T A B L E_T A L K Why can't Africa get its act together? A discussion of this and of the meddling of non-African nations can be found here in Table Talk   How-to, why-not and what-for -- find it all at barnesandnoble.com Search by:  Keyword Title Author     R E C E N T L Y Mediterranean reverie By Anne Dowie Nestled in the rugged mountains overlooking the Ligurian Sea, Cinque Terre is the source of endless scenic and culinary delights (03/28/99) Ring in the loser By Mark Schatzker What you do on New Year's Eve 1999 says more about your economic -- and social -- status than anything else (03/26/99) Night of the living kava By Eric Hansen A traveler trips out on a magical root in the South Pacific (03/25/99) May I help you? By Jack Goldfarb From saffron to leather to edible silver paper, Johnny the market boy knew where to find it in the teeming Calcutta marketplace (03/24/99) Transylvanian nightmare By Jeffrey Tayler A young man bears the lasting burden of Romania's depraved dictator with a dignity that transcends his grim surroundings (03/23/99) Browse the Wanderlust Feature archives Wanderlust's Official Travel Book Partner		GOING WITHOUT AT RAMADAN | PAGE 1, 2 - - - - - - - - - - About an hour or two later, I felt the next pang of general restraint -- illogically fluctuating mood swings. My generally calm demeanor spiraled to deeply agitated, bordering on volatile. My traveling companion was experiencing a similar strain. We started to bicker over which streets to take, what we were seeing, almost anything. And we began to see this happening all around. In the afternoon hours, we witnessed two scuffles between groups of men and three men being escorted into the police station. It's another irony of the fast -- you go without to better yourself, and as a result of the hunger, you get really nasty to one another. Agitation hung jaggedly in the diesel-laden air. The shop owner hawking his wares became a hardship. My friend and I walked through long lanes in the souks, some winding around back to where we had started. I became frustrated by my inability to see that I was walking in circles. The shop owners would see me come by for the second or third time and pick up their haggling where they left off. I didn't want to deal with shopping. I didn't want to haggle. I was tired of people staring at me. I hated the crowd pushing in every direction. I marveled at how much patience these people had for all the delays, the random loaded mules lumbering down the narrow passage, the noise and air pollution from scooters passing on the same route. Even a sign for Coca-Cola in Arabic script bothered me. I wanted out. We decided to leave the enclosed markets and return to our hotel. The lack of food, walking and general unpleasant vibe had worn both of us into exhaustion. We passed through a side street on the way to the hotel, and when a young man offered us hashish, my friend yelled, "No!" and shoved past him. The man returned with, "Fuck your wife!" My companion turned with rage, "Hey, fuck you, motherfucker!" By then, the guy had disappeared, but my friend just snapped. He broke from my side and tore off in the direction of the man. Panic rushed over me as I saw him dash off. I didn't know what would happen. I was suddenly alone and surrounded by possible pissed-off friends of the dealer, but even though I felt like a target, I couldn't help shaking my head and laughing at the lunacy of situation. I waited in the passage with only people's stares to keep me company until my friend returned. He was breathless and expressed disbelief with how he had lost control. He said he didn't know what he would have done had he caught the guy. It was crazy and yet somehow appropriate. That's what happens when you have a city filled with people starving themselves for the first time in 11 months. We headed to our room at the Hotel Smara, where we planned to rest until the Salatul Maghrib. When we arrived, Mustafa, a young man who had just finished school and started working at the hotel, smiled and greeted us. My first impression of him had been when we were pricing rooms upon arrival. He was listening to an English-language instructional tape that cut between bits of Lionel Ritchie's ballad "Hello" and British English speakers reciting the lyrics to teach usage. We were his first American guests, Mustafa had told us. Now he greeted us and asked us how our day had passed. We explained our agitation and exhaustion from the day of fasting. But why are you fasting? he asked. We wanted to try it out, my friend explained. And out of respect, I added. He smiled. We retired to our room. It must have been around 4:30 or 5 p.m. I lay on the bed and felt an immense weight lift from me. The room's cool air fell like a blanket over my weary frame. It was as if all the muscles in my body clung to the stuffed futonlike mattress and refused to let me move. I barely spoke. After a few minutes, I fell asleep. About an hour later, I woke to the sound of the shrill, amplified voice singing the call to prayer. It is a strange noise that lingers below the hum of the city. You wonder if you're hearing anything at all. Then you listen more closely, concentrating on the softer drone until it slowly rises to where it becomes the siren of sunset. Next you begin to hear other calls rising out of the distance from mosques all over the city. It is a cacophony of religious outpouring, and becomes a way of marking time throughout the day. At that moment, it was a celebration that my day without food had finally ended. I didn't remember my vow to fast or my reasons behind it, I only rejoiced in the fact that food was on the way. Elation set in. I fantasized about the day's "breakfast," a term most Moroccans use to describe the meal taken at sundown during Ramadan. It included a bowl of harira -- a traditional Moroccan soup -- plus brochettes, pita, rice, fries and mint tea. I could almost taste the first bite. I smiled at my friend, who now seemed like the perfect person to celebrate my first meal with. He understood my sentiment and seemed to return it. We left the hotel and meandered through the thin streets of the medina toward the plaza. All the surfaces shone orange-red from the setting sun. It cast a surreal glow over the place that earlier had felt like a prison to me. On that pilgrimage to the harira stand, I decided to fast again the next day. If this was the high for all the "suffering" throughout the day, I wanted more. Upon arriving at the stand, the young man who had so cordially wooed us into eating there the night before greeted us and guided us to benches among other hungry Moroccan men who had just locked up their shops and come for their first meal of the day. The young man gave my friend and me each a bowl of soup. I asked a man beside me in French to pass the salt and gestured my thanks. My shoulders slumped forward. I let my body fall limp and lifted the soup bowl near my face. Its sweet aroma pierced the dirty air around us and sent a wave of delight through my entire body. I slipped into a slow trance of spooning the hot broth into my mouth. I was without thought, like a robot mechanically maneuvering the utensil. For some reason, I glanced up between bites and shuddered. I saw my reflection. My traveling companion, all the men eating beside me, and I were all slumped over, all spooning in silence as the sun ran slowly over the plaza like golden syrup. Some invisible force held me, and for the first time I didn't feel like an outsider. We had all fasted that day for the first time in a long while. We had all faced the mean-spirited ambiance that comes with physical resistance. And now, we were together eating a family meal. In the days that followed on my journey through Morocco, I spoke to many people about fasting and my reasons for doing it. Those people seemed impressed that I should want to respect the measures that they took for what they believed as well as to subject myself to such restraint. In doing so, I found a place that I never knew existed. Quite frankly, I believed that people had forgotten the idea of fasting and the inner strength that comes when you eliminate extravagance. I went to Marrakesh to see -- and left having lived. SALON | March 30, 1999 Emily Zuzik is film editor for Siren Magazine. She has also written for Feed, PAPER, Maxi, San Francisco Weekly and Salon.