Rabat has one of the more convoluted public transit systems I’ve ever experienced. There’s this uber-sweet tramway that runs from one end of Rabat to somewhere in Sale, although I’ve never been across the river to Rabat’s sister city yet. It’s really convenient for me because I live a 12 minute walk away from a tram stop in Agdal, the closest thing to a “downtown” I’ve seen so far. However, most of the other students with whom I will be studying live in an area called Tamara, which is technically outside of Rabat to the southwest, so not only can they not take the tram, but they can’t just hop in a cab to get anywhere. The way it works, you can take a “petit taxi” to anywhere within the district or whachamacallit in which you flag it down. Each area’s petit taxis are a certain color (in Rabat, they’re blue) and take up to 3, maybe 4 passengers. If you want to cross the arbitrary lines that exist in Rabat, you have to take a “grand taxi,” slightly larger, white taxis that only leave the taxi stations when they are filled up with 6 people, or I think you can convince the driver to leave without a full cab if you tell him you’ll pay for the empty seats.

In addition to the tram and the taxis, there are also buses running throughout the city. I haven’t been on one yet, but Viviana has to take one to get from her house to our study center/apartment/office building place of learning. There’s also a train station in Rabat, which I hope we’ll have occasion to use to travel to different parts of the country. We’re going to Meknes this weekend because we’ll have the second half of the week off because of the Prophet’s birthday, so maybe we’ll go by train.