Vacationing in a Developing Country
Marrakech is a complete assault on the senses, unlike anything I’d ever seen or dreamed about before. On our drive from the airport my jaw dropped over and over again as I saw men casually hauling products with donkeys, motorcycles carrying toddlers clinging to their parents (helmet-less of course), and stray dogs wandering the streets, all whilst avoiding cars, trucks, and each other. The air is dusty, crosswalks are rare, and the smell of donkey and horse shit permeates almost everywhere (only slightly worse than the dog shit in Paris).
Image credit: Ariana Arzani
There is a magical charm about the narrow, dusty alleyways and crowded markets dosed in the hazy sunlight, but it might also be my tourist-y tendency to romanticize everything. As tourists, we see cities through rose-colored glasses, ignoring or pretending not to see the abject poverty that surrounds us, in fear that it will tarnish our perfect getaway experience.
But it’s hard to ignore young children wandering around Jemaa el-Fnaa, the city’s main square, begging for money, selling cookies, or performing circus acts in front of cafes in the hopes of gathering the attention of a generous tourist. And as much as I enjoyed the city, there was an overwhelming sense of guilt that seemed to hang over me. The amount of money I withdrew from the ATM ($350, which is 3500 in the Moroccan dirham) for my 6 days was the equivalent of what many Moroccans make in a month.
Image credit: Ariana Arzani
There is a heightened sense of your personal privilege and the sheer luck of being born on one side of the world versus another. In that sense, the trip was a very humbling experience, and made me much more aware of how good I have it. While my troubles are no less worrisome or stressful knowing that others have it worse, sometimes it’s useful to take a step back and look at the big picture.
Escaping the “western” bubble was an experience I would 100% recommend to anyone who has the opportunity to do so. A photo in Nat Geo is not the same as being there, avoiding motorcycles every 10 seconds and smelling incenses on every other corner. The world seems so much larger today than it did two weeks ago before my trip. Understanding the lifestyles of those so different from myself instantly made me so much more culturally aware and understanding. I have an inherent tendency to compare everything to my lifestyle in the US, not realizing that the comparison is moot, it’s like apples and oranges. My vacation affected me so much more than I would have imagined, and my 6 days in a lower developing country will stay with me forever.
Image credit: Ariana Arzani
