morocco

I had carefully planned my semester in Spain, including buying a three-month Eurailpass that kicked in after the semester was over. I had intended to do my European tour.

My home university had a program in Grenada, home to the Alhambra, the result of the Moors, or Muslims, having ruled Spain for a few centuries long ago. Grenada is also known for its flamenco bars. The really authentic flamenco bars were in caves in the hillsides above Grenada. 

I had arrived in Grenada a few days before the other students. I was going to be living with a family but was staying in an inexpensive hotel until my move-in date. Eager to explore this new, exotic place, I went out for tapas one late afternoon.

Most Americans now know about tapas as small plate food offerings but tapas have been a tradition in Spain since forever.  Bars offered tapas cheaply as a Spanish version of happy hour.

I went to a bar that was well known for its tapas. Tapas were an interesting and, in 1975, a cheap way to have dinner.  I have rarely gone into bars in my whole life. In hindsight, it surprises me to recall that I went into a bar for tapas. But it was for the tapas.

Plus, as a young blonde female in Spain, I was constantly besieged with attention from men. Spanish men, like Mexican and Colombian men, where I had also lived and studied, were much more openly aggressive towards women than they were in the states.  Maybe I went to that tapas bar because I was so used to the catcalling I heard wherever I went that I had inured myself to the behavior.

So I went into the bar, ordered some food and a cute Spanish guy offered to buy me a drink. I said yes. He insisted on paying for my tapas as well as the drink. When I was done eating, he asked me if I would like to see one of Grenada's oldest flamenco bars.

"Of course," I said in spanish. Por cierto. Claro que si!

So we walked to his car and he drove me out of Grenada up into the hills. We went to a flamenco bar, a tiny cave that had been wired for electricity. There was seating for, at most, 20 people. The small space surprised me. I had imagined a place known for flamenco dancing would have a performance area and a lot more floor space. In this flamenco bar, a man and woman danced the flamenco, with the woman skillfully making a kind of music with the clappers she used so expertly with her hands as she and the man danced. Their stomping also was a kind of music. They danced right alongside tables where customers sat drinking very expensive drinks. It was cosy and it sure seemed like an authentic experience of 'real' flamenco.

After awhile, the guy asked me if I would like to go somewhere more romantic.  My Spanish was fluent by then, after a year and a half in Latin America and having studied it for many years so I did not misunderstand him. I did not misunderstand the words he spoke. I misunderstood his meaning, his intention.

"Yes, I'd like to go somewhere more romantic" I said, assuming he was suggesting we go to a quieter bar and have a drink. The in-your-face flamenco stomping was noisy. I soon learned that by 'more romantic' he meant a place we could have sex.

He drove me even further up into the hills above Grenada, pulled off to the side of a road.  I was in the middle of no where and no one in the world knew where I was but that guy.  When he turned off his car, he let me know he had pulled over to have sex. I said I didn't want to have sex. He punched me in my right eye, cracking me pretty good. I looked around, realized I was in the middle of no where and that guy could have killed me, dumped me out of his car and no one would know how my body got there or even my name, because he could have removed my identification along with my purse.

So I let him have sex with me but it was rape.

When he dropped me off at my hotel, he asked me if I wanted to see him again.  Saying nothing, I slammed the car door as hard as I could and went into my hotel.

When I told my professor, someone I had a close relationship with, about my rape, that professor shocked and hurt me when he said "Oh, don't tell anyone about getting raped. If word gets out, it might ruin my program, less students will sign up for next semester if they know a student was raped."

Next I told him that I was withdrawing from the program and returning to the states.

My Eurailpass was no good for three more months and I didn't want to stay in Spain. I wanted to have some travel adventure before I returned home so I decided to go to Morocco.

I loved train travel in Spain.  People always brought food into the cars. Passenger trains in Spain are different than American trains. They consist of a series of compartments with a bench on either side. There are no big, open cars with rows of seating. The whole train is small rooms lined on either side with benches. And everyone in each room tended to talk to one another, pull out whatever food they brought and shared with everyone.

I remember my train ride from Grenada to Tarifa, the town where the ferry would take me to Morocco. I saw olive groves outside the train windows the entire trip. I had not been aware that Spain grew olives and was known for its olive oil.

When I got off the train in Tarifa, a young Japanese college student, Isao Tamashiro, approached me, speaking in excellent English. He said "I have noticed you speak Spanish well. I don't speak it. Would you help me figure out where to find an inexpensive hotel, get directions to one, ask around and help me?"

Of course I agreed. We both had backpacks. We ended up trudging around a bit, stopping for lunch as well as stopping at a couple hotels before we settled on one. By the time we chose the hotel, Isao had suggested we share a room with twin beds, to save money. I agreed.

I had intended to just spend that night in Tarifa and then get on the ferry to Tangier but Isao said we might never be in Tarifa again. He suggested we stay.

I have no memory of Tarifa, other than the hotel room. It must not have been very interesting, or else it simply paled after Grenada, which had been a capital for the Muslims during the centuries they ruled Southern Spain. The Moorish influence was much more exotic to me than anything I had seen in my Latin American travels. Madrid, of course, was a capital of western culture. Madrid had seemed like just another city, similar to the cites I had seen in Colombia and Mexico but with more modernity.