What about the infrastructure?
Laila Lalami blogged today about trampling Marrakesh. She made the point that, with all of the recent articles about Morocco, more and more tourists are visiting the country (and Marrakesh in particular). Lalami said:
When we were there last spring, I saw a moronic British tourist sticking his ass out of one of the windows of the Ben Youssef Medersa. The floors of the seminary’s student rooms were damaged by all the activity, and one of the guides kept touching the exquisite plaster work in the inner courtyard with his bare hands… The tile floors at the Bahia palace were completely falling apart, and people had no regard for the artifacts. The Menebhi palace was also starting to show signs of wear. Sad.
I don’t disagree - it’s unbelievable how disrespectful Western tourists visiting Morocco can be. While it’s one thing for French women to sashay around in miniskirts, it’s another thing to completely disregard artifacts. When visiting the Jardins Majorelle last April, I saw that many of the bamboo trees had people’s names scratched into them (although one of the best photos I took was of “Rajae + Mehdi”).
I would also like to point out, however, that the responsibility is not entirely on the tourists. Foreign tourists bring extraordinary revenue into cities like Marrakesh, yet little is done to maintain buildings. If the floor in the Bahia Palace is showing signs of wear (a normal effect of the millions of feet which walk across it), then it requires restoration and regular upkeep which, sadly, I believe few Moroccan sites are getting.
p.s. Here’s the article which Ms. Lalami based her post on (if you ask me, it’s disgusting).
November 14th, 2007 at 5:56 pm
What defines Western; that includes British tourists? I ask in honesty because I do not know the Moroccan perspective.
I think tourists in general everywhere are mostly disrespectful. You get the same thing in D.C. during cherry blossom season, in Savannah, GA during St. Patty’s Day and historic cemetery tours, and in National Parks with hikers littering everywhere. I think people just need lessons in manners, self control, and respect. ESPECIALLY when visiting other countries/regions. It’s pretty disgusting and I’m sad to hear about Laila Lalami’s experience.
November 15th, 2007 at 11:05 am
I think this is an issue the government has to face. If Morocco wants the tourists revenue to continue, and increase, they must put money into the sites they are coming to see. This is becoming an important source of revenue for the country and I think it can become more so, but at the expense of the country if steps are not taken. Lessons could be learned from Bhutan, a country that has made tourism an industry that profits the country without destroying it.
November 15th, 2007 at 11:10 am
“Recently a newspaper quoted people from a chic district in Marrakesh as saying that they had been fed up with the mules that roamed about the place, entered the splendid villas and filled the streets with their filth. People from Benslimane, a small town near ours, told the same newspaper quite the same thing about animals behaving like “gangs” in their streets. Why? Maybe because it’s very normal, since that happens everywhere –not only in Marrakesh and Benslimane. You’d find that in Cairo, in Manilla, in Islamabad and Haidarabad.”
That’s a quote from my blog, SALAM LAYLA.
I should say, however, that as a student in the 1990’s I was stunned to see in NEWSWEEK and TIME Magazine pictures with disgusting descriptions of streets in NEW YORK CITY where spaces between high scrapers were “litered” with all sorts of filth. I also saw in these very publications pictures with moving descriptions of AMERICAN white and black homeless men and women sleeping in the streets of Washington.
As I said in my blog, “This isn’t the problem of our neighbourhood alone, though. There’s disorder everywhere: in our neighbourhoods, in our towns, in our bigger cities, in our families, in our schools, in our countries and in the whole world.”
If you read further into the blog you’ll know why all that is.
November 17th, 2007 at 8:46 pm
I think.. there are two main issues (aside from moronic tourists). First, many of treasures that Morocco has have just been a part of the landscape for so long, they are simply overlooked or undervalued by the local population. This seems to be a common occurrence in every country. Second is that looking at it from a foreigners perspective, there are so many special things about Morocco that it would take years to develop the plans and the perspective to preserve them all.
Case in point, look at the preservation of Marrakech vs. Fes. Marrakech still has challenges, but it is better preserved than Fes!
I think in time both the infrastructure and the perspective of the population will develop. Idiotic tourists aside, lets hope there is something left to preserve!
Shawn
www.nineseasdecor.com
November 17th, 2007 at 9:41 pm
I agree with Lady Macleod. And, wasn’t it the British that took as much Egyptian artifacts out of the country as they could?
November 17th, 2007 at 11:49 pm
Marrakesh isn’t just under the threat of having its monument fall to decay. Its culture is under threat because of the influx of foreigners. it’s becoming more European than Moroccan.
Its original inhabitants are leaving the old city (the medina) because of being offered lucrative prices to sell their homes. They move to the new urban areas where they live in modern houses leaving riads and other traditional houses to the foreigners who transform them beyond recognition. So to get a house in the old city you have to be very rich national or foreigner.
November 27th, 2007 at 9:02 am
Hi Jillian!
please try this:
http://www.politicalcompass.org/test