Fotos From Fès

After a long day of two Barcelona metros, one cross continental flight, two trains and a shared taxi (I'm not complaining though.....), I was finally thrown into the middle of the old medina of Fès (...it's still better than work). I instantly had flashbacks of being in Morocco a year ago zith the smells of the souqs filled with tajines and spices mixed with fresh donkey dung wafting in the air.....and the sounds of muslim prayer call echoing of the sandstone medina walls. Fès feels like a highly concentrated, yet unfiltered version of Marrakech. The mazelike streets and alleys are tighter and harder to negotiate, and the touts are more persistent, more professional, and are always in mid-season form. But Fès isn't all about tourism. It's known as the heart of Morocco, has the self-proclaimed oldest university in the world, has 350 mosques (wonderful synchronization at sunrise to wake me up when I don't want to wake up) in a 14 km square area, and about 350 people per hour interested in selling you a tour, a carpet, a blanket, leather goods, hashish, or introduce you to a cousin who could do the same. I'm never embarassed to tell them I'm American (I'm not responsible for my government's actions), but sometimes I resort to telling them that I'm a photography student........photography explains the expensive camera, while student translates to being poor. On that note, here's some poor ass photos of Fès:
intricate zellig (tilework) at a fountain next to my room greeted by rain my first morning in Fès
they have something like 7 billion of these intricate water fountains throughout Fès
I can't enter a mosque since I'm an infidel, but remember the game 'Where's Waldo?'...see if you can find the dangling foot at the foot of the steps entering this mosque
A man in a jellebah (traditional Moroccan robe) walks past the guilded doors of this medersa (Islamic university)
these are the taxis, trucks, and all other motorized vehicles of Fès

The tiled floor of the Qaraouirine Mosque is much nicer than the rain drenched donkey-dung filled alley that I'm standing on when I took this shot
No, this Moroccan woman isn't shaking her ass to the latest in jellebah fashion, she stepped into my shot of the entry into the Andalucia Mosque
It's easy to get lost wandering the medina maze. I was rewarded with this beautiful fountain for my lack of direction
panoramic views of Fès

cemeteries are apparently good for burying the dead as well as grazing livestock he's half provider of death as well as life eternal, Dónde está Che Pelotas?