And the Sea Parted in Bagomoyo...

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Friday morning began with a test. Not a particularly hard test, but five essays kwa Kiswahili does make one think a lot. The test ended around 11 in the morning, so most of us figured that we would grab lunch before packing and heading off to Bagomoyo. There was a problem, however - the cafeterias were not yet open. So we ended up going to the Euro H Restaurant to get the only prepared food they had - rice.

The drive to Bagomoyo took just over an hour. Yet, it felt much longer because there were 15 of us and the two workers packed into a private daladala with all of our backpacks. But we survived it. After arriving at our hotel, we spent the rest of the day on the beach just relaxing. It was a nice way to unwind after a long week.

We ate a nice dinner at the hotel that took almost two hours to prepare. After dinner, we went to a little club that reminded me of a hole in the wall. We mostly went because Leah had heard of the band that was playing that night - African Stars Band. It was good music for the first ten minutes, but every single one of their songs sounded the same. At the club, nobody danced until we, the wazungu, got up and started a trend. We left just after midnight and went to sleep right away because we were exhausted!

That night, I was eaten alive by ants. The room I was in barely had a floor (it was covered by wallpaper) and had many ants. Mind you, the entire city of Bagomoyo has an ant infestation, but for some reason they all liked biting me. At least I got a new and much better room the second night.

Professor Rubanza is not Tanzanian because he created a schedule and stuck to it. By 9 AM, we were on the road to the Kaole Ruins. We then continued to the old slave market and an old German house and prison that had some of the worst constructed steps in history. Nice, but rather boring. It was more fun to listen to the various levels of English that the tour guides had. After all of the little buildings, we had lunch and headed back to the hotel. It had begun to get cloudy and drizzle, so we couldn't head back to the beach. A few of us decided to check out the little handicraft market. The farther we got from our hotel, the higher the prices were. Strange.

That night, 7 of us were determined not to eat at our hotel's restaurant again. So we walked down the beach until we got to a mosque that doubles as a fish market. Since there was nothing past that point we turned around and finally found a place to eat. I even used my Swahili to ask for directions! The food at the restaurant was a good reminder of home. Every now and then you just need some comfort food. And a nice comfort text from Mama. 😊

We returned to our hotel and went to sleep early. Sunday, we woke up at 6 to see the sunrise. We went down to the beach and just sat and watched. Too bad the horizon was full of clouds. But it was still nice. I went back to sleep/took a nap and when I rewoke, I had breakfast and went back to the beach to just lay down and relax. It was then that I noticed a strange sight.

It was becoming low tide and a path in the sea was opening. Literally. Our first trip out, we managed to walk just over a kilometer. On the second trip, it was probably closer to four kilometers. It felt so weird to be out so far into the Indian Ocean, as if we were doing something wrong. Maybe we could walk to Zanzibar....

Back on the beach, we decided to have some fun climbing a palm tree to get the coconuts. It is much, much harder than it looks. My best try had me getting about halfway up. Only Marion got all the way up, but she could not get the coconut down. Finally, a local helped us. They make it look so easy!

On the drive back to Dar es Salaam, we stopped at the house that Professor Rubanza is having built for his retirement. It's massive, fancy insider, and has lots of trees in the backyard. Not bad by Tanzanian standards. I'm sad that I only have one week left in Dar. Then it is off to Mwanza to study the Ecology of the Great Lakes Region. Then there's the safari, Arusha, and possibly a day trip to Zanzibar? We hopefully will find out soon....

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