Just across the river from Rabat is another town called Sale (pronounces Sah-lay). It is more conservative in nature than Rabat, and we were told the medina (old town/market) was nicer, so we decided to go there for an exploration and shopping trip. Our map of Rabat showed the part of Sale that is nearest the river. Luckily, the medina was shown on the map. So off we went, with a vague idea of where we were heading. But as is inevitably the case, reality doesn't usually line up exactly with maps.As soon as we crossed the river, we saw a sign telling us to turn to go to the medina, even though the map indicated we should go a good ways further on the main road. Trusting the sign more than the map, I made the turn. We drove along the wall of the old city for a little ways and then saw a gate leading into the medina. It was a nice "old town", clean and well kept, but there was no market in sight, so we drove out again and around the walls to the further side. We parked just outside a gate that looked promising and set off. What made it look promising, you may ask. Well, there were a couple of people selling oranges or bananas just outside the gate, so we figured there were probably more things being sold inside the gate. Wrong! We didn't see any other stalls, but off to the left there seemed to be more people than off to the right, so....
After walking a couple of blocks and not seeing anything resembling a market, I finally bit the bullet and asked a man walking near us for directions. Not speaking Arabic or French, I used the only word I know that I thought he might understand - "souq", which is Arabic for market. He seemed to understand right away and sent us back the way we had come. I thanked him and we started back, a bit doubtful that he had understood me.
Not wanting to walk all over and end up lost, I asked another man, using the same "souq". He again sent us the same way as the first gentleman, and as we started off, his wife joined us and asked him what was going on. He must have explained what we wanted and they two of them started debating whether he had told us the right direction. As I tried to explain what we wanted, she insisted that we go with her in our original direction. But she soon led us down a side street and THEN she started speaking just a little English, enough to say that we just stayed on that lane to the end. If we turned left we would get to the market that sold "things" and to the right was a market that sold other "things".
She was right! The market was very nice, cleaner than most, and looked like it would sell a nice variety of items. Unfortunately, after all that, we were there too early, none of the shops were open in the area to buy gifts. The other direction, though, had lots of food stalls that were open - selling spices, olives, fruits and vegetables, meat, bread etc.
Even though we didn't get to do the Christmas shopping we
had set out to do, it was a fun exploration and now we know we can find
it. We'll just have to go later next time!
