My 3-Day Bus Ride From Casablanca To Paris.500mph. But by road, it’s about 1,615 miles and it
would take about 19¾ hours driving on a straight
road, non-stop, at 55mph.
Paris due to all the nooks and crannies and, of course,
all the loo, food, rest, and passport stops I experienced
with some 60 other passengers who were mostly young,
punkish, Arab Morocoan males and black North African
female workers who live and work mostly in Paris doing
their low-skilled and low-paid jobs. They were returning
to Paris and their menial jobs, for the most part, from
-.-
The Moroccan-registered bus made all of the ann-
oucements only in Arabic and French, but luckily
for me my bus seat companion was 44 year-old
Fatima Soussi who spoke many languages including
good English. She kindly translated everything for me
and we sat, ate and chatted together during the whole
trip. Fatima was a god send and such a delightful per-
son, too. Her father is Moroccan and her mother is
Dutch and she works, so she told me, at Amsterdam
as a child specialist. She's a devout Muslim, too.
Before actually hitting the bus trail, I briefly delved
into Casablanca, the town itself, that came to world
fame in the early 1940’s during the Hollywood romance
film called "Casablanca," which starred Humphrey Bogart,
Ingrid Bergman, Claude Rains, et al. Even to this day, some
65 years later, many still think the film is what Casablanca
is really all about. Well, baby, it ain't ... And, far from so.
.-.
I'll tell you alot more about the town now ... and so before
my bus ride I then scoured Casablanca as fast as I could
to record my brief stay there upon having returned by
flight from my West Africa Safari with Contessa Maria,
who promptly headed onto New York from Morocco's
largest commercial city of Casablanca as I prepared
myself to hitch a very long bus ride just for the sheer
fun of doing it before arriving at wet, dreary,
Paris three days later. -.-
Street artist's painting "Eyes" for 500 Dirhams.
is not a romantic city at all. Rather, it’s the national
_ _
Casablanca is, after all, a rough and ready city bursting
at the seams with boiling activity. It’s a cheap place to visit
with my own stay at just €9-, yes €9-, per night at Hotel
blind tourists who don’t know the difference, so my
cynical Yankee friend Bob Clancey would say,
I always try to avoid Brit and Yankee tourists
-.-
St. John's Anglican Parish of Casablanca.
My visit to worship at the entirely-walled St. John’sAnglican Church of Casablanca, located just a block or so
from my cheap sleeping quarters, and from the expensive
Hyatt Regency, was particularly nice since everybody
there seemed so civilised and not stiff and shirty expats
like I’ve have found at other foreign-based Anglican
parishes like most notably St. Alban’s at Denmark’s
Copenhagan, which was so bad I almost wondered
why I call myself an avid Anglican. Especially after the
frosty and aloof reception from Venerable Mark Oakley,
who heads the Anglican Archdeaconry of Germany
and Northern Europe.
-.-
At Casablanca, St. John’s parish priest The Rev’d
Mark Cregan, unlike the other Mark, was simply a
pure pleasure to meet. Outgoing and disarming, the
vicar was the kind of vicar who was a vicar’s vicar. I
liked him instantly and if I was ever to move and live
permanently as a retiree to Casablanca, then I’d be
more than happy to have him as my good vicar. His
Sunday morning service and his showcased-sermon
was a sheer delight and his congregation of British,
European, and American expats I was also pleased
to meet. They were nothing like those oddball Brit
and Yankee tourists I try always to avoid on my
wide travels aboard.
-.-
My "own" Casablanca street donkey.
As for food, there are tons of cheap side streeteating places at where you can, like me, get good,
hot, chicken or meat meals for around 20 to 50
Direhams or 2 to 5 quid and find your belly
is full with the large plate of food served to you.
I try to eat at where most of the local natives eat.
And so my aim is to enjoy their culture, lifestyle,
and local food, instead of acting like some toffee-
nosed tourist. Most eateries are open all day and
some all night at Casablanca. So you never need to go
hungry nor spend a fortune on paying thru the nose at
some pricey tourist restuarant or trap that will rip-you
off, pricewise, for the same kind of food you could have
bought at the side streets. Don’t worry about speak-
ing the language. All you need do is point and pay,
like I do. “No” and “yes” are pretty much the same
in most languages, so nod your head for "yes" and
shake your head for "no." It almost always works.
But if it doesn’t for some reason, then
just smile and politely walk away.
-.-
Rough sleeper is she with my copy of Big Issue.
Even though I have taken my various copies of “The Big
Issue” and photographed such, for example, from inside
Auschwitz to the Faeroe Islands to North Korea to South Africa
to the 5th World Homeless Cup to Istanbul and even to Iran,
The Big Issue hasn’t shown a damn hoot or a giddy doo for
such photographs I’ve taken. In fact, when I showed them the
ones inside of Auschwitz itself, they were rejected outright for
publication by the mag’s publisher - Lisa Woodman - and with
no explanation or even a thank you … When I also photo-
graphed Beyoncé with her holding the actual Big Issue
front cover with her on it, The Big Issue wasn’t prepared
to pay me enough for the right to publish my two superb
images of her. I then promptly sold the rights
elsewhere to such for good money as a retired news
photographer that I am. I have no future plans to ever
submit any further photos of mine to The Big Issue
because it’s a waste of my time and my talent to do so.
Like I will not offer my latest photo at Casablanca of the
elderly beggar woman (shown above) holding and display-
ing the mag in her hands on the street at where she rough
sleeps most of the year round. And she’s dressed in
traditional Moroccan Islamic clothing.
-.-
Typical Scene of Old Casablanca.
-.-"Morning Has Broken" at Morocco's Tangiers.
-.-
On the road with us for over 600 miles thru Spain ...
-.-My photoview from my bus window near Granada ...
-.-
Near Limoges, in southern France, the anti-drug French cops pulled our coach over and took us to a secure off-road site to search for drugs and couriers. I managed to photograph from my bus window (see below) the armed cops to the teeth as they singled out a young 20’ish Moroccan guy. They brought his bag to the front of the bus and asked the person who owned it to come with them. The guy didn’t look like a druggie or a drug courier to me from his appearance which was erect and cleanly dressed. He was clean. About ten minutes or so later he came back and took his seat behind me and Fatima Soussi, who was my constant and delightful bus companion all the way from Casablanca to Paris. Watching the French cops doing their thing, it remained me of what such anti-drug cops do in America which is pretty cold and brutal
compared to what I witnessed in France. At the Louisiana/Mississippi state border, the local thug-like Hancock County sheriff deputies target interstate Greyhound buses to stop and search for drugs going to major cities beyond nearby New Orleans. Typically, the deputies pull all the luggage out of perhaps 70 or 80 passengers and make them get off the bus to claim their luggage. Ofentimes they catch a little fish with a big bag of drugs, but also many of the Latin-American drug couriers do not claim their bag knowing that if caught they can expect brutal life sentences against them by the draconian Hancock County Curcuit court with such unjust and vile judges like Kosta N. Vlahos, who is a savage judge at the best of times from what I have read about him in the American press. But such police tactics and draconian sentences only help to make such drug trafficing even more profitable for the big fish somewhere back in Mexico, Coloumbia, Bolivia, etc. They always fry the little guy and get away with such savage and inhumane sentences that America is so well-known for imposing for so many crimes. Hence, over 2 million folkz languish in the penitentiaries of America everyday at the annual cost of billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of wasted lives in the name of so-called American justice. The real crime is the crime the US justice system and its mindless judges inflict on offenders every day across the whole country for crimes that should not entail imprisonment in the first place for non-violent or small first-time economic crimes, for example.
Sadly, the British court system is copying all too many of America's mindless prison sentences resulting in UK prisons packed like sardines due to such stiff judges who copy their American counterparts for imprisonment of the people ... a yoke that speaks of widespread injustice ...
Above: The French drug cops under my bus window.-.-
This is all for now about my 3-day Casablanca to Paris
bus ride. I may add more a little later, but it's rather
doubtful since there are other stories I want to post
quite soon ...
-.-
Fatima Soussi and Uncle Monty in Spain.
-.-
Truly your's, Uncle Monty.
+John Chrysostom, 2oo8.
-.-
(The above caption photo of mine is of Casablanca's
own major Islamic Shrine to the Prophet Hassan. It's
an awesome edifice that sees the main tower reaching
the pure blue sky like a New York skyscrapper).
-.-
I finally arrived at Paris on the 11th anniversary
death of Diana, Princess of Wales, at that dreadful
Paris tunnel that I also happened to travel thru on
the exact day, 11 years later, of her tragic and
untimely death (or murder).
-.-
Dear Monty,
Thank you again for your very kind postcard. It was very good to hear from you and to know that you are well. I must say I loose touch with all the exotic places you travel to and wonder how it is all possible but I am sure it is part of God’s plan. It would be lovely to see you sometime so please keep in touch. Kindest regards and prayers, Father Alexander.
From: "Fr. Alexander Sherbrooke" fralexander@stpatricksoho.org To:
thebiggerissue@k.st Subject: Thank you. Date: Wed 09/03/08 04:10 AM
-.-
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