the best place to play parcheesi in the world...

... Is Cafe (مقهى) Hafa in Tangier.  Because that is where I learned how to play tonight.  With two Moroccans, two Americans, bean-pea soup, and sweet tea with mint and wormwood.  At sunset.  Overlooking Gibraltar.  With the breeze from the Atlantic and the Mediterranean.  Oh, and I learned what Portugal looked like, because you can apparently see it from Tangier as well.

To flesh out this story a little better, one of the most famous cafes in Tangier is مقهى حافة (Cafe Hafa), where Paul Bowles (and friends!) wrote many of their works.  Turns out, as I learned on Sunday when I went there the first time (of what will hopefully be many), that this is because it is located in the beautiful rich neighborhood of Tangier, and located entirely on outdoor terraces on a cliff overlooking the ocean, the sea, Spain, and yes, even Portugal.  And on the way there, when we stopped out what turns out is called the مقبرة رومية (the Roman graveyard), which is a rocky outcropping looking out on the same view and where I feel that at some point some dead Romans were probably found in order to explain the name (confirmation of this theory pending).  Anyhow, while eating popcorn purchases from an old man for 1/7 of a dollar, one of the Moroccans who works with us at the school just happened to come by, and, long story short, Khalil and his friend, 'Adl, invited us to the cafe for Parcheesi.  For the record, Parcheesi is a baffling game that makes no sense, and is kind of like Sorry, which, the one and only time I played it (also this year), I was also really bad at.  That said, somehow, the context made it really fun.  See above for details.