June 2011 D Ream...the only way is up...or is it?

Hi Again Capt Finn...where are those Pirate Dinosaurs?,I'm on a bit of a roll here, so let's not stop it. Of course there we are thinking that we are looking towards the finishing line, or at least the end of building. You see people ask you, when will you finish, noone can tell you. It always feels like it should be three months and it never is, but it soooo feels that it should be.

Anyway, this was the first month that I think we genuinly felt we should have the builders out by the end of the month. That would only leave surfaces to be complete, zeliging, plastering, tadlakt, madlouk and martobbing...well that was the theory and of course it is only ever a theory...but you need a dream, it can never take as long as it might, I don't think it's bearable. That's why we say three months, as that's all we can sustain, till the next three months!

Anyway here we are at the begining of the month, surely, surely we could pull off the end of construction within 30 days!!!!

Of course things don't go that way. Rachid plods on, tho he's more on our side these days...I think the competition from M'hd Everything by the M/2 has helped, but he's painfully slow. And then of course there is the rest of the house to consider. In the garden we've put in a new bartal, which is a grandious garden seat space.

But we've done this by nicking wall space from a neighbours even up to getting to within the thinness of the hirsch on their walls...inside. However a few plinths above and red bricks below and Ali's your uncle....only if he's your brother too...in joke there!

Of course we also have our eco shower and plant beds/wells to put in and there's so much other work from electrics to plumbing and of course carpentry to fit in...we must be crazy...delusional, to think the end is in sight......but it feels so, I can almost smell it, allow myself to dream of not trudging up the hill to negotiate, be shouted at, be disappointed...surely, oh surely it's close...please!

Our delusion has lead us to begin to move things in to the house that reflect the paradigm of finishing. Of course we've been buying and preparing for this glorious day...and there is so much else to buy...so much more to spend money on. Your mum has been excellent here, she searches out bargains, negotiates deals, batters down prices in ways I never could.

God she's good at that, and at so much else...I look forward to the day we can just enjoy each other. We went to Rabat for a weekend away...well a weekend away to buy windows for the hotel, nonetheless it wasn't Soulimans Yard, which is something. Anyway we stayed at a great little hotel, got all dressed up and had a time of it and then, there, away from it all, I remembered who we'd been before this consumed us...I can't wait to get that back. Thus the dream!

But then there are moments when you see an area in the house...the top floor garden for example, which has been planted and begins to take root. It's begining to grow, begining to give the impression of a house without dust and dirt, builders and stinking toilets, shouting and screaming, abuse, lies and headholding....it all feels so close! Is it?

Of course it is only a mirage, because although there are plenty of examples of us having made progress, of walls having gone up, balconies being constructed, potos being made. The reality is that we are still in the midst of a chantier and have gapping holes to fill. It was a joy to get Driss...Good Old Driss, not the other one, back, but he soon disappeared and we were left again, mason lite.

We've thought of re employing many a dud, but can't bring ourselves to. I even called Goldie who said he'd come the next day...and didn't.....only for a refugee from M'hd Everything by the M/2's team to turn up, work a day and then not return...that's how fragile progress is. But guess what, he came back and I smiled, muttered, mumbled "Silver lining"...but will he be there tomorrow?

Yes the shower wall looks so different now, but there is soooo far still to go and so many mines to trip on to, waiting to explode and kill the dream...or at least confound it again.

And that's just it, untill this stops we will forever be at risk of someone leaving, not agreeing to up hold a deal, slipping in a bit of passive or very agressive, aggressive, simply to fuck us up.

Driss puts in a quaos...how long did we take to get this image?

Another classic involves another carpenter. So Hamid left where others had before him and we brought inYussef and Abdelhaq. They're not great but they're better than nothing. We made a deal to do the quaoses over the windows in Twin, the ones we'd bought in rabat and been quoted 9,000 dhs for in Fez. We were up on a deal and could finish the room with the quaoses and a mason. Y and A said they'd be done in a week. They came in after 2, which was fine, but they were too big...just poor attention to detail. We needed 80 cms, they'd done them at 88cms. So they had to be done again. But Y needs more money, and we won't pay any more...we know the story...so now 6 weeks later, we finally get them after weeks of tomorrows and nights of when, oh whens.

Ali has done the same, simply not turning up because he threw a strop...so no plumbing...which is to say running lines through work that has already been done, which means it must be redone!

And then this afternoon Abdellah ( the neighbour who lost his son) from next door comes over and says he'll complain about the build unless we pay for a new cover to his terrace and halka. He knows he's threatening us, that he can get the baladier in and they will find some reason to stop the build, untill a little sweatener has been made...or something has been ripped out.....

And in reality, that's how close we are...which is to say still far too far!

And yet we dream!

May 2011....Is this really happening? Are we making progress...Please don't wake me up!

Evening Finn,

It's way past your bed time and you're fast asleep. As usual your mum and I are shattered, we've just had some friends to stay, Heather and Luke, with their kids Raffi and Talia, and, after a few days posting up old blogs, I've decided to try to catch up with this.

Why?

Well the thing is that we seem to be making such progress, that there is the chance, a small chance, but a chance nontheless, that things could get ahead of us and we'd......shhhhhh...finish...shhhh, before I could update the story!

Of course in reality there's no chance of that happening... finishing that is, but we need to catch up!

The difficulty is, Finn, that whilst we do do many things whilst we are here, what consumes us, what frustrates us, what keeps us up at night and down in the day, is "The Chantier"...I've got so much to show you of you running around away from that, and I will, I will write that up, but tonight, just tonight, I want to try to get to where we are on this bloody build, that I hope one day, will bear a fruit worth the labour and commitment it has demanded! We'll see....so what's news?

The frustrations of April finally saw us feed a progress that I hadn't thought possible, through the winter. I really had only expected this build to take a few months, but it dragged on and with all the new elements of building with new materials and a new team, felt incredibly out of control.

However a number of factors saw winter turn to spring and possibly now full summer bloom. The first was employing Mustapher our Mwalem Hdid. Driss and Rachid had brought a guy with them, but they were too much by themselves, let alone employing new team members through them. I found Mustapha literally by trawling through ongoing building sites in the ville and offering more money that others were paying. he proved his weight in iron and quickly had us constructing chainage and potos all over the place.

Next was finally getting another mason to work, which meant that eventually we were building below and above ground. As I've said previously he left under very mysterious circumstances and I was left very down hearted.

However clouds sometimes have silver linings and a chance meeting with Steven at Riad 9 put us on to M'hd Everything By The M/2 and his team. What a shock. This guy was suddenly pouring out the work, with teams of masons, so quick I couldn't keep up. Ok it wasn't pretty, but it got done and I'd recommend him again...tho only for certain work...new brick build...25d/m/2, old brick 200d/m/2, but hirsching, excellent value at 20d/m/2..and he's also a pretty nice bloke...tho don't quote me on that!

Thus May saw balconies built, walls hirsched and even parts of the kitchen built...it seemed remarkable after the painful sloathfulness of rachid and Driss. Now even rachid was pootling along...well almost! But at least we were moving and were finally seeing balconies moving up.

One of the more difficult things was Abdelillah, who'd been with us since the begining of 813 and who now had a major heart problem. He also has three kids and a brother in law, Said, who'd also worked here, but who'd recently died leaving 3 kids. We tried to help Abdelillah, re employing him as best as he could work. Then where there was work I gave it to his brothers, who were more sloaths. I said to Abdelillah that we'd help his medical costs if his family paid half...he felt they wouldn't and only a week or so later one of them stole money from us. I was amazed. Abdelillah was last seen having taken another advance and his brothers haven't been seen again.

But back at the grime face we ended the month with walls covered and balconies built up to the Pasha's suite...I even smiled!

April 2011 .......A Rant from the Front!

Hi Finn,

This is just a quick blog from the front, the Dar Finn Front, where we are stuck deep in the trenches of disillusion and pushing heavy weights up hill, a hill made all the more resistant by the weight of others pushing on the other side!!

Yes I am going slightly mad! But I’m laughing at myself also.

You see today is just another day, but it’s like every other day in that one is permenantly fighting with others to get a job done, and it takes so long to get jobs done, with every other job being a new negotiation. It’s so fucking boring, and then there is the permenant problem of language, which is another tool to ensure misunderstanding, or to use to explain why there was a misunderstanding, which is of course our fault, for not speaking deriga, even if what we are saying is as clear as day and agreed, understood and shaken upon….until it has gone wrong..at which point it is…yes, our fault!

So what am screaming about? ......You've seen this image before...that's because nothing has changed for months!

Well, we’ve had a façade done by a very good carpenter for the ground floor salon which will be a room. We’ve stood and discussed, drawn, walked and pointed to all the complexities of the work and we have explained in full, that there is a certain height that the ceiling needs to be. Unfortunately when the work arrived, this discussing, drawing, walking and talking goes out the window, and IT’S FUCKING WRONG. In reality this will not…or should I say, should not, be a problem. The carpenter is very good and the problem is solvable.

BUT, it’s along side any numerable other similar issues.

We’re waiting for wood to do the chainage of the garden floor, which is to say the laying of the reinforced metal structure that will support the floor. It should have arrived, but it hasn’t and has required yet further negotiations re price. It will come tomorrow, but late, which delays everyone else.

Then there is the fountain/pool. It’s illegal, we’re bending rules and will probably get caught, but we’re trying because it’s ridiculous that we aren’t allowed a pool in the first place…see Marrakesh. But the “expert team” we have worked with before have just upped their price ridiculously, so we have to start again…more negotiations!

Then the masons are working like snails, and what can we do, say they should be working faster..and then they walk out and we start the search again for new workers who ultimately will do the same.

And then we have the in house carpenter who needs up to 3 days in the “macina” to prepare his wood, which means he has spent almost the whole week there and have we advanced…?

It depends what you call progress!

Anyway, just a quick rant and now I am off to see you, your mum and relax…you and Beccie still make everything better, but it’s bloody hard work, and always in bloody deriga!

March - April/May 2011...a sort of compressed account of the story so far, that'll do for the time being

Oh yes you've got a cheeky side, Mr Finley!

Hi Finn,

It’s been yet another lengthy time since I last wrote to you and yet again I write exhausted. You’re at the pool at Al Kantara and I’m simply resting up at home, with something of a bug…lead by exhaustion.

(oops here's a bit of an editing challenge as I'm writing on top of a piece I wrote a while ago...see if you can guess which is which...obviously I'm assuming you don't have a life or I wouldn't be asking such a question...so I'll just stop there!)

As ever it’s simply a fight to progress. It’s so different from working with an INGO where there are lines of responsibility a sense of loyalty and professionialism. Here it’s every man for himself,out for himself and concerned only for himself.

"I've been down so god damn low.... that this seems like up to me!" In the bowels of our Boutique Hotel!

Do I sound bitter?

We’ve recently separated from our Nth carpenter who had been going on a go slow, purely to eek out more money and then who, even when we’d made a joint assessment of the work he had to do, doubled the cost of completing it. Why? Because he wanted twice as much money!!!!

Despite appearances, Driss actually got our thumbs down!

We’ve employed a couple of brothers since we returned to the site, rachid and Driss, who seem incapable of working separately. Thus we have 2 masons working as one and who when we ask them to work separately, threaten to leave…which has infact lead to Driss leaving, to our great relief.

We’re now working with rachid, who’s simply better without Driss, have brought in another team (M'hd Everything By The M/2) to work in the garden hirching and have another guy starting tomorrow who should be working below ground, in what will be the kitchen.

Images (r/l) down in the depths of the ruin, re buildiing the floor that had previously been a water mill, now including urban waste, running below the house!

Update... live dispatch from the front. We originally got another mason, a Stoner who lasted a day, we finally started another, who started a week late, was great and then mysteriously left...there's a suspicion that there was a bit of pressure in the team...funny dynamics in the team at this point, replacing him was an old guy who lasted an hour, before mummy gave him 20 dhm bus fare and packed him off.

We searched everywhere and finally got good old mwalem Driss (of 813 chantier fame). It was great to have him back, a real mwalem, slow but very sure...you begin to appreciate that But he worked a week, saw a longer job, and left. Now we're starting another mwalem Bni tomorrow, who was working for M'ad Everything's By The M/2 Team , last week, but we need him and he's split up with M'd Everything's By The m/2...I hope it doesn't cause a "thing"

And that's also "The Thing", everything's so fluid...you're constantly negotiating and re negotiating...phewwwwwww.

Anyway, back to the story so far...rather than thus far...which was a real time up date, back to then...weired eh!

Actually it’s beginning to feel almost exciting, strides forward are really being made. You forget how far we've come. I'm just going through some pics for this month and we've come really far. There we are above, down in the bottom of the house, filling a floor above the Oued..which of course runs along three sides of the ruin....yes we spent a lot of time down in those sewers! Mustapha the Mwalem H'did was found literally by going chantier to chantier, in the Ville. He's been a real find, excellent at his job and always putting it in.

But here we are making progress..moving on...It's so often feels like watching paint dry...it's painfull, even on a good day. This is the floor of the kitchen and the basin...the doors from the main house are above the ladder.

We hit a whole new concept in building when we discovered wardi, different materials, different science, different build completely...that'll be a diversion off the usual learning curve...upwards of course!

And not only have we got the first floor balcony up, but we’ve completed the garden floor, and are now in the process of building potos that will become the second balcony....Now this wasn't in the preplanning consensus of what was going to happen....I think this is what they call building!!

Now this is where I am sure we’ll begin to get yet more problems. This second floor balcony will have potos that go up almost to the top terrace. Of course ultimately this will mean that we’ll have another terrace, but that’s not quite in the plans, tho a roof is. Now as you may know our neighbours have been a real nightmare, with Fatima kicking in our door to the derb and Shameless …well, being Shameless.

God knows what will happen here!

My only hope at present, is that we actually manage to finish…it’s killing me I’m sure and just to be able to stop the persistant fight with workers to complete what you are paying for.

A classic is another carpenter, Absallam. He’s brilliant and very expensive. We’re trying to get another mezzanine on our ground floor room and had spoken to him about our plan. I stated I had qualms that these plans wouldn’t work, but he waved me away saying he knew what he was doing.

Now here’s the rub. If at this point you question his ability he’ll either walk away, sabotage the work to prove that your suggestion was wrong, or use any problems that may evolve, on your decision making.

Thus we let him get on with building the façade to the room. From the outset it seemed that there were problems and I called to tell him. A job that should have taken a week has now dragged on for a month with Absallam failing to turn up to complete. Yesterday he did, saw his mistake, refused to take responsibility for it and threatened to walk out, saying that he’d take his work with him…until he realised it wouldn’t fit out the door, at which point he told us to take it apart…knowing full well it would only lead to it being broken.

Hours of ego massaging, whilst trying to gently persuade him of his responsibility and the need for both of us to look for a solution has now meant we are at an impass, but we have agreed to talk again. What will happen? We’ll end up paying more to get it finished…prick!

No really, I'm fine!...I chose to do this.

And this sort of thing is every day, several times a day…currently your mum is fighting with a chair maker who’s almost a month behind on even starting her work…but refused to start without an advance, and thus he now has our money and we have no work!!! And always in Deriga!

Arghhhhhhhh!

Spiderman jigsaws are the perfect antidote...Spiderman anything is good.

But this is our own little world. In the bigger picture the world is in quite some turmoil as the Arab Spring turns crimson with blood in Libya, Egypt, Syria, Bahrain and Afghanistan, and the lesser reported ongoing conflicts or civil disturbances in Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, Tibet…God it’s kicking off everywhere and recently here in morocco we had a nail bomb explode in Marakesh.

Honestly Finn, I see morocco as a developing country and by that I mean that socially, economically, politically, it is progressing. It feels safe and whilst our project is like the proverbial albatross around the neck, there is a good life to be had. It feels a good place to be. 813 is now our home, and somewhere not so far down the line, we can see the finishing line on this build...talk about need for reflection and lessons learning!

But the bomb in Marrakesh has been a disaster for everyone, notably the poor buggers killed or maimed, but also the near complete collapse of tourism at least here in fez. many friends working here have almost no tourists and this will hurt both local and expatriats involved in the industry.

As a result I’m looking at possibly applying for a job in development again. Between us, whilst this is a bad time to leave the project, with us hopefully very close to finishing the hotel, if there is to be a dirth of tourists here, then I may at least have a look for a job and again,in honesty, compared to this, it would feel like a holiday..bizarre but true!

Anyway, as for you, well you’re doing great. You’ve really got into dressing up and have taken to pirates in a big way.

We’ve been camping and out on the mountains a few times, despite a late spell of rain. God it's good getting out of town, can't wait for the spring/summer.

You've started getting in to music... having discovered the power of the volume button. Good taste so far, by the looks of it, tho you seem a bit of a dub fan yourself. Current mutual favourite is, Damon Albern and .Gorrilaz but I've currently got a bit of west African Soucous playing and that's very pleasant. Wonder if you'll be a music fan...I hope so, there's just so much great music everywhere.....I think that was a fatherly guidance moment...well, you know, keeping up with new technology and all that!

Other news has been Uncle tim and Auntie Michelle visiting with family, a great time was had by all. They left happy but with Fezzy Tummies!

Oh, and you’ve met your own princess and have discovered Bubble Boggies…which made us both fall off our pirch!

But more of that later, well I hope so. The thing is Finn, it's bloody hard work and just bloody hard at times. But really, really it's fine...or it's going to be fine. We're fine, tho it's all challenging. but we're fine and this will be finer. I hope you've enjoyed it, are enjoying it. You seem to be thriving.

D'you think so many "fines" might be telling???