March 2009; Visiting friends and celebrations...oh and lots of hirsch

This has been a massively busy month Finn, filled mostly with high lights rather than low lights and made all the more special because we had lots of visitors to celebrate your mums birthday. Of course we've had friends and family over before, but this was the first time that they came en mass and had a chance to see what it is we've spent 18 months doing.

Obviously what they saw were two building sites, both as yet far from being finished, but it gave a taster and I am sure we converted several people to the joys of both Fez and Moroc generally.

Sarah and Neil have been out here a few times and came very close to buying a place of their own here...it's infectious, but the reality is that we have plenty of room at 813 and apart from the pleasure we all get from their company, their generous hospitality in the Uk, that has ensured that we always receive a warm welcome at theirs, demands that they are always welcome at ours. So Sarah and Neil, save your money and stay for free whenever you like!

Tony has also been over a couple of times now. I think his first visit, way back when, was something of a culture shock. Fez can do that to you. It's intense, crowded, feels threatening at times and is always an attack on the senses. This time however, I think he loved it. I suppose it might have helped that he wasn't sleeping in a double bed, in a derilict house with me!

The builds.
On the builds, we've seen some great moves at both Tazi and 813. It's good to see progress, it gives you such a buzz. Wow things are actually getting finished. Well, let's not get ahead of ourselves!

Tazi.
Arches on the top floor before changes.
There's been lots of work going on throughout the house. We've replaced several areas of rotten wood, which at least makes the place look better and we relaid the floor of the collapsed corridor. On top of that we managed to finally change the arches on the landing at the top of the house. This now offers to make this a lovely seating area where there'll be a view of Fez from slotted windows on one side and a creeping walled garden on the other. It should be nice.
Arches after changes.

Depths of work.
Down in the depths of the house we also started attacking the cellar. This could be a kitchen area, but, if we ever manage to buy the neighbours, it will instead become a seating or eating area that will give out through arches, in to a small garden with plunge pool that, we hope, will also act as a rain water harvesting tank in the winter. Then the kitchen will be put in to the basement of the (as yet unpurchased) neighbours, with light wells to provide natural light.

Neighbours still awaiting purchase.

Obviously this still means that we have to buy the bloody thing. We've been negotiating for years and we still can't get any change in the price. The place itself is simply not worth what is being asked for, but if it gives us a walled garden, plunge pool, additional eating/chilling area, kitchen and the space to build balconies for two of the rooms, whilst also providing a second stair case and entrance/exit, thus getting over the rules necessary to open a maison d'hote, then it'll be worth it to us. I really do think it will give us a great option in the summer, if we can get the pool in there, and apart from anything else, it just makes the whole house seem..."wholer".

But of course we are far from agreeing a price...or more likely...from accepting that the price they are offering, is the one that we'll have to pay!

Tazi hirsching teams.
By the end of the month, I was also able to get the hirsching team to move over and start at Tazi. This is also great as it just helps to give this very difficult project a sense that we are getting places....which we are.

813.
Ground floor filled with hirsch. Back at 813 we've also seen great things. I remember I was talking about stages in a build and at 813 we've hit another...the hirsching. As I've said, it's with a great sense of achievement that you finally manage to get all the walls gratted and clear of plaster, stitch them, open doors/windows etc and then have the house looking like a giant skeleton.

Obviously this is then vandalised by the plumbers and electricians, but for a while there, when it's been cleaned and cleared, I anyway, got the feeling that it would be nice to stop there!

813 hirsching teams.

But onwards and closer to the finishing line, and thus the next stage is to cover the house with hirsch. This is a lime and sand mix that goes on all walls (excpet bathrooms when you add a bit of cement...sushhh..don't tell that to the puritans). The process takes over the house as you have to make literally tons of the stuff in great baths of it. The process of delivery to derb, to house, mixing and cooking is something in itself. But then scaffolding has to be put up and moved everywhere and the made hirsch sent to every corner, to be thrown and then plained on to the walls.

Hirsch, the finished product, like a white chocolate cake, yum, yum, yum.

It's a dirty process, but boy does it look good when its finished. Another stage and again I couldn't help but feel a desire to just sit in the house and take it it, with this first layer of skin now on. The two guys who did the hirsching, Abdulla and "The Italian" were a great laugh and worked brilliantly and dilligently. It was great to move to yet another level...tho not it would seem anywhere near the finishing line as yet...plenty to go before we get there it would seem.

Beccies' Birthday.

The main event of the month was you and Beccie returning from UK along with a host of others, to celebrate her 40th birthday. As you know she's not a great one for celebrating her birthday, and what with friends and family arriving en masse, you can imagine her distraction at not being here to organise the whole thing. It's not like anyone could say that your mum was a control freak, but she gets mighty uncomfortable when she's not fully, completely and 100% in charge and involved....I'm sure you can see the distinction!
We decorated the already gorgeous house of David and Sally.

Anyway with little choice but to accept the surrogacy of me as event organiser, poor ol mummy had to bite through her lip and down to her toes. I don't think she relaxed untill after the event, but I'm pretty sure a great time was had by all.

The original idea was to try to piut the evnt on at 813, a sort of building site party and I thought that we'd be able to manage that with a bit of luck. However there not being a functioning toilet, the sewage system being covered by planks at the entrance (as you've seen previoulsy), seating being provided by bags of sand covered with rugs etc, all made this something of a challenge, tho I'm convinced it could have worked and been quite good fun too (umm, maybe I begin to understand your mums concerns now I look at it this way!).

But fortune smiled upon us in the form of David and Sally, two lovely neighbours we have with a house behind us. I've been able to help them a little with things they've been doing to their now almost completed house and I'd asked them if it would be possible for us to use their toilet during the evening. Well, they literally knocked me off my feet when they offered us the use of their house in entirety instead. What? I simply wasn't expecting that and even tho I felt some sadness for the lost opportunity of our first party at 813 being a sort of punky, we can doit, building site affair, I accepted the chance of risk reduction and a calmer domestic life, with both hands.

David and Sally, I couldn't thank you enough.

We got in some Fun Da Mentalists.
Anyway we organised music and entertainment with Jess an artist who lives in Sefrou and is helping to put bands, artists and entertainers in touch with a willing public. We talked about the concept and decided that we'd use some local musicians and a group called the "mentalists" or Fun Da Mentalists as I like to call them. These guys do all sorts of wacky card tricks, mind games and readings, and the most horrific thing standing and having their faces scrunched in to broken glass...definately not to be tried at home. Both the musicians and Mentalists went down a storm, even with a rather cynical UK metro audience, and I certainly simply couldn't work out how they were doing what they were doing...which I suppose is the point Durrrrr!
Everyone seemed to Enjoy it.

I'd also rented a whole service set and waiters as well as getting Fatimas' belle fille and a friend to cook the most magnificant meal, of which there was, obviously, too much. The lamb couscous went down a storm, but I think the biggest hit was the pastilla, a traditional Fassi dish (http://uktv.co.uk/food/recipe/aid/514813) that had everyone clamering for more and then a lovely chocolate cake cooked by Cafe Clock, all washed down with lashings of Moroccan wine and beer and a stock of smirnoff!

Uncle Tony seemed to enjoy himself.

We danced, drank and enjoyed untill the early hours and it gave people to get a chance to see what and why we are trying to rebuild such a beautiful house in the relatively run down quartier of the medina.


Relaxing at Dar El Hana.

Most everyone stayed at Dar El Hana, run by the wonderful Jospehine (MoM (Mother of the Medina), made all the better for her warmth, enthusiasm and interest in all of us, as well the feast she put on for Neils birthday, on the afternoon of their departure.

Thanks Josephine. xx

And finally a note on the weather.

I have to add one last thing tho. Obviously we've had and are still having attrocious weather for decades and the idea of having so many people here in the pouring raiun, was too much to consider. I checked the BBC weather site and it told me that we were to expect heavy rain the whole time. Oh god no!

So I rechecked on Yahoo...the same.

It seemed that our luck was running out, but I simply couldn't cope with the idea and as such I kept on searching, in complete denial, until I found a site that said there would be sunshine!

See, I said aloud, there will be sunshine.

And you know what....just as we had the only spot of decent weather in the country on the day of our wedding, we had the only few days of sunshine for Beccies' birthday, after months and months of sodden wretchedness.

Alhumdoolilahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.