CASABLANCA
‘THE OLD CITY IS ONE OF
CASABLANCA’S LEAST
APPRECIATED TREASURES’
machines, stacks of old magazines tied up with string, photograph
albums, chandeliers, pipe stands and cutlery canteens.
Abdul-Kader pulls something out from inside his shirt and hands
it to one of the shopkeepers. A leatherbound notebook – the cover
damp from sweat, the pages inside filled with tight French script.
‘They found it under the floorboards of the villa,’ he says. ‘To the
right person, it could be worth a lot.’A little later, his pocket bulging
with banknotes, Abdul-Kader is almost home. Rather than reside in
the Art Deco quarter, he prefers the old medina, no more than a
stone’s throw away from the great boulevard.
The French walled the old city, which they regarded as an eyesore,
and did their best to pretend it wasn’t there. A honeycomb of slender
streets, it’s one of Casablanca’s least appreciated treasures. Awash
with activity from morning to night, the medina hasn’t changed
much in the last hundred years. There are carts laden with tomatoes,
melons and prickly pears. Men play draughts with upturned bottle
caps, their wives gossiping in doorways. Children charge through
the streets with hoops, or carry the family’s bread to be baked at the
communal oven on flat wooden trays. Red-shirted watersellers ring
their bells. Mothers hurry to the hammam with their daughters,
plastic buckets under their arms.
Back in the Christian cemetery, Mohammed is closing up for the
night. ‘I spend my days looking after the Christians here,’ he says.
‘And I feel a great responsibility to them and their families. Although
I look after them, I am myself not a Christian. We of both faiths are
“People of the Book”. We are bound by our belief in the same God.’
Mohammed locks the door in the whitewashed wall, then glances
down at his watch, as the evening muezzin rings out over
Casablanca. I must hurry,’ he says. ‘It’s time for me to go to say my
prayers at the mosque!’wheels as it is speeding feet. At the evening greyhound races,
throngs of labourers blow their day’s wage on a few fatigued old dogs
reeling and panting around the course.
Like the cemetery, and much of French Casablanca, the
Vélodrome is in danger of being cleared for housing. With land
prices soaring, just about anything left by the French is on the
hit-list. Old villas and apartment buildings, warehouses and shops
- they’re being ripped down at an alarming rate. Close to the Stade
Vélodrome, a wrecking ball is doing battle with a pretty little villa,
shrouded by bougainvillea and overgrown palms. Across from the
commotion and the dust, Abdul-Kader waits in the shade. One of
hundreds of junk-hunters, he pays a few dirhams to salvage treasure
from fresh demolition sites. Wrought-iron bannisters and roll-top
baths, lead gutters and porcelain tiles, shutters, windows, and
mahogany doors – it’s all heaved in donkey-carts to the sprawling
junkyard of Soco de Moina.
Lovingly, Abdul-Kader runs a hand over the edge of a vast Art
Deco washbasin, fashioned in Paris a lifetime ago. ‘My wife tells me
I’m sentimental,’ he says, ‘and that I shouldn’t care so much about
this stuff. But, look at it – it’s a work of art!’ The day’s pickings are
soon sold to a dealer for a handful of crumpled banknotes. Before
heading home to spend the evening watching Egyptian soap operas,
Abdul-Kader slips down a covered alleyway behind the junkyard.
A labyrinth of narrow lanes spans out in all directions. It’s
crammed with little antique shops, each one packed floor-to-ceiling
with loot. Most of it dates to the inter-war years and the era of the
French. There are gramophone players and mechanical espresso
TAHIR SHAH has had a long love affair with this misunderstood city,
explored in his book The Caliph’s House: A Year in Casablanca.Atlantic waves break along
the Corniche west of the
Hassan II MosqueCASABLANCA