I'd originally planned to spend the delightful week of nothing between my last deadline and when my family arrives doing absolutely nothing. Not true; nothing I really have to do at least. I actually have a lovely note hear entitled "Things to do w my time off" which includes working on my other blog, tagging and parsing my corpus and memorizing the logical fallacies. Thankfully I've been spared from my complete lack of sanity by a luck airfare search.
One evening, against the never-ending chorus of spinning tires out my window, it came to me: I need to get away from Brits and snow. (NB: That's Brits and snow, not either party on its own; I've no beef with either.) The last two days have sent my hometown of London, Ontario over a meter of snow, or so I'm led to believe. They got two snow days. Fair enough. Here: six inches. Six inches and panic set in. It's accumulated to about a foot now, but no one can really deal with it. People go home, shops close early, buses take time off and students in my building spend hours spinning their godforsaken tires trying to get out of our car park. One guy is particularly determined; for the first few especially snow-ridden days he would try multiple times to get his car out - ten minutes to get it halfway into the car across the lot, fifteen minutes to get it nearish his original parking spot. Repeat. WALK. You can get to the train station in less time, not to mention to class and stop for a coffee, drink half, get a panini while you're at it, eat that, decide you'd quite fancy a scone and get one for takeaway on the way.
I was inspired. Why spend a week at home being quasi-productive surrounded by snow that no one knows what to do with when I could get some travel in and escape these lunatics? To the interwebs! Almost went to Norway - that's how desperate I was (the flight was only £12 return at the time, too). But after a brief wiki check and victory dancing I settled on Marrakech. (Wiki tells me their mean temperature in December is 20C - win.)
I booked the flight, found a hostel and, £80 later, I'm good to go! I'm staying at this riad, and the owner emailed me to explain how things go. Apparently I get a briefing over mint tea on arrival about how to get around, things to do, and (thank God) how to haggle. Away we go!
I am unbelievably excited! I've ordered a guide book to the city - a safe bet as Marrakech is notoriously difficult to navigate and there's a few cultural differences I'd rather not encounter for the first time halfway into my trip. I'm not planning on packing much since the markets are incredible and I intend on picking up a thing or two. At the moment I'm surveying friends who've been for tips on places to go, things to eat and other useful odds and ends, so if you have anything to add, feel free to comment or email me!
Boring shite:
- Cannot get up before 9am consistently. Will try later when I'm not starting every day depressed that I have failed at something before even getting up.
- Things are looking up school-wise! 10 days to go! *cry*
Cheers!
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