On Transportation

I'm going to try and describe for you what transportation is like momentarily. For those of you reading who were my aunts and uncles in CEE/IMB/and whatever other acronym you want to throw out there, it's like Romania. The little Renaults here look like Dacias and I think Renault actually bought out Dacia because I've seen that name on cars here. Two lanes become six, using the horn is not an option and all the cars seem to start simply based on the will power of the particular driver. I have to be honest, I feel like I'm at home.

So we have several options available to us in this part of the country. Trains don't run down here so drop that. We have Petite and Grande Taxis. The Petite are for within the city, and Grande Taxis go to other cities. Now all of the Grande Taxis are old Mercedes with five seats... HA! So you get to the taxi stand and say you want to go to Ouarzazate from Marakesh. You tell the guy at the stand and you buy a seat, then you wait. You wait for the taxi to fill up. You could buy out the taxi if you have the money, but I'm a Peace Corps volunteer so lets rule that option out as well.

You wait for how many people you say? I'm glad you asked. Besides the driver, there are considered to be six seats available. Needless to say... we're cramped. It is, however an inexpensive way to get around although you never know how long it's going to take because you don't know how long you have to wait.

For places of the beaten path... we have Transites which are vans that don't have a limit on people. If you can fit someone on top or inside... they're getting in. An excellent way to make friends by the way. If you have to sit on someone's lap for an hour or more, you get acquainted.

We also have CTM which are private buses. I don't have any info on them because I haven't taken them yet. When I do, I'll let you know.

That's all I've got to say about that