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morocco One of two

MARCH 30 - APRIL 20, 2006

THURSDAY, 3/30/06: Car calls at 4:20! I close bags and put on shoes and jacket and get down at 4:25. To airport via very many back streets including Bedford and Eastern Parkway, some streets very busy and crowded, some empty, and get to the airport at 5:16, Ken panicking me by pointing out that the airline notice said that we HAD to be there by 5:40 or we wouldn't be allowed to board the 6:40 departure! The check-in for Royal Air Maroc is almost instant, me unaccountably getting seat 11A which Ken had said had been given to Judy and Jeff Altman, our partners. Check in to the gate 11 security line at 5:25, and through it by 5:38, me not having to take off my shoes OR my belt, as others before me have to do. To gate at 5:45 and they're LOADING already: so much about hours of puzzles to worry about doing before boarding. Maybe my Valium is working overtime, but I'm perfectly calm, wonderfully confident in my almost-perfect packing, verifying that we STILL don't lock our luggage. See the panini line and when we have to sit while they're boarding rows beyond 25, I get a prosciuto and cotta panini for $8.64, tastefully toasted (but admittedly on the small side) and manage to wolf down half of it before we're admitted to the plane at 6:08 to my seat JUST in front of the engine, and Ken shuttled Jeff over, who talks about his being seated in the middle section back at row 27. The Moroccan next to me asks me to change with his friend across the aisle, but I refuse. Jeff and Judy manage to move to 10A and 10B in front of me. A VERY loud baby screams inventively in the middle section between Ken and me, and I put in earplugs, taking them out when the guy next to me asks me questions, but I'm really not interested in him. The sun had been out as we boarded, but as we sat waiting for takeoff, it went down save for a few bloody ribbons of sunset reflecting off the bottoms of clouds. Back out at 6:45, slight bumps on the way up over spectacularly lit Long Island, and then I go to the john in preparation to taking Diazepam AND Ambien at 7:25, hoping to sleep. Announced as a 6:15 flight to Casablanca. I don't sleep over an hour, smelling the dinner but not seeing any of it, so maybe I slept more.

FRIDAY, 3/31/06: Then my WATCH dies on me. At 6AM there's a foggy light, some bumps on the way down, and clouds and bright sun at dawn. Land at 6:45 after Roll 1 #13 countryside at 6:40. TOTALLY fogged airport which they said used to be a US military base and it's ALWAYS like this. Judy loans me a $2.50 Silver Rolex at 7:35. Sit and wait in lounge for Marrakech flight, starting first sodoku, and quickly board bus for flight at 8:05. Board flight 401 at 8:25, seat OVER wing but plane is almost empty but for a loud American group in the middle and I move back to about row 25 for photos. Off at 8:45 and #14 river at 8:53. Dropped watch on FLOOR, but found it and put it in pocket before I found the double-clasp that kept it hooked. #15 medina-like town at 9:01. #16 at 9:03 and #17 Marrakesh suburb and #18 irrigation patterns. Land at 9:12 in the midst of dozens of kinds of flowers! To luggage at 9:27, get 1000D at SECOND ATM. To outside not to see Allesandra, but then Jeff finds her; and we're to smallish car (Ken taking front seat, one or the other of the Altmans taking the middle seat, Allesandra with spare luggage in the back) at 9:55 and to snack because I say I'm hungry since I really didn't have dinner. Ken gets a 40D sundae, I get a 18D omelet, 13D hot chocolate which is more schlag than anything, and 9D toast for a GREAT breakfast while Jeff gets the three-sweet Moroccan dish and the others get coffee, and we struggle over the bill, me putting in 100D and getting out a 10D piece. This goes to 11, late, and Ken gets front seat, hot, cops stop us for about six minutes at 1PM, I take to #22 at Oudaya's feminine coop "Tiguemine Argane" (argan tree oil). #24 Essaouira at 2:02PM and #25 Essaouira arcade at 3:53 after incredible lunch at Restaurant El Yakoute:tagine de viande with pruneau et almonds, sweet & lush,Ken's veal tagine, Allesandra's extraordinary fish platter with two enormous merlot, lots of shrimp, fried flounder, veggies, pulpo, and she also got us a bottle of wine, a large bottle of sparkling which I drank lots of, and some of a mediocre white wine. #24 Essaouira 2;02PM, through number #25 Essaouira arcade at 3:53. To #28 from top of Riad Mimouna at 4:23, magical foggy views over waves crashing over old foundations below, gulls soaring, and it's so wonderful just listening to the sound, looking at the ruined shapes looming out of the fog in both directions, despite the maids who seem determined to wash the floors just when I want to sit and absorb the scenery. Sit entranced until the others come up and we're served tea, but they think it's too chilly at 4PM. Unpack and type some but at 6PM decide to go out to wander the Medina, telling Ken as a joke "Call the police if I'm not back by 7:15." Wander the incredibly complicated streets, first keeping to the right so I can try to find the strange beach I saw from above, but don't get there, passing painters and marquetry workers and wood carvers and many other artisans, finding a fort with gunholes at all sides and take to #32 to 6:55 and want to see the beach, so I'm back to the lady behind the desk, who calles Aziz and he takes a key and opens the black door that I suspected led to the beach, and he goes into a small room and unlocks a door that leads to the concrete staircase that I'd seen before. He can't leave the keys, so we agree to five (or maybe even 15) minutes, and I look around and take pictures and get to the door at 7 and he's just not there. Wait until 7:15, magic gone, and pry the bottom open with a brick, still no show, and then call, bang the door, figure it's impossible to try to go beach-wise, relying on our plan to dine at 8PM to save me. Bang door again, brick, call, almost despair when he unlocks at 7:55 and is ABJECTLY sorry for having forgotten. Ken's at the desk about to ask for me, but she didn't remember me at all. Sit to dine and liquor shops close at 8PM so Aziz has to go to a restaurant for the preferred brand, which they're out of, so he has to go BACK, gets two mediocre reds which we have with our tuna salad, then fish with rice, two bottles of red, two bottles of gassy water, and finally finish at 10:55 after a creamed fruit dessert, agreeing to meet for a 9AM breakfast, and I'm up to take pills and type to 10;24PM feeling quite tired, but want to finish at least one Sodoku to get through that, Ken closing the blinds to make my special bed almost pleasant. Wind and water blowing outside, but we can see lights from across the bay. Ken undresses and gets into his NORMAL bed while I have to settle for the makeshift. End this now at 10:24PM. Pile everything onto the floor and get to bed at 10:45, slightly too wide for the narrow blanket, but fall asleep rather quickly, probably before 11PM.

SATURDAY, 4/1/06: Ken opens the drapes and I'm about to curse him out when he says that it's 9AM and we're supposed to be at BREAKFAST! I'm ASTOUNDED that I've slept ten hours without waking to pee or waking at ALL. Vague dreams forgotten as I get up, wash my face, throw on the same old clothes, and get down to a hard-boiled egg, lots of bread, late hot chocolate that I curdle by cooling with orange juice, the only cold liquid on the table, and everyone finishes quickly, saying we'll meet for the walking tour at 9:45AM. I empty out the A&K bag of all unnecessaries and get down at 9:55 for everyone waiting for me. Out and find a small place that directs us to another place that tries to replace my watch battery but he says the display is broken, so he pulls out an identical Casio and since I've forgotten to put my wallet in my pocket, Ken pays the 120D for the watch, which he sets except for the proper day, which is Saturday, not Monday, and go to Association Tilal where everyone looks at mediocre art and I wait outside watching people pass by the large square, then we're off at 10:35 to take #33 of park and worms (?) at 10:53. #34 dock at 10:58. #36 of snail pickers and get to very busy dock area at 11:08 and change to roll 2 #1 bastion at 11:12. IMMENSE activity with boats and repairs and walking cannons and looking over side to 11:40. #6 colors at 12:02. Videos of sea to 12:30. #11 alley at 12:43. To La Mer for LONG lunch of salad, shark on skewer, and 6 portions of orange and cinnamon and almond slivers, absolutely delicious, getting others to share their fizzy water with me, and leave at 3:15PM. #12 spices at 3:30. #13 Jewish Cemetery out the far town-gate at 4:06, lucky to find an old woman to unlock the gate on SATURDAY, which no one bothered to observe. Out at 4:17, beginning to tire. To rebulding rabbi's house at 4:36, climbing all over it, including the roof for a glimpse of the fogging-in sea, and then to busy auction that I video, jewelry where Allesandra prices a "ruby" and we look at solid gold and silver wedding belts, commenting that the wooden doors protect the valuables adequately. Ken has gone shopping, Jeff back to the hotel, and Judy decides she wants to shop on her own, so I start back to the hotel at 5PM, thinking I'm on the street of the photo shop, but I hit the far gate to the Jewish Cemetery and know I'm going wrong, Back along the whole way, repeating "I'm lost, I'm lost" to myself, and get to the NEAR gate where I recognize the alley to La Mer, go around corners, get asked "Do you live here?" since I'm out of the tourist area, and find a sign to the Al Babar Sea-View Hotel which I think is nearby, and go corner after corner and with relief climb the stair to 301 at 5:30, having a good shit and go up to the terrace, leaving a note for Ken that I'm up there rather than walking down three flights and up four and redo the ruined sodoku by 6:19, having taken #14 of two gulls of the hundreds flying over at 6:04, and start on the second one when Ken comes up in his tee shirt and shows off his purchases wrapped and talks of his day and HIS getting lost, and we're cold and down to the room where I work on the second sodoku until I'm feeling bored and tired about 7:10, and decide to catch up with this by 7:40, totally dark out, windy, and Ken's been reading me from Lonely Planet and I'm ready to change for dinner at 8 downstairs. Very fishy fish soup with lovely toasted-bread croutons which are even better with butter, and tasty-fleshed dorado with potatoes, having started with pepper-spiced olives and I had the red and others the white wine. Creme caramel for dessert and I left when Allesandra lit up a cigarette, and it turns out the others did too and Ken even TOLD her he was leaving, last, because she'd lit up. We get up at 6:15 tomorrow to breakfast at 6:45 to leave at 7:30 for Agadir, going past to somewhere new for lunch to get to Tafraoute for sunset which is supposed to be superb: also, after a few hour's drive in morning cool, it's supposed to be hot at last, and away from the shore we'll be having more MEAT for meals, thank goodness. Up at 9:15 and pee and give Ken my scissors again, and finish this at 9:35, my bed oriented the OTHER way this time, but still will have more than 8 hours sleep. Start packing and get most of the stuff into the blue bag, but the A&K bag is still too heavy: will have to come up with an auxiliary bag for moving days, or just leave the film in the car when I get out. Everything away, leaving teeth to tomorrow, and finish the Times that Jeff gave me and finish this at 10:03PM, Ken reading in bed, my food digested enough to let me to go bed, all my stuff to take with me on the TV table.

SUNDAY, 4/2/06: Wake at 2:02 to pee and shit, and have my first brief dream. Trouble getting back to sleep, but finally do and wake to find Ken in the john at 6:02. Dress a bit and type and the phone rings with a wake-up call at 6:17. Wash my face and shit again, somewhat loosely which inspires me to take six hanks of toilet paper for my back jeans pocket. Transcribe my first dream. Now 6:29 and Ken gets out his suntan lotion, nothing of which I have in my A&K bag yet, but I figure we'll be in the car most of the day when we're not eating. Don't even have my comb, but I really couldn't care. Finish this at 6:30. Have egg and bread and yogurt for breakfast, then up to put bags out for boys to take down, and get down at 7:30. #15 atrium 7:33. #16 AM empty street at 7:39. To car at 7:40, and Ken "graciously" offers his front seat, which I take, off at 7:55. Bald ibis video at 9:42. To #27 and lot of VIDEOS of goats in argan tree to 10:42. #28 Agadir bay at 11:09: road spectacular through day, glad I'm sitting in the front seat, and one advantage might be I can't hear EVERYTHING Allesandra says from the back seat. Hot. Down from height 11:22, hills and cliffs and get lost on road to Tafraoute and stop for lunch at 1PM at Ait Baha, on terrace at Hotel Al Adarissa, chicken, no salad for me, three bottles of water, and out after long slow talk at 2:25, everyone having to finish with coffee. #30 garden entrance at 2:40, but it's only a granary of 130 rooms (2 meters by 3 meters by 9 meters) from 762 years ago. Take pictures to #34 of "agadir" and finish roll 2 at 3:10. Roll 3: #4 satellite dish on ruins at 3:27 from wall at back of granary, where guy pulled up water jug from well. Ken gives 50D as our tip and to Agadir city at 3:43. #5 and 6 on road to Tafraoute at 4:30, higher and higher. To Hotel Les Amandiers high over the town at 5:46, with much more spectacular buildings on the other side of the river in suburbs. To room 208, pee, out at 6:02 to pool. Pool is VERY female, as is all crowd on terrace: "Manatees" as I describe them later. Sun sets on left soon, all hills ahead into shade, take to #13 and sit to hear Ken telling Allesandra ALL my health history and age and "Good shape" to 6:55. Ken's water was 5D, and I lost the bill-sheet so keep figures here for now. 240D from me for ALL the drinks: his two at the bar with Allesandra's two Heinekins, my gin and orange much better than the gin and tonic would have been (though this evening Judy says that the tonic IS chilled without the non-safe ice) and Ken's full bottle of white wine which he drinks half of tonight and half of tomorrow night, and my Heinekin for dinner, which is poor for 25D for 25cl, and change to Pils for 18D for 33cl, a much better deal. Long dinner, three have apple tart, which isn't bad, but I want fruit but they say it's "apple, orange, or banana," until Allesandra insists that they MIX them and they come out with a FABULOUS platter with about four sliced oranges with cinnamon, an apple in slices, and maybe two tiny bananas in slices. I gorge myself and get to bed at 10:30, reading my notes to find that I'd never been to Tafraoute before, and grumble that Ken's taken all THREE free pillows and all I get is my enormous sausage which I fold in half and Ken's been told how to "climatize" our room, and the cool air is just wonderful, closing the door completely and cutting off the light, and I INSIST that Ken uses my flashlight because the light left on in the bathroom is VERY bright, and though he bitches and bitches, finally, he says, "OK, honey," and I respond, "Thank you, dearie," and I only fumble with his feet when I pee in the morning, but since he never mentions it, I figure he wasn't aware of it.

MONDAY, 4/3/06: Ken sets his alarm and gets up and does what he does, and even turns the light on which fails to wake me, though I vaguely remember a light coming on in a dream I don't remember anything of, and he says "Rise and shine," and I groggily get out of bed to find that it's 7:39 and walk naked (I don't give a damn what he sees, but I seem to have been somewhat more than micro this morning) to the shower for a glorious hair-wash with MY shampoo since the hotel gave none, and get out clean for the first time on the trip (oh, brushed my teeth ONLY with the toothbrush last night just to get rid of the fuzz), and down at 8 for breakfast to 8:25, lots of bread, honey, confiture, butter, rolls, orange juice, a pot of hot chocolate not as hot as yesterday which I have with a cube of sugar and a honey-coated spoon since they only GIVE us one spoon for hot chocolate, honey, and confiture. Stuff stuff away in closet, thankful that they didn't clean room BEFORE we left for the morning, and leave at 8:45. Ken says, "You're sitting in the middle?" "Someone has to," "Judy volunteered." I give a look. Aziz polishes windows, Allesandra talks on phone, she has NUMEROUS ENDLESS businesses, and #14 traditional small-stone facade at 9:06. Man takes us through his house to 9:28, telling us more than we really want to know about his planned restaurant, his sleeping arrangements, the garden wall that he agilely CLIMBS up to open from the other side to show us the cherry blossoms and Argan blossoms and flowers and watering hoses and then truck out to Jean Veran's blue rocks at 10AM. #12 rock patterns in foreground 10:10, #28 flowers at 10:29, and they're on path and I'm way OFF path, wondering why car can't take us where we're walking in the hot sun, and I'm glad I put lotion on my arms this morning. #29 lion's head (quite convincing) at 11:48. Try to exit but find that the village has put up a gate because foreigners were rushing through and raising dust, so we have to detour back around the way we came from 11-12, and to the traditional house built into the cliff-side at 12:05. #34 kitchen at 12:28. Finish tea in the first room at 1:20, which I think I video, with sexy older son, and then to the house, where they DO have two toilets despite Judy's not seeing that the hole was a john, not just a shower, and up steep stairs to a VERY sexy ringed-fingered unmarried slender sexy guy who serves us a good tomato salad, water, a wonderful chicken tagine in a marvelously layered flavored sauce with bread and potatoes (which Jeff gives to Ken) and olives (which Judy gives to me) and another bottle of water, and then platters of fruit of which I have a good small banana, VERY ripe, and an orange, and forgo an apple, and Allesandra talks and the guy talks and everyone talks and Judy's eyes close and MY eyes close and they tell me I can lie down, so I do, and FINALLY move out at 3:15, long walk back to car at 3:40 while Allesandra photos more cemeteries, commenting about the blind host who has good teeth at 64, and start to gazelles at 4:01. #36 rocks at 4:05 and berbers call themselves "Freemen" which is like the "Fremen" of "Dune," reminding me again of the Mu-Adib of the Muadin for Muezzin in Arabic, and I'm OUT of film when we get to the hilltop with the guy who KEN finds sexy, so I click empty camera until we get at 5:03 to defaced gazelles when I decide I DO have my video, so do THAT to record the disasters of the white-paint splotches and the chalked penis on what are not gazelles but "bovides," or, ugh, cows, with horns. Totally undatable. To car at 5:25, and to hotel at 5:35 when Ken decides he has to go shopping, Allesandra has to shop for provisions for our pic-nic, to follow her hyphenation, for tomorrow, and Jeff also wants to shop, or was it Judy. I get to hotel at 5:35 and order two cold Pils at the bar and go upstairs to sit and shit and drink one Pils, then start typing 5:46-6:13, drinking the other Pils, and am just leaving to see what the sunset will be like when Ken comes down the hall for the room and I go down and sit and watch the sunset until all the other couples leave and I sit at the corner of the pool and soak my feet in the deliciously cold water until Ken comes in and says HE wants a Pils, so he orders one for each of us and unaccountably BREAKS his glass, showering the table with glass shards, some of which he unthinkingly scatters on the beach-floor where people will be walking barefoot, and gets another glass and we sit until Judy joins us and decides to get a gin and COLD tonic, and I seem to annoy Ken by saying, "I hope this doesn't annoy you, but I'm sure you know we're gay, and we wonder if you'd be annoyed if we at some small times decide to discuss what we think about some of the men we meet, like the two sons this afternoon," and she smiles and says she's very tolerant, and we might have to fight her about liking some of these men. Sounds good, but Ken seems to berate me, and I ask whether it's WHAT I said or HOW I said it, but he can't really answer, and the subject is closed and we continue a delightful conversation until 7:31 when I say I want to continue with my journal and I'm going upstairs, and Ken joins me, trying to buy some stamps, but the small shop is closed, and I'm up to type until 7:58, when we go down to be the first ones there, and I look at the menu and decide, rather than having a fourth Pils, which is REALLY poor, to have a half-liter of rosé for 60D, which isn't that bad, and Ken finishes his white wine, and I start with the omelet aux fines herbes, which is really quite good, and three of us have steaks, surprisingly good, and Ken eats most of my fries AND many of Judy's and Allesandra's fries too, because he doesn't like the meat of his kafta, which I'd tried last night and hadn't liked anyway. Only one single woman at another table until a family of four comes in, and Allesandra has on a colorful blouse that features her nipples, and we talk of all kinds of things, having the orange tart for dessert, and I pay 200D for various drinks, three of my Pils and one of Ken's and though they say Allesandra pays for the wines for the meal, I have to pay another 100D for the waters and my wine. Up at 9:39 when everyone comes up, deciding to have breakfast at 8:10AM and leave about 8:45 for a day mostly on the road, Jeff being in front, and Ken having the NERVE to say he will NOT sit in the center of the back, saying that Judy has volunteered to sit there, and I remonstrate with her saying she should NOT spoil him, but it's not resolved. Type away here until 9:55, having piled my bed with all the stuff I have to pack for tomorrow, including trying to find the old charge sheet. Do that now at 9:56PM. Find my charge sheet and bring it up to date by 10:07PM. Pack everything away for tomorrow by 10:18, listening to Ken bitch about how I'm not going to bed in the half-hour that I said, and now I'm to bed by 10:20, Ken's alarm set at 6:15 for 7AM breakfast tomrrow.

TUESDAY, 4/4/06: 6:01AM: Finish typing my dream and check back here to find the alarm isn't until 6:15, but decide I might as well shower now that I'm up, without getting back to bed for just the few minutes before his alarm goes off. Really should switch my "temporary bag" that goes into the back of the van with one that CLOSES securely so the rocking truck won't throw things out of it. Ken says "Good morning" through my showering at 6:12AM, and I'm out to dry myself outside while he goes in to shave and, oddly, brush his teeth. I open my bag and root all the way through it until I find that the "Patient's belongings" bag has contained my dress shoes in the very bottom, so I substitute my smaller bag for the shoes and the larger bag is perfect for my jacket (why, I'm not quite sure, but that's REAL insurance), my dop kit, flashlight, pillbox, and AlphaSmart for the back of the truck, and will of course add my slippers when I change from breakfast to leaving. Open the blinds to find it still dawn-dim outside, and a mosquito buzzes the door as I close it. Ken fusses in the bathroom, and I fancied I heard the shower in the next room where one of the Altmans was showering right next to me. Finish this at 6:30, wondering what I'm to do with the rest of the morning before breakfast: should also pack a spare sodoku in an outside bag for spare idle moments without people to watch or sights to see. Outside at 6:30, sun not near up yet, and I take the note: Doves, dogs barking, early workers, strollers, motorbike growls, cocks crowing, west hills in sunlight, sun finally breaks through east cleft at 6:45 (not so) as kids' noises grow louder and I think about getting back. Actually not EVEN sun at 6:55! 6:58 sunrise at hotel steps, door now open, solitary guy sitting at top of steps, no one down yet, so I go to lounge and look out, and at 7:01 find Jeff has ordered our three omelets and my hot chocolate which is sitting at the table waiting for us! Allesandra gets half a dozen hard-boiled eggs for lunch and goes to pack, omelet and bread and honey and hot chocolate good, and I leave Ken and Judy talking to go to room at 7:25 and brush teeth thoroughly the first time while watching TV: either a gardening/cooking program from France, or a dim cartoon of Arabian Nights genre. Workers outside working on water tower for hotel. Bags out at 7:30 when porter comes around to check, Ken shows me 10, 20 and 1/2 dihram coins, with 10D and 5D with centers. I finish this at 7:48, ready to put on my shoes, put this into the bag, and get out to the car in case we leave early. Ken says Tata is in the desert, and we're staying at Le Relais des Sables. Leave at 8AM and go back partway the way we came in, before turning off on a piste that turns into a track, sometimes not even large enough for ONE lane, but the only other car we meet comes as we're picnicking at the bottom of the gorge. #3 and #4 woman and town of Tazal-Arhite at 9:20. #5 and #6 of two sides of pass, with a long video at 10:22. Very hot, very bumpy. #7 hanging village taken by Ken out an open window at 10:49. #9 glyph hunting at 12:07. Stop for lunch at 12:20, Allesandra telling us to go amuse ourselves as they put it together, and they get out seven blue stools, two of which are used under the somewhat shaky table. There are vats of food including breads, an enormous salad, Laughing Cow and gouda cheese, cans of tuna (which don't have openers and they try my Swiss Army knife but Ken only gets about 30% around and the driver muscles the rest with his enormous knife). There's highly spiced meat, but only about a tablespoon each, along with tuna on one plate, and at the end a huge bowl of bananas (very green), apples (very red and probably to be peeled only), and oranges, which I have a good one of. Two bottles of water go around, Jeff pours a good stiff glass of olive oil into his half-filled glass of water, and there's at least a quart of argan oil which hardly anyone uses, except I pour some on my bread, which pours over my hand. Forgot the hard-boiled eggs, of which I have one and about three are left over. The pièce de resistance is the whole fresh pineapple which retains some of its coldness and is fresh and sweet and juicy. The kids circle us with laughter, but remain dozens of feet away, to my delighted surprise, since at the first village we stopped at we were surrounded by the kids who were let out of school expressly to see us, who smiled and laughed, and when one girl was talking with Allesandra with a neatly lettered notebook, I pointed to it and asked her to read it, and it went on much longer than I would have thought, had the word "Mohammed" a number of times, and she read rapidly and graciously. The valley was one of the most spectacular I've ever seen: innumerable times a series of layers of various colors (Jeff's Strata-Various) would loom to one side, with an exactly similarly-thrust mountain beyond sending the same kaleidoscope of strata skyward in precisely the same orientation, but a few miles in the other direction, a mountain would be corderoyed in a vastly different way, as if an elaborate shawl with a uniform pattern would be thrown over a complex hillside but the pattern would adhere perfectly except where channeled by downflowing streams, which Allesandra said might flow for only a few days a year, but with such force that the road would totally vanish, cutting off all these villages totally for the few days, and that Tafraoute would report such closures. Veiled women in the most indigo of gowns would peer down at us unwaving from far roofs, while more colorfully dressed women would wave and smile from closer quarters. Some trails were zigzagged across the hillside bound for some aerie above, while whole sections of riverside would be palisaded with rocks from two to twenty feet tall which would enclose garden-plots ranging from literally two square feet to twenty or thirty at maximum, growing barley, onions, what looked like the rough leaves of whatever plant furnishes brussel sprouts, rutabaga---cruciferous was the word that sprang to mind, and some smaller or taller stalks of corn. Some plots were freshly watered, damp mud showing much care, other plants were so withered they looked like they might not survive. Melodious song-birds remained hidden in the trees, though on the drive up there were white-and-black birds that I thought looked like wagtails, larger brown birds with wings like thrushes, and upright little birds which Allesandra said the French called something that sounded like "cockades." I saw one grasshopper, very few bees for the billions of flowers that Allesandra suggested might then be pollinated by the winds, and at one point I videoed a panorama to try to capture the hypnotic LINEARITY of the stratigraphy, ending on a clump of bright yellow flowers which alternated with whites, bright purples, and the occasional riot of interspersed poppies with their indelible red-orange brilliance. Lots of mules waited patiently or brayed with surprising volume, many women gathered grass which they lifted to their heads to carry home to dry for their herds. We passed three or four combined goat-and-sheep herds easily numbering over a hundred, watched many times by a solitary herder, a few small shelters which looked unoccupied except as shelter from the sun for a quick lunch, and we wondered how far these gleaners had wandered from their widely separated villages. Sometimes alone on the canyon wall was a hotel-like monster of five or six floors, loggias with eight or ten doors opening onto them, crenelated towers almost like mosques, and Allesandra would say these were immigrants from Casablanca who'd made a lot of money and built these castles to show that they'd succeeded. Back at lunch, the driver, call him Abdul as part of his double name (Abdelkrim, with a road named after him somewhere), set up the area, opened the cans, and presented the somewhat tattered sardines, cleaned the knife, brought the water, and then finally ate off by himself, salad and most of the leftovers as far as I could tell, and Jeff took him pieces of the pineapple that Allesandra cut and served. We finish with the table at 1:40 and Allesandra tells us to go look at the scenery: wine-colored cliff-areas alternating with sand-colored blocks, until they finished cleaning up in about 20 minutes, and we got to the car and went at 2:01. I was on the right, using my hat as a sunshade often, Judy seemingly content in the middle: Allesandra commenting that she could see more easily over her smaller head, and Judy kept repeating that she had lots of legroom, felt perfectly comfortable, and Ken complained about the lack of space when the three guys were sitting in back, me freely bouncing back and forth with my soft shoulders onto their soft shoulders. #10 of incredible vacated citadel stepped down a hillside at 2:23, and then we got back to the main road and stopped for tea, where I had a lovely cold Coca-Cola for only 5D, others had coffee and then we all had to share the cost of the "complimentary" tea to which Ken gave 10D, nicely flavored with what might have been oregano, and then Allesandra suggested we do MORE today so we could do EVEN MORE tomorrow, and I gave my favorite saying that "More was more," but everyone vetoed me, particularly Ken who wanted to go into town for the two most inconsequential things: stamps (and the post office at 4:20 was closed until 8AM tomorrow (which would be a holiday according to Jeff), and a tee shirt, for which Ken left to walk to town to find at 5PM that they just don't have what he wanted, and the ATM didn't even work. So he now suggests we go for a drink at the bar at 5:40PM. He pays a total of 42D for his two 25cl and my 33cl, we chat with the Altmans, I get my entry number and since he'd written HIS on MY form, I wrote MINE on HIS form and returned to room at 6:42 to finish this in coolth (no AC in bar or reception, despite full leather drag of two aging motorcyclists (at least I HOPE they were motorcyclists, or why else would they look like THAT?)). Work one sodoku to 7:10 and start on another that fails at 7:49, so get ready for dinner. Meet the Altmans, but Allesandra comes through talking on the phone, so we wait and wait, then order a bottle of rosé for four of us, so no one gets much. Harira soup OK, then a skimpy tagine of beef and prunes which we find fatty but still not enough, and end with creme caramel. Then at 9:10 we meet to talk about tomorrow, crowded, and back to room at 9:36 when I try to re-work sodoku, but by 9:58PM it doesn't go, so I type this to 10, Ken already naked in bed, and go to bed.

WEDNESDAY, 4/5/06: 2:52AM: Wake from dream and look over and Ken is looking at watch, and I sure hope it's not near 6AM, but it's only 2:40 something, so after he gets back in bed I get up and pee and type dream and get back to bed about 2:55AM. 4:35AM wake with VERY sexy dream, pee, and type it. 6:14AM wake with dream as Ken goes into bathroom to start shaving, so I type dream to 6:21 and logily get into day. Shower doesn't work the way it's supposed to, but I manage to turn the broken holder toward the wall and jam the shower head into the space, so it works well, only from one side, but I shower thoroughly, all skin tacky from sunshine yesterday, and get out at 7:40 to Ken to return to bathroom. Ken and I exchange profuse apologies for our "crudeness" to each other last night when he bridled at my "Oh, FUCK" when he tried to pee as I was typing for four minutes, and my bridling at his "What are you DOING?" when I put on the light to finish typing when he went in to pee. Breakfast omelets without spices, and after more bread came out, out came CREPES. I had three cups of hot chocolate, and Jeff left early: they weren't operating yet since their alarm didn't work and they woke only at 6:55AM. Back to room to type to 7:46 and get back to hard-to-solve sodoku. Leave at 8, Post Office opens at 8:30, they say, they stop and shop to 8:08 for water and stuff for lunch. The PO is open, and I buy 10 1D stamps which Ken puts in his envelope for me. Gas is 10.8D/liter, to 8:25. 8:55 leave car (at what on the map may be Bou Akba) for #12 and #13 2 cows, one on right very eroded. #15 two animals 9:32, AFTER many videos. To car 9:55, Leave car 10:17, to #22 site 2 (at what on the map may be Hassi el Mounir) at 10:26, hot and vaguely disappointing, with lots of climbing and arm-waving by Allesandra. #30 horse, camel, donkey at 10:43, with 3 shields. Ladees (?) 11:06. Last stop 11:25, #34 giraffe 11:40. #35 3 bovines 11:48. Car goes at 11:52, orange after ROUGH road, then walk 12:55: #36 Allesandra, man on right, cow above at 1:01. Roll #4 #1 and #2 to 1:20. #4-5 "Flying Shaman" at 1:24. And video to 1:33. Ride in river bottom to oasis to 1:53, yesterday we were at "Enchanted Valley," and today first was Imaoun, then lunch over at 3:10, having seen one orange and one green-and-orange iguana dashing across the rocks, full from late lunch, and Adrar-Isserdane-Tayaline second for "Flying Shaman." To Omne Laak 3:51 #10 2 gazelles at 3:54, extraordinarily windy, dry, hard walking, constantly lookig for a piece to pick up to keep, #13 melange at 4:15, #15 broken RECENTLY at 4:25, depressing. Pick up three pieces, leave at 4:33. Go to hotel at 5:25 and buy beer, drink it and pee at 5:30. Ken comes back, crowing about two tee-shirts that he bought that look exactly like undershirts, and buys second beer and water for total that I record, and he showers while I try sodoku at 6:05, then I take shower to 6:34, putting on clean shit-stained-rear shorts and socks, and type this just to catch up by 6:46, enough to moan about Allesandra apologizing for talking to her colleague in Rome who's going up and down the hierarchy to facilitate her incredibly complex scheme to funnel money to poor Moroccans who will learn how to welcome rich Americans to their lifestyle, bring Morocco to them rather than having them vegetate in luxury hotels just like in the USA, and I get the idea she's trying to suck Jeff in, and he certainly offers ideas: about the traditional house in Tafraoute, other people who have nothing better to do, though Allesandra suggests they may all have part-time jobs working for the local government, since there isn't much else to do in these small towns, and Ken actually agrees with me that she DOES go on a bit much with her rocks and cultures and theories and "oldest" and "roundheads" and "Libya" influences, and what's been lost, and what isn't maintained, and how much money is needed, and talks on and on, and the car is hot and filled with flies and I almost wrench my arm trying to leave Judy space in the middle, and I get the front seat tomorrow. Stop now to dress well to leave for dinner with the Shiek at 6:52PM. But the car's not there! Wait until 7, when Allesandra says they've been shopping, and drive into the small village and get lost, but see the host waiting in his light and get inside an enormous courtyard, take our shoes off to sit at an outside sofa to be served tea while turning over the tea service to show it's been manufactured in Manchester, Great Britain, and another piece from France. Tea is first just green, then green with mint, rather than with absinthe. Then he comes out with the costumes, starting with me as a Caid, which Judy photos and then all FOUR of us are dressed and photographed, by which time the lights on the stairway to the roof are fixed and we go up for a wonderful field of stars and a half-full moon, and a toothy handsome son who knows no French. Then downstairs to a dining room where the Caid himself serves us first the enormous salad which we eat with forks, and then the couscous which we start with our hands, but he puts a spoonful on my plate which I take as a hint I should use my spoon and fork, which I do. Then a lovely orange for dessert, lots of talk, and leave about 10:10PM to get lost, directions from two wandering boys, and long way back to hotel at 10:25, being told that Ken wll get up at 6, me before 7, bag out at 7:15, and we'll leave at 7:30. I suggest we leave right after we ALL have breakfast at 6:30, but Jeff insists he "wants time to himself after breakfast," so I just shut up. Bed at 10:40, Ambien out in case all the tea makes it hard to sleep, but I have no trouble going to sleep.

THURSDAY, 4/6/06: 3:15AM: Wake, feel warm, pee and type dream. Ken pees after I do about 4AM and I say he can make the room cooler, but he says it's OK. Another dream, then wake at 6:05 when Ken does and now type about yesterday at 6:25AM. Finish that at 6:33 and prepare to pack and dress and get out to breakfast. Jam much more than usual into my blue bag, leaving only my dop kit, pills, and AlphaSmart for the extra white bag at 6:51, sneeze and blow my nose, put my blue bag out, and check for anything left behind now at 6:52, ready for shoes and breakfast. Fred and Judy are just finishing, having ordered my hot chocolate, and I have one cup and order another pot from which I have two more cups of (rather weak) chocolate and finish up the tea with the milk as I'm left alone at the table with a tasty buttered crepe and some other bread and confiture, and two triangles of Vache Qui Rire. #17 brigade putting topsoil into constructed pots while Abdelkrim gets gas and Judy comes over with me to photo the scene, men waving at us. Also photo the hotel and entrance by 7:43, nicely cool. #18 copulating couple at 8:17. #19 a DOZEN drawings! At Akka Izem, which she and her husband Michele discovered and counted at LEAST 600 drawings, most of which haven't been catalogued or photographed. To #21 by 8:30, getting hot, then I take video to try to give idea of the isolation and vulnerability of the site, particularly when we return to the car and pass two young men on bicycles coming here for I can't imagine WHAT reason except to pilfer. Leave at 9:03, #23 of Oued Tissint, which means salt, and has a permanent spring and a road way down crossing from our cliff-side of the road to the town itself, at 9:43. Tissint view to 9:52, then passport stop at Mhamid, but we don't have to get out OR show the passports which we were told to have available if needed at 9:54. #26 of cascade with people washing clothes at 10:05. Down nice road but off onto a rocky piste at 10:57. #27 panorama at 11:20. Long drive on ABSOLUTE dessert, sometimes making totally our own road, sometimes on gratifyingly hard saltpan, sometimes on slithery sand that I worried about getting stuck in, and by golly we got stuck at 12:45 for about 5 minutes, and we got out while Abdelkrim (or Clime, as Jeff dubbed him) shoveled sand with his bare hands away from all four wheels, and then managed to back onto a hard ledge from which he could get the speed to bypass the sandtrap. Drive toward edge of enormous Oued Draa, trying to find a sheltering tree for our final picnic, and finally park under an adequate tree (with a pissing tree nearby for the men and HUGE distances so the women could squat into the sand in some semblance of privacy). They set up while I write notes to 1:22, feeling tired. Lunch to 2:45 of first only bread and mustard and water, of which at least we seem to have an endless supply though Jeff can't find another five-liter and has to settle for a one-liter bottle like the rest of us. Then comes the rice-based salad with tuna, cheese, green and red peppers, half hard-boiled eggs, onions, cucumbers, and then they open a can of sardines on which I pass, more gouda on a plate that I gorge on, more Vache Qui Rire, more water, and then the bowl of fruit from which I take the last good, delicious orange, and then a banana which, though green on the outside, is overripe inside but good. Then everyone washes up and I contribute my usual task: piling up the blue chairs and taking them to the car for Abdel to pile on top. Over more dessert, surprised by at least a dozen touristique vans, over ten sand-scooters in which virile young men CROUCH in their positions to absorb the bounces, and even a few motorbikes and a distant pair of cyclists followed by what appeared to be a support truck. So much traffic! Jeff insists on getting out to pee at 3:45 and Allesandra has a smoke and everyone else pees and I just sit, having closed my eyes a bit when the scenery was just too much the same, though I told them about the significance of the Mount Coleman lookalike, and took a final shot of the Mayan castle. Doze. ROUGH road, with noises from the back that prompts Allesandra to say jauntily "I'm still alive," and I sort of worry about my AlphaSmart in its almost unprotected bag, but at the end she's put it on the floor and everything survives; even the pills don't spill out. Stop at Hotel Pasha at 5PM, for a welcome coke by an infinity pool, livened by a peacock's erectile tail, and olives to 5:45, #28 temple-top at 6PM. Finally hit asphalt in a single lane on the way down through two spectacular valleys toward 6:45 sunset, and get into Tamegroute at 6:55PM to find them definitely closed, but they say they open at 8AM tomorrow and Allesandra says we'll go. Back into car for brilliant shards of ruby-red clouds in a purple sky for a sunset populated by what I call angels but no one responds to, though we go through the categories of cumulus, cumulo-nimbus, nimbus, nimbo-stratus, stratus, and cirrus, of which Ken said he thought there was a stamp series about ten years ago. Dark into Zagora, first its suburb, then onto main street to see an open pharmacy at 7:10, where Ken can't get foot-powder but I get 2000D at an ATM where he later gets cash too, and Jeff pees AGAIN and Ken tries SECOND pharmacy and gets something he can sprinkle into his shoes which turns out to be a feminine hygiene product primarily, out at 7:23. Bright clouded sunset, hotel at 7:30 and check in to room 66, getting bags quickly, but not unpacking since we leave tomorrow, and dinner is at 8:30, which I leave for now at 8:26, happy to be caught up to date, including dumping junk out of the bottom of my A&K bag. No one's in the inner dining room, so I go to buy ten perfectly acceptable cards (5 for me, 5 for sending) for 10D, a real bargain, and then Allesandra comes up to lead us to the courtyard by the pool where we dine under the half-moon and stars! Aside from a loud Spanish birthday party for about 30, it's an acceptable dinner starting with a usual mediocre cream of vegetable soup, then a better kefta tagine with extra-ordered potatoes and vegetables, good Ksar white wine for 150D including water and a 20D tip, and everyone's in a good mood and we finish at 10:15PM and Ken's getting up at 6 and breakfast is again at 7AM, so again it's not going to be a LOT of sleep. Appalled to find a HOLE in the top of my shirt, but who the hell cares? I still seem not to smell and Ken is so concerned about his foot smell, which I haven't noticed either---oh well. Now 10:23 and I'm ready for bed, full stomach or not! Have no trouble getting to sleep.

FRIDAY, 4/7/06: 6:44AM: Wake at 3:30 but don't type dream, though I remember it, and shit a bit and get back to bed to have a little trouble getting back to sleep, but do so until I wake at 6:10AM, Ken not stirring, so I get up and shit a bit again and take a shower, and when I come out at 6:40AM it's still dark, so I turn on the light and Ken wakes and looks at his clock and says "Shit, either the alarm didn't go off or I didn't hear it." He goes into the bathroom and leaves the door open for a long time, but finally closes it to shit himself, and I finish with this at 6:46, telling myself I have to get my Vicks out of my permanent bag, because my nose is becoming quite dry. I guess Ken is in there soaking his feet in his feminine hygiene product. Dress and get to breakfast at 7AM. Ken farts and coughs and blows his nose in the bathroom, and sadly I'm already becoming slightly tired of the trip: too much walking, too much driving on unmarked pistes, too much of Jeff's over-loud laugh which last night Judy remarked could be heard all across the restaurant, though at wonderful times she too throws her head back and laughs uncontrollably. Allesandra's CONSTANT use of the cell phone: I don't think there's been a SINGLE meal or refreshment break that she hasn't been on the phone at least once, lately not even bothering to leave the table. The sights aren't quite earth-shaking, though I hold out hopes for the Koranic Library this morning, and I look forward to going north to the more elegant hotels and meals (and maybe even shampoo furnished in the bathroom!) and I'm starting to be aware of the days far too early: it's now Friday, and in two weeks at this time we'll be on our way home, and I'm looking forward to relaxing more, enjoying just BEING in the country rather than rushing from one far destination to another---and thank goodness yesterday was the last picnic, with its search for a cool windless spot, the setup of the elaborate eating area, the preparation and distribution of the courses by the two guides while we just sit and eat, the taking of the plates to be cleaned before we're even totally finished with the final fruit so they can be put away, and I'll have more time to tend to my teeth which tend to smell with the constant onions at lunch and dinner and the only-once-so-far use of TV to do my teeth cleaning completely. Ken exits the bathroom nude and comments he THOUGHT it was cooler in here: I opened the drapes to see the bright sunlight outside past the glass shutters, the wood shutters, both of which I opened, and the screen shutters that kept out the bugs. He's finally dressing now at 6:58AM and we have some chance of being on time for breakfast, though Jeff has threatened to stay in the hotel, so we'll have to RETURN to the hotel to get him, from the Koranic Library. He's at breakfast first, providing some confiture for the table, and he WILL be going to the library, hurray---and Ken just exclaims "The bug stuff IS here," rather than in his suitcase, which is gone already at 7:38. I treasure the coolness of the morning, the sounds of the birds, but NOT the loud Portuguese of the primarily female tourists in the buffet breakfast, for which Ken leaves 50D for the three omelets we had, and we each had three glasses of orange juice and I had two cups of hot chocolate, so I feel ready for the day, and since it's to Ourzazate, it WILL be a bigger city, though Ken says most of our hotels are NOT very centrally located. Can't think of any more ways to waste time now at 7:41 by typing. Allesandra talks of the Berber horseman in the cast of two horsemen said to be from some French frieze, and car goes at 8:10. #29 TIM (?) 8:14. Library 8:32-8:56, 4000 books, 1300 earliest, video ONLY outside. #30 mosque door 9:02. #31 door, #32 market paving at 9:10. Back to car, Ken in middle actually! Stop for gas, piss, water, cigarettes. Leave Zagora 9:44, NO museum because we're late. Off at 10:37 after 7km of bumpy piste. #33 overall wall at 10:45, horseman. 3000 characters in two areas. #34-#35 lifesize shots at 10:50. #36 bow first shown, shooting back at 11:03. Roll 5 #1 and #2 E=mc2 at 11:08. #7 whole WALLS at 11:30. 11:41 to car, onto asphalt, then 20km of piste to village #9 and #10 at 12:40 at Ait Mlik. #11 tower 1:09. Arrive Chez Jacob 1:21. #12 Tamnougalt old town 2:55, 15-16 Century. #13 up to sky 3:09. #14 ENDLESS tour 3:46. Lunch started with good eggs, and the meat in the tagine wasn't bad but everyone said they were potatoes but I insisted that EITHER it was all squash OR that the squash-juice had so penetrated the potatoes that they BECAME squash. Feel unutterably depressed when a dreadlocked black came in and started singing mournful Berber songs with his guitar, and we had to applaud (which I didn't) and listen to him (which was just as well since I didn't feel like talking). The waiter christened me Ali Baba and I was the joke of the meal. Good melon and cinnamoned oranges for dessert, which Jeff actually asked for and GOT. Oh, Ken had to return to hotel after library to give the 50D tip for the omelets and for Jeff's pee. Then Mohammed gave an ENDLESS tour of the casbahs attached to each other, with three featureless air-towers, countless dusty rooms, dark hallways where Judy said she was glad I was wearing a light shirt so she could follow me, and I just felt like getting back into the car and LEAVING. Allesandra photoed children with handmade whirligigs, everyone laughing, and I just felt fouler and fouler, but at least when we left I could actually take a shit which I feared would not hold to the next hotel. #15 of napkin-folded display at 4:07, seeming ready to leave AT LAST. Fantastic Tizi between Tamnougalt and Ouarzazate built and built curve after curve, taking #16 and #17 of Grand Canyon which wasn't even the top, but Abdel wouldn't stop on the other side, which was looking into the sun and unphotographable anyway, but I would have been happier to have been given the choice. Drive into Ouarzazate too late to pay the 10D for entrance to the Kasbah as the place from which to watch the sunset, so we get to room 539 and decide to find the bar for a beer and watch the sunset. Out and find a far VERY dark bar, and told we can get a drink at the pool bar and carry it up to the tables on the terrace on the roof. Casablanca beers are now 35D and Ken tips for a total of 80D for just two beers, and we're up two flights to find four corner suites and three tables with three chairs, some of which we carry. I watch flights of egrets over the swamp behind, the sun sets behind a tree at 6:40, which would have been AFTER the sunset, and try to read my notes unsuccessfully to find what I saw between Erfoud and Ouarzazate but can't make sense out of it. Ken kindly takes the two forms to the reception desk, buys postcards for FOUR dihram each, and I finish this up at 7:45 as he shows me his cards. 7:54: was GOING to put on my long-sleeved shirt, but it's just buried too deeply to be extracted without unpacking, so I'll just go as I am---as I've ALWAYS been on this trip: I already told Judy I didn't give a fib (which of course should be FIG) what people thought about me, and this'll sure prove it! Dinner near the pool is buffet, and I have small salads to start, small meats in the middle, a good Semillant wine, and lots of talk with kids being obnoxious around pool, and we talk about tomorrow but I remember little. Back up at 9:22 and scratch and scratch and scratch my hair, and type this to 9:26PM and decide to go STRAIGHT to BED.

SATURDAY, 4/8/06: 5:42AM: Fell asleep quickly, feeling better after dinner and drinks and conviviality. Woke about 2:15AM but decided I didn't really need to pee; fell back asleep; woke at 5:40AM with an incredible dream which I got up to pee and transcribe. Finish typing at 5:56AM, having only peed, wondering if I should just get up, since I've already slept just over 8 hours, but we don't have breakfast until 7:30, as I recall, so I could still nap for another hour at least. Ken get up and uses the bathroom, vacating with his usual "Prochain victim," which makes it sound SO appealing. Go in for my shower at 6:50 and the shower-head is marvelously inefficient, requiring a huge volume of water before the stream condescends to fall toward the user, rather than seeping meekly down the wall. Shut the water off twice, and use the shampoo only once since there has still been no shampoo replacement available in any hotel, and get out at 7:09 to find Ken plaidly reading and I type until I have nothing more to say at 7:11, having thought on Friday, already, that in two weeks on Friday I will have already been home a day, and that goes twice for today, Saturday, and in a few days it will be down to two handsful of days left. Brush teeth thoroughly after breakfast, watching BBC news, put bag out at 8:10 to be collected, and finish this at 8:21, ready for walk to Kasbah. Parking lot a riot at 8:30, stand outside with puzzle, which I get none of. 8:?? video cedar ceiling. #19 Snow-capped mountains beyond Kasbah Taourirt at 8:49. #20 Stork in nest 9:04. In Kasbah with lousy guide and hordes of people 8:43-9:13. Rooms and stalactites and videos and pictures. Besieged by lizard salesmen. Sit in shop while Ken looks for shirts, Judy looks at jewelry. Jeff says he only wants fossil shells, and Abdel chats with friends (I thought they were waiting for him, but no, they were shopping, til 9:32. #21 over mosque door at 11:54. #27 salt spring at 12:44, lots of night-video inside mine. To Telouet 1:11, finish lunch at 2:22 and shit for the second time today. Telouet is at 1800 meters, or just over a mile. Up rough road, lots of traffic on narrow cliffides, to Tizi-n-Tichka at 2260 meters at 3:55. Get totally disgusted typing this on my lap by 7:54. To Roll #7 #1 a flash of a coffered ceiling in the Kasbah at 2:52. Out at 3:08. #3 Tichka sign at 3:58. Down easier road, more traffic, no snow to speak of, a nice waterfall, stop a few places for Jeff to look for shells but finally he says it's enough. Into busy 1,000,000 people Marrakech to get a look at the Koutoubia, the Medina surounded by a wall, and Restaurant Casanova, which doen't have that name yet at 6:40. Allesandra's back is sore so she might not join us. Ken phones and we'll meet at 8:15 to get there by taxi, hopefully, by 8:30, needing a large taxi because a petit takes only three people. Get to rather tacky hotel at 6:45, to room 323 to put everything away, find that I've started on roll 7 though I can't figure out how, and then shower 7:13-7:41, having to tie the shower head to the wall by means of my handtowel or I won't be able to use it. Threw the attachment on the tub-floor, pissed because we're too moved in to move to another room. Ken comes out of the shower clearing his throat and grunting and dressing at 8, and I'm putting on clean shorts and got out new socks and will wear my long-sleeved shirt since it might be cool this evening and I don't want to wear a jacket, and my black pants. Room barely gets cooler as evening wears on, and I discover I'm hungry. Get a "large" taxi for the four of us to Casablanca, which the driver knows, for 30D with 10D tip, but the meal isn't the greatest. Their first choice of wine has to be changed, they try to insist that Valpolicela is the Bardolino Ken ordered, which isn't bad, and my vitello tonnato is passable, they like their shared prosciutto and melon, and Ken his half-order of some pasta. My saltimboca is VERY salty, and the peas are hard and mushy at the same time, and Ken refuses to admit his chicken is tough as hell. Jeff's pasta is boring, and I didn't get a taste of Judy's. They got tirami sus which weren't bad, Ken's semifreddo didn't please him, but my strawberries in cream was wonderful. Michele, Allesandra's husband, is gruffly unhandsome but tries to give good service. Bill is 1320D to which Ken adds 100D to our half, making it 760D for two, unconscionably expensive but we think of it as a gift to Allesandra, and they LOVE my idea of an envelope with a large sum of money saying "This is NOT a tip, but a contribution to your project." Ken says it's one of the most uncharacteristic things I've ever suggested. Get out about 10:15PM and they insist there are no large cabs late at night so we take TWO cabs for 40D apiece. Get to room and right to bed at 10:50 but the sound of the air conditioner is HELL, and I CAN'T get to sleep.

SUNDAY, 4/9/06: 8:40AM: Wake about 1:15 to pee and get a SEVERE chill, so I bundle up under the covers and gradually stop shaking, but I'm sure I have a fever and feel AWFUL, but with full earplugs in AND the door closed COMPLETELY, AND a pillow over my head, I manage to block out the hellish sound, but get up again about 3:25 and have trouble getting back to sleep, and about 5:15 Ken goes to the john AGAIN (leaving the door partly ajar, which I'd gottten up before to CLOSE) and I say "I BEG you to close the door completely, or I have to get up and do it myself, and I'm thinking of changing my room if they can't shut it off." He tries to be sympathetic but clearly thinks I'm mad. He's into the bathroom at 7:30AM and I get up and say I'm going to the breakfast room, and he joins me quickly and I have decent buffet with two cups of hot chocolate and two glasses of orange juice and some cold cuts and cream cheese and feel as if I might survive the day, though I report morosely to Ken that I got about 4 hours sleep and now feel like the END of the day rather than the START of a day. Then they finally join us and a BABY starts SCREAMING in the room and they joke that my AC whine is now trivial. Ha. I go upstairs and shut OFF the AC and start typing, Ken comes up and goes to the john and the repairman comes and works for awhile and says he's taken the machine OUT and will replace it when it's fixed. I ask about the safe, which doesn't appear to work, and he smugly reports that it requires a card that we can rent for 25D per day. Sure we will. Back up to finish this at 8:45AM and prepare for the day, or the morning anyway. Found also that if the elevator is ON the ground floor, to open it you don't get a result by pressing the UP button, the door opens when you press the DOWN button. Down at 9 and Jawad appears at 9:10, apologizing for being late, and at 9:26 we're out of the car by the Koutoubia. #4 Koutoubia 9:26. To car 9:42. To Saadean Tombs 9:46, crowd scene, #5 Tomb at 9:54 "Always look to the ceiling" here at the Al Bahia Palace, the previous one, since the current king hasn't been around long enough (1999?) to build a bigger one. To car 10:15. To Palais Bahia 10:24. #8 bougainvillea 10:26. #9 plaster carving at 10:39. #12 great court colonnade ceiling at 11:07. Long stork action video to 11:13. #13 throne room ceiling 11:11. Car 11:32. Menara Gardens 11:43, where Jeff and I walk inside to see families picnicking, drums banging, carpets hung up for "privacy or modesty" as Jeff surmises. #14 Koutoubia from Menara gardens at noon. To car 12:04, Abdelkrim always there, but Ken pays him 500D from us because TODAY, not tomorrow, is his last day with us. Buy wine to 12:30. Then to restaurant El Doha for great rose-filled fountain, a six-course starting salad, good roast chops and sausages that we don't do credit to: Jeff is feeling awful and hardly eats, I keep saying that I feel it's the END of the day, not the MIDDLE of the day: just exhausted. Cute waiter, sounds like surf, or trains, or thunder outside walls, and Ken looks out now and says he thinks it's raining. Get back to hotel 2:22 and fall exhausted into bed, not joining Ken and Judy for a mediocre shopping trip with Jawad that includes a not-very-interesting stop at Place Jamaa el Fna, so I'm just as happy I didn't go. I get up about 4:10 to put all my new pills in the box, filling it up including two extra multivitamin pills that I clearly miscounted. Just sit down then with Cryptic Crossword that I looked at a few days ago and could get NOTHING of, and get three of the first five in no time at all: telling Ken when he comes in that it's another example of the mind working on something even if you're not aware of it. He suggests tea, so we're down to El Yasmine Bar, a dynamite construction in copper and reflecting mirrors, where he has a Paradise with gin even though he doesn't like gin, for 80D, and I have a Yasmine For Ever with orange juice, champagne, and Marhaba, or something that turns out to be coconut. We get olives and two kinds of nuts, and then Ken orders tea for both for 10D each and we drink that and come upstairs about 7, and I lie for a few moments, then decide I've GOT to do this, and type through to 7:22, having to dress to meet them (or Judy if Jeff's still not feeling well; I thought I might have to take a Lomotil when I shit a smelly loose shit when I got back from the restaurant, and then thought I had to do it AGAIN, but it didn't happen, so I didn't take anything, yet. Allesandra is feeliig worse: had trouble walking, and Ken refers to Radiative Radiculopathy, or some such multisyllabic diagnosis which she's supposedly had in the past and is a bitch to take care of in a short time. Warning for the future? Really feel tired, but have to dress for Stylia, the best food in Marrakech, though it had to move out of its beautiful riad because of reconstruction and is now in the BASEMENT of a new high-rise, not the best presentiment. Finish now at 7:25. We're out in TWO cabs, a long way to go, and it's a glorious rose-petal covered rose-scented entry with roses on ALL the floors and tabletops (they didn't move after all). Waiters very gracious, saying it's a set menu with choices: we all four have pigeon b'stilla to start, delicious, but Ken derides me when I said the one I had in Brooklyn was MUCH higher, lighter, and almondier. Then a chop, Jeff's much better with onions and tomatoes, and a tagine of mediocre vegetables, then a couscous which was good, with a gravy, but we're all totally full. Then comes a dessert of corn-flake pastry like at lunch, which is good but we're all too full for anything but a single bite. We'd both opted for the more expensive wines, so the meal was 450D and the wines 320D per bottle extra, with 25D for water. We leave at 10:30, escorted to two small taxis by an attendant, and roar back to the hotel to get to bed instantly at 11PM while Ken stays up for awhile, but I go to sleep almost immediately, exhausted and stuffed.

MONDAY, 4/10/06: Wake at 3:15 to pee, Ken mercifully having left the AC off. Then up to shit at 6:50, doze, hear his alarm and wake him to shut it off at 7:15, and 30 seconds later he gets his wakeup call. I pack my laundry up to 7:30, shower to 7:50, go down early for breakfast, feeling somewhat better, and have a bit fruit. Jeff brings a thermometer and I find I have 99°, better than the 106° on the register when I got it. When I return it, he suggests I keep it for the evening. Call the maid in to take the laundry, Ken comes up, we both take umbrellas and jackets because it's actually RAINING lightly out. Type this to 8:53AM and try to catch up a bit with last night. 5:59PM: Leave to find Allesandra looking frazzled but saying tonight will be fine after her 5PM acupuncture session, but she'll have to phone whether we take a taxi or she'll send a car for us, which message hasn't come through yet. New guide, Rachid, seems intelligent, with a better command of English than Jawad, whom everyone is just so sorry not to have tipped yesterday since he's not back today (HA!). New driver Najib takes us out to enormous white Transit with two seats separated in front, two sets of two seats next, and three seats in back. I get the seat behind the driver first, which Ken manages to snag twice after, and the Altmans seem content in the rear, the PA system working well, as does the AC. We leave at 9:11. 9:27 to main public (lots of small private ones in same area in from tannery gate, one of 15 in 19 km walls around old Marrackech) tannery, #16 tannery 9:30. #21 traffic jam 9:44. #23 11th Century (restored in 14th Century) caravansarai 10:03. #24 madrassa entrance 10:09. #25 Madrassa plaster ("most beautiful") 10:17. #27 museum chandelier 11:14. #29 museum alcove 11:36. #30 13th Century Almoravid foot-wash for nearby mosque at 11:43. To end of roll 7, from top of highest atelier at 12:07, having tea on elaborately carved table sitting in huge chairs, Ken paying 1500D for a silver hand of Fatima which he ruefully reports does NOT heal his evil eye (into which he keeps forgetting to put the required drops), and Judy buys what may be a tacky pair of silver earrings for 200D, each "playing the game" of putting what HE wants for it on the right (2800D, starting for Ken; 4100D for a box I merely looked at and he INSISTED on trying to get me to bid on, putting down the number and saying "Here is a pen and here is paper," to which I responded "Here is my hand, and I put it to my heart and say 'Merci' and I don't want to say anything more." He takes it in good grace, but Rachid should be happy with his cut of the cut. Medina actually exciting: busy traffic on foot, bicycle, motorbike, donkey, pulling and pushing carts, wagons, panniers, loads, buckets of paint, and shops selling everything including tacky belts which would have been the only thing I wanted to buy. Roll 8: #1 and #2 shop at 12;12. Carpet #4 started at 25000D, so for something from 17th century probably a fake? #6 street at 12:48. Driver Najib to Riad Tamsna at 1PM for one of the very best meals: Moroccan salad of VERY tasty eggplant, tomato-and-onion, zucchini in cream sauce, beets, sweetened carrots, something else, and when Jeff refused salad and I suggested menu he ordered cucumber gazpacho, which Ken insisted was ALWAYS the main ingredient, not tomato. REALLY? Then WONDERFULLY tender lamb (fork-cutable!) with eggplant and potatoes, then another corn-flake-crust cream layer which I can barely eat. Go to john to shit a little bit, second time today? Yes, check that first was at 6:50AM. Couple of cute husbands, and we go to second higher terrace for tea and coffee and take pictures to #10 to 2:51 from top. #12 water vendors in Place Jamaa al Fna 3:20 from back, hopefully without Ken striding into picture, and to car 3:25 an exact half-hour after we called for him, and when BEFORE he said he had another job and had to return us to the hotel, he could now take us to the Jardin Majorelle and PICK US UP after. To garden at 3:42. I pay 120D for our 4 30D entrees, and Ken pays 60D for our 4 15D museum entrees, barely worth it. Pleasant plantings with hordes of tourists, videos of turtles and waterlilies. Leave 4:30 and back to hotel quickly, beer to 5:05 with Judy and Ken and a cute stomach-scratching Brit playing cards outside with his girlfriend, and I'm up to room to shit for the THIRD time today, still not feeling the greatest, and find my temperature is 99.3°, and write and address and stamp TEN postcards to Fred, Charles, Mildred, Shelley, Sherryl, John, Jean-Jacques, Rita, Arnold, and Carolyn, who I did NOT remember and had to check before adding name, to 5:51. Start to type on bed but Ken goes to john, I take to chair by window, he snores a bit in the bed right next to my typing, and I finish at 6:27, tired, waiting for message about dinner at 8PM at Allesandra's as a car alarm goes off outside JUST like in NYC! And goes off after about 30 seconds. Wash my face and lie down like Ken. Hope someone is minding the store, and, oh, yes, the laundry isn't back yet. The fucking car alarm goes three or more times and then stops, at least by 6:38, still no idea how we get to Allesandra's, looking forward to tonight's sleep. I lie down, then up to empty bag for tonight and put on socks and shirt because I'm cold, and Ken goes down to phone Allesandra at 7:04PM. 7:28PM: Ken got Allesandra: she didn't get acupuncture because she has to have an x-ray on her back and therefore CANNOT TRAVEL. She (unfortunately) arranged for the guide from YESTERDAY (the unliked Jawad) to come with us as the COUNTRY guide, of course letting us have local guides in the next cities, but who's to show us the stops between? Ken says her quote was "We have not used him for anything aside from local guiding." We go next door (where Jeff invited me to watch a very over-over sunset) to tell them, and they have all kinds of suggestions, but I say we simply have to wait to talk to her tonight at dinner. And, surprise, Abdelkrim is driving up from Ouarzazate this evening and will phone our room about 8:15-8:30 when HE will pick us up to take to Allesandra's. So now at 7:34 I decide to go back to Crossword, rather than lying down some more. Ken says he does NOT want to act on my suggestion to "donate" $100 to her cause, so I say "My cheap personality has no trouble at all going along with you." Our phone finally rings at 8:22 and Abdelkrim meets us in the lobby at 8:30, drives us to a garage door and rings, the maid answers and leads us to the third-floor apartment where I take two pictures and we have harari soup with wooden spoons, she and I share most of a bottle of white while they have red, then a darkish toughish duck that Ken likes and I don't, good green beans, salad after with ENDIVE, which she praises, saying it's expensive, then GREAT strawberries in orange, which I finish Jeff's portion of; Jawara, a corn-flake like dessert; and a toughish apricot tart which I manage to finish. Talk longly about guide problems, finally deciding to have NO national guide and only LOCAL guides. Hope it works out, since both Ken and Jeff are willing to handle vouchers and we'll be in touch with Allesandra by phone almost hourly. Here's hoping. Good dinner, leave 10:30, get two cabs on Avenue Mohammad V, to hotel at 11:01, and into bed at 11:14PM, Ken insists on not sleeping on a full stomach so I get eyeshade and bed about 11:19, sleeping fairly quickly.

TUESDAY, 4/11/06: 4:01AM, type dream while taking care not to pee on floor. Feel vaguely feverish but too lazy to take temperature. No urge to shit. 6:15AM: Trouble getting to sleep, then wake WITH urge to shit, while typing remembered dream 2. At 6:18 don't feel like shitting, but try harder. Don't. Ken's up and in bathroom at 8:23 when phone wake-up call comes at 8:25. I shit that awful smelly shit and take my temperature of PRECISELY 98.6°. Wash face and hands and start packing at 7:38, finishing more or less at 8:05 when I finish this and Ken's already gone for breakfast and to ask for our bills. Down with everyone there, returning Jeff's thermometer, and come up last while Ken pays hotel bill of 580D, and I type this til 8:38, hoping to brush teeth and get down by 9AM. 7:36PM: Can hardly BELIEVE my good luck: spent most of the flower-filled two-hour drive between Marrakech and El Jadida fantasizing about masturbating, counting the ten days until the end of the trip and wondering how I could get away from Ken for a real cock-session. We check into the Sofitel Royal Golf El Jadida room #17, but before I can unpack the door knocks and the key to #16 is presented to me insisting that we have TWO SINGLE rooms! I can hardly believe it, but there it is. Reminded me of my comment when it appeared we weren't going to be served outside the bar, so we went inside as I said "Anyway, they probably won't be smoking cigars in there," and instantly passed the nearest of the male trio near us who was in the process of lighting an enormously thick cigar. Back to my notes from the day: Ken clears throat INCESSANTLY. Finish ALL my tasks by 8:50 and I turn on bathroom light to wash my eyeglasses and there's a pop that blows the fuse in the room, though not in the hall when I check at 8:55. So I suggest we go down early, jamming toilet paper up my ass. Into car at 9:05. "Gueliz," I'm reminded as we pass a sign, Allesandra said comes from the French "Eglise" for the new town. 9:12 we get to Cobratours, though it takes us a while to realize it's up three (or is it four?) flights. Allesandra says that the write-in vote later seems to have defeated Berlusconi, and she's delighted, though she agrees it'll be contested and he might actually never let his power go. Start our talk at 9:28. Five of us talk schedule, and then Najib arrives and he seems to understand a lot and be willing to do a lot. We talk to 10:15 and get to car at 10:45, the last bit taken with getting Najib money and I THINK she wanted to return 400D to ALL of us (rather than 400D EACH), but Judy gave her MY spiel of donating to her project, and Allesandra actually gets a tear in her eye (anyway, she wipes the corner of her eye) as she kisses all four of us her thanks for our wonderful present. Drive out at 10:49, straight through fields covered with poppies, yellow flowers, white flowers, and sometimes a tapestry of all three, to stop to pee at 12:51 at a thoroughly wet floor for both genders, and to La Raquin Bleu 1:50-3:19, almost edible fish soup and somewhat tasty skewers of two or three fish with a bottle of good white wine for the four of us for only 175D, and at 3:35 to the medina where we walk central street to side slope to top, taking #17 Portuguese cistern at 3:42, with lots of video beforehand, delighting in the effect of the beam of light from the central hole shining on the puddle of water that almost fills the floor so that the visitors have to circle respectfully far from the central light, reflecting the gothic arches of the roof [from file 3: of COURSE the file would have to run out while I was trying to type an expansive insert into the middle of it!] built something like 1492, discovered only accidentally when a builder bought the property, I guess with something built over it. I love it mystery of it, the flies buzzing golden in the central light, the light-column reflected in the waters and rippling off the intersecting columns, the surface so still it looks like the floor is a series of concave inverted vaults which could have inspired the upside-down black cathedral ceiling in "What Dreams May Come" when---forget the name of the comedian doing nicely serious work [Robin Williams]---is trying to return his wife to life after her suicide. I climb the stairs to get a higher view, and even climb the BLACK stairway higher, hoping for another view, but only get a blocked door that looks out onto a weedy surface-lot green in real sunlight. Back down for more photos and videos, despairing of capturing half the magic and mystery of the scene, and hear Ken calling me where the three are sitting on a bench at the entrance, and I repeat his phrase back to him: "What's your rush?!" Out at 4:43 to finally have to phone Najib who gets to the car at 4:54 and to hotel at 5:15, VERY elegant, though he had to ask directions, get served tea while the luggage comes in, and then we're taken to room 17 while they wait to be taken to room 7, and then I'm moved to 16 as reported before. at 5:38. Ken wants to explore, so I keep shoes on, which is a good thing because of the sand on the way to the beach, and we look at the closed shop, the open shop which turns out only to be the entrance to the sauna, and then to the beach to climb a tower and take #28 of Sofitel at 6:40, to the bar for his Thingamajib which I had intended to have, but have El Jadida Rose, not bad, and good nuts, they only charge his 85D drink 60D so he leaves 20D tip, and I get to room at 7:30, type to 7:42, shower to 8:10, having sprayed the BACK of the room from the badly-placed shower head and then the FRONT of the room from the bad drainage from the shower itself. Type this naked (answering the door to a draped lady who says she's sorry) to 8:24PM and then have to dress for our 8:30 appointment with mechoui. Can't immediately find my room-key, and have a vague recollection of leaving my key in the outside door in some recent hotel, maybe this one, and when the woman knocked it was only as a distraction to steal my key and come back later when I was at dinner to ransack my room for money. Get out my bankroll and slip it into my capacious right pant's pocket, still searching for the key, worried about being late, and finally find it lying on the suitcase-holder and dash down the hall in my white shirt to be extravagantly praised for my wonderful appearance, and it does amaze me that Jeff is still in his crappy teeshirt and blue jeans even in this elegant restaurant: Judy as usual is mostly in black, though she's wearing her new silver earrings, and Ken is in a cream-colored dress shirt but I think still in his ugly brown canvas pants. We sit at the table we chose while a party of young women in the next room sound and laugh as if they're sitting in our ears. Finally Jeff gets up to get service, saying we've been sitting there for ten minutes, and the same smiling waiter comes in to ask for our appetizer choices, and Ken gets his fish Pastille which he says turns out to be quite different from a B'stilla but refuses to admit my logic that if they'd been SERVING a B'stilla they would have CALLED it a B'stilla, but he insists the two words are applied in exactly the same way, which I can't quite accept. I tasted it and it wasn't that good: thick pastry, fishy fish, mediocre saucing, but Ken praised it, saying it didn't HAVE to have almonds and be covered in powdered sugar like other versions, and for the first time of probably many I wished Allesandra was there to give more data about the food. Judy has difficulty choosing her appetizer, Jeff wants none and insists on talking about his main course, and in typical form Judy berates him loudly and cruelly that "He's not ASKING for the main course, he only wants your APPETIZER, so just SHUT UP and let me order." I was curious about the Braized Bazoukies, or whatever they were, thinking that if she wanted to order the salad, the fourth appetizer choice, Jeff could order the turnovers just so we could see what they were: I heard "cheese" and they turn out to include fish and meat in the other two, though Judy said that the fish one we all sampled was the best and they were just like Indian samosas, which they looked like. I had nothing to order but the harari soup, but it was good: pepperier and spicier and I though more delicate than Fatiah's version at Allesandra's, but Ken insisted hers was the best. I didn't finish, feeling still full from lunch, or still sick, or wanting room for mechoui (fantasizing about checking for that word through a DVD containing ALL my files to see where I had it before). Then Ken ordered his pigeon tagine, but "Pigeons are out of season," though they'd had pigeon the day before in Marrakech----"probably frozen," opined Judy---and don't have Loup de Mer either, which pisses Ken, because he wanted one or the other or HE may have opted for the mechoui, particularly after finding that the charge is STILL only 100D for the special room for people on demi-pension, as our vouchers have us, despite the fact that the mechoui is priced on the menu at 220D (minimum 2, but the charge is for EACH, the waiter makes clear) and most other items are 120D, but those prices only apply to ala carte orders. So he has the chicken tagine, as does Judy, so again, as so often, in a very special restaurant we only try two of our possible dishes. They think their tagine is pretty good, and the sauce for the couscous that comes that we all decide is for all four of us, particularly when I ADD it to the already juicy-tender lamb of the mechoui, and Ken stands to get the dish and Jeff stands and leaves at one point to get Judy's copy of the itinerary from this morning to PROVE to the disbelieving Ken that we DO leave this morning at 8:30AM, not 9AM, and Ken REFUSED to believe that was the case. Three of us have to have red wine so Ken is left to choose the only half-bottle of white on the menu, the typical Guerdon, or whatever, which he's not happy with, but he accepts it, while we three share another Medaillon which gets better as it breathes, or as we eat and drink more wine. As with the shared bottle of wine with lunch, it makes us all uproariously amused at things I inadvertantly say: I don't even KNOW what it was at lunch that I said that sent them off into gales of uncontrollable laughter, Jeff having to direct Ken to remove various food remnents from his mustache and beard, and tonight they somehow mentioned "Chip and Dale" and I thought they were talking about the chipmunks, and I made some remark about eating their meat, which caused almost epileptic seizures of laughter, desperately asking Jeff what was so funny and it turns out they were talking about the muscley male dancers the Chippendales, not the chipmunks. The mechoui arrived in a shank-leg hunk of brown skin-covered haunch, and when we asked for assistance in cutting it, the waitress merely presented Jeff with an enormous knife, which I said the surgeon should use, and he said he was never a surgeon, but once a wash-up nurse and then "an honorary nurse," which Ken asked him to define and it turned into more of a joke or exaggeration than anything else. He keeps refering to his military service in the Navy on a ship, in Hawaii, somewhere else where Judy moved to live, maybe with their two daughters, but they both make clear that "he no longer has his license to practice," which makes it sound more like it was withdrawn for nefarious practice on his part rather than mere retirement---after all, he's only 64 and she's 62, as I remember. Anyway, he cuts into the meat and say it's just easier to pull it off in hunks, and I think it's just wonderfully tender and flavored, but Ken has just one taste and wrinkles his nose and says he doesn't much care for lamb so he's glad he didn't, in fact, order it, while Judy says typically that she has enough to eat and doesn't want any other tastes. The red wine goes down slowly, so I feel I have enough, and we just divide the bill in two at the end, onto their room 7 and Ken's room 17, leaving my room 16 out of it for me and Ken to split the expenses of later, as we did for the drinks in the bar. The waitress, pretty but new, admitted right from the start she knew NOTHING about wine, so we had no help choosing from her, though Jeff praised her ability to remove the two corks. She couldn't help with much else through the meal, and an one point the room got fairly crowded, but then it cleared out and it was 10:15PM and we hadn't had dessert or even been asked about it. Jeff said he was going to the next room where he knew there was a dessert buffet, so I followed him, saw the ENTIRE buffet laid out, which Ken had looked at, snubbed, and said he preferred the Moroccan restaurant though it was 100D per person supplement, and I took three tiny pieces of pastry which Ken tried to order from OUR menu (the only non-fruit item of the four offered) and finally got an overflowing plate of macaroons, pieces of what were like Mars/Snickers bars pieces, pink puffs that Judy said were too sweet (no, that was Jeff, since he changed seats with Judy to be near me for access to the mechoui platter), another tasted like coconut which I didn't care for, another was pistachio something not very good, and finally my special order of fruit salad with jus d'orange arrived tasting more like Dole from a can ("with added banana slices," said Jeff) so I was content with eating only a bit of it since I was STUFFED with the the mechoui, though it didn't seem I ate THAT much of it, but it was SO good and no one ELSE was eating much of it, and there wasn't THAT much left when we finished. Finally managed to get and sign for the bill and staggered back to the room at a time I can't read from my notes but might be 10:40 and then I deperately try to cum, trying electrical wires, my wristwatch, a tied sock, and finally just my fingers to apply the proper pressure to attain erection, finally getting out the vaseline to LUBRICATE my cock to semi-erection and orgasm at 11:13, fantasizing that Ken is next door listening to me, and wash off my hands and cock to 11:23, bed at 11:28, asleep almost instantly.