Under the Rooftop continues

The sun sets in the valley while the montain tops are still sunlit

He became more and more silent not having a very good companion in me. I preferred the scenery to making up a conversation for the sake of it. He did intrigue me with an occasional exclamation of a prolonged aaagh. This he so indiscriminately pronounced that made them into a question, statement and admiration at the same time.

His best moment came when he, once we had in sight one of the higher picks of the Toubkal Mountains, started pointing to the top of the mountain and saying you could see Marrakesh like this. Then he would place both of his palms in front of me turning them up. He also said that he lived there in the highest of the mountain and had to walk up five kilometres to his home. He did ask me where I was going. To which I curtly replied that it was to a village some forty kilometres from Tarroudant. He immediately invited me to come along to manger et dormir at his place where the views are stunning.

I thanked him profusely but neither accepted not refused and I think he was quite surprised when we stopped at Had Imoullasse (I learned the name of the village later) where Osaobi got off and asked me to follow. As the old man was getting out of the cabin to let me alight I noticed a beautifully ornamented curved dagger at his belt which I am sure he had to carry for his protection from the beast and the man of the wilderness his home was.

I had no doubts that his invitation had it been accepted by me would have presented me with extraordinary and once in a life time experience. Unfortunately and may be luckily I had other plans. It remains for me only to guess what I have missed. I am sure the tea and the couscous as well as the views of Marrakech would have been outstanding.

Once we got off the truck we took a branching dusty piste road uphill. I tried to be subtle in asking questions as to how far our destination was. Osaobi was a little cagey with a reason. What I did not know was about five kilometre of uphill dusty road to his village. This was the price for being allowed to be late in the morning. The only transport to his village goes about eight o’clock. The others go elsewhere and it was a question of alighting at the nearest point to his village which in this case was five kilometres. It did not occur to me that he was prepared to walk this extra distance just to let me sleep a little bit longer. I failed to express my appreciation.

Keeping me in the dark as to the distance he eased my possible anxiety. He was right.

Nevertheless despite the dust and long uphill walk the scenery that started to develop before us took all the pain away. The breath was already taken away by walking and the thin air.

Soon we took a shortcut passing some houses and not following the road. There lodged between sides of the hill and meandering its way round the house was a little brook with running water. It was a sight for sore eyes as water always is in Africa. Osaobi washed his face and his hands. He needed it more than me having spent the entire trip exposed to dust mainly caused by our own truck. In the distance I could see the snow covered pick which I now know is over three and a half thousand metres above the sea level and is the western part of the famous Jbel Toubkal, the second highest mountain in Africa and the roof top of Morocco.

I found it a bit difficult to keep up with my young guide, who was so light-footed and light in weight and also knew his ground that he had an unfair advantage. By now it was already noon and the sun was hot. The thin air of the mountains did not help either. My estimate was that we were at between twelve hundred and fifteen hundred metres above the sea level. I made a resolution to get an ‘altimeter’ next time I travel.

There was little conversation for many reasons but mainly because Osaobi was keeping ahead of me. He was however very considerate and every now and then would turn around to check if I was all right. Without a fail I reassured him that I was where the truth was a little different. I did not want to show my age and as result I was sweating profusely while there was no visible sweat on my young guide.

The scenery was developing all the time. Here and there an Almond tree in blossom, the green fields of newly sewn crop Osaobi kept calling ‘le ble', wheat, perhaps barley. There was also an occasional orange tree decorated with ripe fruits. There were palm trees, not many, everywhere. Then further I could see lot of evergreens and olive groves interspersed with leafless walnut trees. This green oasis followed the river upstream like a belt while above looming were treeless rocky giants ranging in colour from milk to dark chocolate. And above there was the pure of purest blue skies. It was so beautiful that my camera did not do justice. I can only recall a couple of places where colour photography cannot do justice to nature and this is one of them. It was all absolutely stunning.

With some evident joy and relief Osaobi pointed to a village, ‘Ma maman village’. It was the village of Al Khamss, perched into the mountain side to the east from where we were. I was also relieved as it probably meant that our destination, his father’s village was not far away. This was right and as soon as we turned the bend in the road there was a village in the distance having the snow capped pick as its background. We passed another hamlet of Assaka and Tintgot and headed fast uphill to the mosque topped hamlet of Ait Wadjass. I copy the name from the back of my dictionary where I asked him to write all the village names for me. There are seventeen in all.

He proudly, though in a low voice, pointed a house on the hill across another brook that was in front of us. That is the house he said and I pretended to understand which one he meant. I was looking at the wrong house. It did not matter as some minutes later we were in front of a green painted metal door which he timidly unlocked to let us in.

I knew that the house was unlived in and apart from expecting little in any house I expected very little in a house in which no one lived. I was determined that a place where my host could stay was good enough for me. It was not that I prepared myself for the worst I just did not prepare myself for anything. I was determined to accept whatever I find and to enjoy it. I secretly expected to learn more about the ways people lived, or may still live and I was not disappointed. In the forty two hours I spent at the place I traversed centuries and lived as people lived for thousand of years.

My first comment was that it was quite a big house to which he replied no not really. From the side of the main entrance the house seems one story. As the ground sloped towards the street that the house was on it had three levels. The ground level, as it were, when we entered had an entrance hall. Some rooms to the left and centrally placed riad[1] type skylight with an iron mesh as protection. There was sunshine inside the house. Facing us was the salon which was bare. In the middle of the floor was another mesh letting the light down to the lower level were the bedroom and other main rooms were and a stairwell leading to lower level.

Osaobi told me to place our luggage on the floor there and told me to wait for him. He went downstairs and busied himself for a while. I kept asking him if there was anything I could help with to which he always replied no. Some minutes later he agreed for me to come down and I found him using the broom to clean the floor of the bedroom. This is a huge room some seven metres long and about half that wide. The room was empty yet full of serenity. It was a time capsule of a sort. The walls whitewashed and in parts cracked. The ceiling had large and exposed wooden beams that ran both ways supporting the floor above. There were two tiny windows, made even tinier by the size of the room. The walls must have been built of stone and were half a metre thick. There were no smells associated with a closed and unlived in rooms.

I had to be careful not to bang my head against the door frame so small it was like medieval doors of an abbey or a castle on British Isles. The house is not that old but they must have preserved the old way of building. It was to conserve energy, cold in summertime and warmth in brief winters.

The windows slots had wooden shutters with bolts. There was a green plastic mosquito and fly mesh fixed on the outside of a wrought iron bar fixed to the outside of the window. There were no glass panes or windows proper. Once you close the wooden shutters there is no light coming in.

(For the rest of the story please click below Subpages (1) The Rest of the Rooftop Story

[1] Riad is a type of local grand house which has a central courtyard with the building on all four sides