I slipped out early in the morning from the riad. Gayu and Rhea had decided to sleep off the desert fatigue, while the Aski’s were going to try the Hammam. I caught a petite taxi to Medersa Ben Youssef. At 8:00 am, the doors of the old school were still an hour away from opening.
With time to kill, I asked a nearby stall owner where the souks were. He looked at me quizzically with disbelief.
“Go left. Go right. ” he said, “It is all souks”.
So dismissed, I slinked away sheepishly. I crossed a couple of streets and found myself outside Cafe Arabe. I had read a lot about it, so I stepped in to see if they had some breakfast. “No petite dejeuner, monsieur”, I was politely told.
A few feet away, under a dilapidated arch, I saw a woman in a hijab standing besides a stove. On a hot metallic platform, she was roasting square shaped flat bread that looked like the Indian parathas. Without a second thought, I walked right in.
As I entered, I got looked over by the clientele. Clearly, they were not used to tourists sauntering in nonchalantly in this establishment. I made my way to the only empty table in the back and settled down. Once my eyes adjusted to the dark, I realized, it was a modest sized room with wooden tables and chairs sprinkled around. Besides being a local eatery, the room was rampantly used for storage. Drums, coils of ropes, gas cylinders, empty coke crates and half a dozen mopeds and bicycles were randomly parked.
People had gone back to doing what they were doing. A old man and his grandson were bent over a well worn chess set. Obviously a lesson was in progress. Yonder, a young woman clad in black burqua was staring at nothing. In her incredibly delicate hands, she nursed a steaming cup of hot tea. A disheveled man sat with his back to the adobe walls, one leg propped up on the chair, carving his teeth with a toothpick. He was looking straight at me clearly obvious of my ill camouflaged discomfort.
I sat there for a while. I had no idea how this was going to go. So far in Marrakech I had always ordered in English or had our guide-of-the-day to translate. Just as I was getting uncomfortable, the patroness – the women at the stove – walked up to me. She gave me the largest toothiest smile in Marrakech. (She was the only woman who smiled at me in my entire stay in Marrakech). I pointed to the flat bread on the stove. She smiled again and said something. Without doubt she was asking me what I wanted with it.
“La”, I said, “No”, one of the few Arabic words I had picked up.
“Tea?” She said with a headshake that clearly meant, you should at least have tea with it. Without waiting for an answer she walked away rewarding me another one of her smiles.
She returned in a couple of minutes.
“Math-lhoooh”, she said as she laid down the platter and the paraphernalia. (I later found out she was telling me what the bread is called – Matlouh.) She tilted the brass teapot over the glass and served the mint tea Moroccan style, the spout an inch from the lip of the glass at the beginning and then slowly raising it till the trickle was falling a couple of feet.
“Bon appetite”, she said before leaving me alone. That startled me. I am so not used to hearing French from a non-Caucasians. The hot bread, multi layered bread was crisp and delicious. Within no time, it was gone, washed away by the sweet mint tea.
I stopped at the stove on the way out. I pulled out my wallet. This time she laughed a throaty laugh. She waved me with a nod and a blink. Obviously she had enjoyed the experience as much as I did. I laughed and walked out.
Yes, there is no such thing as a free lunch, but can’t say that any more about a breakfast anymore.
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The “Arabian NIghts” lounge at Cafe Arabe, but no petite dejeuner for monsieur.
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