Which raised some questions I thought about as we walked. When you build around a courtyard, in the riad style, doesn't that require a lot more land? What are the economics of the Andalusian style versus the Riad style, and does a Riad style make more sense in more extreme climates than the Andalusian one?
Take a look--this is the Andalusian style.
You can see similarities to New Orleans style--the filigreed balcony, the outward facing buildings that mean that if there were ever an invasion, the inhabitants could attack the invaders by shooting from their windows, or dumping boiling water from the balconies.
The streets are also wide, so the windows have something to look out onto. Contrast this with the Arabic style.
Here there is some decoration and some light sources into the houses from the walkway (and also a cat!) But the passages between the buildings can get very narrow!
As you can see, sometimes the building goes right across the sidewalk. Quite a few of the travelers in my group are civil engineers, and they occasionally looked with horror at the haphazard nature of the construction. Large sections of walls bowed out, and upper story additions seemed to be precariously propped in place with beams that just were stuck into the walls.
Maybe that was just me, but it looked like once built, many of these structures could not be accessed for repairs because they were just too close to everything else. But then, these building have been standing for at least 700 years, so perhaps I am just a worrier.
Finally, here is a picture of our local guide, the man who guided us through the labyrinth of Fes, Mohammed 1.0. (Our tour leader was also named Mohamed, which is a VERY common name, so we gave them numbers to reflect their relative ages as well. Or, as one traveler said, "Mohamed 2.0 is the upgrade." We are very fond of our Mohamed 2.0!) Here he stands in front of a 17th century synagogue, now mostly disused.
No comments:
Post a Comment