“Just walk assertively, but not aggressively pass the monkeys and everything will be fine.”
I had never imagined myself in a situation where this advice would be necessary, or even reassuring, but on a hike last weekend in the Atlas Mountains such a scenario emerged. Our group of nine, distracted by a herd of sheep and a Berber shepherd to our left, had slowed upon entering a forest and startled a territorial group of Barbary monkeys. While we were stopped taking pictures, three of four monkeys began to advance towards us and hysteria immediately ensued. Cries of “They look just like mini-humans!” and “They have opposable thumbs!” and “We can’t even outsmart them; they are just as smart as us!” rang through the trees. Luckily, calmer heads prevailed and we simply moved out of monkey territory and continued on our way, but, for me, the incident was emblematic of my Azrou experience.
Traveling on our own, without the direct support of Amideast, was wonderfully confusing. I was out of Rabat and independent - buying my own train tickets and setting my own itinerary. At the same time, underestimations and language confusion lead to overpaid cab rides, angry drivers, and the group walking for 55 minutes and not making it beyond the city limits of Azrou. But all of it was so fantastically Moroccan I didn’t really care. So there wasn’t an online review of the inn for me to study in detail before we left – it turned out to be an amazing Berber guest house complete with our own sitting area. So I paid four times the price of a cab to ride down a mountain highway on a tractor – it was the best form of transportation I’ve ever taken. So I didn’t bother to explore Azrou and just ate at the inn– I had the best vegetable soup and chicken and carrot tagine of my life! The ups (seeing endless country stretch for miles) AND the downs (sweating for the entire 2 and a half hour train ride back to Rabat with no A/C) were both fantastic. And when I didn’t know exactly what was going on or what to do it was ok. Instead of freaking out, I just followed the monkey advice and acted like I did, “walking assertively, but not aggressively,” and everything turned out fine.
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