Moroccan Travelogue, Part 7

A night of perfect silence and total darkness accommodated 10 hours of sleep. I would have slept longer, but someone's alarm in another room woke me up.

Monday is a bad day to be a tourist in Toledo or anywhere else in Spain, because many of the sites are closed. Nonetheless, the weather was perfect and it was enjoyable simply to walk the streets of this amazing medieval city.

I began by walking to the Alcázar, even though I knew it would be closed. Originally built by the Romans as a palace, it came to be used as a fortress and then was repeatedly destroyed and rebuilt by the Visigoths, Moors, and Spaniards. Because of its size and its placement at the highest spot in the city, it is one of the most identifiable structures in Toledo.

Across the street, I stopped at a café for breakfast. Like most Europeans, Spaniards seem to love coffee and a typical café has more coffee variations than a Starbucks. There are different cool sounding Spanish names for all the coffee drinks of varying ratios of coffee and milk. I think all coffee tastes like noxious demon bile, but I felt like I had to try at least one cup as part of the whole Spanish café experience, so I ordered a leche manchada to go with my chocolate-filled pastry. That's the variety that contains the least amount of coffee. Once I added plenty of sugar, I actually managed to down the entire cup.

My next stop was one of the few tourist sites actually open. Sinagoga Santa Maria La Blanca was originally built in 1180 to serve as a mosque. It was later purchased by Jews and used as the city's principal synagogue until the Jews were chased out by the Catholics in 1492; the synagogue was then converted into a church building. Today, you can find elements of all three religions inside the structure, but the Muslim influence clearly dominates. You'd swear you were in a mosque except for a large wooden altarpiece bearing Christian icons that looks like it was plopped down against the front wall as an afterthought. It's a bit ironic that the Catholics ran the Jews out and then installed iconic images and carvings, most of which depict Jewish characters from the Bible.

I continued walking until I reached the backside of the medieval city and I then crossed over the river and headed for the modern part of Toledo. I came upon some Roman ruins that weren't even mentioned in my guidebook. Built in 192 BC, Circo Romano could hold 13,000 spectators. All that's left are a few arches.

I had already made the decision to stay a second night in Toledo, so that meant that I had time to take a day trip somewhere else. I made my way to the bus station and bought a ticket to the small town of Consuegra for less than 4 euros. The bus followed a driving tour that took us by several crumbling Spanish castles and some beautiful countryside.

I went to Consuegra for the same reason as most tourists, to see the castle and windmills of Cresteria Manchega, which inspired the imagery found in Cervantes's Don Quixote. I climbed to the top of the hill overlooking the town and walked among the windmills. A busload of Japanese tourists spoiled the image of La Mancha that I had formed in my head, but they soon left and I then had the hilltop to myself. I loved it. The view itself would have been worth the climb, but the white windmill towers with the little blue window frames made for a unique experience. It made me wish I had brought a copy of Don Quixote with me on my trip. Instead, I had been reading Crime and Punishment--an excellent book, but the ravings of a criminal mind in 19th century Russia just didn't seem to fit well with Spanish castles and windmills.

I returned to Toledo with plenty of time remaining to do nothing. As I headed back into the medieval part of the city, I found a dirt trail that allowed me to stay at the base of the plateau as I walked along the river's edge. Before long, I started making an ascent, but stopped when I came to a view that couldn't be passed over. I sat down to watch and listen to the rushing water below. A duck was paddling back and forth in an eddy. Above the river on the other side was a medieval castle and towering above me on my side was the Alcázar. To my left was a massive stone bridge that seemed to stretch all of the way back into the middle ages. Against the riverbank was an old mill tower and pigeons were flying in loops from its rooftop, out and over the river and back again. At that moment, I wouldn't have traded my place in the sun for any museum, palace, or monastery.

I went to a nice restaurant for supper that night. It was after 7:00, but that was still too early to run into the dinner crowd, so I was the only patron. It meant that I had my own personal waiter who was very attentive, but he still managed to cheat himself out of a good tip when he made me mad by giving me 9 euros and 93 cents in coins when making change. I left him a pile of pennies.

Tuesday, April 1, 2003

My last day in Spain. The next bed I would sleep in would be my own.

I took the train from Toledo to Madrid, arriving at the station with plenty of time to spare. I converted my currency back into dollars and then found a café inside the train station where I sat down for a leche manchada. Am I becoming a coffee person? Say it isn't so! No, just one last taste of Spain.

I had to make multiple subway changes to get to the airport, but still managed to arrive more than an hour before my flight time. My Metro card was still good for five more rides, so I decided to hang out by the Metro ticket machine and look for someone whom I deemed worthy of giving it to. As soon as I got there, I spotted a group of American college girls getting in line to buy tickets. They would have been an obvious choice, but I was still getting my bearings and I hesitated too long. I thought that I wouldn't have to wait long for another American to come along, but the ever-present American tourist suddenly vanished. I ended up waiting for almost 20 minutes before one came by whom I considered to be deserving of my generosity. He expressed the proper amount of gratitude and I headed for the Continental ticket counter, now satisfied.

It turned out to be a much longer walk than I anticipated. Passing by a bank of departure monitors, I saw that my flight was already boarding. I quickened my pace. When I finally arrived, there was only 35 minutes remaining before the scheduled departure time.

Before going any further with this tale, would you care to guess how far to Oklahoma I got before being hassled by airport screeners? If you are guessing the ticket counter at the Madrid airport, you are correct.

Actually, "the Ordeal" began before I ever reached the actual counter. The woman who stopped me was wearing a dress uniform and I assumed she was a Continental boarding agent, but she turned out to be an airport security agent. She glanced at my ticket and passport and then asked whether I had any bags to check. I said "no," and that's when the trouble began.

I should explain that I was intentionally traveling light. I carried no luggage other than my backpack, which I was treating as a carry-on. It wasn't one of those large hiker's backpacks, but was the size of a high school book bag, so it could easily fit in an overhead bin. I thought that by travelling lean and mean, I would be able to get on and off planes more quickly and would reduce the likelihood of being held up by security goons. Well, the goons failed to go along with my plan.

She couldn't believe that all I had was one small backpack. "Did you check in other bags earlier?" she asked.

"No."

"Are you shipping back some bags separately? Maybe on another airline?"

"No."

"How long have you been gone?"

"Three weeks. Well, twenty-two days."

"And this is the only luggage you have?"

"Yes."

"Are you travelling with anyone?"

"No."

She didn't like that. Next, she asked me to name all of the places I had been, which I did--in detail. That wasn't good enough.

"What are the names of the hotels you stayed at?"

"I don't remember." I wasn't helping myself much, was I? But did she really expect me to remember the names of 14 different hotels with foreign names?

"Do you have any of the receipts?"

"I don't think so."

"Did you travel by bus or train?"

"Both."

"Do you have the receipts?"

"No."

It was time for a closer examination of my passport. I knew that nothing good could come of that. She inspected every passport stamp, which took some time. Then she came to the crescent moon.

"When did you go to Turkey?"

"Just over two years ago."

It was time to get a supervisor. Once she arrived, I had four security agents working on me simultaneously. She started from the beginning, asking me all of the same questions I had already answered, including which cities I had visited. Then she asked whether I had any maps or brochures from those cities. Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! We had a winner! I reached into my backpack and pulled out a fistful of city maps and ticket stubs from various tourist sites. I started laying them out on the table one at a time, but she stopped me after the first two. She was satisfied. I thought that my ultimate salvation might end up being this very journal that you are now reading, but it wasn't necessary. The supervisor told the Continental desk agent to start processing my boarding pass.

That didn't mean that question time had come to an end, however. The first security agent had to complete a written report on me since I had caused so much trouble, so I got to answer some of the same questions for a third time, along with the standard questions like, "Did I pack my own bag?" I looked down at my watch and saw that I had about 15 minutes to make my flight. In hindsight, I decided that the 20 minutes I spent looking for the right person to give my Metro ticket to might not been the best use of my time.

She completed the report and then stuck a red tag on my passport. I doubted that this was so that I could pick up my prize at the gate. I noticed that everyone else had received a blue tag. That made me feel oh so special.

I was handed my boarding pass. "Now you have to hurry!" Of course.

Once I got out of sight of the security personnel, I looked down at the red tag and seriously considered scraping it off. No one had told me not to, and I knew that its presence could only cause me more problems. I ultimately decided against it, however, which was probably the correct decision. As I neared the gate, I saw another female security agent lock her eyes on me and start speaking into a walkie-talkie. I could imagine what she was saying:

"I've got a visual on the red tag, that's affirmative. The red tag is now approaching my perimeter."

She took my boarding pass and passport and escorted me to the screening table where four men in green uniforms and badges were waiting for me. That's right--it takes four officers to handle a dangerous red tag like me. One of them went through my bag, removing and inspecting every item. Meanwhile, another one ran his wand over me and asked me to remove my shoes. (Tell me you saw that one coming.) As he ran his wand over one of my shoes, it went off. Of course, there is no metal of any kind in my shoes, so he must have hit the beep button for entertainment purposes. It generated the expected grunts of interest from the other officers and a more thorough inspection of my shoe ensued. Once the entire platoon finished with everything, they let me pass.

I boarded the plane and the door was shut behind me. I had just made it.

The in-flight movies were Live to Die Another Day and Two Weeks Notice. The meal was chicken cordon bleu.

It was lightly snowing when we touched down in Newark, NJ. Terror Alert Level: Orange.

By this point, you can be sure that I had scraped the red tag off my passport, but I still received odd questioning at the U.S. immigration booth. "Have you ever been arrested?"

"No."

"Never?"

I gave it some more thought. "No."

Then it was the Agriculture and Wildlife Inspector's turn. For everyone else, he simply took their declaration cards and waved them through. For me, however, once he saw that I had been to Morocco, the questioning began.

"Why were you in Morocco?"

"Pleasure."

"Where else did you go?"

"Spain . . . Gibraltar."

"What do you do for a living?"

"Slacker." Or maybe I said I was unemployed.

"Let's see your passport."

"Here comes trouble," I thought. But after thumbing through it, he let me go.

The fun part came next. I walked right past the baggage claim area and headed for the domestic terminal. I had been at the gate for twenty minutes before any of my fellow passengers showed up after rechecking their bags.

My flight to Houston was trouble free. As I tried to board my flight to Tulsa, however, the boarding agent punched my information into the computer and it started beeping. He couldn't figure out why, so he just shrugged his shoulders and told me to board.

The red tag had slipped through! The Slacker was home!