Page 20




When we got into the terminal we went to baggage claim to get our backpack. It was going to take a few minutes because they're pulling it apart again, looking for drugs and whatever. This was at a time before they had drug sniffing dogs in the airports, at least there were none at this airport; or any of the airports we’ve been in. We’re feeling quite safe and confident.

We got to the CP Air desk at 6:30 pm, it was closed and wouldn't be open again until 9 o'clock tomorrow morning, shit. We were looking at the chart for our flight number and departure time; 11:30AM tomorrow.
Fuck! we're going to be stuck here for seventeen hours and we couldn't leave the terminal.

Although no one had informed us of any official reason why we were unable to leave, we were just unable to leave. We were pretty sure that our being stuck in the terminal had everything to do with the fact that we had just arrived from Morocco; and maybe they just wanted to keep their Big Brother eye on us. What a joke.

To let us leave the terminal to run wild and loose in the streets of Madrid might be perceived as some sort of a breach of airport security protocol.
It's quite possible they may have thought that we could be,...oh, I don’t know, maybe saboteurs or terrorists or maybe something else equally ridiculous.

Bottom line is, we’re going nowhere until tomorrow morning. And when we do leave we’ll be on an airplane flying out of their country.

We walked around a bit and ran into a girl who was waiting to make her flight connection to Brazil. Nice girl, spoke pretty good English, but don’t remember her name.
The three of us hung out together and chatted for several hours.
Later we all tried to get some sleep on the benches, not at all comfortable, the floor was our only other option.

It's very early morning and the terminal is already quite busy, people running here and there for their connecting flights, and of course there’s lots of cops and soldiers.
The Brazilian girl caught her flight home and now we’re just hanging out waiting to catch ours. But we still had a couple of hours before the CP desk would open.

We met a French Canadian guy who was taking the same flight as us, but only to Montreal. Eve and I needed to walk around and stretch a bit, we asked the French guy if he would keep an eye on our backpack, he said sure, no problem.
We walked around for a while, found a gift shop and bought a few small things. We called home to let them know our flight number and ETA.

As we were going back to our luggage, Eve said she could smell the hash. We went around a corner and I put my nose between her boobs and took a whiff, all I could smell was her Chanel.
A little while later she mentioned it again, again I took a whiff, still couldn't smell it.
I think she was just a little paranoid.
I suggested she just calm down a bit. It was warm in the terminal so body temperature was rising, maybe that's why she thought she could smell it.
Maybe just a bit of anxiety about smuggling a couple of small chunks of hash; just stay calm Eve, calm is always the key.


It was now go time. Our plane is ready to be boarded, what a relief. We get to walk out and onto the plane with no problem.
But just as we walked out the back of the terminal to the tarmac, there were police, soldiers and airport security everywhere with guns at the ready... what the fuck!

All of us passengers were in total shock; we didn't know what the hell was going on.
The cops began lining everyone up in two rows, men in one, women in the other. My first thought was, are they lining us up for a firing squad.
Good grief Joe, you’re so fucking dramatic, just chill man

As there was no wall behind us, or posts to tie us to, a firing squad was probably unlikely.
But then again, you just never know when life is going to take a great big shit right on your head.
Fuck no! Whatever is happening here doesn’t look like it will end well so someone.
As we’re so close to being home please don’t let anything bad happen to us, not now.
This is not a reality I was expecting that we would have to deal with.

Whatever this is about, it sure as hell isn't about a couple of little chunks of hash.
This whole scene has put everyone on edge. No one is telling us anything, people are getting scared, we can't leave the area; what the fuck is going on?

Now as everyone knows, there's always a chance that a plan could go awry, but no one really thinks their plan is going to fail, or they just wouldn't follow through with it, right? right.

You carefully formulate your plan, careful to not overlook anything that would cause any kind of system failure, then you put your plan into action, comfortable in the belief the odds are in your favor, and that’s because you took all the precautions necessary, that’s the reasonable approach.

But there are times when circumstances beyond your control surface, and no matter how well your plan is put together, and those very circumstances can cause the odds to be stacked against you as well; you just never know when that's going to be, that’s how people get caught committing crimes.
So if our plan is going to fail, it's going to fail within the next couple of minutes.
I'm scared, really fucking scared, but not so much for myself.

With all the cops and soldiers standing guard, there’s obviously something big time going on here, and it ain’t about us and our little bit of hash.

No one believed this was any kind of a normal security measure, unless the authorities suspected something of a very serious nature; which was obviously the case here.
We never did find out what the reason was for all the - guns at the ready.
Whatever was going on, we were just grateful to not be ones on the hook for some serious illegal activity...my fingers were crossed

Now, before Eve and I committed ourselves to a hash plan we had a real serious talk about it.
I asked her a few times in all seriousness if she was good with the plan, or did she just want to scrap the whole idea.  I told her that if she wanted to scrap the plan that it wasn’t that big of a deal, and I assured her that I would be perfectly okay with whatever she decided.
She also knew that we both needed to be on the same page or this whole deal was never going to fly.

Each time I asked, she said she was good with the plan and wanted to do this.
I needed to be sure she was okay with it, so I put a little pressure on her.... She finally convinced me she was perfectly okay with the plan; and I kinda made her swear to it as well.
I just hope her position of "I'm okay with the plan" is still in the forefront of her mind when we're dealing with custom agents at the airports.

Even though our crime was small time and our plan was simple and easy, and about as common as any plan gets, it was still a criminal act, and subject to prison time. So it was important to consider some possible scenarios if there was a fuckup.
Like I stated earlier, Eve is not an daring or adventurous person. So the possibility of her freaking out if something went south on us was foremost on my mind; and that's why I was scared.

Now, I never believed this possibility would ever come to pass, but in the event that if Eve got caught and I didn't; in that scenario the only way I could help was for me to get on the plane, come home and get my hands on as much money as I could and go back and buy her out of jail.

Word on the street at the time was that the justice system in Spain was so corrupt that getting someone out of jail in this way was quite common, but expensive.
Money must be paid to a judge, police chief and a lawyer.

In the scenario where we both got caught, then we're completely fucked. We'll spend years, if not the rest of our lives in a foreign prison eating bugs and shit to stay alive.

In the final scenario, everything goes as smooth as silk, no issues, no problems; easy-peasy, nothing to worry about...hopefully...again, fingers crossed
This was the scenario I was shooting for.

But in spite of the possibility that something could go wrong we're still feeling pretty confident. We’re sure that the plan is going to work perfectly, but I'm also just a wee bit nervous as well, which I think is a good thing, don't want to be too cocky.
I do have faith in the plan, I totally believed we could pull this off; I have to believe.
I do believe.

While we’re waiting for whatever is going to happen next I started to get this weird uncomfortable feeling coming on, what the fuck is this now...Suddenly from somewhere out of the blue comes that part of the brain that evokes responsibility shows up.
“what the fuck were you two thinking? This is without a doubt the most irresponsible act of your lives. What in the hell ever possessed you to do something so foolish”? and blah blah blah blah blah blah...

Conscience, you fucking prick, why are you doing this to me now?...I can't deal with your shit right now, your timing sucks so bad....so just piss off so I can deal with the matter at hand.

And the matter at hand is this; we're in the line up now, it’s too late to change our mind about anything, we’re way passed the point of no return.
All we have to do now is be cool and calm and we can pull this off, no problem.

Eve was about two or three people ahead of me in her line up. I was watching real close, hoping she could keep it all together. She seemed to be okay. Everyone is going to get frisked or shot to death, not really sure yet....

Okay... it appears they're not going to shoot us. They're starting to frisk everyone.
Eve's best saving grace was the fact she looked like a typical lady tourist, not a hippie type at all. Her look was that of ‘above suspicion’.

The woman cop who was frisking the women was short, thick around the middle with a facial expression that said something like “I hate your guts”; she had a very hard, tough intimidating look, and a nasty attitude as well; she was very well suited for this job.

Eve extended her arms out from her sides, the nasty woman patted her along her sides and under her arms, then across her shoulders and down from the top over her breasts, then up and down on her back side and between her legs.
Success! Nothing detected, this was a biggie. It’s always about the plan, man.

Eve was cool and calm and pulled it off like a champ. I was quite impressed, I considered the possibility she might crack under pressure, but she did great.

When my turn came, the cop looked me straight in the eye for a few seconds, didn’t do or say anything.
Then with his disgusted scowling face he looked me up and down like I was nothing but a piece of shit.
In his mind, I was just another drug crazed hippie asshole.

When he frisked me, he touched every single part of me, and there was nothing gentle about this guy. The only thing he didn't do was a cavity search.
He spun me around to frisk my back side, I thought, well maybe this is where I get a chance to fart in his face when he checks my butt crack, but he didn't check, so I didn't fart.

We got through the frisking process okay,
and we're not being hauled off to jail today.
However, it could have just as easily gone the other way,
but we managed to get through it okay,
lady luck was with us this day.

...there, that little rhyme seemed appropriate to celebrate getting through that experience with our asses still intact, and our hash still in Eve's bra...eeehaw.

...and its all going to be okay ..................now.

We were ushered onto a mini bus that drove us over to the plane. Once we were on the plane Eve mopped up the bullet sized balls of sweat that had leaked out of her face.
We sat on the plane the better part of an hour before it took off.  We had to stop in Lisbon briefly, then back in the air again.
We’re real happy to be on our way home.

Next stop Canada.


At cruising altitude we were well above the clouds. They looked like giant mountains of pure white snow. You would almost expect to see a snowmobile to come flying over the top. It was pretty awesome looking.

There were also large openings in the clouds which enabled us to see the ocean. I was staring down at it and I could see a ship, but it looked so small, like the head of a match.
The only way I knew it was there was from the little trail of churned up white water behind it.

The pilot announced our flight was going to take a couple of extra hours because of strong head winds. I hope whoever is picking us up isn't going to be too pissed off about the delay.

At some point Eve said she thought she could smell the hash again, I put my face between her boobs and took a whiff, there was an ever so slight smell; and just as this was happening a flight attendant came walking by and noticed where my face was and cracked a little smile as she passed by.
A little while later she mentioned the hash again, again I stuck my face between her boobs, and wouldn't you know it,

the same flight attendant walks by and sees us agin,
This time she followed up with a big grin,
I wondered what her thought might have been,
take her to the washroom man
and give her the ‘mile high’ spin

Well wasn’t that a cute little bit of rhyming fun

We just laid back and tried to pass the time until we got back to Canada.  Eve never said anything again about smelling the Hash. I guess we're good to go...

Canada, we're coming home baby!

We were getting close to the Canadian coast, but it's too cloudy to see very much.
We started to descend and we're a little below the clouds and could now see Montreal. This was going to be a quick stop.
We were only there for 30 minutes then back in the air.
Next, and last stop, Toronto.

Touchdown in Toronto, we made it. The flight took almost 12 hours and we're exhausted. We just want to get home, see the kids, and go to bed, our own bed. It's going to feel so good.
But we're not quite there yet.

I went to baggage claim, no backpack.  Everyone’s luggage was there except mine.  When I inquired about it, I was told the customs people were “checking it out”, and I should have it shortly as long as there were no problems.
“What kinda problems are you talking about, there are no problems”,....
"except for you assholes". I said under my breath.

We had one more minor obstacle to get through. That was the desk where you have to declare everything, and if they have even a remote suspicion about anything, they'll hold you up for questioning.
We've come way too far to have some bad shit like that happen to us now.

We got to a customs desk, there were several of them, like grocery store checkouts.
There seemed to be some kind of a problem at one of the other desks. A man and woman were having words with an agent, something about the lining of the woman's coat; which appeared to be an expensive looking fur coat.

A couple more agents have now sidled over to the desk where the coat issue was happening. I think our agent wanted to get in on the action too, so he was kinda hurrying us through the process.
He asked if we had any items to declare, we showed him the few things we had in Eve’s carry on bag, that was all.
He asked if we had anything else to declare, I came back with, "I do declare, it's wonderful to be back home in Canada". He smiled and let us go through.
I think we owe the fur coat lady and her husband a bit of gratitude for providing a reason for our agent to process us through the system so quickly; thank you folks.

As we went through the arrivals gate, Eve's mother and two of her sisters, Marge and Dorothy were there to greet us. Everyone was so happy, hugs and kisses all around. Out the door we go, loaded our gear into the station wagon and climbed into the back seat. We didn't even mind the one hour drive home, we were all busy talking about the trip.

We're at home now, the kids look great, it's so nice to see them again, and give them hugs and kisses, we really missed them a great deal.
I had to check the mail; there were three or four sick benefit cheques waiting for me, awesome.
A couple days later I had to go back to the Doctor for a follow up. We chatted for a while about how I was feeling. I told him I felt great. He said, “good, I'm glad you're feeling better Joe”.

He seemed very interested in many of the places we visited in Morocco, he asked lots of questions about our trip. We talked for quite awhile about it, probably more than 30 minutes. He seemed to have more than just a casual interest.

As it would turn out, a couple of months later him and his wife took a month long vacation to Morocco, but not a backpacking hippie trip, absolutely not. Their trip was all about nice hotels and tour buses.
And I just have to mention this also; the next time I saw him after his Morocco trip, he was different. He had let his hair grow out quite a bit, it now covered the back of his neck and well over his ears, and in conversation with him he used terms such as 'man and cool', and all so causally.  
At this point I felt that the Doctor patient relationship became a little more friendlier; that pleased me

Right from the first time I met him, ten years earlier, I thought he was a hip and cool guy, and he was. Although on the surface, his appearance was that of a clean cut short hair conservative type British gentleman that didn't look like he would say shit if he had a mouthful.
Gee, maybe going to Morocco did something for him, or to him; maybe he had some kid of an eye opening experience.
And now he even looks the part of hip and cool.
I thought his new look served him well, he looked great.

Okay Joe, “I'm giving you another week off to get rid of some of the tan”.... [wink wink]

Thanks Doc, you're awesome. You’ll never know just how much this trip has meant to me, I could have never taken it without your help and support.
Thanks for everything Doc.
        

---

                                                                       the weather we left behind, 24 hours ago

                                                                         the weather we came home to, 24 hours later

   
​
Well that's the story of Joe and Eve's wild and exciting Moroccan adventure.  If I were still a young man and had the chance of doing it all over again, I'd do it a heartbeat, but not the  smuggling part,  I'd never do that again, it's just not worth the risk.
   
And yeah, we smoked a lot of hash during this adventure, but that's just what we were into at that point in our lives. 
​We had an incredibly exciting and fantastic adventure that most people couldn't even imagine.  
We experienced more thrills chills and excitement in those four weeks that many people wouldn't experience in the better part of a lifetime.  
In the end it was worth everything we had to do in order to take this trip.

I personally came away from it with thoughts and feelings about many things that have stayed with me all of these years, and always will.
A very spiritual, emotional and moving experience given to me by the 'Gigantic Valley' that I can still see just by closing my eyes and thinking about it for a minute, it's right there in my minds eye; and it can still give me goose bumps and make my arm hair stand.
I know that sounds a bit heavy handed given that it was more than forty years ago.  It's just that some of the things I saw and experienced impacted me so deeply that they're permanently byrned into my brain.

I also now have a much greater appreciation for where I come from, and all that I have in life; although I had felt at times I deserved more.
After going to Morocco, I've now began to question myself as to how I could feel I was more deserving of anything after where I've been, and what I've seen. 
It seemed almost ridiculous trying to find a reasonable justification for deserving more when I've seen so many trying to make it through life with very little, and many with nothing at all.

...to justifiably feel I was more deserving, I think maybe not

I also have a renewed appreciation for the opportunities we have for the good life that enriches us in so many ways, that far too often we take for granted.
I didn't just get high in Morocco. I learned some very important life lessons that have stayed with me ever since, and they'll be with me for the rest of my life.

In the month we were there, we experienced a culture so completely different from our own, as well as adventure excitement thrills chills and risks of impending doom, any of which could've had such dire consequences .
But in the end, we made it home, safe and sound.

​
...and it's all going to be okay now   
                                                                    now
                                                                                          now
                                                                                                                   now
                                                                                                                                               ...                                                                                                                                                                                      
   the end
                                                                                                                                                                                                       

                                                                                          'for all that I have in life I am truly grateful'
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               
                                                                                     
 
                                                                                                                      
Thank you for taking the time to read our story.
I welcome any and all comments.
Don't forget to visit the Morocco video page. Its an opportunity to see in live action some of the places where we had been.


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