About four days after arriving in Marrakech I realized that I had no idea where my passport was. After searching high and low, I decided that Tucker had probably put mine somewhere safe but that was not to be. Everyone joined the search trying to remember where we had seen it last. No luck! I would have thought that maybe I had done something creative with it after a few glasses of wine but I can’t even use that as an excuse anymore. Tucker comforted me by saying it is just old age.
The good news was we are American and there are Embassies and Consulates all over the world and we had two work days before we were leaving. The bad news is to replace the valuable piece of paper is super complicated.
Siham, the manager of our riad, figured out that the first step was to report the loss to the police and get an official stamped report. This sounds easy but turned into a huge adventure involving two police stations, the post office, three photo shops, and a random shop to buy a stamp. How to get around?
Siham and I venturing out to the great unknown
Siham and I get decked out in our warm clothing ( mine being the crazy bilious green jacket that I bought at JCPenny and causes comments even in the US). We hop on her Peugot motorbike. Anyone who goes to Marrakech should have this experience. The streets are approximately 9 feet wide and are shared by pedestrians, donkey drawn carts, motorbikes, kids playing soccer and shop keepers trying to get tourists to buy their wears. Chaos at best. We weave in and out all over the city. I thought this would be terrifying but it actually was fun. A word of advice: always have a copy of your passport with you, and your driver’s license when traveling. After four hours we had our report in hand.
We now have to go to Casablanca to the consulate. Siham suggests that she take Tucker and me by train but then realized that she had a final exam for her web design class so we hired a driver and off we went. The countryside reminded me of Montana. The Atlas Mountains in the distance and wide open space with nothing growing and few people. Three hours later we arrive at the Consulate.
The building was architecturally hideous with two rows of garbage dumpsters planted with Palm trees in front of the entrance. Security guards were everywhere and no Americans were to be seen. At the third check point we had to have everything scanned and they kept our cell phones, cameras, cords, lipstick and my Starbucks Via Coffee (a very dangerous product). We finally get into the inner sanctum where a US Marine standing guard ( this was the only American we came into contact with) and start the process. One and a half hours later we have the new passport – good for one year.
The only other complication was that I had to get out of Morocco. They are very careful who leaves the country so exiting with a passport that you didn’t enter with created a new set of standing in line with lots of papers. Thank goodness we had allowed over 3 hours at security and check-in.
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