Daily things:
For most things we need, we go to our closest Hanut (Ha-noot). It's like a convenience store, but different. The one closest to our house is run by the family that lives across from it, and is frequently manned by the dad, the grandpa (I think), or one of the daughters. They have basically anything we need, from soaps to Laughing Cow to fresh bread (it's still warm when we buy it in the morning) to canned tomatoes. One of the interesting things about Hanuts is the vast number of them. We have that one right next door to our house, but then if you walk just two minutes to the main street, there are four within immediate eye sight. They all sell mostly the same stuff, but with a few variations (some will have the Red Ball cheese while others don't, some will have my favorite brand of chocolate chip cookie while others don't, etc). And if you walk up to one and need something they don't have, they'll generally tell you which other one to go to in order to get it. Hanuts are also price regulated, so there isn't really an issue of bargaining.
Souk:
This will definitely be worth it's own post later, once we get to go to the massive one for our region (coming next Sunday!). Because Taounate is so big, we do have a decent variety of souk alternatives, though.
On Mondays and Thursdays, there's a mini-souk right near where our host-family lives. It has all the produce options that we would need, as well as spices, home goods (You need a cheese grater? This souk has 'em. You need a blender? Not this one.), and a few meat options. One of the fun things about souk is that the prices are completely open to bargaining. We've seen it done, we've been with people who do it, and we've thought about doing it, but we're still working on our technique.
There's also a daily marche in the downtown part of our city that kind of feels like a souk, but more structured.
Clothes and Household Items:
This is the fun part. One might assume that things like mattresses or refrigerators would be a set price, but they're not. The stores for these sorts of objects are all generally really close to each other (at least in our city - that might not be true everywhere), and it's all a game. While shopping for our big ticket items, we were lucky to have our host-cousin with us to take care of the bargaining, because we're clearly still too new for that. The prices are all generally laid out on the table once you ask (price tags? Of course not!), then if you like an item enough and it's close to your ideal price, you start asking about bringing it down. Anass (cousin) is a champion at this. Not only did he find us the stores with the products we liked and wanted, he got them down to a reasonable price and got the owner to deliver. What a guy.
Clothes are the same way. Our only experience in this was jellaba shopping, and we managed to get lower prices 2/3 times. Slowly but surely we're learning that the key here isn't necessarily to have amazing/speedy language skills, but to be willing to walk away if you aren't 100% on the price. Also, if a store owner isn't willing to work with you a little, just go somewhere else, they'll probably have the same thing.
(You can also buy track suits!)
Poultry:
Could this have gone under Souk? Probably. But this is our most recent experience and also just a very interesting one.
Today, we decided to buy some chicken. We had asked around about ground beef prices and decided to wait for another day, but chicken is generally cheap enough. For this one, we decided to ask Anass about chicken prices (just so we would know if we should try bargaining or not), and he came with us, which was very helpful.
There's a little part of the daily marche that usually sounds like a million chickens are just hanging out, and (not surprisingly) it turns out that that's where you go to get dinner. We walked up to a little chicken Hanut, and learned that today's price for a whole chicken was 30 MAD. Alright, cool, we could work with that. (We do have a freezer in our new fridge! And we're looking to make some chicken stock later anyways, so perfect.) After agreeing to the price, the owner ('mul' in Darija) walks back and grabs a fluffy little lady and brings her up. I won't go into the details here, but barely 5 minutes later, we left with a full chicken (sans feathers or inside bits), that had already been butchered for us. That's it. About 5 minutes and 30 MAD for an outstandingly fresh chicken.
Overall, shopping is pretty fun. The owners are generally impressed with the Darija we try to speak, and if they know any English, they try it on us, too.
Some other prices, if anyone is interested:
Giant bushel of fresh mint: 1.5 Dirham (1 D if you get an older bunch)
Bananas: 15 D/kilo
Ground beef: 80 D/kilo
Round of 8 Laughing Cow Wedges: 10.5 D
Fresh bread: 2 D/disc
Garlic: 1 D/head (but they're pretty small)
Onions (Red): 3 D/kilo
Avocados: 40 D/kilo
Lemons: 10 D/kilo
Ground black pepper: 5 D/approx. a half cup
You get the idea.
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