Tangier Slight Return Part 1

Written on the train to Fes

I should have been more careful with my metaphors, I thought as I watched the metal door of the ship slowly close itself shut on me. The view of Tangier disappeared, I felt one last breeze from the harbor and that was that. Unfortunately, I was on the wrong side. It looked like I might be shipped back to Spain without having set foot in Morocco.

For the past two days I had been photographing, almost obsessively, every single ancient looking door I could find in Granada. On the night before my journey to Tangier it came to me as I was talking to my newfound Brazilian friend: that’s what I was looking for in Morocco: a DOOR! Ten years ago, a door had opened for me on a very special night in Marrakech and now I was going to find out if there was another door there for me to go through. And if I got there and the door was closed. So be it. My friend made a joking gesture as if saying don’t be so melodramatic. I shook my head. I was dead serious. Well, as I said, be very careful about what you imagine. There was the proof. I had found a door. The exit door of the ship and now it was closed because I had not gotten my passport stamped on the ship by the custom agents. I realized this as I was exiting the ship, giving some casual words of advice to a tourist couple on their first visit to Morocco. They had asked me if there was a “shuttle” from the harbor to the train station. I chuckled inside. This is Tangier, baby. They had slept the whole way, inside the lounge while I had lapped every single juicy moment of the boat ride, the blue, the salt, the straights of Gibraltar, two lovers almost kissing. And yet, they had stamps on their passport. And I didn’t. Who was the fool? I was so “awake” during the 2 and half hours of sheer visual bliss that I missed the real world! It’s happened to me before. Once on my way back from my second trip from Morocco, I missed my flight to Durham from JFK because I wanted to pray before the flight. Not an easy thing to do in JFK. Ablution, towel, finding the East… There’s a reason why there is an exemption in Islam from all rituals while traveling. I’m just a fool.

What? You were sleeping? Said one of the attendants.
On the contrary, I protested. I heard every single announcement, In English, French and Spanish! I’m tri-lingual. And it said that people with card needed to clear customs on the boat. Not pedestrians.
There was another message.
Yeah, I heard it. It said after docking in Tangier we needed to go to some “passage” named something I can’t remember.
Yes. That was a passage inside the boat, she said clearly exasperated.

No one could leave the boat without a stamp. I had not realized it, and the police would have stopped me later on, for some reason or another, they would have thought I was a Mossad agent for sure. From the Israeli Intelligence. And then I would have been royally screwed. I would have watched another kind of door altogether shut itself on me. So, for now I waited. The only way I was going to get off the ship is if they took pity on my and decided to bed the rules. I told them that I was going to a wedding in Al-Jadida. So, I waited went over some calming prayers in my head. I really should have been more careful.

After thirty long, excruciating minutes of watching Morocco refracted from the hundreds of windows lining the ship and listening to the worst imaginable elevator techno Arab music I have ever endured one of the security guys showed up – pissed as hell – and said grab your things and follow me. Ok.. That was kind of good. We walked down stairs, a few sliding doors and next you know I’m stepping out of the ship through the empty car vault.

I walk out accompanied by another guard, up a rickety stairwell, down a hanging bridge, in through the back door into customs. I put my luggage through the X-ray, they stamped my passport and told me to get out. So I did. I went through the front doors, stepped into the Moroccan sun and smiled to myself.

On the road I was once told: thoughts have a life of their own. They are born, they mature and they die. They can travel long distances carried by angels and can do good or do harm. So, never mind what comes out of your mouth! Make sure you control the main switch and you won’t be stuck on a boat on the wrong side of that door. Now I know. I should have never uttered the words “if it’s closed, so be it.” No, all the doors are open. And believe me, in the next thirty minutes I was about to get a taste of that limitless power.