day two

-we are currently sitting on the second floor. there's a small lounging couch, low to the ground. it looks out into the courtyard, and there are squeaky birds flying back and forth!!

-now we just went to the kitchen and asked for some mint tea. Oh! the mint tea! a nice girl just served us mint tea in tiny glasses in a silver teapot

-this morning, we slept in and came down to the lobby. there was a small table set up and we had a breakfast of: fresh squeezed orange juice, coffee, traditional moroccon crepes with jam, homemade coffee cake, homemade yogurt.

-we ventured out again, further than last night. we followed the same path, and went past the restaurant. we made it all the way to the big plaza, which was totally surrounded by vendors selling more of everything. in the center, vendors were selling glasses (real glass) of fresh squeezed juice. you stood at their stall and drank, then gave your glass back. and everyone was selling fresh figs and dates and nuts and dried fruits. they looked beautiful, however, they were covered in flies.

-we looked at everything, then decided on lunch on a rooptop terrace. I had a fresh salad with quail eggs and smoked salmon, mauricio had a lamb tajine. It was cool, overlooking the plaza. It started to get ridiculously windy, and we saw gray clouds looming ahead, so we left and walked back to the riad. Stopping, of course, to buy street cookies (at two different places), mandarins, and my first souvenir (from a guy that tried to steal 100 dirhams from me! the nerve! i'm smarter than that).

-tonight, the riad is cooking us couscous for dinner.

**update!
the dinner at the riad turned out to be a great surprise.
we started off with a moroccon salad, like an antipasto.
it was on a divided plate- into five sections. there was a cold carrot salad, with carrots finely grated and mixed with orange juice. there was the standard cooked eggplant spread (very similar to eggplant parm, but finely diced), a kind of fresh tomato salsa (not spicy), marinated beet salad, and a potato salad like salad, but with no potatoes- it was a mayonaise sauce, with cabbage and raisins. not sure what else was in that salad; i couldn't figure it out. it was served with the traditional small round bread.

our tajine couscous was surrounded with squashes and chickpeas and had cabbage in the middle.

dinner was finished off with a delicious fresh fruit salad in a cocktail glass filled with fruit juice, and hot mint tea.

we ate in the middle of the riad's lobby. by candlelight :)