The Medina -- the Old City -- of Fez is the best-preserved, medieval walled city in the world. Inside this vibrant Moroccan community, internet cafes and mobile phones coexist with a maze of donkey-trod alleyways, thousand-year-old sewer systems, and Arab-style houses, gorgeous with intricate, if often shabby, mosaic work. While vacationing in Morocco, Suzanna Clarke and her husband, Sandy, are inspired to buy a dilapidated, centuries-old riad in Fez with the aim of restoring it to its original splendor, using only traditional craftsmen and handmade materials. So begins a remarkable adventure that is bewildering, at times hilarious, and ultimately immensely rewarding. A House in Fez chronicles their meticulous restoration, but it is also a journey into Moroccan customs and lore and a window into the lives of its people as friendships blossom. When the riad is finally returned to its former glory, Suzanna finds she has not just restored an old house, but also her soul. Born in New Zealand, Suzanna Clarke grew up in several parts of Australia. In her twenties she lived in a Welsh commune, an Amsterdam squat and a Buddhist monastery in Nepal. She has worked as a photojournalist for more than two decades and is the arts director of The Daily Mail in Brisbane. Her husband, Sandy, is a radio broadcaster who now spends most of his time in Fez. Their blog is riadzany.blogspot.com. A House in Fez Building a Life in the Ancient Heart of Morocco By Suzanna Clarke Pocket Copyright © 2008 Suzanna Clarke All right reserved. ISBN: 9781416578932 1 When we mentioned our fantasy of buying a traditional Arab-style riad, or courtyard house, in Fez to a friend, he said dismissively, "What a terribly nineteenth-century thing to do." He had a point. For most of my life I have been enchanted by tales of early European women travelers, such as Isabelle Eberhardt and Jane Digby, who broke out of the strictures of lives far more confining than my own and found another way to live in Arab cultures. Of course, such adventures are only romantic if you ignore the fact that Eberhardt, who disguised herself as a man, contracted syphilis then drowned penniless and alone, washed away with her final manuscript. There were other acquaintances who, post-September 11, asked, "Why would you want to buy a house in a Muslim country? They hate us." This was easier to counter; we knew it simply wasn't true of Moroccans, who can be friendly and hospitable to the point of overwhelming. We were also aware that people in Western countries tend to view Muslim nations as a monolithic bloc, whereas there are many cultural differences between them, despite common elements. The present King of Morocco, Mohammed VI, has built bridges with the West and was the first Muslim ruler to express sympathy for the United States following the destruction of the World Trade Center. Besides, we saw our venture as an opportunity to explore Islamic culture further, and to gain a deeper insight into why the Way of the Prophet has thrived for so long. There was a certain inevitability about my interest in Morocco. My parents had visited the country in 1961, long before it was fashionable to do so. At that time only a handful of hardy souls, forerunners of the hippies who were later to invade, made their way down from Spain, following the sun. Enthusiastic young travelers, Meg and Henry drove their Volkswagen beetle around Morocco's few, mostly unpaved, roads, and after some hair-raising adventures ended up pitching their tent in the camping ground at Marrakesh. It appears they had a particularly convivial time there, because I was born exactly nine months later. Being conceived in Morocco and growing up in New Zealand, I learned to walk at a shuffle in my father's Moroccan babouches, surrounded by mementos from their visit. One of their more colorful tales was of the night they camped on the side of a road high in the Atlas Mountains. In the middle of the night, a truck came winding up from the valley below, its headlights swinging across my parents' tent. They stayed in their sleeping bags, hoping it would continue past, but when the truck drew level with their car its engine stopped. Rocks crunched as footsteps moved toward them. My father, deciding drastic action was called for, unzipped his sleeping bag, grabbed the tomahawk, and when he judged the moment was right, leaped out wearing only striped pajama bottoms and swinging the tomahawk above his head, bellowing a Maori haka. "Ka mate, ka mate, ka ora, ka ora, Tenei te tangata puhuruhuru..." ("It is death! It is death! It is life! It is life! This is the hairy man...") He must have been a terrifying sight, because four djellaba-clad men ran to their truck and sped off into the night. I wonder if those men now tell their grandchildren about the time they stopped to help the occupants of a car they thought had broken down and were confronted by a screaming madman. By early 2003, the idea of