Tag Archives: Tangier Gardens

Landscape and CJ

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20,000 feet or on the ground…

Where are the plants?
Where are the plants?

In Tangier Gardens, CJ learns about landscapes, gardens and plants. Landscapes are mysterious because they harbor weirdness as he learned from Bree and he sensed from his West Africa experiences.

In Yenbo Palms, CJ once again gets wind of unusual things in the landscape, this time in the deserts of Arabia.

These stories are not for, or about tourists. They are about the expatriate who never dreamt of leaving home. They are about a person who is, like most of us, inspired by the beautiful and endlessly varied landscape. 

He loved landscape so much he studied it in college and earned a degree in landscape architecture. But what he learned in school didn’t prepare him for the expatriate landscapes that perplexed him. Arcane landscapes? Could there be such a thing?

CJ chases nature, its landscape and plants to their existential roots. He describes his interactions with cultures, landscapes, gardens and plants of the world—where the unexpected and downright strange become daily facts of life.

Tangier Gardens, buy it now on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3HLrtyv

Dichotomy?

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CJ studied fine arts for his first two years at college. In music, literature and painting he found an enigmatic similarity. Many composers, authors and painters were inspired by nature, either the outdoors or human nature. That was clear.

It was, however, the dichotomy of the critics that confused him. 

The critics’ perplexing dichotomy pitted human social nature vs the natural world, nature without humans. He wondered why the dichotomy? Were not humans part of the nature in which we all lived? Even though humans were at the top of the food chain we were still part of the chain. How can behavior, intelligence or spirit separate humans from the nature all around us?

And why have so many sought to make that ‘false’ distinction?

CJ’s own battles with this dichotomy got serious when, after deciding to major in landscape architecture, he went to North Africa, for his term abroad design study.

There he met a couple esoteric horticulturists, one Russian and the other British. They had built and were guardians of an arcane garden, the Oval Garden, behind their Hibiscus House. There they tried to educate CJ–solve his enigmatic fine arts, landscape and garden concerns.

Read about it in Tangier Gardens on Amazon. Buy a copy.

Taos, New Mexico

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Listen to Christopher Janus’ own words: “In New Mexico the picturesque landscape captured me… but I felt there was something more… I couldn’t put my finger on it.

“At university, I dug into the fine arts and landscape architecture. I read JB Jackson, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, FL Olmsted, Ian McHarg and others, seeking the deeper content of the landscape. Some people today write that sense of place and landscape are similar—they are… nebulous, ambiguous, enigmatic, impenetrable… need I say more?

“A strange thing happened. The more I researched, the harder I looked, the foggier became my results. Then I did my term abroad design study in northwest Africa, Morocco.”

And then what happened?

Take a walk in Tangier Gardens and find out. Arcane adventures on the way.

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Collective or Individual–Freedom?

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Do you remember the first time you felt, through your sense of sight or your sense of smell, the absolute magic of plants: trees, shrubs, flowers, leaves?

Do you?

Well, my friends, it is a joy that you can find everyday… is it not?

The glory of that experience is the story of Tangier Gardens.

Read Tangier Gardens. Re-live the fun.

How great, peaceful and refreshing are the simplest pleasures of nature’s plants.

Have you forgotten? Then read Tangier Gardens.

Vacation without hassle? Dig this.

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International travel with all the excitement, all the intrigue—without the wheelies, without the passports, without the hassles.

  • Colorful Open-Air Markets
  • Beautiful Flowers
  • Entrancing Patterns
  • Exotic Destinations
  • Peaceful Courtyards
  • Mystical Labyrinths

Travel with us to Morocco on a quick, fun trip—Andalusian legacies, languorous gardens, ancient medinas and markets—colorful, exotic markets. These tales bring Mediterranean life to the comfortable home of the armchair traveler.

*Curious Tales*

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#Morocco #Tangier #Mediterranean #FlashFiction #LandscapeArchitecture #Design #Cultures #Gardens #Plants #Landscape #Travel #HistoricalFiction

E-Book FREE NOW Here: https://amzn.to/3nO2WEG

#Morocco #Tangier #Mediterranean #FlashFiction #LandscapeArchitecture #Design #Cultures #Gardens #Plants #Landscape #Travel #HistoricalFiction

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The Difference? There is none

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What do you think happens day to day with your term-abroad students? Check this out–student on the way for his term-abroad design study in Morocco, passes six days in Spain–the difference between a slide lecture and real life.

SIX DAYS IN SPAIN

This sequel becomes the Tangier Gardens prequel. Three Vella episodes tell the entire story. Please visit for a quick read: Six Days in Spain at = https://www.amazon.com/kindle-vella/story/B0BWPT2ZHZ

Been there? Done that? Visit it again!

Please check it out.

Tangier Gardens

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For a limited time only…

It’s the year 2000. CJ needs a break. 

Been there? But have you done that?

He has been busting his hump full time six years at university with one more class till

graduation–a term abroad design study.

CJ’s studying landscape architecture, into pedestrian towns 

and warm sandy beaches.

He’s on his way to Tangier, a town with sandy beaches on the Med 

and a historical pedestrian district, the medina. 

But, it didn’t quite work out. 

When the West meets the East… there is always turbulence.

Tangier Gardens

For a limited time only, Tangier Gardens e-book is FREE on Smashwords at:

https://bit.ly/3SIAfma

Pick it up!! Did I say the e-book is FREE!!

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The Interzone or Garden of the Hesperides?

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There are four distinct Berber communities in Morocco.

A weak breeze and a few late wisteria flowers prepared me to be charmed by the view of the Strait of Gibraltar the way I like it, a safe distance–a comfortable distance away from that strangely aggressive magic, that throbbing aura of Joseph Conrad’s Africa. The more I thought about it, the more I could feel that hot African breath prickling the back of my neck.

I was in Gibraltar, sitting with a man who knew his way around the Tingis region.

“But the maquis, the maquis, what about the maquis?” I asked.

“The maquis? The maquis is all that’s left. The remnants, the refuse of a great botanical richness that used to be. Old growth has been stripped. The maquis? Nothing but a few odiferous weeds. Suitable for the Interzone.”

“The what?”

“The Interzone, just as Burroughs’ wrote. But it’s real. Look at any satellite image. The Interzone is a land nobody owns–separated by the Sahara from Africa and separated by the Mediterranean from Europe. You don’t think so? One continent with towns like Timbucktu, Gran Bassam and Little Popo–another continent with towns like Rome, London and Paris. You tell me what happens where those two continents meet…the Interzone.”

“Wasn’t that some kind of 1950s fiction?”

“Didn’t you understand? It’s a real place, not a literary fantasy, but a geographic reality! Listen, in the Interzone rootlets from Africa and Europe attack and they attach. They try to suck energy from you. African rootlets suck European energy. European rootlets suck African energy. Anyone who lives there long enough becomes a crippled schizoid.”

Learn more about this strange conversation in this FREE short story, The Rock, online on Amazon Vella: https://bit.ly/3Hv6p2p

Na, Na… …Na, Na

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Every morning, around 8AM, I would be awoken by shouting from a man walking down the street outside my apartment window. Where was this? Ville Nouvelle in Meknes, Morocco.

He was yelling NaNa, NaNa…with a lot of nasal. He, wearing qadrissi pants (characterized by a wide and low crotch that reached to the knees), was walking with his donkey. And the donkey’s two saddlebags were chock-full of freshly cut mint clumps for making mint tea at home.

Fresh mint–the only way to really enjoy it is the Moroccan way. Grab a bunch of freshly picked mint and just add a pinch of black tea, too much white sugar and a sprinkle of orange blossoms on top. The water should be too hot to touch, too hot to drink. Got to slurp it. Hospitality without words.

This is local-agriculture-home-delivery. I had seen it once before in the early 1950s where I grew up on the East Side of Detroit. Then it was a local baker–up and down neighborhood streets. What kind of neighborhoods then? One car per family used by father to get to and from work. Neighborhoods sized by cars–not by pedestrians–no walking–only driving. But late 20th century–Meknes, Morocco. It was walkable and local. I loved it.

Had to tell that story–thus CJ was born. Read about his experiences in Morocco. He wrote about them in Tangier Gardens: Out of the classroom into real life… via plant portals.

The ebook is FREE now at Smashwords via this link.

How Easy Is It?

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Morocco

How does a beauty such as this…come into reality?

What was there in that same place before?

How does water get there?

Where does the water come from?

Who made the design for the tiles?

Who made and colored the tiles?

Where did the color come from?

How long has the fountain been there?

Why did people stop using it?

And how does the fountain fade away and die?

Is it a cultural museum piece?

In Tangier Gardens, CJ had plenty to examine when he went to Morocco for his term abroad design study; but somethings got in his way…

Somethings?

These are what CJ describes in his curious tales.

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Those tales are very short stories, for the first time, being released on Vella everyday between now and Christmas Eve: find them here=http://bit.ly/3B9rJXE

ENJOY!

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All 43 tales will be found under one ebook cover titled Curious Tales and via KDPselect will be offered for FREE on the day of launch likely in the first half of 2023. Sign up here to be notified of the launch date to get all 43 tales for free=https://bit.ly/3q5lcaq

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If you wonder what actually happened during CJ’s six months in Tangier, pick up the eBook, Tangier Gardens–out of the classroom into the real world–via plant portals, here: https://amzn.to/3HLrtyv

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