Tangiers to Cadiz
Share Article After doing my work at ground zero for two months in Morocco I leaped on a ferry from Tangiers to Algeciras, Spain.
An American woman from a lonely-hearts club tour group in Scottsdale, Arizona said hello.
“Hi, my name is Jean.”
“Hi, I’m Timothy Grasshopper. Nice to meet you.”
She opened a small book of quicksilver questions about life as a nomad, how it worked, how one survived. She gave me a multiple-choice exam to satisfy her curiosity.
“How does it work?”
“How does what work? The universe?”
“Moving around like this. Do you get scared?”
“No. I pay attention. I avoid choke points on the street. I trust my instincts. I see everyone before they see me. I am a ghost in exile. Invisible.”
“I was petrified in Tangiers. We were hustled by every child in the city.”
“They’re hungry. There’s huge poverty in Morocco. Fear of hunger and starvation and loneliness is a daily reality. One person supports thirteen. The majority makes less than $1.00 a day.”
“Yes I suppose so but I hope not. This is my first time away from the states. Some of my friends were afraid to leave after 9/11. They stayed in Arizona and Boston.”
“The media sells fear after 9/11. It’s a snake eating its tail if you know what I mean. What goes around comes around. Hello karma. Why did you leave?”
“My husband died a few years ago and I just sat around and then some friends got me interested in social activities. They told me about this tour, you know, stay in a Spanish coastal resort and see the sights with a day trip to Morocco. Then they stayed home after 9/11. Afraid to get on a plane.”
“I’m sorry to hear about your husband. Grief is part of the process. Letting go. Were you married long?”
“Twenty years. We were high school sweethearts.”
“Did you travel much?”
“Only around the states.”
“That’s a good beginning. I hitched around the states in high school and survived a year in Nam. Then I explored Europe, the Middle East, China, and Tibet. It’s evolving like a dream. One life, no plan, many adventures.”
“That’s really exciting. I wish I had the nerve to do something like that, just get up and go. This has been really good for me, it’s opened my eyes to a lot of things.”
“If you want to do amazing things you need to take amazing risks. We adapt, evolve and adjust. What have you learned?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Things like handling my luggage, realizing I brought way too much stuff. Stuff I don’t need, things I could have left behind. But of course I didn’t know any better. Seeing other people and their expectations, their attitudes being American. How many are loud and boring, childish really, like they’re in some foreign amusement park, how they give the impression of being rich, rude and stupid. The way some of them treated the Moroccans was just terrible. Everyone has their bias and prejudices.”
“Welcome to the freak show. I’ve observed kindness and stupidity. There are way too many idiotic crass tourists on the loose. No sensitivity or tolerance. Others are kind and polite. A day trip is only a fragment isn’t it?”
“I didn’t know any better. It’s part of the package. I’d love to come back on my own or with a friend someday.”
“Morocco is amazing. Hospitality. If you return I suggest you travel south into the Atlas Mountains and west to the coast. Get away from cities. Stay with people in villages.”
“Yes,” she said seeing a blue sea. “It’d be nice to go further.”
“Travel is the real education. Experiences are teachers. It’s essential to slow down and see with new eyes. We see through our eyes not with our eyes. Sit down in one place for a long time. Engage your senses.”
“Yes, I feel a little better now. Where are you going?”
“I left the states September 1st for six months. I’m going to Cadiz for a month, sit down, write and explore. Satisfy food, shelter and unconscious creative needs.”
“How exciting. What will you write about?”
“Experiences in Morocco and beyond. I was there on 9/11. Two months absorbing diverse realities. Using humor and satire with imagination and truth I will write about governments and media creating fear to advance their dystopian goals of social and psychological Control and greed ...
... I’ll write about illusions of fear and suffering as characters discuss how propaganda manipulates people. How humans face personal and collective desire, anger, ignorance, adventure and surprise on their quest for individuation. We are all connected on emotional and intellectual levels of awareness. Cadiz is the oldest city in Europe ...
... After a month I will live in an isolated mountain pueblo for the winter. My discipline is 1,000 words a day or two hours of revision. Polishing is the party. Next spring I’ll return to Tacoma, build a tree house, plant roses, caress thorns and write a book. I have a gonzo attitude. Be a master journalist with the eye of a photographer and the balls of an actor.”
“That must be exciting. They tell us every day where we’re going, what we’re going to see, where we’re going to eat, what time the bus leaves, where we will sleep, and who knows what. It’s a bit too much.”
“Hey, it’s your first time out. Think of it as a test run seeing how a tour package works. What you like and don’t like. You can use your experience to plan new independent adventures.”
“Yes, I like the idea and potential of being independent.”
“It’s a test with compensations. You are a free spirit in a free world.”
“Yes I am. I’ve always wanted to go to Greece.”
“Good for you. You’ll make it.”
“I’ll research it when I get home. You’ve been a big help. Nice meeting you.”
“Be well. Forget the words and cherish the ideas.”
She joined her group wearing nametags for a photograph with the sea sparkling blue and green foaming white.
Adventure, Risk, Transformation - A Memoir
