16th Stop - Rabat

Another improvised stop on my tour. I met Nezha, a JCI member from Casablanca and this year’s national treasurer last year at the JCI World Congress in Tunisia. I contacted her about my project and she really wanted to help out in any way she could. Already, from afar, she gave me precious info and helped me arrange accommodations in Casablanca. Before leaving Tangier, she asked if I wanted to stop in Rabat to meet her friend from the university, Adnane. Sure!

Same old story, no phone and only a Moroccan GPS to rely on, we decided to meet at the train station at 5:30 pm. I had a few minutes to spare, and I stopped twice for directions to make sure I was on the right track. I went the wrong way and was about 1 km from the station when I rolled down my window for a third set of directions. Surprise! It was Adnane in the car with his father! I think my luck is starting to turn around, all it took was to make it to Africa.

Random people.

We parked the car and went for a nice long walk through the medina and along the waterfront. Adnane told me about the cultural work he does for the British Council and we talked about future plans and ambitions. He brought me to the coolest café nestled into the walls of the fortified city, overlooking the river estuary and beaches. The view was magnificent and the mint tea even better.

As we walked over to a fruit juice café, he asked me if I had time tomorrow before leaving to give a talk on leadership to a group of high school students participating in an entrepreneurship program. Of course, I would love to! Mohammed, who is in charge of it, joined us and we ironed out all of the details over an almond, strawberry, banana, kiwi, orange juice cocktail. They went to the mosque to pray and I stayed in the café to watch the world cup final on the smallest screen you can imagine. Adnane’s patience for soccer being what it is, when they came back and the game went into overtime, we decided to go back home.

Adnane practicing his presidential smile

Luckily, Adnane’s dad was watching the game so we caught the second half of overtime and Spain’s game winning goal. I knew they were going to win all along (see prediction in previous post). I just wish Erik B. had been there with me, along with his conversational football skills--just like old times in Ezzarha! Benito, a guest of Adnane’s from the Netherlands, came back from the ambassador’s residence not too happy. Benito would also be giving a talk during the leadership seminar tomorrow. We stayed up a little longer then went off to bed.

I woke up early the next morning and had breakfast with Adnane’s dad. I really appreciated our conversation. He told me that he retired from a government ministry and now dabbles in real estate and is very active as president of a retired persons associations. His cardinal rule for sales is not to try to please your buyer at all costs and lie about things when you don’t know. For me, trust is one of the best assets to have when selling something, and you gain people’s trust by being honest with them.

Benito and I left for the school and gave our presentations later that morning. Leadership is a vast subject but I decided to stick with a few simple notions like focus on the positive, smile, listen to others, and create a vision that others can believe in. Unfortunately, I couldn’t stay for all of Benito’s talk. He was on a roll in the beginning and I hope to see him again in the future to find out more!

Time for me to hit the road again but before I do, thanks again to Nezha, Adnane and his family, Mohammed, Marouane and Benito for such a memorable time in Rabat!

Next stop: Casablanca!

15th Stop - Tangier

The plan was to drive down to Tarifa at the bottom of Spain, take the ferry, and somehow connect with Bess in Tangier later that evening. Again, still no phone (had the phone but had to wait until Tuesday to get international mode) and no more GPS once I get to Morocco.

I stopped for lunch and information after being on the road for about 4 hours and learned that the port in Tarifa wasn’t allowing cars and that I would have to go to Algeciras. Ok, no problem, I hadn’t got my ticket yet and I was still on the right track.

I rolled into Algeciras in record time. In fact, I had the time I needed to try to get the Western Union cash transfer I was waiting for. I parked and started running around from place to place to find a phone I could use to call a toll free number and get the codes from Visa. Pay phones don’t allow you to call toll free numbers in Spain. I finally found a travel agency who would let me use their phone and got Visa on the line but it took forever. I waited on hold for 20 minutes, then decided it was time to get back to my car.

Perfect timing. As I went back to the car, I saw a tow truck, policeman, and quickly realized they were towing my car! Oh shit, pardon my French, this is not good. How would I get it out of the impound lot with no registration papers (see Brussels blog), driver’s license and no money to pay the three parking tickets I got in Madrid? I don’t know what I did but I managed to plead with the policeman in a mix of my 25-word Spanish vocabulary, French, English, and non-verbal gestures. While trying to explain that my papers were stolen, I mimed someone trying to steal his wallet. Except there was no wallet, just a gun. Not a good idea.

The policeman accepted my €35, made a note that I paid in part and let me go with my car. Whew! Now I just had to get to Tangier and find Bess.

I met Bess through her husband Jon, another former English assistant I had the pleasure of meeting ten years ago and with whom I recently made history in Washington DC during the Obama inauguration. Obama was making most of the history but we did our fair share, too. Anyways, who cares about Jon, back to Bess.

Bess is studying Arabic and plans to teach national strategic decision-making to high ranking military officers. She is on a scholarship in an intensive Arabic program at the American School in Tangier for the summer. This is where I knew I could find her.

Night fell while I was getting through customs at the port. Great, I was given two different Moroccan SIM cards at the port, now I could call Bess. Not quite, stupid phone was blocked. I asked one of the guys giving out the cards if there was a way to get it unblocked. He told me I could go to Derb Ghallif once I get to Casablanca to get it “flashed” so it will work with any SIM card I want. Well that’s not going to help me now, “Can I use your phone to call a friend?”

One of things I really appreciated in Morocco was everyone’s willingness to help you out if they could. Sure enough, he gave me his phone; unfortunately, Bess didn’t pick up. No problem, I’ll head into Tangier I thought to myself and ask for directions when I get there. I got there 30 minutes later, but wish the highway exits were more explicit: you have East Tangier and West Tangier, no Center.

I could feel I was getting close, or maybe lost, so I stopped at a public phone boutique to call Bess again. Still no luck. I did manage to talk to Said, a friend of Nezha’s friend Djamai (more on them to come), but he wouldn’t get out of work until midnight. Time to ask for directions. The American School of Tangiers, sure, just go straight here, through the round about and up the hill. Then stop and ask for directions again. Ok. After a series of consulting my Moroccan GPS (random helpful people on the street), I pulled up in front of the school. The gatekeeper had me write down Bess’ and my name on a newspaper and disappeared. He reappeared moments later followed by Bess!

After meeting her classmates, roommate, and program director, we went out for some tea and got lost. We thought we were at the Rain Sky bar but it turns out we ended up at its copycat a block or so away. We eventually made it back to the dorms and chatted with Maya and Nate. It turns out that Nate is a former English teacher and used to live next to Nice. He explained how he tries to encourage young people to spend some time abroad teaching English. I couldn’t agree with him more. I had some of the most important, memorable experiences of my life teaching in France and Vietnam some time back.

As for the picture you see above, I couldn't resist. The pedestrian crosswalk lights are animated in Tangier. The little green man starts walking slowly and gradually works his way into a full sprint before turning red!

We had a nice big breakfast the next day with some other people from Bess’ program and then parted ways. I want to thank Bess and Adriana for helping me find a place to stay in Tangier for the night and wish everyone the best of luck with their Arabic studies!

Next stop: Rabat!

14th Stop - Madrid

Who would have ever thought that traffic in London would be so bad on a Tuesday morning? Obviously not me. At least I had my new GPS that I bought used on eBay the day before. As it brought me closer to Portsmouth, it was clearly indicating that I go in the opposite direction and not follow the “Portsmouth Docks” sign. As it was very early in our relationship, I wasn’t sure if I could trust it to go all the way... so I went towards the docks. Bad idea.

A stop at a hotel for directions and in a MacDonald parking lot to make a phone call via Skype later, and I realized I had totally gone in the wrong direction. Of course, the GPS was laughing at me as it displayed an ETD of 25 minutes and inferred that I would probably miss my ferry to Spain. Time to test the limits of the Mercedes on British highways!

I made it, just in time, got settled into my cabin and went out on the deck for lunch. Instead of taking the short ferry and driving through France, I took the more expensive option of taking a ferry to Santander, Spain. In the end, this actually worked out quite nicely. I worked on a translation, which more then compensated for the additional cost, got to sleep, and saved more than a 1,000 km of CO2.

I initially hadn’t planned to stop in Madrid but I got a message from a colleague, Virginia, inviting me for a few days if I happened to pass through. Ok, why not? I met Virginia at a translation conference last summer in Ohrid, Macedonia and was looking forward to talking to her about business. It turns out that she was recently promoted to Senior Resources Manager, though we both agreed that Super Senior Resources Manager would be a better title! While I was there, she had another offer to take on more responsibilities in quality control. Good luck Virginia, I know you’ll be great!

I didn’t do much tourism in Madrid. I mostly caught up on some work I had to do, went to the pool, and visited with Virginia and her roommate Julia. It was very nice to be in Spain for their semi-final victory against Germany.

I want to thank Virginia for hosting me for three nights and three bednets and look forward to seeing you again in Prague maybe!

Next stop: Tangier, Morocco!

13th Stop - London

Finally, another request to road-share, this time from Bruges to London. Ok, why not, but this is going to be very complicated because I no longer have a cell phone. Not having a cell phone, puts you back in touch with yesteryear, when you had to fix a set time and place to meet someone and even go so far as to where a specific color, especially when they have no idea what you look like. Today, it’s as easy as let’s meet somewhere in the city, sometime in the morning, we’ll call each other to nail down an exact time and location depending on where we both are at the time we call! A combination of failed email confirmation and the lack of a specific meeting point behind the Bruges train station doomed my attempt to meet Victoria. Bad luck strikes again.

My swing through Bruges ate up precious time and I had to gun it to make my ferry on time. Great, 15 minutes before it’s leaving, I made it... or not. “Sorry sir, the platform has been raised, you’ll have to wait for the next one in two hours.” Mitigated luck, I had to wait but could work on a translation I had to do and they didn’t charge me extra.

I was kind of worried about driving on the wrong side of the road, but in the end, it was quite easy. I think having the wheel on the left side helped. I made it safe and sound to London but had a few things to take care of before meeting up with Jimmy, one of my best friends from high school.

Visa had set up an emergency transfer via Western Union so I could get some cash. London is an expensive city, I was going to need it. Unfortunately, they gave me the wrong codes and I couldn’t get the money. So I stopped at an HSBC in Lewisham and withdrew money at the “world’s local bank”. Thanks to my status as a Premier client, I can withdraw cash in any HSBC around the world. That’s cool.

It was so great to finally see Jimmy again, meet his wife Oanh and their newborn baby boy, Miles. We took a nice walk through the park that evening with Miles and Jimmy filled me in on everything that happened in Vietnam since Anaïs and I left five years ago. His stories actually convinced me to change my itinerary and stop by Vietnam. Oanh made an excellent chicken dinner that night and I must say that Jimmy lucked out and married not only a beautiful, friendly, and dynamic woman, but also an excellent cook.

The next two days I did private Wordfast trainings in-company and in-library, but more importantly, struggled with parking. Three minutes late with the meter and I had a ticket for £40! On Friday, I ended up parking in the most expensive parking garage I could find, after searching for hours it seemed, then had to take the tube into the congestion zone.

Friday evening, we met up with Jimmy’s friends from Vietnam, Esther and Liam at the Commercial Tavern on Commercial Road for an afterwork. But the fun only began there, we later stopped at a Burger King in a tube station and got whoppered up. While making a connection, Jimmy recognized a girl they all knew from Vietnam. sure enough, it was her, totally random running into her in the tube on a Friday night in a city with millions of people. Our final destination, Madame JoJo’s on the West End for a deep soul and funk dance party till the wee hours of the night. We grabbed a night bus home; unfortunately, both of us fell asleep. I woke up first, then woke Jimmy up. Jimmy ran to the front of the bus without saying a word while I asked someone if we had passed Camden Town. “Camden Town, yeah, like 25 minutes ago!” Luckily, we got off and another bus going in the opposite direction came 10 minutes later.

The next night we went out to a house party after having tapas and cheering on Spain to win their quarter-final match. The house party was hosted by a friend of a friend of a friend from Vietnam! It was interesting meeting the staff from expedia.com, some actors and film production crew from a recent movie, and a contingent of Spaniards from Malaga who were there visiting someone...

We celebrated Oanh and Jimmy’s one year wedding anniversary in a park with Hiroko, Esther, and Liam. Not sure if it was a coincidence but there was an arts festival going on and we got to see dancers and a play set in the trees.

One last highlight of my time in London was the indian restaurant we ate at Monday night. Note to self, stop eating once I start feeling full, I don’t have to eat everything on the table. We all had a hard time standing up and walking out of there!

A big thanks to my Wordfast trainees, Alison and Kristin, Liam, Esther, Hiroko, and everyone else I met during my stay in London. A special thanks to Oanh, Jimmy, and Miles for their hospitality. Together, we’ll help protect six families over the next five years from contracting malaria. Looking forward to seeing you all again soon. Oh, and best of luck Jimmy in your new job at Coca-Cola!

Next stop: Madrid!