VOLUBILIS (Day 3)

Allahu akbar, Allahu akbar... Ash-hadu an la ilaha ila Allah... and so began our daily ritual of the exceedingly early morning mosque call. We took a taxi to the local bus station. There were no bus schedules, destinations posted, or even numbers on the busses. Basically you just told one of the many men standing about where you wanted to go, and he pointed you to the correct bus. That was his job. There was no direct bus to the ruins of Volubilis. Basically you just arranged with the driver to be dropped off at a road junction in middle of seemingly nowhere in the countryside and got to walk the rest of way. On our walk, we were greeted in French by many sheep herders and farmers riding donkeys straddled with heavy loads.

Volubilis (meaning morning glory, after the flower) was one of the Roman Empire's most remote outposts after the area was annexed in about 40 A.D. It continued to be inhabited up until the 18th century (at which time it was plundered and destroyed) and once housed 20,000 people. We hired a personal tour guide to lead us around. The place was enormous even though only 18 of the 40 hectares have yet been uncovered by archaeologists. Many of the houses were fairly well intact and the separate rooms were easy to discern. The site's most impressive monuments were the enormous triumphal arch (built in 217), the capitol (a large Greek temple, also built in 217) and the basilica (the former judicial building turned church). There was also a sundial, oil press, sacrificial altar (for animals), steam baths, sewer system, public fountain, vomitorium and even a brothel (with a very obvious symbol carved into the stone!). The true reason for visiting, however, had to be the stunningly detailed, still intact, giant mosaic floors.

To get back to Meknes, we paid a few dirhams to hitch a ride standing in the back of a pickup truck to town. While we were waiting, we got to talking with one of the employees who promptly invited us to dinner at his house that evening. Another scam? He quickly said he would pick us up from our hotel at 7 pm. Before we could change our minds, our ride arrived. We hopped into the back of a very old pickup truck filled with about 10 men. It was standing room only, but fortunately there was at least a metal outer frame to cling to as we wound our way through the local hills on a one lane dirt road. Once we reached the nearby town of Moulay Idriss, we could catch the bus back to Meknes... again standing room only.

At 7 pm, we were waiting in the hotel lobby. The man appeared and led us a few blocks away to a dark car parked on the street. There was another man in the driver's seat. With great concern, we got in the car and were driven for about 20 minutes into the darkest recesses of the city. We stopped in a small apartment complex area with numerous tiny dark alleyways. We were led inside and given a seat on the couch in the tiny four-room apartment. The two men frantically ran about trying to tidy the place up and start dinner. Gradually we learned that Abdel and Mustapha worked as free-lance photographers at Volubilis. They were two bachelors who shared this place. We then had a wonderful evening eating a delicious meal of tajine (a type of stew) and couscous with vegetables, talking, watching some tv in French, and looking at their pictures. When it got late, they drove us back to the hotel and never once asked for anything in return.

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