Touts

Well, I've been meaning to tell you about the (often) suffocating tout presence in this place, and the addition of today's anecdote has given me sufficient motivation.  In under a month, we have already amassed an explosive handful of interactions - real over-achievers. You're probably thinking this is out of character, eh? 

It's all a bit humbling, or disappointing really.  I like to think of myself as quite seasoned and thick-skinned, floating above the drama of your average tour-on like a Zen puff pastry cloud stuffed with wisdom and patience.  Lots of patience. (J reading over my shoulder: "You're the opposite of that.") Anyway...

I've had plenty of experience with touts.  I didn't let it ruin my experience at the Giza Pyramids, and those guys are commonly regarded as the most relentless on the planet.  I got kidnapped/scammed for an entire morning in Sri Lanka when a seemingly well-meaning local offered to give me a lift to the bus station in his tuk-tuk (he insisted I tour a few temples and visit the businesses of multiple merchants he was in cahoots with), and came out smiling, still in good spirits and only 390 rupees lighter (and with an understanding of Colombo geography).  And I've developed a highly efficient brush-off move for the beggar, street vendor and hashish salesman.   Chiseled down to the gracefully callous through  repetitive use on the mean streets of Guatemala and Lebanon (pursed lips, lowered eyebrows, barely-audible "tsk," and the hand motion of a one-armed baseball umpire signaling "safe"),  it's almost undetectable to the casual bystander, but they know.

The wheels fell off just outside Essaouira city limit though, twisted off in ironic fashion, as we had cruised through the tout hotbeds of Tangiers and Casablanca without incident.  Further irony: we at least halfway picked this place (Esso) to lay up for a few months (I start teaching at an American school in the fall) because of numerous descriptions in guidebooks and online forums praising the place's mellow vibe and less persistent toutage - it is something that has to be considered. The fact that Bob Marley and Jimi Hendrix famously spent time here is used hilariously as proof positive - 40 years later. Tangiers and Marrakesh, one expects to be touted, but Esso is supposed to be an oasis-like respite.  And it is more relaxed here, but we have managed to find the cracks.  Ten kilometers from the city, after a roadtrip originating in Nice, France, we got pulled over by a 16 year old cop standing in the middle of the road with a speed gun. 

To be continued.