Jamming in Morocco

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DAY 252: Legendary international superstar Bob Marley has had a long lasting effect on the people in Essaouira.  Long after his departure not only were people big fans of his reggae music, they also tried to look like Rastafarians with kitschy woolen hats with dreads knitted into them.  But the Moroccan affection for Bob Marley epitomized at the Festival d’Essaouira’s big finale act:  The Wailers, Bob Marley’s former band.

Even with The Wailers in town, Sebastian and I almost didn’t see their performance.  As much as we wanted to that morning while eating homemade olive sandwiches in our hotel room (a favorite sandwich of my creation), we planned on doing the smart thing of making headway northbound towards Spain because we both only had limited time in Morocco and need to be in Europe in three days.

But when we tried to get an afternoon bus out of Essaouira, they were booked solid—we had no choice but to take an overnight bus to Rabat, leaving us to stay until nighttime to see The Wailers perform.  (Oh, poor us.)

THE SUN BLARED DOWN FROM ABOVE, baking the mostly blue- and white-painted seaside city with a beach to temperatures too hot for me to wear my galabiyya.  It was a shame I didn’t have it one when we stumbled upon the open liquor store, so that we could have done the experiment we wanted to try the day before.  However, even without the Muslim attire on, I was stopped by the clerk guarding the back of the store where the wines and hard stuff were.

“[Oh, you’re with him?]” he said, seeing Sebastian call to me from behind.

“Oui.” He let me and my foreigner ways pass.

We killed the early afternoon on the roof terrace with ice-cold beers until show time.  We managed to snag a really good vantage point as The Wailers took to the stage.  The band members started playing reggae instrumentals until the lead singer showed up to singing classic Bob Marley tunes (picture above). 

“Lots of the Moroccans are wearing these hats [with the wool dreads knitted into them.] That’s because they want to be like us!  Rastafari!”

The sounds of the trumpet, saxophone, bass, keyboard, guitar and drums wailed through the air from the same group I’d heard time and time again on my Legend CD, only live.  I found it funny that I was listening to world-renowned Jamaican music in Morocco of all places, which was sort of like when I had really good Vietnamese food at Tony’s in Tanzania.  The lead singer ad libbed a bit for the occasion, changing the lyrics of some of the songs.  “We’ll be forever loving Ja” became “We’ll be forever loving Allah,” and “We’re jamming” became “We’re jamming in Morocco.”

After about an hour of playing, the band quietly left the stage without a band, the way most bands do in a concert pretending like the audience won’t ask for an encore, but knowing damn sure they will.  The Moroccan encore call was full of chants that were reminiscent of those in a Brazilian soccer match, with raised hands and waving fingers.  It wasn’t long until the band came back, this time led by a guy who played with The Wailers of Moroccan descent who had never been to Morocco before, but enjoyed the hero’s welcome.  He led a whole bunch of more songs, ad libbing as well.

“I remember… when we used to sit… in the government yard in Morocco...”

The encores ran until dusk with more Bob Marley classics like “One Love,” “Get Up, Stand Up,” and appropriately, “Exodus” when the band was about finished with their set.  There were more encore calls, but a festival organizer took the mic and explained that the festival was over, thanking the performers and the sponsors.

Before our own exodus, Sebastian and I killed some time at the beach and at a sidewalk cafe drinking mint tea (where yet another guy mistook me for Moroccan) until we got our bags and walked over to the bus terminal.  Inside our bus, the festival was still going strong with most passengers apparently of the Moroccan college crowd going back home after partying all weekend in Essaouira—complete with their clouds of hash smoke.  Singing continued with rhythmic clapping and drumming on the backs of seats, and it was a pretty rowdy time.  The 2004 Festival d’Essaouira may have been officially over, but it didn’t prevent people from jamming in Morocco.


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This blog entry about the events of Sunday, June 27, 2004 was originally posted on July 01, 2004 on the blog, "The Global Trip 2004: Sixteen Months Around The World (Or Until Money Runs Out, Whichever Comes First)," hosted by BootsnAll.com. It is one of over 500 entries that chronicled a trip around the world from October 2003 to March 2005, encompassing travel through thirty-seven countries in North America, South America, Africa, Europe, and Asia. It was this blog that "started it all," where Erik evolved and honed his style of travel blogging. (It starts to come into focus around the time he arrives in Africa.)

Praised and recommended by USA Today, RickSteves.com, and readers of BootsnAll and Lonely Planet's Thorn Tree, The Global Trip blog was selected by the editors of PC Magazine for the "Top 100 Sites You Didn't Know You Couldn't Live Without" (in the travel category) in 2005.





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