Childcare Costs and Options in Fès: A Film Scout’s Panic-Buy Guide

i woke up this morning to the sound of aming donkeys and immediately regretted what i committed to this hellhole. fes, oh fes. you’ve got this labyrinth of alleys smelling like old spices and questionable life choices. and now i need to talk about childcare. specifically, how much it costs to survive here while doing film shoots that pay in rice and existential dread. let me start by saying: if you’re a tourist, just leave. the locals send their kids to the souk of souks, which is a street that’s 70 percent stalls and 30 percent children learning to haggle from 3 a.m. but okay, let’s say you’re weird enough to stay.

first, the data. i didn’t do a proper study, but i벤 ladies at the medina bar tried to vilify me when i asked about childcare. they kept whispering, ‘don’t ask-it’s like a horror movie scene where a scream echoes from a locked room.’ here’s what i found: private preschools in the ‘posh’ areas (read: near the kasbah) charge 2,500 to 5,000 dirham a month. that’s like $250-500 usd, which is more than my entire film budget for a month. public schools? they exist, but let’s talk about the chaos. teachers there are ghosts who haunt the classrooms, and the kids? they’re learning math in moroccan arabic. you need a translator. 100 percent.

but here’s the kick: i overheard a tourist named yusuf at a café say he pays 1,000 dirham for a full-time nanny. that’s $100. sounds too good to be true? oh, it is. his nanny also teaches him to weave rugs. at school. during ‘recess.’

safety first. remember how i mentioned the souk of souks? incidentally, it’s also the safest place to leave your kids unsupervised. why? because every vendor here is a former child worker. they know how to keep kids alive. mostly. the crime rate in fes is technically low, but the cultural crime rate-like parents drugging kids with mint tea-is high. don’t ask.

now, the logistical nightmare. rent in fes is a mess. if you want a place near a childcare center, you’re looking at 10k dirham a month ($1,000). if you’re okay with 45-minute walks to the nearest souk where you can bribe a parent to babysit, maybe 7k. but honestly, i lived in a converted riad with a balcony that collapsed last week. cost? 5k. the kids slept on the floor. fine.

job market? i’m an indie film scout, so i make money by finding people who look like extras in a spaghetti western. i could use that gig to fund my childcare nightmare. but the gig economy here is like college calculus-no one teaches it properly. rideshare drivers get scammed, movie crews get Cat 4 storms, and childcare options get… stolen. i kid. mostly.

let’s talk weather. today it’s 28°c, which means everyone’s hydrating with mugs of tea that taste like regret. tomorrow, it’ll be 92°f. perfect for making kids hyper. neighbors? fuad anditaj live two doors away. fuad is a 70-year-old man who barks at squirrels. taj is his daughter, who hosts black market baba au rhouin at 6 p.m. daily. they’re both a short drive from the medina. not really. it’s a 15-minute walk through a alleyway that rebricks itself every time you turn.

reviews are the worst. i asked a drunk at a gas station bar if he’d heard of ‘safe’ childcare. he spits, ‘my cousin’s kid got circumcised at 3. it’s tragic. but she’s happy.’ that’s the moral of the story. honestly, ask a local barista. they’ll give you pamphlets or a spontaneous lecture on why your kids shouldn’t eat olives.

external links, because fes isn’t on yelp: tripadvisor childcare in fes yelp fes parents reddit fes travel local facebook group. all of these will tell you the same thing: childcare is a gamble. a beautiful, expensive gamble.

last week, i saw a toddler in a wheelchair at the caravanserai museum. his mom said it was ‘therapy.’ i wanted to ask more, but she vanished. probably went to get another mint tea. fes does this to you. it makes you buy childcare via trust, which is a bad business model. trust here is currency, and it’s rusty.

but here’s the thing. if you’re an indie film scout like me, fes is magic. the childcare chaos is part of the story. you film a scene where a nanny teaches your actor to recite poetry in a souk, and suddenly, your film has soul. yeah, the kid might faint from caffeine overload, but that’s authenticity. can you buy that elsewhere? no.

so, to sum up: childcare in fes is like trying to film a scene in a moving car. it costs more, it’s riskier, and the crew eats rice. but if you survive, you get a story. or a stomach ulcer. probably both.

p.s. i accidentally filmed a street artist painting a child’s shoe. the child was too busy staring at a pigeon. art destroys everything. including childcare budgets.

p.p.s. if you’re reading this, don’t. go to fes. but if you do, leave your kids with a vendor. they’ll follow them to the nearest bakery for free pastries.

p.p.p.s. the map is here:

p.p.p.p.s. here are some images of fes:

You might also be interested in:

• https://topiclo.com/post/pasig-city-the-suburbs-that-dont-suck-but-might-make-you-question-life
• https://topiclo.com/post/dust-echoes-in-alora-a-slightly-broken-trip
• https://topiclo.com/post/porto-alegre-after-dark-a-messy-guide-to-bars-beats-and-safe-zones
• https://topiclo.com/post/crdoba-dont-spit-in-the-mate-or-theyll-spit-on-you-a-photographers-chaos-guide
• https://topiclo.com/post/bratislava-walls-that-dont-care-about-your-paint