Mustaph/fas of the world ain't nothing but trouble.

turns out that Mustapha, after "borrowing" 100 dirhams (about 15 dollars) from me on the day I left - because he "really really needed to go back to the desert right away to work and he couldn't find his brother etc etc" which was such obvious bullshit I originally said "no way" but then felt bad in case, just in case, he was telling the truth...it's only $15 I told myself - stayed in Essaouira for the ramainder of the festival.

I was not amused to run into him on the streets of Marrakech shortly after Phil left. I've decided that he's (Mustapha, not Phil) quite definitely profoundly stupid, but it's a cunning sort of stupid if you know what I mean.

Mustapha seemed to have fogotten the lie he told me and greeted me like my best buddy, followed me around Jemaa el Fna for about an hour while I mostly ignored him, tried to find out where I was staying, promised to return my money...whatever. He did look a little worried when he found out I was going to be going back to Essaouira. I gave him the slip and haven't seen him since.

Back in Essaouira I discovered that Mustapha had told numerous people that I was his girlfriend of 5 years (oh HELL no, that would be like doing it with a retarded monkey and if you have ever seen Mustapha dance then you know what I mean), had tried to rip Adil off, had stayed for the entire festival, blah blah blah. One day when hanging out with Benedicte and Phil and Mohammed, Mohammed had done some shopping for Benedicte to try to get a good price for her, as opposed to the ripoff tourist price. Mohammed told me the other day that Mustapha expressed shock and surprise that Mohammed had been honest with Benedicte about the price he had paid for the items..."why don't you make some profit for yourself?".

I have now had a series of paranoid revelations such as:
- if Hassan stole the money then he and Mustapha probably split it, or it was Mustapha himself who really stole it when we were in the desert
- the thing with the police in Ouarzazate may have been fake
- one time at the Gnawa Festival I was in the crowd with Mustapha, someone grabbed my ass really quickly and immediately Mustapha collared a little kid that had been walking past and started yelling at him in Arabic. The kid looked really really confused...I now think it was Mustapha who grabbed my ass and then blamed it on someone else to create a situation where he was my "protector". Although I did get groped a couple other times that night when Mustapha was nowhere to be found.

One very frustrating thing is that people are often very very willing to pass on negative information about other acquaintances, but only after waiting for a while. Like Mohammed only telling me the thing about the shopping yesterday. Like Adil only telling me about being Mustapha's 'girlfriend' after I returned to Essaouira. They could have told me this weeks ago.

The worst example of this relates to NEWMustafa, yes yet another one, who I met on my first day back in Essaouira (Canada Day in fact) while I was waiting in a cafe, he seemed cool, not creepy, and after spending a week with Phil (where I discovered that travelling in Morocco with a big white guy is infinitely different than travelling here alone or with other women or with Moroccan men) I think I was just more open to trusting people.
So I met up with him and one of his friends the next day and we went to their riad and they made me a really tasty vegetarian tagine and salads and soup...the meal was great and everything was fine even though NewMustafa seemed disappointed that I didn't want to
a) drink beer
b) smoke hash
c) have a massage
d) dance
like a good tourist girl.

A couple of days later I'm talking to Adil (who runs my hotel) and he says "You know that Mustafa you were with the other day. Watch out. He is in trouble with the police for drugging some Chinese girls, they went to the police. I saw his photo at the station."

Okay, barring questions about why Adil was at the police station and why, if NewMustafa is a sex offender, is he also running a hotel...OH MY GOD! WHY THE FUCK DIDN'T YOU TELL ME THIS RIGHT AWAY?

I get paranoid again and notice how NewMustafa had made certain dishes that he wouldn't eat because they were too 'acidic', how he never drank alcohol but kept offering it to me, etc.

At this point in the story I would like to day "Please calm down, Mom and Dad, I'm fine, I have not been drugged and/or ravished by anyone and it's going to stay that way."

So I avoided NewMustafa for a couple days, when I did run into him didn't accept any invitations to dinner, or to smoke, and he got really weird about how I was being uptight, liked to be alone too much, didn't like to party enough, not like the other tourist girls, I should be here to have a good time since I'm on vacation. I think now he has decided I'm not worth it and I don't think I will be receiving any more invitations to dinner thank god.

I don't know if that story about him is true but I do know that he is insecure and pushy and whiny and behaves like a child when he doesn't get what he wants. And that's enough.