Wanted to rewind to a day trip we took last week to Sidi Ifni, a fishing port 20 minutes down the coast from Mirleft. Sidi Ifni was under Spanish rule until 1969 (seems like yesterday) and when they retreated they left behind some awesome Art Deco buildings and a bunch of wine. Score.
While researching our trip stateside I read about the Iberian flaired ghost town and was all set to book an Airbnb before Billy casually mused, I wonder if it’s a good place for toddlers? I typed “toddler Sidi Ifni” into the search engine and up popped a blog post entitled, Sidi Ifni: What a Cesspit.
The blog was written by a woman who’s been traveling the world with her family for a while now, and she prefaced her post by saying she usually doesn’t like to leave negative reviews, but… She described an awful stench on the path leading down to the beach which she deduced was human feces, lambasted the roadwork which they must’ve been doing BY HAND (her caps) because there was no progress after four days, and said that the men of Morocco can be so misogynistic that she felt uncomfortable pulling out her camera. “They stare, call out, make comments…You’ll be hard pushed to find a woman out during the day.”
I guess one woman’s cesspit is another woman’s #happyplace. I did not feel uncomfortable taking out my camera, nor did I receive any comments. And I saw plenty of women out during the day. I mean, reading her comment one might think that the women only come out at night? Or do they stay inside 24/7? In which case I guess the men are doing all the shopping and schlepping the kids to and fro?
#happyplace, indeed.
But I don’t mean to dog on this woman. She’s done a lot of traveling and her experience is straight up valid. But it’s her own. I didn’t receive any comments or calls, but then again, I’m no spring chicken. And I’ve got a big, burly Billy with me.
It got me to thinking, though, about why we travel. The places we like, we say, “the people were so nice” (to me) and “it was so beautiful” (for me) and “the food was delicious” (in just the right way my taste buds decipher deliciousness). And yeah, sometimes we just need a vacation. And we pay to stay in the fancy place, with the fancy drinks and the fancy pool, (I’m writing this from one such place right now,) and we ignore the poverty right outside the pearly gates because we didn’t pay for that, didn’t pay to think about that, and it’s not our fault.
And yes, there’s roadwork forever here. They use pickaxes, it’s looks like a scene from a 1920s chain gang, but I’m guessing the Moroccan roads and highways budget isn’t in the black. And yes, a lot of the women are covered up, as opposed to wearing logos on their ass and shirts slit down to the sweaty crescendo of their breasts, but how is one better or worse? And yes, there’s garbage, but how many plastic bottles of water have we drank since we’ve been here? It’s not like we’re loading them up on a carryon to Spain.
I don’t have a point, even though it may seem like I’m circling my big metaphorical dick around one…
I guess I just think that if you’re going to travel to foreign places, you should check your foreign assumptions at the gate. If you want things to be just like home, then why leave?
By her own admission, this woman hated Morocco. She said it’s a country people either "love or hate." Damn binaries. In my experience, you stay anywhere long enough and you’ll love it and hate it and love it and hate it ad infinitum. Of course, her post wasn’t the only research we did on Morocco, but it certainly gave us pause. And clearly I’m a fan of writing about your own experiences, but it’s that pause we take when we read something bad that so often turns into us staying put, regurgitating the poor reviews as fact when it comes up in random conversation, like we already bought the ticket and took the ride.
And, okay, blogging about shit on a path leading down to a beach? It's not exactly fear mongering. But I wonder how much more often we're scared of doing all sorts of things now that we're able to endlessly stream, read, watch and listen to a million different versions of how bad things "really" are out there. We've got the world at our fingertips without ever having to touch any of it.
And at the risk of this entire blog sounding like a PSA for travel, or even worse, sound like I'm patting my own back (that fucker slipped a disc for Christmas; I owe her nothing) but I lived in New York City for two decades, and in my spring chicken years I road tripped across the US, backpacked through some of Asia and some of Africa, and never once was I mugged, robbed, raped or beaten. But those were the things I was warned of, those were the reasons, if I would've listened to them, I might never have left home. And I am not the exception to the rule. I am, in this one little way, the rule. Of course those terrible things do happen, but they are the exception. And even so, there are plenty of people that would call me lucky.
Okay. So be it. I’ll take it.
But maybe we should all push our luck a little more often. Sidi Ifni deserves it.
Me gusta.
And, last thing I'll say on the matter, but what kind of cesspit has a restaurant like this?
Comments