As I shuffle into my dotage, I’ve become an aficionado of slippers. I’m forever in search of the perfect pair, and I’ve always wondered how a curled pointy-toe pair of yellow Ali Baba specials would feel on my feet. Where better to rub the magic lamp and see if my wish might be granted?
Mohammed kept having to slow his brisk pace while I lingered at the numerous leather slipper racks, so after the rug transaction he suggested we might want to see the tannery. Eyah, brother! As we twisted our way through the slim passages nearing the section of the Medina dominated by the tannery, the acrid smell of animal carcasses (insufficiently eaten clean by dying insects?) started testing our nasal strength.
By the time we arrived at the store crammed with leather goods that overlooked the tannery, Mohammed had to give us a handful of fresh mint to hold over our noses. Then he introduced us to a sluggish man who mumbled unenthusiastically that we should follow him upstairs. The thought bubble above his head said, “Thanks, Mohammed, I was just about to call it a day.”
On the third floor a large table was piled haphazardly with leather jackets, suitcases,shoulder bags, and collapsible ottomans. Along the back of the room a wide open window provided an overview of the cylindrical stone tanning vats filled with cloudy dyes that had the odor of fermented horse piss. As I was taking in the full miasmic layout, Ella elbowed me and said, “He looks sick.” Glancing over my shoulder I saw that our host was leaning lifelessly on what looked like a camel’s saddle. Can you find him in the far right photo below?
Before the man fell over in a heap, I aborted the tour by asking him if they had any slippers. Clearly relieved, he led us downstairs to the main floor showroom where, in one corner, there was a profusion of leather slippers pigeonholed by size and color. Open sesame! Ali baba lives! I plucked out a pair of yellow pointy-toed beauties and tried them on. They fit, but the leather felt stiff. By now another younger, healthier salesman was by my side.
“The leather?” I ask.
“Elephant!”
“Okay…you have the same color in something softer?”
He went to another set of pigeonholes and whipped out a pair of rounded-toed yellow slippers in my size. I slid my foot in for a trial fitting. Soft but not clingy. And to be truthful the pointy toes were too tight. This might be the moment. Will the magic hold? I have to ask.
I gulp. “The leather?”
He answers this time less triumphantly, “Camel.”
The last time I checked, camels weren’t endangered, so it’s a go for Ali Baba!
Nice! (With my sense of smell, I wouldn’t have been able to come within 3 blocks of the place!)
And the mint didn’t come close to disguising the odor.
You could always soak your Covid mask in Vic’s Vapor Rub.