We got to Jemaa-El-Fna around 9 pm – wow what at place, my first reaction – shock and terror! I read about this place before hand on Routard guide, but yet any descriptions of it can not possibly describe reality, the tumult, pulse, vibe, craziness of this place.
There are thousands of people Moroccan and tourists alike and all possible vendors; everything is for sale from “normal” things to all kind of weird looking stuff (we had no idea what they were). Some people just have a small blanket with a few strange things on it and sit there in the middle of crowd trying to make a few pennies. There are women that offer tattoos and henna paintings on hand and feet.
Also there is music, dance performances, monkey wranglers, snake charmers. I couldn’t take pictures at night, this is a picture of the snake charmers in the day time. In the middle there are two cobras.
Right in the middle of the plaza there are many “only at night” small outdoors vendors restaurants and Moroccan patisseries; (these vendors are not there is the day time, only at night); all restaurants and patisseries are pretty much same and they all have numbers.
For restaurants there are long plain tables where everyone can sit as long as there is room. Every restaurant has one or two guys in charge of getting customers to their restaurant. As we walked by many of them come to us showing up the menu right in our face.
That night we had already dinner so we decided to come back and eat here in couple of days mostly because of the atmosphere and “the experience”. The smell of the “grillades, tajines, spices, cakes was very enticing.
We went back a few days later; as all restaurants are the same, after shaking off some of the restaurants touts, we choose to sit somewhere not too crowded. I had poulet tajine, and Mark poulet grillades, about 6 Euros, plus French fries and grilled aubergines (eggplant). Before our order arrived the waiter brought a small plate of olives and some spiced sauce. The food was just OK, when we had to pay our bill we realized that the waiter has included also the food that we have not ordered and we have assumed that was free. In Canada if you are given a little something that you have not order before your meal that appetizer is from the restaurant and it is free.
The extra amount was very little, but yet we learned that in Morocco if we ever get food that we have not ordered we will ask first how much is going to cost.
That was our night experience in Jemma-El-Fna. As I recognize that maybe most tourist find this place very exiting, for me was again once in a life time experience. I am not planning to ever go back to this place.
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