Desert Karaoke

The camels were waiting outside the hotel, on the edge of the dunes.

All eight of them were lying down (their knees bent backward in that freaky camel manner). One of them was collapsed completely, its long neck and giant head laid flat to the ground. Really, this particular camel appeared so lackluster, I actually worried it might be dying. Of course, this turned out to be the one assigned to Mom.

We were told that one of the camels was named Jimi Hendrix and one Hammoud (a local pop star). I choose to believe that I rode Jimi into the desert.

Y helpfully tied our totally unnecessary and expensively purchased scarves around our heads, making us look like Lawrence of Arabia wannabes. Then it was time to hop on. Three adorable young couples from Holland, Canada and Austria would be riding with us.

Mom got to mount her camel first. I was next. They were one hump camels. (The two humpers dwell in neighboring Algeria. We HATE Algeria here in Morocco and have been told many bad stories about its terrible people.) Specially-constructed “saddles” made from what looks suspiciously like the highly-priced “antique” rugs on offer in the shops disguise the hump, and also come equipped with small metal handlebars in front. The kind you might see at an amusement park for small children.

Straddling the hump like it’s a super-sized horse (because I have SO much riding experience), and gripping the handlebars very tightly, you cling on as you are forcefully thrust first forward (as the rear legs rise suddenly to like six feet in the air while the front stays stationary); then backward (as the front legs join the rear).

No one actually fell off during this procedure, although the Belgian girl was so terrified she shrieked throughout. (Her husband didn’t actually shriek, but he wanted to. I could tell.)

Camel mechanics operate thusly: There are four extremely long and heavily jointed legs which do not appear to ever actually work in concert with one another. It’s like each leg sets its own pace and slightly varied direction… and somehow the whole operation manages to move slightly forward. For a while I was certain that my camel’s rear legs were cantering while the part of the beast I could actually SEE was plodding steadily along at a snails pace. “Your camel is skipping!” Mom confirmed.

Riding upon the very first camel in the caravan means one of two things. 1) You’ve lucked out and gotten the best behaved camel of the bunch – the “leader.” Or, 2) Your camel is so rotten that the guide doesn’t trust it to follow along behind as the other camels do, tied loosely together… no, he will personally lead this naughty beast, walking along on foot, the rope lead ever in his grasp.

I believe the second scenario was at work, and began making contingency plans for bad camel behavior. It may have been my paranoia, but it felt truly as though my camel wanted to gallop across the dunes. If he were to suddenly break free and make a dash for it, my plan was to somehow swing my left leg up over the bicycle handlebars and bail out – regardless of the six foot drop. I would leap clear, and then hopefully roll, scrunch into a small ball and wait for the stampede to end.

If my camel were to spit – and it did – I would cover my face at the first sound of phlegm. I’m not sure what I expected the trajectory to be, but it turned out that without so much as glancing to the side, the disgusting glob of camel snot landed neatly at a 90 degree angle from its mouth. Camel lips are fascinating, floppy things and camel teeth are singularly intriguing. They bite in circles – first clockwise, then counter-clockwise, over and over. It’s sort of mesmerizing.

Once I had finished thinking about the various scenarios that could go terribly wrong with MY camel, it occurred to me to start worrying about Mom’s. I don’t mean worrying about Mom’s welfare, because I was certain she would handle herself just fine in a dromedary emergency. Rather, when I felt a soft nudge on my shoulder, I realized that Mom’s camel (directly behind me) was tailgating to a very great extent. What if it (____________________) fill in the blank:

• Nudged me right off the back of Jimi Hendrix?
•  Managed somehow to spit on me or wipe its flubbery camel lips on my hair?
•  Got hungry and decided to bite me?
•  Pissed my camel off creating a showdown with Mom and I helplessly attached to the saddles?

After about an hour of going over various scenarios in my head, we arrived at camp. I could tell we were about to arrive, not because I sighted the rustic rug tents (which were nestled deep between tall dunes, well out of the wind), but because of the impressive amount of droppings in the camel parking lot.

Our camels were eager for us to dismount and so we repeated the “giant heave forward, then backward” maneuver and all stretched our legs by walking up a nearby dune to watch the final moments of a spectacular sunset. Walking up the dune gave me new respect for Jimi Hendrix and his cohorts – particularly the silent guide who walked our caravan the entire hour. The sand was almost impossible to navigate and we ended up exhausted just climbing this one small dune.

After sunset, we retired to our camp to inspect our surroundings. The tents were giant rugs thrown over metal frames, and real beds inside each. A single bulb was just inside each entrance, and it was already growing dark. We sat at a series of card tables set up inside the little alley of tents and were joined by five more guests – two retired French couples and one son. They were the life of the party – especially the mother, whose singing by the bonfire later was wonderful. She had a beautiful voice, a joyful personality and was simply a delight to have in the group… we dubbed her the “Chanteusse
of the Desert.”

A dinner of tagine, and Y came through when he recommended we bring a bottle of chilled white wine along… we were able to share with the French. The young people were well-supplied, particularly the Canadians, who regaled us with really funny stories from their pre-Honeymoon (France and Morocco). Everyone was friendly and amiable, which was a good thing, since we were stuck together for the evening.

After dinner, the three camel men lit a bonfire and began playing drums and strange metal oversized castanets. They tried passing the bongos around and encouraging us all to have an international sing-along, or sort of desert karaoke night. Mom wanted to sing, I could tell. Fortunately, she couldn’t think of any good songs on the fly and we were mercifully outnumbered by other nationalities. (Particularly the enthusiastic French.) We joined in on a grand round of “Frere Jacque,” which everybody on Planet Earth knows, apparently.

And we did a quick, impromptu verse of Johnny Cash’s “Ring of Fire.” The bongos were playing it – I would swear to you. After hearing us actually sing, the Berber guides mercifully stopped harassing us to sing more.

They were great musicians! And who knew - our silent guide from earlier was a complete cut-up. They had us all laughing, and we spent a couple of really fun hours listening to music (if not actively making it) and watching the incredible stars.

Us “old folk” retired earlier than the young couples, and it was fun to listen to them laughing around the fire. The Canadians admitted that they’d been sick on their trip and purchased medicine in a souk. Eventually someone deciphered their pill bottle for them and informed them that they’d been taking meds for camels and sheep… “But we feel
better, so it’s OK!”

Sleep was not difficult for me – though it was so unbelievably silent that I could hear every sigh, snort, wheeze and pillow adjustment any of the 15 guests up and down the tent alley made. We teased the timid Belgians about having the tent next to the latrine – “Hope no one gets confused in the middle of the night!” It was COLD outside, and some
wind would gush through at intervals. I found this refreshing and calming. Mom, who didn’t sleep as well, said it made her feel insecure.

Let’s ponder that for a moment.

You say you voluntarily rode a giant beast into an unforgiving environment, putting yourself at the mercy of three 20 year old men who are more interested in figuring out how to make Bob Marley sound right on the Berber cymbals than in your personal welfare… you paid a great deal of money to spend the night among total strangers from all over Western Europe, strangers who derided your lack of language ability in that subtly smug way that only the French and Belgian have… you left all your belongings divided between a hotel room which may or may not be rented out to someone else in our absence and a car that is who-knows-where with our absentee guide… that is aside from the passport and credit card you have strapped around your middle under your clothes, which you are sleeping in… and hoping the guides were only joking about scorpions and trying to forget about the black beetle you spotted on the sand earlier – the one that was the size of a silver dollar…

… and the lightly flapping tent entrance is making you feel insecure?

We were awakened just before sunrise the next morning – enough time to scramble up a dune to see. Peaceful, beautiful. The camels and guests were eyeing each other with equal dislike, then we mounted up again and trod slowly back to the hotel, a hot shower, and a good breakfast.