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“Fez is really just the medieval city that it was,” Mr. Seffar went on, contrasting his hometown with its fast-developing jet-set sister and rival, Marrakesh. “We are a little scared of what Marrakesh has become. Fez is the soul of Morocco. It’s the last bastion of what Morocco really is.” – Abdelfettah Seffar, Fes, from the article “The Soul of Morocco,” NYT, 4/8/2007
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While I dearly love Fes, this man has a very typical Fassi mindset. He forgets the thousands of years of Amazigh ????? that’s still in evidence in hundreds of little Berber villages across the Atlas, not to mention all the various unique aspects of other Arab areas in Morocco – Khemisset, Nador, Oujda, Safi… There’s still a lot of “authentic” Morocco to be found outside the main tourist areas – which, by the way, includes Fes and its knobby-kneed crowds of French gawkers.