Yellow House

September 10, 2007

I have had guests more or less straight through since June, and so I have been getting about for pleasure rather more than I otherwise would have been. Abbie has gone, Dave arrived and left, Denise is currently here and leaves Thursday.

But I want to write about Zanzibar. It isn’t the most recent adventure. But it was recently. As a prelude, let me just say it was the heaven of heavens.

Zanzibar

Ever since I learned there was a Zanzibar, I have wanted to go there. It seemed like it would be an amazing place to visit because let’s see.. white sandy beach, seafood, blue waters, exotic location. I also always thought I should honey moon there (though to be fair Nova Scotia was a perfectly nice island too). When I realized I was getting divorced I wanted to sequester myself there for a month. It’s been on my mind for many years, but the thing that actually got me there was so mundane.. a conference. An occupational therapy conference of all things.

Living in Kenya and mixing with travelers you hear some fairly horrendous stories from time to time. Stories that include robbings, muggings, the occasional thwarted kidnapping. Over the years the worst stories, the ones that chill me to the bone have all by some coincidence occurred in Tanzania. I haven’t therefore really gone further south than Dianni beach though I am sure the same sorts of things could have as easily happened in Kenya or Malawi.

But anyway.. Dave and I arrive in Dar es Salaam and it’s a zoo. Immigration is a throbbing mess, it’s unclear where to stand and we have no American currency to get our visas. After much debate I just walk through immigration, pull Dave’s bag off the conveyor belt and return with all the dollars he’s stashed in his luggage (not really a recommended practice I might add). I share this experience in a few sentences, but the reality took close to two hours.

Once through the booths of stern men with big rubber stamps we were convinced by a baggage handler we had missed the last ferry to Zanzibar that goes at 4pm and we should fly to Stone Town. We thought we would and then once we were taken to a dodgy back room featureless save the extraordinarily crappy furniture we decided to go to the port and see for ourselves.

The next 45 minutes were fairly insane in retrospect. But they basically went like this:
- Get in a cab which we pay small fortune for with last of our dollars (the
return taxi turns out to be 1/3 of the price)
- Get stuck in traffic, 4:00 well and truly ticking by
- Arrive at port. Told that ferry is still there. Dave and I between us cannot generate the required amount of money for tickets in Kenyan Shillings or Dollars.
- I leave all the baggage with Dave and literally run to the cash machine and pull out money.. see.. just gets stupider
- We return and I hand some guy the equivalent of $120
- We attempt to get into the port, but some authority figure turns us back. We can’t even see ferry
- Man runs off with our money.

Dave and I look at each other. Me: “He’s gone hasn’t he? We are so damn stupid. I deserved that.”
- Man reappears (!) still with money and tickets for ferry.
- He fills them in, while I hold the cash
- We get on ferry

So.. it’s true we paid double what the tickets were worth, and it’s true we didn’t have seats but just perched on a bunch of luggage in a non-passenger section for several hours, but we were so happy! Happy to have made it on the ferry, happy to be on the Indian ocean, happy to see the sun set and have the cool breeze on our face.

And this brings me back to my opening point. Zanzibar is so heavenly. You really just have to see for yourself. The food is also unbelievable. There really were no lowlights (for me- Dave gave himself food poisoning), so to give you highlights I’d have to describe each and every meal.

We did so little there. Once we went to the east coast (north of Paje) we sat, swam, read, walked, drank copious amounts of beer and generally lolled about. We stayed in a place right on the beach with no electricity and dinner served on mats by lantern. The stars were endless.

I did actually attend the conference. I did a poster which turned into an impromptu presentation as well as a workshop. I met the other Kenyan attendees and when they asked me to do trainings in coast I finally said something which I need to say more often..”if you sort out the funding and logistics, I will come and provide the knowledge.” VSO did give me $600 to train OT’s in Nyanza and Western province though so hallelujah.

So Zanzibar. Go there. We stayed at Clove Hotel in stone town and Robinson’s Place on the east side. They were both great. I envision myself there for the entire month of December.. sitting out the Kenyan elections. Karibu sana. If no one takes me up on the offer, I have a box of books ready to go.

More soon. B xx

p.s. I hugged a giraffe this week. It was awesome. I haven’t laughed so hard in a really long time. Photos on flickr..