Sunday, November 16, 2014

Mediterranean 2014 - part six



Tangier, Morocco. I check my 1881 Handbook to the Mediterranean: 'To a stranger who has not travelled in the East, the first view of Tangier is very striking ... he finds himself transported into a city as thoroughly oriental as a page of the 'Thousand and One Nights'.'



I step off the ship, run the gauntlet of irritating 'guides' and am soon sharing the Kasbah's battlements with a cat.


Within sight of Spain and well used to foreigners, in a progressive country by Arab standards, Tangier is hardly backward. But the Medina still offers wonderful photography. Using a compact camera, I shoot from the waist, hoping to be as unobtrusive as possible. 










Chance takes me to St. Andrew’s Anglican Church built when Tangier was an international city, ruled by the British, French and Spanish.


In the churchyard, a small Commonwealth War Cemetery - an RAF crew that died together February 21, 1944. The stones are close as it was difficult to tell the individual bodies. One is a Canadian in this lovely Christian haven in the heart of an Arab city.