Kasbah or Casper?

3/1/22- Today we woke up and had another homeade breakfast then met up with Abdul who drove us out of Marrakesh and up into the Atlas mountains. These mountains are home to the Amazigh people commonly known as Berbers. Until 2011 these people did not have running water, electrictiy, or heat in their homes. The king has helped them improve their situation however they are still impovreshed. The Berber people live in houses out of clay made from the dirt and sand mixed with straw. These houses are easily weathered so they need the straw to keep it dense and they use a mixture of thuja wood and bamboo like reeds for their ceilings/roofs. We got out at Kasbah Algiers, (pronounced like the ghost) a castle like home of the Berber people. In this specific kasbah the Gladiator arena scene was filmed. The native people all pointed out their small roles in the movie and showed us pictures of them acting. We toured one of the Berber families homes and saw how they lived on a day to day basis. Afterwards we went and ate lunch at an adjoining restaruant. After lunch we drove further into the mountains to another Kasbah where the movie Hanah was filmed. We toured this fort like home and learned that the stairs were uneven to make it hard for enemies to run up them as well as they had many fake windows to confuse any enemies trying to attack. The entire building was based on 5's. There were 5 towers, 5 arches, 5 kinds of plants in the garden. This all had to do with the Islamic influence in Morocco. After the kasbah we drove even further up the mountain thorugh a grove of olive trees which are common here and to our hotel for the night. They prepared a 4 course dinner for us that was the fanciest I had ever eaten.