Fasten your seatbelts! Taxi trauma and turf thrills as Morocco bids to join racing's fast lane

Morocco is crazy. That is the verdict of the taxi driver on my first night in the country when he seeks to absolve himself of blame for almost mowing down a pedestrian at a crossing. He says stopping at them is optional. Judging by the look on the face of the other party, and their gesticulating in the rearview mirror, they wholeheartedly disagree.

My nerves are already reasonably frayed after it took several attempts to convince somebody to take me down to the marina. After realising my French is about as good as my Arabic, despite many wasted hours on Duolingo, the driver decided it was just about worth his while to take me there, if only to stop the awkward conversation, and gets me to hop in. 

Travelling around Casablanca, the country's largest city, is an interesting experience, not least because there is an exceptional volume of traffic, both in terms of the number of cars and the fact some of its residents seem incapable of driving without holding their horn. Normal traffic laws do not seem to apply here, which does add some jeopardy.