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Published: January 2nd 2008
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Hiya travelblog lovers! =)
We hope you all have had a really nice Christmas. Now we're back in a cold and dark Gothenburg. We're not too sad about it though since we have missed all our friends, family, sushi and salt liquorice just to mention some things. And we have had a really nice traditional Christmas too 😊 But if you are curious to find out what we were up to the last two weeks of our trip, keep reading...
To go from Zambia to Tanzania we were ready to take a 48-hour train journey which we were not looking forward to. Getting to the train station we just had a 2,5 hour bus ride. It might sound strange, but the train was nothing compared to the bus ride. We thought that arriving to the bus station at 9 am gave us a really good margin since the train left at 4 pm and the bus only took 2,5 hours. The bus driver kept saying we were going to leave SOON! Yeah right! 3 minutes before the train took off we reached our coach! 4 hours we sat on the bus waiting for it to get full so we
could leave!! The next train left 3 days later so you can imagine that we were glad we made it! Close one!
48 hours on a train - with beds, a shower, an ok restaurant and a bar - felt really comfortable and we didn't even catch up in our diaries before the train arrived to Dar es Salaam. On the way we killed time by sleeping, watching animals (more than on our safari trip!) and people trying to sell fruits when the train stopped. We also met a crazy group of South Africans to hang out with.
We spent a day in Dar with an American before we took the ferry to the wonderful Zanzibar. We found a relatively cheap bungalow on the beach in Nungwi, in the north of the island, and settled in. It was pretty nice getting a "real" vacation and just relaxing on the beach doing nothing but enjoying the sceneries for a week. We couldn't wish for anything more than 30 degrees, white beaches, turquoise water and great food. The only thing occasionally bothering us was all the masaii's and beach boys trying to cell crafts and telling us what a great
impression we had made on them, and 2 seconds later asking "what was your name again?" Very charming 😊
We did also move a few hours south (sitting in a crowded and overloaded dala-dala with the locals which we love so much) to Kizimkazi. It wasn't at all as touristy as Nungwi; there were no food place to be spotted anywhere and the guesthouse we stayed at had 3 rooms. But we only came for 1 reason and we were not disappointed. Early one morning we jumped in a small fishing boat and drove off for a dolphin safari. After seeing a few far away we got to go up close 😊 Mask and fins on! JUMP! We jumped in and there they were; 4 lovely dolphins just a few meters from us. They didn't seem to notice us and kept on swimming while we tried to keep up with them! Cooool!!!
Before reaching Gothenburg we had one fun (but crazy) day of shopping in Nairobi and one evening catching up with friends in London. Those of you who were lucky to receive some African Christmas presents should know that we really had to work to buy them!
Just walking into the market place we had people all around us trying to convince us to buy their things. Seeing two pale Europeans (although we thought we were pretty tanned at the time) they probably started seeing dollar signs in front of them. We got a lot of help from our Kenyan friend Godwin however which made the experience so much better.
So to the question you all are thinking about, what did we like the best? Hmm, tough choice since all the countries have been so different from each other. It is easier however to say what we liked the best within the different countries, and in different categories.
The best beaches we thought we found in:
1. Tulum, Mexico
2. Zanzibar, Tanzania
3. Negril, Jamaica
The coolest cities:
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and Havana, Cuba
Best party place:
Cancun
Nicest people:
1. Brazil
2. Zambia
3. All other countries
Most heard “expressions”:
1. Mzungo = white person (Africa)
2. Jambo/Hakuna matata = hi/no worries (Africa)
3. Respect mon (Jamaica)
4. Selta ei = sit down (in Rio at the football stadium)
The strongest drinks:
The tequila in Mexico was
pretty strong, but then we got to Jamaica and the drinks were SO strong we almost had to go to the bar and ask them to put some more mixers in there. So we thought that was as strong as the drinks can get. In Brazil however when you order a vodka drink, that is what you will get; vodka, and nothing else...
The wildest dancing:
Without competition: Jamaica! The Cubans are very good dancers, as are the Brazilians, but when it comes to energy and just craziness, we don't think anyone can compete with the Jamaicans!
Best place to throw yourself out of an airplane, bungee jump, go rafting or do just about anything adventurous:
Victoria Falls, Zambia
Before this trip we had some prejudices towards most of the countries we were going to. For example that people in Mexico eat a lot of tacos, drink tequila and wear big hats, and in Texas people drive big trucks and listen to country music. We imagined that in Jamaica people said "Ya mon" a lot in a funny accent, listen to reggae music, and smoke (something else than cigarettes). What we had heard of Cuba was that
people love cigars, talk about politics and that it’s heaven for people who love old cars . We imagined that in Brazil people played football all the time and that the beaches were full of beautiful people. Thinking of Africa we had the image of “The Lion King”; a lot of wild and exotic animals, people saying “Hakuna Matata” and rural villages with houses with straw roofs, and people carrying everything on their heads.
Now you might think that we're going to say that of course it's not like that in reality, but to be honest it was exactly like that! We have never eaten as much tacos as we did in Mexico, heard so much reggae as we did in Jamaica (and felt the smell of marijuana), seen as many old cars as we did in Cuba (there’s a saying that you will find the best mechanics in the world there). In Brazil we saw people play football at any time, even 12 o’clock on a Saturday night, and you don’t exactly get bored watching people on the beach..😉 In Africa we saw elephants, giraffes and camels at the side of the road randomly, and people carrying even
backpacks on their heads!
To try to conclude one thing we can say about our incredible journey is that we had an amazing time, and that we wouldn’t want to be without a day of it! We hope you all enjoyed our blog!? We sure enjoyed writing it! HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! Maj Shamaref (Cheers)
Lots of Love / The Svetnas
PS. To get you a little curious, keep a look out for something called AMZUNGO. More information about this will be coming! 😉
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