Moroccan Saki

I just got back from my weeklong trip to Morocco. In Fes, we took a tour of the city and a nearby tile factory. At the tile factory (aka third world sweat shop), we followed the mosaic tile making process from start to finish. The end of the tour is, of course, the show room. In the show room, I browsed. A unique piece up on a shelf caught my eye. It was behind a tall vase (you can see it behind me in the photo) and a man came up to help me with it. He got it off the shelf and proceeded to explain to me that it was an ink well. He said he'd give it to me as a gift. I politely declined. He asked again, adding that if I liked it, he'd buy it for me, but then he'd get to "keep me." The ensuing diatribe described how much happier my life in Morocco as his wife would be. He said I could eat tagines (a savory-sweet traditional Moroccan dish of roasted meat and fruit), not work (because sitting in front of a computer all day hurts your eyes), and live stress free- all without a visa (not like in America)! He remarked, as he held my hand in his own, that our hypothetical marriage would work because we were the same color. After my repeated rejections of his proposals, he relented and agreed to give me his card and take a photo with me as a souvenir. Turns out, he was a tour guide and a member of the family that owned the tile factory. His name was Saki (like Kawasaki, he told me). He walked me all of the way to the car and encouraged me to call if I changed my mind. Hilarious!
If you care to check out the site, the link is: www.artnaji.net

The Carrot and the Stick

The other night my flat mate and I went to our local, 24 hour, halal convience store to pick up a few cans of Red Bull to help us get those report card comments finished.
We go to the counter to make our purchases and the cashier is snacking on a carrot.
I notice, but say nothing & think nothing of it until he tells us we need to buy more items to use a debit card. I quickly scan the store for additional items and say,"I need a snack." At which point, the cashier reaches behind the counter to offer me, a bag of the raw, unpeeled (and probably unwashed) carrots that he's been chomping on! Now these weren't the baby carrots in a little bag that we're all used to as snack food. These were whole, large, fully grown, need-to-be-chopped-into-slices-or-sticks, sized carrots.
I decline the healthy snack and opt for a Snickers.