tunisia log final

8/14/2019 Tunisia Log Final

1/17

Spring Break

(27 Feb 10 Mar 2009)1) Q & A

Before we go any further I think its important to field a few of the questions we

have received thus far.

How is school?o School is going well - both of us are now in the middle of mid-terms so

things are heating up a bit. Its sad to say that quality teachers are hard to

find (teachers are lacking in their English skills) and as a result the courses

seem to be more about what the students make of them rather than what

the teacher teaches.

Also, how is the knee recovery coming along?o The knee is back to normal. Grant has been running on it a little bit and

yesterday did some leg presses in the gym. Not to mention the extensive

walking that took place while in Tunisia on Spring Break.

Are you able to get any exercise?o As you may have guessed, the answer is yes. There is somewhat of a hole in

the wall gym that we go to most mornings. We also do a substantial amount

of walking on weekends when exploring new cities. Alicia has a friend to do

yoga with a couple times a week.

How are Americans perceived here?o

For this question, we so far have to break this down into our time inMorocco and our time in Tunisia. Im sure this will be subject to change also

as we explore other Middle Eastern countries down the road, and especially

the closer we get to Israel. In Morocco and Tunisia Americans are well

accepted mostly, it seems, as a result of the election of Obama. Most of the

time when someone asked us what our nationality was and we said

American they would spout out Obama in a very receptive way. Perhaps

its enough of a change for them, just to have him in office. Obviously, how

they perceive the U.S. presidency is going to be different than a U.S. citizen.

For the most part though, I would say that we have been not so much

judged by our nationality but by the color of our skin and hair (soundsfamiliar, being judged by the color of ones skin?), and our inability to speak

either French or Arabic. The simple appearance as a foreigner leaves us

extremely susceptible to travel agents (especially in Morocco) and an

onslaught of staring (as in Tunisia) and begging (especially in Morocco), but

more than anything there seems to be the perception that its okay to rip-off

foreigners, so every money transaction always involves a negotiation.


2/17

Overall though it just takes some getting used to, especially since due to the

language barrier there are aspects to the culture we will never fully

understand.

2)Spring Break

DAY 1 Casablanca,Morocco

DAY 2 Jendouba, Tunisia

DAY 3 Le Kef, Tunisia

DAY 4 Douz, Tunisia

DAY 5 Matmata-El Jem,Tunisia

DAY 6 Kairouan, Tunisia

DAY 7 Tunis, Tunisia

DAY 8 Carthage-Sidi BouSaid, Tunisia

DAY 9 Bardo Museum,Tunis, Tunisia

DAY 10 Tunis, Tunisia

DAY 11 La Marsa, Tunis,Tunisia

DAY 12 Casablanca-Ifrane,Morocco

Legend

Blue = Air

Red line = Bus

Green = Louage/Taxi

Orange = Train

Pink = Light Rail


3/17

Where do we start? Tunisia was certainly an adventure for us. The best part about thetrip was seeing the amazing Roman ruins scattered throughout the Tunisian landscape. Weessentially did a circular tour of the country and took pretty much every means of masstransportation available to us (bus, train, taxi, louage, etc.). Before embarking on our Tunisianadventures, we came armed with a little historical background of the country, a printed fast fact

sheet/map of Tunisia, and Al Akhwayn University librarys 1998 version of the Rough Guide toTunisia. Surprisingly, the 10-year old book proved to be quite useful on our whirlwind tour ofTunisia. But as we found later on, reading is definitely different than experiencing!

We left the university on Friday, February 27th with 3 fellow Moroccan students and afellow exchange student for Casablanca. Arriving in Casablanca in the early evening, we got aroom at the Hotel Ibis near the train station that would take us to the airport. We decided thiswould be our evening of luxury to start the trip off right. After securing our room we walkedto Ricks Caf near the Medina of Casablanca. To refresh your memory of the movie Casablanca(1942), Ricks Caf was Humphrey Bogarts nightclub in themovie! While the movie was never actually filmed on

Moroccan soil, tourists like yours truly certainly eat up theambience of the restaurant and setting. With great success,we found the caf without any real problems and found thatwe were a half hour early for the restaurant to open. Luckily,we were within a short walking distance to Casablancasgreat draw The Hassan II Mosque which was built in 1993.I am not sure anything could have quite prepared us for thisextravagant mosque. Built overlooking the Atlantic Ocean,the view of both the mosque and to the west wasbreathtaking. We arrived just as the sun was setting and thecall to evening prayer was beginning. We took somefabulous photos, people watched, and walked down near theocean listening to the waves crash against the shore. Allhunger pains had subsided at this point it was a verypeaceful setting. We then walked back to Ricks Caf

anticipating a great meal and we werentdisappointed. Alicia got a colorful saladand Grant got a T-bone steak (who issurprised here at our meal choices??). Wealso ordered a bottle of wine that we

slowly savored. Halfway through themeal, we learned that we would have livepiano music at 9pm (his name wasnt Sam,as in the movie!). So Alicia got a coffeeand we both got dessert Grant a brownie,Alicia an apple tartlet. In the meantime,we were receiving several text messagesfrom fellow international students who

Alicia in front of Hassan II Mosque

At Ricks Cafe


4/17

were headed to Casablanca en route to Hungary, Mallorca, and Italy the following day. Theydecided to join us at Ricks Caf so we migrated to their table and settled in for a little longer.All in all, we spent a good 4 hours there enjoying the ambiance, the waiters with their fez hatsand essentially feeling like we had been transported to the Hollywood Casablanca rather than thereal streets of Casablanca. The girl who was traveling to Italy around the same time as Grant and

I ended up catching a cab with us back to the Hotel Ibis we unsuccessfully tried to sneak herinto our room so she wouldnt have to pay they wouldnt have it! Instead, she had to pay for aroom by herself for only about 4 hours of sleep. Cest la vie. We caught the earliest train thatmorning 5:30am and headed a hour outside the city to the airport. Without delay, we wereon Royal Air Morocco heading a couple countries west to liberal Tunisia. Or so wed read.

Our first view of Tunisia was that of its capitol, Tunis. With the Mediterranean off in thedistance, white-walled urban development of the city, and clear organization of the citys streetswe had a very favorable first impression of Tunisia. Debarking from the plane, the weather waswarm and we headed off to clear customs. Nothing too significant here except trying to fill outforms that are written solely in French and Arabic, and needing to provide the customs officials

with a Tunisian address of our destination which we didnt have. To appease them, Aliciapulled out the Rough Guide to Tunisia, flipped to the hostels in Tunis section, and provided themwith an address. I guess governments are fairly similar in that aspect. We got Grants checkedbag and tested Alicias first experience in negotiating (let alone speaking) in French trying toget a rental car. Discovering it was simply too expensive, we abandoned that idea for thegrander adventure of taxis, buses, louages (long distance mini-vans that leave once filled), trains,and most importantly, our own two feet (what a concept!). We left the airport in search of a taxito get to the bus station. This cab ride will go down in the history of cab rides for the mostexpensive one in Tunisia for the shortest distance. No, actually we are certain they rip everytourist off that doesnt know any better.I mean, they have to earn their bread somehow, no?Sadly, this was our first taste of Tunisia but at the time, we didnt even know it because we hadnot figured out the Tunisian currency in the least. The Tunisian currency is the Dinar and it isbroken down to a hundredth of a decimal. Talk about slightly confusing so when we thoughtour cab ride was 18 Dinars and paid the driver 20 Dinars (in which case he would not returnthat extra 2 Dinars claiming there was a baggage fee) in the end our metered cab ride wasreally 1.8 Dinars! You do the math. At the bus station we purchased tickets for a ride toJendouba that would leave in another hour or so, so we decided to go in search for food. Wefound a little caf down the way and ordered a sandwich fromage for Alicia (cheese sandwich)and 2 sandwiches for Grant. Next door to the caf was a little produce stand and we bought 2bananas and a grapefruit that Alicia carried around the whole next week but the grapefruit wasexcellent when we juiced it! The bus was rather crowded and long. We had a couple people tryto talk with us mostly trying to figure out where we were from, that sort of thing. We got toJendouba and were dropped off at the bus station a stones throw away from a hotel that waslisted in our guidebook. With a little bit of communication difficulty, we managed to get a roomfor the night. Tunisians speak French certainly, but not so much English. Grant and Aliciaspeak English certainly, but amongst us, only have certain degrees of proficiency in German,Spanish, and French. And so the language divide begins. We left the hotel in search of food andhappened upon a pizzeria that was not only our favorite pizza in Tunisia, but also happened to bethe best service we got in Tunisia as well. The staff was so accommodating and a lot of fun andwhile neither of us spoke the others language, we tried. Also, of note, the waiter turned the


5/17

television to 24 of all shows, and affirmed that not only do they like 24 but that it could onlybe played in English. Jack Bauer had never sounded so familiar and good English-starved ears!

We left early the next morning for the Romansite Bulla Regia which was about 15 KM to the north.

In the end, it was the only tourist site that we paid forwhile in Tunisia because since we are internationalstudents, we were able to get into all the sites withoutcharge! Bulla Regia was a much larger Roman ruin

site than we hadexpected. It wasbuilt in one of themost fertile valleys

in Tunisia andprospered, once,from grain production. What makes this site remarkable

though is that the Roman inhabitants, due to the heat in thesummer, were driven underground. The villa, grainproduction and storage were all underground. The exceptionwas a theater, chapel, and bathing complex that all stoodabove ground. What makes this even more remarkable, as wewill later see, is that this idea of subterranean life also appearsand may have been inspired by the Berbers in the south,specifically Matmata. After spending nearly four hours atBulla Regia, we flagged a cab back to Jendouba and boardeda buss to Le Kef, where we planned to take a bus to Douz.

Arriving in Le Kef, our critical mistake was to get off the bus somewhere other than thebus station. Wandering around the city for some time we eventually found our way to the bus-station, thanks in great part to Alicias attentiveness. We soon discovered though, that the nextbus wouldnt be leaving until the next morning. Our plan had originally been to explore the northsome more to see some of the other Roman ruins in thearea, but we had come to the conclusion that wewanted to prioritize the sites in an effort to either havea longer, more relaxing, break at the end or explore thepossibility of going to Sicily before our return toMorocco. Hence our next stop was to be Douz in theSahara. For now though we had the opportunity to

explore Le Kef. We first tried to find the local hostelwith no success; a group of girls tried to help us but inthe end only wanted money, kind of entertaining. Atone point they wanted our phone number, told us wewere their friends, then asked for money so they couldbuy chocolate. They were giggling the whole time.We then met a guy whose ex-wife was from Texas,and generously showed us to a hotel that was

Theater at Bulla Regia

Alicia walking over an underground

settlement at Bulla Regia.

Woman herding sheep in the hills above Le Kef


6/17

reasonably priced. After trying to find food with no great success, we went up to the Kasba thatpresided over the city and then over to a hill/mountain that offered a nice vantage point over thecity and the region. Heading back into town Grant spotted a nice-looking sandwich shop that alsohad some desserts. We ate the sandwiches indoors and took our chocolate desserts outdoors andattempted to have an enjoyable time eating them while watching the sunset. Instead, a guy who

spoke German started talking to Alicia, asking for money. We gave him a bite of dessert but thatwasnt enough, he needed money. In German, he tried to use the logic that he didnt have familyin Tunisia to support him for him to buy bread and such, in which case Alicia countered with thelogic that we didnt have family in Tunisia either and we were poor students to boot! Heeventually wandered away, and we headed back to our hotel. We ended up going out that nightfor a glass of wine, and met 6 Tunisians who were very friendly with us. With the use ofGerman, Spanish, French, and English we had a limited conversation about us being students inMorocco, on spring break in Tunisia, that we were married, and what Grant and I studied inschool. It was mostly the German and French that helped here very interesting.

Waking up at 0400, we left to catch the bus to Gafsa, on our way to Douz. Leaving at

0530 we were able to look out as the lush hills and valleys in which Roman ruins such as BullaRegia were strategically placed turned to more baron and dusty terrain, and making our closestmark to the Algerian boarder (about 20KM). Stopping in the dusty city of Gafsa, we soon caughta louage to Douz. After about an hour and a half of driving across the desert plains of what usedto be a lake, we arrived in Kebill, where we had to switch louages to go to Douz. After a painlesstransfer, we were on our way and about 15minutes in we could start to see the wavy sand duneson the horizon. About 15 minutes later, we arrived in Douz and learned a lesson about Louages:that if you connect with another louage you have to pay for the second as well. After some body

gestures we resolved the problem with thelouage driver, and sought out the hotel 20 Marthat was highly recommended in our travel book.Finding the hotel with no problem we foundextremely affordable and nice rooms, though notas lively of aplace as thetravel bookmade it sound.Stowing ourbags andgrabbing the

water andcamera we

then made our way out to the dunes, on foot. After stoppingfor useless directions in the travel agency, we found our wayby following the steady stream of Land Rovers taking touristsout to the Dunes and picking them up from their camel rides.After walking through an oasis at the edge of town we steppedout into what was clearly the Sahara. We passed houses withcamels outside, and a large flat area where hundreds of camels

roamed just waiting for the next set of tourists to take them out

Camel herder in the Sahara

Alicia sporting it in the Sahara


7/17

into the dunes that overshadowed their current resting spot. Walking maybe 3 or 4 miles in theSahara we were soon heat exhausted and out of water. Having seen plenty of dunes, camels, andtourists we called it quits and headed back into town. On our way back we stopped at a sandwichshop where Grant ordered a chwarma that came with a mixture of vegetables that made itspectacular, and Alicia ordered a freshly squeezed orange juice. Going back to the hotel we

showered, relaxed, and then headed out to explore the city and eat dinner. After some searchingthrough a city that was surprisingly creepy at night, with everyone driving mopeds down darkstreets and little street lights to speak of, we ended up going back to the same sandwich shop fora bit less spectacular of a meal. Before we leave Douz behind there are three things ofimportance to note here: 1) This far south a large number of the population is black due todisplacement as a result of early generations of slavery; 2) The typical Jilaba that is worn byBerbers and Bedouin, as well as the turban is more common due to the desolate and hot location;3) The minarets of mosques change the further south you go, whereas in the north the minaretsare blocked off in sections, minarets in the south tend to be more circular and triangular in theroof construction. The next day we headed to the bus station which we found to be unreliable ifyou tried to get early transportation somewhere, in our case, Gabes. After trying to figure out

which would be better, louage or bus, we opted for the louage and were in Gabes by noon.

Gabes was another citythat shouldnt be included onyour travel itinerary except totake advantage of its placementas the hub for transportation fromthe north to the south, which isexactly what we did and decidedto go south to Matmata. Taking abus the ride was a little less thanan hour. The plains of the desertthat we were used to gave way to

dry dusty mountains and soon tosporadic Berber settlements(caves built into the sides of hills of mountains). Then up a windy mountain pass of a road, we

made it to Matmata. Though there are somemodern developments in the city it was still easyto see how this settlement once looked. Hiking uponto a hill we could see on our left an extensivelyterraced mountain side and on the right (lookinginto the city) a rather brown town with sporadicmounds of displaced dirt. Yes, if you haveguessed it from reading earlier, these are the pitsthat the Berber traditionally live in to stay out ofthe sun, and no they dont live in the pitsthemselves, but rather in a series of caves thatthey have built into the side of the pit. Walking

down into the town, we found that navigation wasby more of a series of trails than roads.

Looking down into Matmata, notice the pits at the base hills on the right.

Traditional Matmata pit dwelling


8/17

Precariously walking around the edges of some of thesepits that seemed to just appear out of nowhere, we cameacross a lady who invited us in to take a look around herpit dwelling. Which once we entered the caves used forsleeping and eating, the concept made complete sense as

the temperature dropped from the hot outside air to anear perfect room temperature. The room was notspacious to say the least, but the shelter it provided fromthe elements was amazing. After looking around wegave the lady 5 Dinar and explored the village even

further and definitely off the beaten path. We wandered through somesmall crop fields and finally made our way back to the center of town,where along the way we ran into a kid asking for money and gave him some bread instead. Wewanted to see where the usual tourists were going and traced them to the Troglodyte hotel; ohdid we mention Star Wars was filmed here? Yes, this same hotel was built around theHollywood set of the bar scene where Luke Skywalker and Hans Solo met on planet Tatatouine,

named after a city just a little further south of Matmata. We had lunch in this corny, bar setting.The food wasnt great but it was something to write home about! We then headed back to the busstation and returned to Gabes. As in Douz, the busschedule wasnt exactly convenient and we ended upgrabbing two Louages to Gabes.

From Gabes our next stop was El Jem to the north. Wanting to save money by takingovernight transport we caught a 4-hour bus from Gabes to El Jem at 10:00pm to see El Jemsspectacular Roman amphitheatre. We arrived in El Jem at 2am to dark streets and without aplace to stay we definitely lost a lot of sleep that night. We tried going to the one of the hotelslisted in the guidebook where the bus dropped us off but the man who opened the hotels doors

Farmland in Matmata

Star Wars set

Roman Amphitheatre/Coliseum in El Jem


9/17

said they no longer were a hotel, or at least they no longer were renting rooms for that night wewerent sure. So, we ended up spending the night in the train station trying to read our books,somewhat sleeping, trying to stay warm, and otherwise just clock watching for 8:00am whenthe amphitheatre opened. By 6:00am we were bored enough that we decided to walk around ElJem, watch the sun rise, and walk around the amphitheatre outside its gates. We ended up going

to two different coffee shops for some coffee and hot chocolate (side note: coffee shops aremainly a male-dominated space/in-public social activity), and still were just waiting to get insidethe gates to see El Jem. At around 7:45am, the employeesmust have felt sorry for us getting there so early orsomething, as they allowed us to enter the site a littleearly. The unique thing about this site was that it waswhere we first figured out that all historical sites inTunisia were free for students as long as we showed ourinternational student identification card! In the end, wesaved quite a few dinars for being students which wasgreat. We cruised through El Jem in record time, under an

hour. We went through the courtyard and throughout thedifferent levels of the stadium luckily we had gottenthere just a little before the many tourist buses that arrivedshortly after us. We had practically no sleep from the night before so we did a very brief tour ofthe site before heading in a louage to the next stop: Sousse. We realized we spent more timewaiting for El Jem to open for the day than we actually spent touring the site, but we were tiredand felt like we had seen more than enough of the Roman ruins for one day! However, we gotsome great photos of the amphitheatre and were trying to picture what it would have been like towitness such a spectacle in its glory days. Alicia, for one, preferred going there without thefighting, maiming, and bloodshed of animal and human alike! Grant, on the other hand, wasenjoying the thought of defending himself before such a large crowd in an enormous arena! It

was a great site to see despite being tired and ready for a good nap (which was to be had themoment we set foot in our hotel room in Kairouan).

The inside of the Amphitheatre/Coliseum in El Jem

To get from El Jem to Kairouan, you have to go some 40KM to Sousse by Louage andthen another 30KM to Kairouan with another Louage. Though this may be a more indirect routeand there may be alternate ways of getting to Kairouan, a definite plus is that Sousse is a nicecity on the coast and the Sousse Louage station was very robust. This leg of the trip we did notbother staying long, and about 40 minutes later we were in Kairouan. The purpose of going toKairouan had been to see the Great Mosque of Kairouan, the old Islamic built cisterns, and the

Grant at the amphitheatre/coliseum


10/17

Museum of Islamic Art and Architecture.However, arriving there we were still exhaustedfrom a night of no sleep in El Jem and precededto find a hotel for the night and nap some of theday away. Several hours later than when we had

planned to wake up, we were off again toexplore what we could before nightfall, whichended up being the cisterns and the Mosque from the outside at night. Conveniently, our hotelwas situated across the street from the cisterns that were now included in what looked like apark. The complex was comprised of two cisterns, originally thought to be built by the Romansbut later discovered to be Islamic, one consisted of two pools and the other three. By allowingthe dirty water to enter and settle in the bigger pool, while only allowing the water line crest intothe next pool they were able to filter the water,making it drinkable. Given the hot, dry, anddusty location of the city this once proved to beinvaluable. After checking out the cisterns, the

sun was setting and we decided to try and makeour way the Kairouan Mosque. Arriving just afterdark we were treated to the illuminated minarettowering over the walls of the medina, with amartyr cemetery at the foot of the wall.Unfortunately by this point the mosque wasclosed for visiting so instead we stumbled upon a

pizza shop called Miami whose employeeapparently lived in Florida at one point. After arather decent meal we went back to the hotel to rest and prepare for the next day of seeing the

Kairouan mosque and the Museum of Islamic

Art and Architecture. Little did you know thatthat night the halls of the hotel would be filledwith the sound of women cheering with theconclusion of wedding that had just taken placedownstairs. Alicia stayed up watching Germantelevision for about 2 hours, and then also wentto sleep. The next morning, Grant was ecstaticto finally see the Great Mosque, arguably theoldest Islamic praying site in North Africa, andthe fourth holiest site in Islam, after Mecca,Medina, and Jerusalem. However, after passing

through the mosques rather robust walls,resembling more of a fortress than a site ofworship, we were disheartened to see that due tothe Presidents visit that would take place in justa few days, they had erected a huge tent in the

middle of the Sahn (the inner courtyard of amosque) that completely ruined the atmosphere, let alone some unique qualities about themosque that were kept in the courtyard. After some looking around we snuck into the tent and

The cisterns at Kairouan

The minaret overlooking the medina wall and

cemetery.

The Prayer Hall inside the Kairouan Mosque


11/17

were able to take a look at some of the courtyards items including a sundial that was once usedto tell when prayer time was, and a fountain centered in the middle of the courtyard that doubledin the function of collecting and storing water for the city as the floors were sloped in order todrain into the fountain. It should also be said that the reason for the Presidents visit was toconduct a speech on the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad (10 February 2009). Keep in mind

that this will also be different next year as it is based on the Islamic lunar calendar. Nevertheless,the tent did not spoil our view of the magnificently decorated prayer hall with neatly stackedQurans along the rows, and rich mosaics along the Qibla wall (direction of Mecca) andespecially around the Mihrab (the niche, usually centered on the Qibla wall, where God sits,similar to an apse in a church). Having taken in the Mosque to the fullest extent, we set off tofind transportation to the Museum of Islamic Art and Architecture, some 15KM outside of town.Getting somewhat lost we ended up taking a taxi to the Louage station for transport further on.That taxi experience was and has been our only experience thus far in witnessing a traditionalMuslim funeral. Coming up to our turn, we found ourselves cut off by a procession of men,maybe 50-100 in total, carrying a wooden coffin down the street. The atmosphere was extremelysolemn, but none of the procession was emotional as they took turns carrying the coffin to the

cemetery. This is important in two main aspects: 1)Women are not allowed at Islamic funeral burials; 2)Funerals/burials are about honoring the deceased lifeand praying for his/her afterlife, and not mourning theloss as there are other places to do this. Making it to theLouage station, we secured a ride in no time and thanksto some understanding on the drivers part, he took usstraight to the Museum. The Museum of Islamic Art andArchitecture was a great comprehensive museum ofIslamic items, to include pottery and glasswork from the8th century, coins from every Islamic Dynasty, and goldleafed pages from Qurans written some twelve-hundredyears ago. It was all fascinating and unfortunately Grantdoomed the photo shoot by using the flash on an itemhe shouldnt have. The guard kept us from takingphotos from that point forward. With time running outand the objective of reaching the capitol city of Tunisby nightfall, we were off again. Walking back toKairouan, we caught a ride on a Louage to a separate

station and then attempted to find the other one (for longer distances), but really only managed torun into some kids who after turning down their request for money preceded in throwing pebblesat us. Finally making our way to the main Louage station, we had no trouble in finding a rideback to Sousse where we then planned on taking a train to Tunis.

Arriving in Sousse we soon found ourselves reintroduced into the tourist atmosphere ofcoastal warm weather and scandalous European clothing (clearly foreigners). Given thecountry and how culturally insensitive the country appeared to us thus far, this was especiallyappalling for Alicia who thought it as being somewhat disgraceful attire. We got enough staresand we were fully covered; imagine wearing short shorts and a spaghetti-strapped tank top! Aswe were to also find, many of these beach towns are monopolized for most of the year when the

Grant's last picture in the Museum.


12/17

weather is nice by Europeans fleeing the north in search of a warmer climate. Let this not deteryou from Sousse though, as it really is a nice city on the beach. Complete with a Rabat (oldfortress) overlooking the beachhead and cutesy tourist shops along the main strip, nevertheless, aprolonged stay here was not on our agenda. Soon we were on a 3- hour train ride to Tunis, wherearriving upon our arrival that evening, we were greeted by stormy weather and congested

sidewalks. Finding a two star hotel for the night (maybe a one star by western standard) wedropped our stuff and set out to have a night of splurging at a nice restaurant. We found whatlooked to be a nice Italian restaurant and our first red flag should have been when they servedsome god awful Tunisian wine that tasted more like straight Vodka than anything. Thinking itmay have just been the wine we remained optimistic about Alicias salad and Grants seafoodpasta. While the salad turned out fine, though overpriced, Grants seafood pasta turned out to bemore of a Cajun dish that his delicate stomach could barely handle. Leaving the restaurant ratherdisappointed, we stumbled upon an ice cream shop that was the shiznit, boosting our moralequite a bit (strawberry sorbet with whole chunks of strawberries in it!). We wont bore you toomuch with our food exploits except to say that alcohol in Tunisia is something that is really keptunderground and it took quite a bit of work to track down places that served the Tunisian beer

called Celtia that is a bit like Budweiser in its quality so nothing special but not bad. Anyhow,the next morning we set out to explore the legendary site of Carthage. Conveniently enough, alight rail will take you to the city for a dirt cheapprice. Something of a shock to the both of us washow little of the ancient city was preserved. Whereonce an epic battle occurred, here stood theresidences of Tunisia's rich and famous. For thisreason, we narrowed our visit to two main locations,the Cathedral on top of Byrsa Hill, and the AntoninusBaths. Presiding over the city, the Cathedral on topof Byrsa hill was once the epicenter of the city withprevailing views over virtually the entire coast. Now

a museum adjacent to the cathedralhouses many artifacts of the ancient cityto include mosaics, statues, and somedead guys bones in a stonesarcophagus. Byrsa hill, itself has beenencroached on by plenty of residentialdevelopments, but still has manystanding ruins of the ancient city left for

people to wonder through. Our next stopwas the Antoninus Baths, at the end of agorgeously landscaped preserve full of ancient ruins. Since we dont know much about RomanBaths and these are supposedly the most important ruins of Carthage, we will lethttp://www.planetware.com do the talking:

The massive remains of the Baths of Antoninus Pius, which were the largest in the Roman worldoutside Rome, occupy an area of 1.8 hectares/4.5 acres. Built between A.D. 146 and 162, in thereign of the Emperor Antoninus Pius, they were extensively restored in 389 but subsequently

The View from Byrsa Hill.

The Antoninus Baths


13/17

collapsed, presumably as a result of a structural defect, and thereafter were used for centuries as aquarry of building stone. As a result all that remains is the walls of the basement story, whichowing to the nearness of the baths to the coast had particularly deep foundations, and a stretch ofmasonry on the west side extending up both stories. On the ground floor - and not, as was thenormal arrangement, in the basement - were the heating and water supply systems, together withrest rooms and rooms for the staff of the baths. The baths proper were on the upper floors, with a

grand staircase (of which nothing remains) leading down from them to the sea.Having planetware.coms description, yes it was awe-inspiring especially given the fact that we

were practically the only ones there due to the sporadic bad weather. For anyone doing this trip

in the future, it might also be well worth it to go a few kilometers south to see the Military

Harbor which we didnt really see. Moving on from Carthage we set out on foot to Sidi Bou Said

further up the coast, to see the picturesque scenery of Tunisias most wealthy community on the

Mediterranean. About halfway there we ran into a few people telling us to walk on the other side

of the street, only to find out that we were approaching the Presidents Palace and apparently we

cant even walk on the same side of the street as the Palace complex. There is a symbolic

comparison here to be made. Where in the United States the White House is a symbol of

democracy and freedom that is purposely placed in a

spot of open visibility, the Tunisian Palace was

tucked away and secluded behind nearly a kilometer

of guards, hills, and trees. Here freedom of

expression, speech, and press is only free when

compared with neighboring countries. Anyhow,

reaching Sidi Bou Said we discovered one of the

cleanest cities weve been to in North Africa, but

when it came to asking for directions everyone was

so uptight (especially the police) that staying therewas not only going to be ridiculously expensive but

also frustrating. After eating at, yeah you guessed it,

another pizza shop we caught the light rail back to Tunis and took up refuge at the Hotel Medina

in the medina, which was reasonably priced about half the price of the place we stayed at the

night before. We reserved a room for two nights the longest we stayed in one place our entire

12 days. At 0630 the next day we were startled awake by the morning call to prayer which lasted

for a painstakingly long thirty minutes. Finally able to go back to sleep, we woke a few hours

later and looked out the window and discovered that no more than 50 feet away was the Minaret

of the Mosque that sounded the call to prayer with all four of its loud speakers. Learning a

valuable lesson about mosque locations relative to your chosen hotel, we set off to explore theMedina and track down the famous Bardo Museum that houses virtually all of the Roman art and

architectural pieces from all the ruins in Tunisia. Making our way through the narrow windy

streets of the medina that sometimes seemed to dip down into tunnels under buildings we

emerged on the other side and set off to find the Museum. After some walking we ended up

flagging down a taxi that took us another half mile or so in the same direction. Before entering

the museum, we wanted to grab a bite to eat. Ironically this meal was to be the site of both our

Sidi Bou Said, in the far off backdrop to the right is

Carthage


14/17

cheapest and best meals in Tunis

pumping out freshly baked bread

then crossed the street and entere

we were inside. Every room was

country. Depictions of gods, seas

Since it would be overly exhaust

to: http://bardomuseum.com/ho

information. After nearly a half

set out again for the Medina to e

thoroughly. Ironically, we kept r

German tourists that were at the

Alicia felt at home trying to liste

she had been tagging along with

itself! Meandering through the

Madrasa (Religious School) and

exploring. Nearby was the Belve

a zoo and a rather extensive area

El Khadrah that weekend was a

seemed everybody was out to sh

market). A flood of people were

fruits, fish (of all sorts), and virt

animal you can imagine. Diving

we found the Halfaouine Mosquand retro look, built up onto a se

merchants and venders selling th

sides on the ground floor. Trying

were stopped by a man who didn

we continued walking further int

15 minutes later as we were tryin

The Bab El Khadrah gates.

ia. We came across an unassuming sandwich s

and together had a couple sandwiches for may

d the Bardo Museum that was almost too much

packed with Roman mosaics and sculpture fro

ons, and animals lined every wall and space in

ive to describe everything in this vast building

e.html for any further

ay spent in the Museum we

plore the area a little more

nning into a group of

ardo Museum, and yes,

in and use her German as

the group in the museum

edina we saw an old

then emerged back into themain city where we

grabbed a bite to eat

and then went back to

the hotel to sleep. For

our planned last night, we decided to mo

Tunis (closer to the airport) and stay at a

hotel near the Bab El Khadrah which is

double entranced wall that used to be the

into the main medina of Tunis. The area

El Khadrah is a

neat area worth

dere Park, complete with

of a park. Within the Bab

assive fair where it

p in the souk (open

in the streets buying nuts,

ally every part of an

further into this Medina

with its rather uniqueond story with

ings items out of the

to enter the Mosque we

t really explain why. So

o the Medina and about

g to make our way

Zeus at the Bardo M

The Halfaouine Mosque.

op that was

e 3USD. We

to take in once

all over the

he walkways.

e will refer you

ve to Northern

old colonial

restored

main entrance

around the Bab

useum


15/17

through the mass of people when we heard the call to prayer. We realized at that point that the

reason for us being prohibited from entering into the mosque was because of the close proximity

to prayer time, something else rather remarkable happened. Perhaps because it was close to

Prophets Birthday, but EVERYONE in the souk stopped what they were doing at the drop of a

dime and proceeded to head towards the mosque to pray. Within minutes, the streets that were

once packed were now deserted and more than half the shops were closed. This was also the

Medina where we were stopped by a truck filled with propane tanks, as the driver attempted to

pass a parked car in a narrow, Medina. After some frustration on the part of the driver, several

Tunisian men attempted to move this unfortunately, parked car (what??). When this didnt work,

the truck driver simply side-swiped the poor car and drove along his merry way. It would have

been nice to figure out how this was a culturally accepted practice. Anyhow, after a little more

exploring we headed back to the hotel, ate (tried unsuccessfully to go to a Chinese restaurant),

and called it a night as we had to catch our flight in the morning.

Our flight was scheduled for the morning of 9 March 2009. We arrived at the airport

about 3 hours early and decided we would try to make sure our flight was still in order by going

to the Royal Air Morocco kiosk. Luckily we did! We went to their office and the lady told us

quite bluntly that our flight had been cancelled for that day, and hadnt we received an email to

that effect? We responded that clearly we hadnt, as we were at the airport on the originally

scheduled date. We wouldnt exactly say she took pity on us, but rather she realized we were

students in Morocco, we needed to get back to our university, and clearly we had not heard of the

flights cancellation before that day. She left the kiosk for a brief stint and arrived back

breathless and informed us that not only did she secure a flight for us on the next days plane, but

as compensation, she put us up in a hotel (turns out: it was the nicest hotel we stayed at while in

Tunisia) and provided us with a voucher for free lunch, dinner, and breakfast the nextmorning. Score! We werent thrilled with an extra day in Tunisia but we were nevertheless

happy about the arrangements Royal Air Morocco made for us. In the end, the lady did

apologize which made us both feel better. We left the airport in search of yet again another taxi.

We managed to get a taxi that tried to charge us 15 dinars for the ride what should have been

less than 5 dinars. We literally did a circle around the airport and made the taxi driver take us

back.we were wiser to their dishonest tricks. Slightly miffed, we approached a second driver

who we negotiated down to a better price and managed to get to our luxurious hotel in tact.

We arrived and knew we were in high class when a butler saw us to our rooms and it was all

business people at this hotel. Immediately we inquired at the hotel how to walk to the light rail

station that would take us out to La Marsa. While we had been provided a nice hotel, we wereready to hit the beach! We walked to the train station no problem and headed east. The

Mediterranean Sea was absolutely spectacular! We took some great photos, found a few

seashells to take home, and had a small picnic on the beach. The only unfortunate experience is

that it was slightly too windy that day so eating bread and cheese with sand in it wasnt the

most appetizing. One exciting thing for Alicia was that we found dried apricots that were so

very yummy! Apricots are supposed to be the great fruit specialty of Tunisia but alas, these


16/17

tasty apricots had come from Turkey. Cest la vie! After a walk down much of the beach, we

returned by train back to Tunis and walked back to our hotel room. We ate our free dinner at the

restaurant that night; it was buffet-style and had

quite a selection for both of us! We tried to stop by

the bar to get one last Celtia beer before we left in

the morning, but we decided that it was too smoky

and too expensive in the bar and we just didnt feel

like being there. So we went back to the room and

watched CNN in English. While maybe not our

station of choice back home, it was the only

channel in English and it was simply nice to hear

news from home. We can remember that CNN

reported on Obama removing barriers to stem cell

research, news of Barbies 50th Birthday, and a

report about a lady who was raped in Saudi Arabiaand yet the Saudi woman was the one being

charged for it.oh CNN we missed your

sensational news reporting! Grant took a bath that

night the first and maybe the last bath until our

return to the US and we slept in anticipation for

our return to Morocco. The next morning we went

to the free breakfast, milled around a bit, and caught a taxi back to the airport. As luck would

have it, we had no problems and were checked in for our flight a good two hours beforehand.

We killed time by drinking coffee (Alicia) and beer (Grant). We tried to burn through some

Tunisian dinars at the duty-free stores, but they only accepted Euros or credit cards. Grant triedto buy his much-prized Rocher chocolates, but you needed a minimum charge of $10 to use a

credit card, so we gave up and just waited for our flight out of Tunisia. In summary, we would

call our trip to Tunisia worthwhile as far as the sites and experience went; however, as far as the

cultural insensitivities, the language barriers, the pre-formed notion that it was going to be the

most liberal Maghreb nation (thanks for nothing guidebook), and not comprehending when a

tourist comes to Tunisia and is making a genuine effort to see the country, and not simply play

tourist.for those reasons, it did put somewhat of a damper on our Tunisian travels, hence our

anticipation for Morocco.

We arrived back in Morocco on time and with a little more cynicism than when we hadleft. We got through customs much easier than our first time in Morocco (mostly attributed to

being accustomed to it, and nothing more) and booked a train from Casablanca to Meknes. We

met a guy who had just arrived in Morocco and seemed pretty frustrated thus far with the

country. Mind you, he had only been in Casablanca about 2 hours. We let him look at our

Lonely Planet book for a hotel in Casablanca and we tried to reassure him about Morocco, telling

him that rest assured, it was much more tourist-friendly than Tunisia! In the end, we think he

Alicia enjoying the extra day at La Marsa


17/17

was just sleep-deprived and we left him with an address for a hotel in Casablanca. The train ride

to Meknes was fairly predictable. We did have a Moroccan guy try to sell us on a desert trek in

southern Morocco he just randomly came into our car and tried to sell us on this tourist plot of

his. After our sojourn in Tunisia, he couldnt have picked a worse time to try to sell tourists on

anything! We were no foolswe can thank Tunisia for that.

We arrived in Meknes, and by chance, we met up with a Moroccan friend who was

heading back to the university with 3 Moroccan girls. Since taxi cabs can fit 6 people, plus the

driver, we had the perfect number to take us back to Ifrane. We arrived home at around

8:45pm after a long day/week of traveling. We ate a fairly quiet meal in the restaurant, hopped

on our computers for a few minutes to email people we were back, and fell into a much-needed

sleep. It was back to university life, campus food, and midterms that would be taking place the

following week.

tunisia log final

Documents