‘Did you say you were just having a look at what is going on? Are you sure you didn’t want to buy something? I have leather shoes for you. Look, green, red, yellow, black, blue? What is your favorite color? These ones go very well with your eyes! No shoes? No? I have carpets for you. Are you married? Very good present for the wedding! For your sister, your brother, your friend. No carpet? I have bags, look, leather bags, better than Gucci and Louis Vuitton, this is real leather, habibti, don’t want a bag? I have a jacket for you, good jacket, special quality’ …… and if you don’t want the jacket, the dress, the carpet, the shoes – he will find some other things to sell to you … Sorry, for him – you have money in your pockets and it is an offense to come to Fez and not buy anything 😛 … I left with the yellow shoes, what could I do? He was a pro in whatever he was doing !!! Hassan 😛 I’m sure the ones you will meet when you will travel to Fez will be his cousins or cousins of his cousins! The shoes are great, though, hahaha, man, do never speak English or French in Fez if you want to be left alone, just say “Shukran, Laa” which is “No, thank you” and they will leave you alone! That is the secret weapon!

Welcome to Fez, the shopping center of Morocco! This is the gate to the medina, Bab Boujloud.

Fez is car-free, this is one of the biggest pedestrian urban areas in the world. Fez is old, there is a lot about history there, a lot about ethnicity, heritage and languages. Fez is also about hospitality. Ok, there is a difference between the market harassment and their cultural values. They are not very far from the desert, therefore prepare to be welcomed, they know how to do it!

   

Aha, here you go, the tanneries! Chouara is the biggest. The leather smell is not one of the nicest, but they will give you plenty of mint leaves to dim the odor.

    

    

      

      

    

Fez is a great place where you can still see how they make all kinds of handicrafts. They still do a lot of things manually, actually everything you would need day by day (before computers appeared) !

   

      

Place de R’cif is another gate to the old medina, which is on the other side of Bab Boujloud.

    

    

I miss these markets soooo much …

      

Shoes, shoes, shoes … pha, if you leave with 7 pairs, you really know how to limit yourself …

      

How could I forget? Yes, and pottery: ‘I have plates, big, small, for tagine, for soup, for decoration, to put on the wall, for a present, very nice present’, Hassan could sell you the world and you wouldn’t regret to have bought it from him!

      

The Andalous garden gate … There was a jacaranda there … in June … but I might be mistaken… these gardens are really nice, a good place to find some peace, unless the vendors followed you up till there …

    

Don’t forget to go to the hammam 😛 And get yourself some argan oil!