Ouarzarzate

Where Is Zat?

Morocco changed its time Saturday night, falling back an hour. Normally, they follow the UK and Portugal on daylight savings time. But because Ramadan starts this week, they changed the clocks for the next 5 weeks. Since everyone fasts (no food or water) from sunrise to sunset, the time change means the sun sets an hour earlier, therefore they can eat an hour earlier.

This morning we drove out to a small village where we met a family who was going to serve us lunch. The father is a mason, repairing the adobe that make up the village. In recent years, people are switching to cement, which last longer and is cheaper in the long run. Cement homes are hotter, but money rules.

They showed us around their house, then showed us how they make flat bread, stretching it out like pizza dough, then baking it on hot gravel rocks.

We climbed a small ridge behind their house to enjoy the view, have tea and the fresh baked bread, as well as a bread stuffed with herbs and spices, the best thing we’ve had on the trip so far.

On the way down, we stopped and he showed us how he makes bricks for the adobe houses using mud, straw, and manure from his cute little donkey. Air dried for a few days.

Back down to the house where they served lunch. Couscous steamed over stewing potatoes, carrots, zucchini and more. Then they top the fluffy couscous with the vegetables and then some very tender beef from a pressure cooker.

During lunch we chatted with the family, the mason, his unmarried 34 year old daughter, two younger daughters, and a couple of neighbor kids 8 and 13.

After, we visited a women’s association for a really boring pointless presentation that wasted an hour.

On the way back, some of us visited a movie studio. Ouarzarzate is the Hollywood of Morocco, which serves as a background for lots of movies. Gladiator, the Mummy and numerous other Egypt movies, and Game of Thrones, which evidently has desert scenes.

Nice dinner tonight in a Greek restaurant. Don’t know why, but it was really good.