practices in the mountains caused the river and the harbor to become choked with silt, and the Romans moved the capital back to Carthage. It may be a stretch to call it an historical coincidence, but Carthage, Tennessee (ancestral home of the Al Gore family) owes its recent prominence to another man-made environmental disaster of global warming.

The Romans rebuilt Carthage into the second-largest city in the western empire, with about 500,000 residents by the 2nd century AD. African agriculture and trade were acore part of the empire’s strength. Most of the ruins and mosaics that we saw are from this period. Finally, after Vandals and Goths had ended the Roman empire, Islamic invaders captured and (once again) destroyed Carthage in 698 AD.

Aside from the history, we had a relaxing time at the Dar Said pool, reading in the gardens, and walking in the streets of Sidi Bou Said and Carthage. I wish we had gone into Tunis proper, but we ran out of time.

Yesterday morning we packed up again, took a taxi to the airport, and flew to Istanbul. Zola was delighted that we got upgraded to business class.

The plane was absolutely packed with about 250 silent, elderly people in long white robes trimmed with yellow. The strangeness of this was reinforced by the expressions of other Tunisian and Turkish passengers who were not with this group, as they came into the departure lounge in Tunis. To a person, they went to the desk and asked, “Is this really the flight to Istanbul?” Eventually we figured out that this was a group of Algerian pilgrims, en route to Mecca. Apparently they had to change planes in Istanbul for Jeddah.

We arrived in Istanbul at rush hour on a Friday during Ramadan, and the traffic was horrendous. It took nearly two hours to get to our hotel from the airport.

Now, however, we are seated on our balcony, looking out at the ships on the Bosphorous, and at Asia only about a mile away. We are off to explore Istanbul.

This post is about the fun things we did while we were in Morocco.

Reading back through my posts, it sounds as though we spent our entire time there tromping humorlessly through the medinas, dodging mopeds, and fretting about economic development. Actually, we had a wonderful time overall, and did a lot of fun stuff.

Here are some of the highlights:

1- Camping and riding camels in the Sahara desert. We were in the “Erg Chebbi,” which means the Chebbi Sand Dunes, down near the Morocco-Algeria border. On the afternoon that we arrived, we basically tumbled out of the 4×4, sat on the camel saddles, hung on while the camels stood up (not easy) and rode off into the dunes. As Zola said at the time, “There are three reasons [McKinsey partner's kid!] that this is awesome: I am riding on a camel, I am in the Sahara desert, and I am only eight years old”

On the second day of desert camping, we got up before dawn, and rode the camels up into the dunes to watch a spectacular sun rise. Although we look cold in the picture, it was warm and pleasant in the evenings (and unbelievably hot during the day).

2- Staying at Dar Ahlam hotel near Ouarzazate. Dar Ahlam may be the best hotel I have ever stayed in. They gave us a villa which was bigger and more comfortable than our last apartment in New York (probably 2,200 square feet) with its own pool. The food was amazingly great - simple, but subtle, and made primarily with organic vegetables grown on the property. The service could not have been better - having a staff to guest ratio of about 5 (particularly when we were the only guests on our first night) made it easy for them to lavish attention on us. More important, everyone there seemed to love the kids, and to really enjoy their jobs. India and I celebrated our 14th anniversary with dinner under the stars, while the staff took care the kids. What a great place.

They had loads of board games, a great swimming pool, and they organized bicycles and donkey rides for us in the afternoons. Because Zola and I rode so much together over the summer (~200 miles) we immediately slipped back into a familiar and comfortable bicycle discussion. He treated me to a 45-minute two-part monologue on Pokemon and on airsoft rifles. It was wonderful.

3- Riad roofs. At both of the riads where we stayed (Riad Fes in Fes, and Riad Anayela in Marrakech) we spent a lot of time on the roof decks of the hotels. That is where we did our school work, ate most of our meals, dried off in the sun after swimming, played Pokemon, and looked out over the respective medinas. In both places, we felt privileged to be up there, seeing the old cities spread beneath us, listening to the calls to prayer, and enjoying being together as a family.

4- Talking to Khalid. We were fortunate to have an excellent professional guide for six days while we were in Morocco. He organized our desert excursion, stayed with us in Ouarzazate, and showed us the sights in between. Because he knows everything about Morocco, and is an impassioned advocate for his country, Khalid was the perfect person to talk to for hours. His insights and knowledge and companionship made the trip a lot more fun.

Overall, Morocco is a somewhat tough place for a family vacation with small kids, particularly staying in riads in the medinas. If we were to do it again, we might spend time on the beaches (eg, Essaouira), and would definitely spend more time at Dar Ahlam.

This short post is about walking in the medinas of Fes and Marrakech.

If walking in the Fes medina were a game, it would be a maze, written on dusty ancient parchment, and worked through with an old quill pen. It would be played in a room that was 105 degrees, but shady. It would be pleasant, but frustrating.

If walking in the Marrakech medina were a game, it would be the old video game, Frogger. In Frogger, the player controlled a frog that was trying to cross a stream by jumping from log to log. The logs are all moving at different speeds, and in both directions.

The streets in the Marrakech medina are generally twice as wide (or more) than the streets in Fes. This means that they are generally 15-20 feet wide. In the marketplaces, the streets tend to be narrower, and to have shops on both sides, spilling out into the public space.

In Fes, there are no cars at all, and very few motor scooters or mopeds. The biggest traffic hazard is the donkeys and donkey carts, which force everyone to the sides with shouts of “Belek! Belek!” Having so many pedestrians crammed into small space slows down the pace of walking, but it is subdued and civil.

In Marrakech, the streets are complete chaos. In addition to the pedestrians and the donkey carts (fewer), there are thousands of motor scooters and bicycles, plus the occasional small car or truck. In any given minute, walking in the center of the medina, we would:

• Pass 20-30 people sitting on the sides of the street
• Pass 10-20 people walking slowly or standing and chatting
• Be passed by 40-50 people walking int he opposite direction
• Be passed by 3-5 donkeys and/or donkey carts and 5-10 bicycles
• Be passed by 20-30 mopeds and motor scooters, going in either direction, at speeds ranging from 5-30 miles per hour. Many of these vehicels are carrying two or three passengers.
• Be passed by the occasional car (one every 5 minutes or so)

As you can imagine, this much motion creates collisions and near-misses all over the place. All of the two-stroke and diesel engines also spew exhaust which hangs in the air. Young men (in particular) rev and skid and rev and skid their motor scooters through the traffic, seeming to revel in the video-game aspect of it.

We only saw two real accidents (one bad one), and within the family, Zola was the only one to have a vehicle make contact with his body. A huge, slow-moving wheelbarrow cart full of pastries knocked him into a shop in the shoe market. There were no injuries.

Marrakech is vibrant and alive, and full of people eager to get from someplace to someplace else. Our walks through the old city have been very stimulating, except for Tallulah, who is incredibly casual about it all. This afternoon, she fell asleep in the stroller for over an hour as we walked over the cobblestones. Amazing.

This post is about our dinner this evening in a restaurant in the souqs of old Marrakesh. Nothing dramatic or extraordinary happened, but the whole experience reflects how different Morocco is.

Even though our afternoon walk back to the Riad Alayena hotel had been stressful, and took a lot longer than expected (these facts were related), we decided to stick with our plan to have dinner out on the town. Both kids were tired (Zola even took a highly uncharacteristic nap), but we figured that an early and quick dinner, followed by a walk in the night air, would be perfect.

The Riad’s manageress made a reservation for us at a popular place called Cafe Arabe. Because it is Ramadan, the earliest reservation we could get was for 8pm. So much for the ‘early’ part of ‘an early and quick dinner.’

As the crow flies, Cafe Arabe is probably about a mile from Riad Anayela. Because the Baird Family can not fly, and because the medina’s narrow streets could take us hours to navigate, we called a ‘petit taxi.’

The ancient Dacia taxi somehow managed to navigate from the nearest gate in the walls (called Bab Kheshish) deep into the medina’s labyrinth towards our hotel. When the road got too narrow, the driver, Youssef, sent someone on foot the last 50 yards, into the alley where the hotel was located (called Derb Zerwal), to let us know he had arrived.

Youssef executed a neat 183-point turn to reverse direction, and we started driving back toward Bab Kheshish. Maybe because the fifth call to prayer had just sounded, the streets were largely deserted. Tallulah fell asleep almost immediately.

Five minutes later, as we exited the medina, Youssef asked (in French), “Where are you going? To the big square?” I guess there was a communication breakdown between the hotel and Youssef. Fortunately, and uncharacteristically, I had a scrap of paper with the name and address of Cafe Arabe on it. After a few confusing minutes, we were on our way again.

We drove through the remnants of a huge flea market that had been held just outside the medina walls, and then onto the anarchic 3-lane ring road that encircles the old city. After driving 3-4 miles, we re-entered the medina on the westen side (if the medina walls were a clock, we had exited from Bab Kheshish at about 2, and were re-entering at about 8).

We drove into a new labyrinth, with many more small shops, all of which were open, and with many more people on the streets. When Youssef could go no further, he indicated that the restaurant was “five meters” down the street we were already on. We woke Lu up, and walked off into the medina.

“Dad, how much is five meters?” Zola asked.
“About 15 feet. The driver may have exaggerated how close it is, but I’m sure it is right up here somewhere,” I responded, confidently.

We walked for several minutes, past dozens of tiny shops, selling clothes, shoes, baked goods and sweets, leather products, toys. We walked past small cafes filled with men drinking coffee after a long day of fasting. We passed hundreds of people on the street. When we asked directions, many people offered to show us to “a much better restaurant,” before they indicated that Cafe Arabe was a little further on. We dodged dozens of mopeds, scooters, and bicycles.

Finally, a well dressed young man escorted us the last 200 yards (and two turns) to Cafe Arabe. When we arrived, he said (in English) “You pay me 50 dirham,” which is about $6. I felt proud for negotiating him down to only 20 dirham.

At Cafe Arabe, we climbed three flights of stairs to a stylish open-air terrace. Seated, Moroccan-style, on a semi-circular sofa, both kids fell deeply asleep after ordering. Zola did not even drink his hot chocolate.

India and I had a pleasant dinner, barely distracted by our snoring children. The waiter kindly packaged up the kids’ pasta dinners, which would have been otherwise untouched.

When it was time to leave, we woke up Zola. India supported him in walking sleepily back down the stairs (like a coach assisting an injured player from the field). I carried Tallulah and the stroller.

We walked the gantlet of activity back to where the petit taxi had dropped us. As agreed, Youssef pulled up at 10pm on the dot. We all loaded in, and drove back out of the medina.

Youssef took us back around the anarchic ring road, which was much more crowded than it had been at 8pm. All manner of car, truck, moped, donkey cart, horse and carriage, bicyclist and pedestrian, hurtled along the road, miraculously not smashing into each other. Zola and Lu, of course, fell asleep again in the taxi.

After we turned back in to the medina at Bab Kheshish, we realized how packed the streets had gotten. The flea-market area now hosted dozens of little pick-up soccer games, involving scores of kids (many of them about Zola’s age). Again, we passed hundreds of pedestrians, a few full cyber cafes and many people sitting and talking. At a barber shop, we saw a man getting shaved, and a little boy getting his hair cut.

Finally, we arrived back at Derb Zerwal, within 50 yards of our hotel. The night manager from the Riad, named Badr, met us, and helped us get the sleeping kids back inside and up to bed.

In retrospect, we probably could have stayed in. Riad Alayena would not have been able to provide a big dinner (they would have had to start in the afternoon, and besides, the water in this whole section of the medina has been shut off for most of the day). They would have found something for us, though. It will be interesting to see if the kids remember anything about this small adventure.

This post is about our dinner this evening in a restaurant in the souqs of old Marrakesh. Nothing dramatic or extraordinary happened, but the whole experience reflects how different Morocco is.

Even though our afternoon walk back to the Riad Alayena hotel had been stressful, and took a lot longer than expected (these facts were related), we decided to stick with our plan to have dinner out on the town. Both kids were tired (Zola even took a highly uncharacteristic nap), but we figured that an early and quick dinner, followed by a walk in the night air, would be perfect.

The Riad’s manageress made a reservation for us at a popular place called Cafe Arabe. Because it is Ramadan, the earliest reservation we could get was for 8pm. So much for the ‘early’ part of ‘an early and quick dinner.’

As the crow flies, Cafe Arabe is probably about a mile from Riad Anayela. Because the Baird Family can not fly, and because the medina’s narrow streets could take us hours to navigate, we called a ‘petit taxi.’

The ancient Dacia taxi somehow managed to navigate from the nearest gate in the walls (called Bab Kheshish) deep into the medina’s labyrinth towards our hotel. When the road got too narrow, the driver, Youssef, sent someone on foot the last 50 yards, into the alley where the hotel was located (called Derb Zerwal), to let us know he had arrived.

Youssef executed a neat 183-point turn to reverse direction, and we started driving back toward Bab Kheshish. Maybe because the fifth call to prayer had just sounded, the streets were largely deserted. Tallulah fell asleep almost immediately.

Five minutes later, as we exited the medina, Youssef asked (in French), “Where are you going? To the big square?” I guess there was a communication breakdown between the hotel and Youssef. Fortunately, and uncharacteristically, I had a scrap of paper with the name and address of Cafe Arabe on it. After a few confusing minutes, we were on our way again.

We drove through the remnants of a huge flea market that had been held just outside the medina walls, and then onto the anarchic 3-lane ring road that encircles the old city. After driving 3-4 miles, we re-entered the medina on the westen side (if the medina walls were a clock, we had exited from Bab Kheshish at about 2, and were re-entering at about 8).

We drove into a new labyrinth, with many more small shops, all of which were open, and with many more people on the streets. When Youssef could go no further, he indicated that the restaurant was “five meters” down the street we were already on. We woke Lu up, and walked off into the medina.

“Dad, how much is five meters?” Zola asked.
“About 15 feet. The driver may have exaggerated how close it is, but I’m sure it is right up here somewhere,” I responded, confidently.

We walked for several minutes, past dozens of tiny shops, selling clothes, shoes, baked goods and sweets, leather products, toys. We walked past small cafes filled with men drinking coffee after a long day of fasting. We passed hundreds of people on the street. When we asked directions, many people offered to show us to “a much better restaurant,” before they indicated that Cafe Arabe was a little further on. We dodged dozens of mopeds, scooters, and bicycles.

Finally, a well dressed young man escorted us the last 200 yards (and two turns) to Cafe Arabe. When we arrived, he said (in English) “You pay me 50 dirham,” which is about $6. I felt proud for negotiating him down to only 20 dirham.

At Cafe Arabe, we climbed three flights of stairs to a stylish open-air terrace. Seated, Moroccan-style, on a semi-circular sofa, both kids fell deeply asleep after ordering. Zola did not even drink his hot chocolate.

India and I had a pleasant dinner, barely distracted by our snoring children. The waiter kindly packaged up the kids’ pasta dinners, which would have been otherwise untouched.

When it was time to leave, we woke up Zola. India supported him in walking sleepily back down the stairs (like a coach assisting an injured player from the field). I carried Tallulah and the stroller.

We walked the gantlet of activity back to where the petit taxi had dropped us. As agreed, Youssef pulled up at 10pm on the dot. We all loaded in, and drove back out of the medina.

Youssef took us back around the anarchic ring road, which was much more crowded than it had been at 8pm. All manner of car, truck, moped, donkey cart, horse and carriage, bicyclist and pedestrian, hurtled along the road, miraculously not smashing into each other. Zola and Lu, of course, fell asleep again in the taxi.

After we turned back in to the medina at Bab Kheshish, we realized how packed the streets had gotten. The flea-market area now hosted dozens of little pick-up soccer games, involving scores of kids (many of them about Zola’s age). Again, we passed hundreds of pedestrians, a few full cyber cafes and many people sitting and talking. At a barber shop, we saw a man getting shaved, and a little boy getting his hair cut.

Finally, we arrived back at Derb Zerwal, within 50 yards of our hotel. The night manager from the Riad, named Badr, met us, and helped us get the sleeping kids back inside and up to bed.

In retrospect, we probably could have stayed in. Riad Alayena would not have been able to provide a big dinner (they would have had to start in the afternoon, and besides, the water in this whole section of the medina has been shut off for most of the day). They would have found something for us, though. It will be interesting to see if the kids remember anything about this small adventure.

This short post describes some of the phrases and words that we have found ourselves using frequently in our first five weeks of travel. Like any closed system of people, our family is definitely developing our own vocabulary, to match the rhythms and practical needs of travelling together. Here are some of the favorites:

“Cowboy up, cupcake!” - this comes from Alexandra Fuller’s new book, ‘The Legend of Colton H. Bryant.’ Basically, it means “stop whining and get on with it,” which has become a core part of our parenting repertoire. India and I, and then Zola (surprisingly, because he is only 8), all read this book while we were in Mallorca. Another phrase from the book which we use frequently (and was Colton Bryant’s simple philosophy on life) is “Mind over matter. I don’t mind, so it don’t matter.”


“We did a Dingle.” - this refers to any activity which didn’t go well, due to poor preparation and/or communication by Mom and Dad. It refers to our comically mishapful day trip from Ennis to the Dingle Peninsula in Ireland in June. Since then, the main Dingle has been our trip to Toledo, Spain (see the post from roughly August 22)

“Cough it up, boy” - this has become Zola’s, Lu’s and my way of asking for pretty much anything. I think India is a little tired of hearing it. It refers to a conversation at Zola’s camp this summer, between a counselor and a camper who was trying to sneak a video game into his pack on an overnight trip. This phrase was used dozens of times last night when Zola crushed me in French-language Monopoly.

“Can I play DS?” - Zola uses this phrase within 2 seconds of becoming bored. It means that he wants to play Pokemon on his Nintendo hand-held game. We have not been letting him play much, but he is relentless in asking, and generally good-natured about the denial of his requests.

“James Carlock” - Tallulah has been using this as the catch-all name for many unnamed boy animals we have come across. It refers to a very cute little boy who was her friend at camp this summer. The camel that she and I rode in the Sahara was James Carlock, and she was very concerned about where James Carlock’s Mommy was, whether James Carlock was too hot or too cold, how James Carlock’s tummy was feeling, and whether we could take James Carlock home with us. Yesterday we went for a donkey ride in Skoura, and her donkey was James Carlock, as was a tiny kitten we were introduced to when we were invited into someon’s house. This morning, as Lu and I played with a chess set, she named her king James Carlock.

“How’s your tummy?” - this is self-explanatory, but refers to the greater (Lu and me) or lesser (India and Zola) extent to which our bodies have struggled to adapt to Moroccan food and water. Someone tild me that in french this is referred to as Achmed’s revenge.

“Deux lait chaude avec chocolat, s’il vous plait” - French speakers shudder, but this has been the invariable drinks order from both kids (through me) since we got to Morocco. The chocolate-milk powder is really good.

“Zola, write your ‘My name is…’ ” - for our roadschool, this is like the home room bell. India has Zola writing a short paragraph every morning, to practice handwriting, and to signal the start of school.

“Non, merci. Non, merci” - in the touristy parts of Marrakech’s medina (the souqs and the Jemaa el-Fna), we have said this hundreds of times, in response to offers to visit a shop, have a picture with a snake, get a henna tattoo, etc. The hustling is not overly aggressive, but there is a lot of it.

As we travel, I’m sure there will be many more like this. It isn’t quite the same as learning French (or Arabic), but maybe we are learning something.

This very short post is about the abandoned water wells in the desert, beside the road, near Al Jora, Morocco.

We are driving west, from the edge of the Sahara up into the highlands. Just outside of the town of Al Jora, the landscape next to the road is dotted with scores of small hills with flat tops. They look like tiny volcano craters (or rounded termite mounds): about 6-8 feet high, and maybe 20 feet in circumference. They stretch several hundred yards in every direction. The desert around them is flat and brown and dry (as you might expect).

These are all abandoned wells. We got out to look, and discovered that there is a hole (2-3 feet across)in the cone of each hill. The hole descends into blackness. We asked our guide, who said that each well is roughly 200 feet deep, and dry at the bottom. They had been used over hundreds of years to irrigate nearby fields and provide drinking water. When I pitched in a large stone, we did not hear it hit.

Having small kids around all of these abandoned wells triggered some kind of deep-evolution parental protection response in both India and me. Neither of us is a particularly nervous parent, but our hearts raced, we maintained physical contact with each child, and basically wanted to just get out of there. It was a very strange sensation, as if we had somehow stumbled into a room of loaded pistols. A parental nightmare, in the literal sense, would be running amidst these wells, searching for a lost child. I shudder at the thought.

One hundred yards up the road from where we stopped, still amidst the wells, was a Berber-tented ‘rest stop,’ serving tea and selling souvenirs. Ironically, the sign for the rest stop read “Place of Relaxation.” Not for parents of young kids, I’m afraid.