Morocco: Fes – inside the medina

Fes medina (old city) is made up of hundreds of narrow streets randomly going in haphazard directions with zero planning or organization. Some streets are mere alleyways only 2 feet (1/2 meter) wide, where you can only squeeze sideways. Shops and various crafts making places are everywhere – the place and atmosphere feels like it hasn’t changed much from medieval times. Here’s a metal worker pounding and making plates and cooking utensils, here’s a leather shop hand coloring leather and making traditional bags and footwear, here’s a religious medresa (school), here’s a vegetable shop and a grill roasting lamb and goat, and so on and so forth. No cars are here – only donkeys and mules transporting everything around. It’s loud, crowded, and overwhelming, but insanely amazing and exhilarating. It is the largest non-motorized urban area in the world!