Morocco Hitch Live

We’ve travelled a decently long distance over the past couple of days, but rather than feeling the weight of that, it’s the conversations we’ve had that have left the most with me. The journey’s been a series of snapshots we’ve taken of the lives – their cultures, families and personal choices – of the people we’ve met, all of whom are at once individual in their experiences, yet universal in their concerns.

In England, of the five hitches we got, there were at least three references to Murphy´s Law, also known as Sod’s Law, or in driving terms, the if-I-bend-down-to-take-a-sip-of-water-right-now-the-light-will-turn-green rule. The British Orthodox Priest was the one who spoke about this at greatest length. Equally interesting was how most of them had reasonably extensive contact with either south-east Asia or the continent we were hitching to – our very first ride had worked in Singapore and visited Morocco, the man in Portsmouth lived in Pattaya half the year and the British Orthodox Priest spent a lot of time in Egypt in the Coptic Church. Might explain why they converted the sympathy which most people felt – and showed through waves, smiles and “thumbs up” signs into actual rides. Who knows?

The French, in the limited interaction I have had with them, are lovely – once they actually bother to speak to you. In a bid to get a ride on the ferry, I’d camped outside the truckers’ lounge with our sign until around 2 in the morning and again at 6 the next morning. I’d spouted all the French I knew at anyone who had stopped to speak to me. We’d even sneaked in to appeal for further help later. When all seemed lost, and we seemed destined to have to get a ride at the ferry terminal itself, a little Frenchman I’d bid “bon voyage” to earlier came back and offered us a right to Tours.
He immediately starting to describe his truck to us in rapidfire French – it turned out he knew no English. “Great,” thought I, “this is going to be interesting.” A French lady dressed to the nines who’d walked past me six times without once looking at me or my sign, now standing in the crowd rushing to disembark suddenly turned round and in perfect English explained to me that this trucker was a good guy who was genuinely trying to help us out and apologised for being unable to help herself. In my delighted state I’d blurted that she had fantastic facility with languages. “Ah,” she said, “but I am French!”

Noel was an absolute dear. He called ahead to other truckers to look for a ride for us and tried his best to keep up the conversation even though it was obvious we could hardly understand him. Unfortunately, lorries aren’t allowed on the road on Sundays, so most trucks weren’t doing long-haul trips.

It was an amazing experience speaking to him in the little French which I did know. Pointing at a cow in Normandy and exclaiming “vache!” caused him to launch into a proud exposition on Norman cows, their milk and cheese and the superiority of French and cuisine Asiatique to horrible and expensive English food. I found out that he hadn’t seen his family for 30 days, or would have probably been on a long-distance trip himself and been able to drive us further. Asking about his home triggered exuberant descriptions of flowers and being two kilometres away from one of the chateaux of the Loire.

Looking out on the endless fields and chateaux that dotted the surroundings, the pleasure palaces of the French kings and their mistresses, within which much of French cuisine as we know it today was honed to perfection, his almost palpable Gallic pride seemed apt – this sure is some way to see France.

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The next trucker friend we made, Eduardo, picked us up at the tollbooth within seconds of our arrival there. He deserves an entire post dedicated to him. For now, I’ll leave you with these little observations: for those among us who’ve read the greats of Latin American literature, my personal favourite being Gabriel Garcia Marquez, living with a homesick Brazilian trucker is an incredible experience – so much of that rich spontaneity shines through everything he does, the experiences he’s chosen for his life and the advice he’s given us, including “don’t leave your nail clippings around, someone might pick them up and cast a spell on you”. Seems like magic-realism is alive and kicking even in the Basque Country, due in no small part to this amazing fellow. Incidentally, he speaks almost no English other than the little he’s picked up through song lyrics. Best of all, he speaks only Portuguese – I have no guidebooks on Portugal, and Brazilian-Portuguese is pretty different from the Continental version. In a mixture of gestures, and inferences based on shades of differences in tone of that beautiful voice of his (you should hear him belt out Elvis hits), the two of us have had the most enriching conversations with him, especially about his wife and children, whom he loves to bits, so much that he came to Europe, a continent he dislikes, to work to support them. Europe, according to Eduardo is where the people are best described by a hand-motion which is at once dismissive and coldly imperious.

Most of the people we’ve hitched with are extremely family-orientated – the truckers tended to be very expressive about this, the English were a lot more muted about their spouses and children, but their love for them still percolated through their British stiff upper-lipped politeness. Perhaps marriage and children, so favoured for the stability they supposedly provide to society really do empower people with a security that allows them to look beyond their rabbit holes to extend a paw to those who need it.

Just the same, almost everyone we’ve met and bothered to listen to us explain our situation has been so kind and polite – the man at the counter at the ferry terminal, unable to give us a discount or free ride, even managed to find us a driver going to Alicante, Spain, telling us to “look for the little guy with two scars on his cheek, you’ll be sorted if you get him to drive you in his van!” The slightly snooty Frenchman at the counter on the ferry, refusing to make an announcement for us over the PA system (“I do not make announcements for personal reasons”, “Morocco? I have been there 25 times”), gave us a knowing grin and said “The Pit Stop Restaurant, some of your friends have had luck there, no reason why you won’t, too”. Even the little manager of the French toll station outside of Bordeaux after chasing us off the motorway asked his subordinates at the tollbooths to let us thumb there instead.
The enduring stereotypes, while certainly having more than a grain of truth in them, are always subsumed by a certain magnanimity of spirit which transcends culture.

I’m really grateful to everybody chance (or God, if you’re me) has brought to us along the way so far, and also to PJ, who, if he reads this any time soon would probably blush, is the reason this dodgy guy on the ferry changed his mind about trying to make me go to Toulouse with him, not that I was having any problem refusing the ride, but having a sleeping guy by your side does make a difference.

Tomorrow, Espagna!