December 2011 Not The Chantier 2. Xmas 2011. Santa brings everyone the presents they want

So Finn, as you might imagine Xmas this year was much more fun than in many of our recent past. We had about 8 adults and 3 kids and everyone brought a contribution of food. We (that is your mum) did the turkey and the cake...both delicious.

But the baked beetroot and salades were excellent. You got really in to the whole event and may have wondered at the fun and games the adults got up to. I look forward to next years, this is fun. Santa certainly smiled at you...do you remember hauling up your sack of presents?

It was good to have so many people round and again I hope that one year we'll have family and friends from home over too. But as I've said, we've got good friends here now...and that's great too! Especially when they are inclined to play silly games like these!!

But of course the best part of Xmas was watching you. We'd built up the excitement..well mummy did most of that, cooking the turkey, making the cake, putting up the tree and the decorations. But you were so looking forward to Papa Noel coming, it was a simple joy...and then you woke up on Xmas day and ...well you were perfect....but to see that we'll have to be able to upload the video, which is proving difficult...perhaps it's own post, we'll see.

Anyway everyone else also loved Xmas...here's Richard and Vannessa looking beautiful...must have been early on!!!

Other Xmas goodies that happened over Xmas was that Tours Around Fez got it's first grown up clients. Mr and Mrs Stephenson, on honeymoon from Los Angeles spent a day with us having a very private and luxurious champaign lunch on Mt Zalagh before taking them on a walk across the mountain spine.

I think they liked it. Despite several calls for more clients, tbh we were both knackered and thus simply closed down. Yes there was money to be earnt, but it'll have to wait whilst we recharge our batteries. The main thing, as I keep on saying is, we've finished and now it's about us marketting the very good products we have. Bring it on!

December 2011 That Clear Blue Sky Feeling

And now Finn, Now you get to see what Santa brought to all those little boys and girls who've been good throughout the year...and I don't know what we've done, but this is the best Xmas present I've had in many years!!!

Here you have it Finn, a review of some of the completed product, which is to say that as I write this, after our real first guests, after we've "finished"...we've still got a list of finishing that's several pages long...snagging, I think the official phrase is!....but by jove it's better than it's ever been. So here's a few images and some words about them.

The Terraces are simply stunning. The views are, I think, some of the best in Fez and especially so as you come up the stairs on to the lower terrace. I love the whole chill feel to it all, very Ibiza, very Zen and all helped by the loungers and curtained gezeebos that provide shade and simplicity amongst the flowers and plants and beside the bar, which is simply great fun and very cool..another cocktail my friend...hmmmm, perhaps a bit of deep funk with that!

The Blue Room, or 1st Floor Shaft Side, as I've known it for years, is very stylish. The blue is cool aesthetically and stylishly and the iron work completed by Abderkarim our Mwalem Hedid, is simply beautiful. I love the grace and fluidity of the curves. It has one of my favourite bathrooms, the story of which is held in an archive called Tales of Shameless, but the glass bricks are perfect and the window on to the courtyard gives views of detailed zuak plaster and paintwork, that is some of the best in the house...cool room.

I think The Troublesome Twin has always been my favourite room in the house, perhaps because it's changed so much or perhaps because of it's simplicity. Having been joined to the ruin, it now has it's own (I think the best) balcony, as well as beautiful kaoused windows with iron zuak detail. The interior doors are now curvacious, luchious arches and the doors and windows that we've restored all look perfectly suited. The bathroom is also very cool and stylish, I love the simple double doors and low window. But I think it's the clear beauty of the coloured glass windows going on to the balcony that seals it for me....lurve!

The Pasha's Suit should be anyone favourite. The incredible detail of the painted zuak on the qubas is quite extraordinary initself. However combined with the exquisite carvings in the plaster and the intensity of the zelig, the room reflects the grandeur of it's original occupant, the Pashas legal advisor whose office it was. With the addition of it's own balcony and the splendid simplicity of it's bathroom, a far cry from the original, this room has everything to satisfy the exotic fantasy in you.

The Garden is still under completion as I write, but any day now and mohammed will complete the zelig in the plunge pool and the tadlekers will finish the side of the fountain. The transformation of this area from water wheel, to chaotic shamble of flats and now to garden and sun lit kitchen, reflects the transformation of the house. This area makes the house, adds another level. I always thought we'd need a pool, especially in summer. But it's the syle and the use of for example the zelig from Jerez, and the balconies, that give this whole area a beauty and openess that I love. A few choice pieces of furniture and it'll be perfect.

This is what were able to offer our first guests and it is a great feeling, to be able, at the end of all this, to be really proud of what we have achieved. I never really felt any love for Tazi, as she was called. Certainly it wasn't the project I wanted to undertake (we'll see that in Xaouen...or maybe Zalagh) and without the addition of the "ruin" would be far too like many other places, to feel this good about it. But it is different, and it is cool. I haven't got all the rooms to show here, but hopefully it'll give an idea of what we've made for ourselves. And now it's about developing and marketting something that I think will be a real hit...along with some sessions from radio 6...great fun there!

November 2011 Mazel Ma salitnass? Tick tock, tick tock....Naaasssssssssssssss

It's late now Finn and I'm desperate to sleep, but (not quite) like your mum, I want to finish...to put this, before I put me, to bed. Your mums off celebrating Vinces' 40th at Mikes in Moulay, it'll be a great gig, but we've all been really ill around xmas and New Year and we've some serious travelling to do before we lie on that beach in Kerala, so I didn't risk over indulging...tho' I'm not too sure what you would call this...anyway!

So with days to go before our first guests, who are also our first reviewers (no stress there!!) arrive and all workers leave for weeks at family homes to gorge themselves on ram's stomachs, we were still far from finished. Of course we were seeing progress but no matter how hard we tried to coax extra work out of the guys, it never seemed enough to get everything completed. The tadlakers are a fine bunch of chaps, but how much did they chat, how long were their tea and lunch breaks and when would they arrive to start work...but they came day in, day out...we progressed and the clock tick tocked..tick, tock!

Saviours in all of this were Arab the plasterer (0663630709) who did a fantastic job in both houses and is a joy to work with.

Absalam the carpenter proved to be a complete .....carpenter and Ali was consumed with having his land taken by a guy he was trying to prove was dead....a challenge at anytime, but a costlier one closer to Eid!!! Rachid of course wasn't answering his phone...oh yes it was the elections..remember those? Another Islamic party wins power in the Magreb, these are interesting times outside of our microbe, very interesting indeed.

And all this time we were trying to empty the RDC/foyer so that it looked the cool loungie funky area we envisaged and not still part of a building site. Plants edged out slowly...but only ever slowly! Tick.....Tock...Tick...Tock!

By the time we had our end of chantier dinner (that reminded me so much of the meal we'd put on for our frist week of building so very long ago!!), it was clear that we weren't going to get finished in time.

None theless it gave us an opportunity to celebrate where we had gotten to and to celebrate with friends...Beccie let her hair down and boy did she deserve it. We've both played our part in this and we've both had times when it was all too much, or when we took the lead. But at this final furlong, it was your mum who stood up and just did it...ground it out...well done Beccie xxxxx

Of course just because there are no labourers left in the house doesn't mean there's no work, and with the onset of a reviewer who already wasn't going to be able to stay in the hotel, but who needed to get an idea of the "vibe" of Dar Finn, we needed to move on to another finishing stage, one which we are still, if not struggling with, perhaps enjoying the challenge of completing. Lights, curtains, loo roll holders, latches, you name it and it's in the detail and even then there was still work to be done by Rachid Bni and Rachid electrician...if we could ever get hold of him.

One of the benefits of having a finished home built in the medina is that when the hotel isn't finished, you can invite people there for an all together different experience and our home is beautiful...and so are you, which helps melt hearts and minds...thanks Finn...

And yes we did get in to Jigsaw guide as a recommendation for style gurus coming to Fezzzzzzz, which is what we did when everyone had gone home...Eid? Don't know mate, I was chilling or sleeping..........tock!

And this time that we began to get has already paid dividends, I decided to take you out with Omar of the Fez Camera Club (0659661502) and we ended up in Derb Sidi Bni Yahyaa...which is of course where we live. It was only whilst there that I entered his mausolium, a shrine to this holy man, about whom I must get to know more. The shoot was about "children" and I got some great shots of you, but also of the kids we see daily...there's some great photo opportunities here, let's hope I take some.

But as I say again, with my head out of the chantier I can see clearer and I love that we have an amazing mausolium next door, I love that I buy my coffee freshly ground, along with my spices, from a local grinder, or that our local baker makes fantastic hot bread, that we have a huge fresh food market at the end of our street, a well for locals and horses to collect water from near by and a brilliant aged hamam within 5 minutes away, or that another neighbour makes candles by dipping wax and designing in his tiny hanoot.

I love that, and I know that, because we've finished the bloody chantier...well almost!!!

October 2011 The story of the end...an inaction packed tale of watching tadlakt dry.

Morning Finn, as you’ll know, it’s now a new year and a new phase in our lives and despite there being along way to go in our developing a successful business (there being our authorisations and the small fact of global economic collapse..regardless of the environmental chatastrophies that are looming…I’m sure you’ll know all about these by now!!) it’s beginning to be possible to to look out from the consumption that was the chantier, and to begin to see where we are, both in ourselves and as a family and finally a functioning business, but also in where we are living and why we chose to live here.

The demands of the chantier and it’s impact on us, has made it almost impossible to consider, let alone appreciate much else. But just as the weight of it all has fallen from our shoulders, so it has given more space to simply look up, and Fez, Morocco all over, really is spectacular….but more of that later, you see I want to end this year with a completion of the story of this build.

Even at this stage, Oct – November there still seemed to be so much to do. We’d tentatively booked in for Jigsaw, a design magazine that were considering putting in their guide, to come to visit us in early Nov’ at the beginning of Eid. Eid would bring an end to our work for up to two weeks, so it seemed an appropriate target to aim for.

I’m laughing now, but your mum went on a mission, and we had a few very difficult moments. It’s been terrible like that, so much stress and strain. As Beccie said, another thing to celebrate is us getting our marriage back. In around 6 years of marriage, four have been involved with this, and of course raising you. Now we get to refocus. Great, it’s nice to be back.

Of course along with that brings, even a small amount of time to indulge hobbies or interests, people other than builders. We’ve been here for four years now and I must assume that we are to be here for the foreseeable future. In this time we have gotten to know people that we once called “new friends”, but who are now simply “friends” and who I hope will remain so for the foreseeable future. We’ve all got a shared history here, have shared the trials and tribulations that are thrown at you here, but also enjoy what Fez and each others company has to offer. We are a vanguarde of sorts and tbh, there’s simply a great group here. It’s, they’re fun and interesting and our friends…that’s great.

One reason I came here was to be in a country that interested me and where I could indulge my interests. So now I’ll have time to return to photography, (I remember how I enjoyed it in Ethiopia and Mozambique), travel generally and cycling in particular (ditto) and getting fitter, cooking and learning about cooking/food, and finally to get to use the paraglider, which I hope will begin in India…I’m getting away with myself, but you get my point! Even to begin to develop Xaouen and indulge the second career..we’ll see where the WASH Cluster and Tajikistan lead us next year!!!

(Does this sound indulgent..it isn’t meant to. You see that’s it, being here means that we can enjoy things that would be more difficult at home. Morocco offers us..me..and yes you, many, many opportunities which we can now enjoy more fully, and which I now have time to share with you more fully…just on that, incase we did, I’m sorry if we couldn’t spend as much time as we would have wanted with you these first 4 years. Hopefully you’ve turned out pretty fine regardless and we have tried, but anyway, just so that you know, this is also so that we have more and better time with you and with ourselves as a family…love is the answer!)

And that’s part of the thing, in October, we were so far from this…what can I call it, freedom to live the dream…rather than the ever present, never ending nightmare!

We’d been thinking what tiles to use for ages and finally saw an example that interested us, not in Fez but with Seb in a flamenco bar in a riad in Jerez. We took a photo and I brought it back to Fez to Ain a kbee. This then brings you in to a process that, with a bit of daylight, simply oozes why Fez is great as here we had a stencil made and two guys spent a week making our zelige romi, in individual squares that took days to make and more days to dry. Of course this hit Ramadan and Eid, but by the end 25 days, we had it sent to the house where it would take a further month to be laid…….a gorgeous process including a wealth of mwalem and local expertise…but the clock was ticking,,,tick…tock!

The tiles were only a fraction of the problem, given that we also had to have all our ground floor and balcony walls tadlakt. Of course we’d had a nightmare trying to find a team to do it. I can count 3 or 4 teams who didn’t get/take the job and again the clock ticked incessantly. Eventually we found a team from Marakesh (abdelkadre 0666317017). Before starting the tadlakt needed to settle, scaffolding needed to be lain and spaces cleared…tick tock.

Even with so much going on on the outside, we still needed to move along with “finishing” and this included plants, which means soil, manure, plant pots and of course lots of transport. Again here that's going to pot sellers either in the medina for new pots, or in the countryside for old pots formally used for smeg (yes it really is called that!) or oil and then trying to fine the space to put all of this stuff whilst we waited for places to be completed that might free up space to move plants and pots in to.....tick tock...if we don't finish the zelig in the garden, we can't empty the plants, earth and pots from the RDC, so we can't put the seats in...so it'll look like a mess...building site!!! Tick tock,,,tick tock......

And that's the thing, it all takes it's own time...along with the added complications of multiple mwalem egos, greed, agendas, other work...oh yes, finishing a chantier means people begin to look for other work...and phones stop working..Rachid electrician (0674060174...if it works!!!)..

Oh and of course there's the inevitable, never ending, always being messed up again, process of cleaning...which, it must be said, Beccie loves...but it's all needed.......another sweep, another tile laid, another floor covered with tadlakt, another pot we can move from the forecourt. And we crept closer to Eid, to the holiday, to our rendezvous with our first review...and we were nowhere near finished! The Zeligi kept laying (Mohammed 0662052536), tadlakers kept swiping, Rachid Bni (0664873739) kepting coming to our rescue and Rachid electrician kept not turning up!!...And then there were the carpenters...but that's the same old story...tho the RDC mezanine began to fall in to place!

Aside from this life of personal clutch disc burning, I hit 48 and Tours around Fez had the fortune to combine this with meeting Jack from Trufflepig, thanks to Seb.

This would lead to us starting to develop tours with them and I hope moving TAF forward, which will link to completing Xaouen and maybe even more stuff on zalagh...oh yes, Finn, there are plans, bigger plans..empire building..or just adding to the dream...I'll be interested to read this next year when we've been able to develop Tazi...now Dar Finn, and Tours Around Fez...and witha bit of luck, to develop Xaouen also...now that's more like it and gives Beccie and I different interests...which is a great thing! The future starts here.

This is the end my beautiful friend Dec 2012

Finn, it’s 05^th January 2012 and the world has changed, the sun is shining, the sky's bluer and everything's better…we’ve finished it. It’s finished, it’s over. In reality it feels like I’ve been let out of jail, finished a sentence, got my, our lives back.

Finn Takes Charge of the Chantier..Dar Finn!

I’m sat at home listening to Don Letts on BBC radio 6, don’t know if you’ll be able to get this but if you can…..

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b018xx6w

is a great show... loved the orb, it’s another great evening in and there’s such a lightness of being…it may sound crass, but it’s not. Something very, very, very difficult has finished, it’s over.

For so long this build has been omnipresent, everywhere, always, relentless.

And then it stopped. We finished. We won.

And now, having so frequently felt so unimpressed by the hotel, ex Tazi, now Darr Finn, it’s really wonderful, beautiful, stylish. I’m proud of what we’ve done. It’s been a nightmare, and I mean that sincerely, but we got through and now it’s great.

There were times we thought it would never end!

We’ve got a beautiful house, outstanding Dar, great you and Beccie, and gorgeous projects to develop. It feels good and that feels odd, rare. And now we’ve done it.

There’s more, much more to say, but the bottom line is well done us.

I called your mum when I was in the South and she said…”don’t speak to me, I’m on that mountain in Slovakia. I’m moving forward because I have to..because there is no other choice….” And from this at the end of October, we had our first guests for Xmas!

Ask her, she’ll tell you...another nightmare I dragged her on...not sure she enjoyed that too much, though it was nice when it was over...Slovakia that is..not sure she'd agree about the trip...but that's a whole other story...But I digress.

The bottom line is that in the last 2 months we went from this...to a finished house, a hotel, with our first guests for Xmas.

Of course it was a nightmare, and of course we saw things differently. But your mum took charge and just did it! We've got lots of learning about us to do, perhaps it's too soon to start that and a well earned holiday in S India beckons first, but by god it's an amazing feeling to be able to say...IT'S FINISHED!

We did it. Thank you. And thank you Beccie, it really never could have been done without you.

I love you Finn. I love you Beccie. 2012 Fantastic, Fantastic, Fantastic xxxxx