‘Welcome back’ I hear you cry! Well, realistically the majority of you didn’t even know I was away but yes, I have been jet setting quite a lot recently hence the lack of blog posts, for which I do apologise.
I have ventured North of the Wall (a.k.a Scotland), to the sunny Marrakech in Morocco and then finally back to the Emerald Isle.
When I chose Marrakech as a holiday destination for myself, my sister and my mum, I was quite honestly just looking for somewhere that would inject a bit of Vitamin D into my borderline translucent body (please see featured image on the Home Page). And Marrakech did not disappoint.
Although I just wanted to remain horizontal on a sun lounger for the week, I knew I ought to do some cultural things and was advised that the Old Town, or Medina’s, souks and food stalls were one of the top things to visit. I was well prepared for the haggling that would be needed and knew to wear long trousers, having had to resort to wrapping my scarf around my bare legs last year after realising that I was the only person not in something below the knee in Egypt’s Old Town. These long pins certainly did cause a frenzy with the stall owners…. (Anyone who knows my leg to body ratio will note the irony of that statement).
As soon as we arrived in the Medina, with our guide La La [please insert appropriate Teletubbies joke here], I realised that I was very thankful for my daily Oxford Street commute. Weaving through tourists, avoiding charity collectors and saying a firm NO to those people giving out ‘free’ bags of makeup put me in good stead.
My twin sister and I, as some of you will know, are not the type to accept being ripped off, so we were fiercely haggling and bartering with every stall owner, much to the mortification of my mum. One particular man tried to sell my sister a unique, one of a kind, never to be seen anywhere else in the world EVER, carpet, for a casual £1,000. Following a swift exit we, unsurprisingly, saw that same unique, one of a kind carpet hanging on a cheaper stall 100m away – the con artist!
We day-tripped to the seaside town of Essaouira where we found out that its Medina was known as the Lucky Square. Much to my horror, Essaouira gained this name due to the copious number of seagulls and their frequent bowel movements. My irrational fear of seagulls was tested to breaking point, and I did come very, very close to being ‘lucky’ at one point, much to the amusement of our tour guide; ‘’Oooh that was a big s**t” – thanks mate, I’m aware.
Our tour guide taught us a lot about the history of Morocco, its political and education systems, but if I am perfectly honest I only took one piece of information away that day. Apparently, in Essaouira, instead of saying someone is sexy, they call them salty – from the expression salt of the earth- which had me singing ‘ Heeey salty lady op op op op oppan Gangnam Style’ for the remainder of the holiday. And although I did get asked out by a Moroccan Peter Andre, sadly no one actually called me Salty Lady.
So despite my mum’s attempts to rid herself of her embarrassing twin daughters, she realised that Ryanair may have charged her just a tiny additional fee to get camels into the hold, so we all arrived safely back in the UK without a Moroccan husband or a caravan of camels. Although my dad did suggest she try a 2 for 1 offer next time. Cheers Dad…
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