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July 28th 2008

Published: July 29th 2008

And then there were eight. As the last entry left off, three members of our group departed in Arusha. So only eight of us took the 10 hour bus journey home to Dar es Salaam. We took the nice bus, Royal Coach, and were treated to three magnificent movies (please note the sarcasm): Mr. Bean, Mr. Bones, and Universal Soldier III. No, we did not see I or II, but the third part of a trilogy is always a good movie to watch on a long bus ride. Mr. Bean was by far the best movie in the group. Mr. Bones began as mildly offensive and soon turned to outright offensive by the end. It played right into every stereotype that people have of African tribes. The bus, because of the length of the ride, makes a short pitstop at a rest area for lunch. We were there with a lot of other buses. I'm pretty sure that the place is owned by Indians because all the workers are Indian. Yes, great detective work on my part.

My homecoming was rather humorous (in my opinion). Deborah, the housegirl, had no clue that I was coming home to stay with Mama and Baba for the night before Zanzibar. She was surprised to see me and then began to make a fuss about how she didn't prepare enough food. That was clearly not the case because there was more than enough as usual during dinner, but I let her be concerned. She seems to take pride in trying to make me fat.

Unlike Deborah, my parents knew I was coming home. They were happy to see me and life then resumed back to the way it was when I had been there for three weeks. We watched Isidingo (the awful South African soap opera) and the news kwa Kiswahili. The headline story was about the Bunge discussions about the status of Zanzibar. Mama and Baba were not happy because they are not big fans of Zanzibar, believing that it drains vital resources from the mainlanders who pay the taxes. They may have a point.

On Friday morning, after a great night at my house in Dar, we loaded a bus on the way to the ferry that would take us to Zanzibar (well, Stone Town, the port on the island of Unguja, known as Zanzibar around the world). Anyway, the bus ride was fantastic because it let me see all of the improvements in Dar es Salaam since a month ago. For example, the road between Mwenge and Ubungo has been mostly completed with the kipulefti (roundabout) actually functioning and each direction having clear lanes. And I found a traffic light where people actually stopped. Only 1, but still a traffic light. After seeing so much of the country, Dar really feels cosmopolitan.

Well, we arrived in downtown 45 minutes early. Barak's hotel, the fancy Kilimanjaro, has a little cafe where we got chocolate cake. Oh, it was amazing. I almost felt completely out of Africa at the moment!

Now to the ferry. One way to describe it would be inefficient. One man takes a look at your ferry each time they require you to show it (three times in all). Frustrating. Inside the ferry, however, it was amazing. Seating was airplane-style and the seats reclined a little bit. For those who did not care to sleep or stare out the window, they had a movie playing. Just my luck, it was Mr. Bean again (followed by Rat Race). My guess is that it was the entire collection of Mr. Bean in one of the good pirated movie styles.

We finally arrived in Zanzibar and began with a Spice Tour. We went to a farm and walked through it past a bunch of different plants. We ate some of the fruits, smelled the spices, and earned leaf hats and other gear. It's amazing all of the things that a leaf can be made into. The guy made rain glasses, hats, handbags, and necklaces. Following the amazing tour, we visited the main market and some museums. I was so glad that I took African history. I saw lots of information about Tippu Tip and Sayyed Said bin Sultan al-Said. I found the museums to essentially be affirmations that what I learned was not fake but was real history. It felt great. Through the entire day, we walked through many parts of Stone Town which reminded me a lot of Jerusalem. The streets are narrow, the buildings rise a few stories above, and people ride motorcycles and bikes through these narrow streets. Also, the old Arab women walked around and smiled whenever we greeted them formally. Their smiles made me feel so good.

That night, we went to dinner at Mercury's Zanzibar. It is named after Zanzibar's most famous son, Freddie Mercury. However, shhh, he did not die of AIDS. No no no. People in Tanzania seem horrified to learn about his personal life. Following real dinner, we went to the alleyway market-ish area in which there was more food. It is only available at night and serves a wide range of foods from chapatti to kebabs, corn on the cob to Zanzibari pizza. We clearly needed to try a Zanzibari pizza and got the banana and chocolate flavor. It tasted like a banana and chocolate crepe. It was, as any human could probably guess, absolutely delicious. Then we went back to the hotel for a little bit and went to some places to celebrate our last night as a group. Yes, we were smaller, but we were still together. We got back to the hotel after 1 AM. I liked Zanzibar because I felt safe even at that late hour. I say it was the streetlights.

One time I didn't feel safe was when we went into Tippu Tip's house in the dead of the night. It didn't feel like a very good idea and inside was kind of scary looking. There were lights on upstairs, but we think people actually still live there. Well, the door was already partially open so we went in to the bottom floor. Our fears joined our brains and we decided to leave...but it was hard to get the door to shut. Our luck. It finally closed and then we continued with our night.

On Saturday, I returned to the spice market to buy small bags of certain spices for 500=/ which translates into about 50 cents. Strangely enough, there was a guy trying to charge 1000=/ but I didn't understand why. Who would buy from him when everything was half the price two feet away? After purchasing my spices, I met up with several other people inside the old fort where there is shopping and henna tattoos, which the girls got. I stayed around and watched.

And then there were five. Around lunchtime, three went back to Dar so as to be prepared for their early flights the next morning. The remaining group walked to the North End of Stone Town, about 15 minutes from our hotel. There we saw the State House and some of the Old Slave Quarters. These buildings, to me, showed how much more history Zanzibar seems to ave over the mainland.

And then there were four. Dan was staying in Zanzibar for two more nights. There was some weird customs getting out of Zanzibar (it's a part of Tanzania, but has its own immigration and customs, hence the reason for the debate in Parliament). While we waited on the boat, we watched bad early 90s love power ballad music videos. Then another boat had the audacity to hit us. It was hard enough that our boat jolted backwards and we could see a dent on the perpetrator. The ride back did not get better, with the waves crashing over the boat because of the intense storm we went through. Several times I felt like we should be able to see underwater. While most people felt sick, I found it strangely comforting. What wasn't comforting was the next round of bad action movies. We can never seem to avoid them.

And then there were three. Ryan was dropped off at his hotel and we continued back to campus via taxi.

And then there were two. Marion was originally supposed to be in our taxi on Sunday to the airport, but her family decided to drive her instead. So only Ashley and I needed the taxi later in the day. We asked him to arrive at 6, but he came half an hour early because he didn't want to be late. I questioned his Tanzania-ness at this comment. At 6 we finally began. Well, we tried at least. The car would not start so Best (the taxi driver) took a rock to it, beating in several things inside the hood. Certainly made me feel safe? We picked up Ashley and continued to the airport. Around Ubungo there was a lot of traffic and Best turned the car off. I was afraid that we might have to find another rock, but the car thankfully started. Phew.

The trip back to the United States wasn't that bad. Our flight stopped in Nairobi where Marion got on (back to three!), as did nearly every other person on the plane. Luckily, the seat next to me remained open so I had two seats on which to lay and get comfortable. On the plane, we saw a few fascinating people. The girl next to Ashley (behind me) goes to Duke and was in Bagomoyo for over two months volunteering at an orphanage. The girl in front of me was 8 years old and was on a plane for the first time alone. And she was alone. I can't even imagine doing that to my child for his/her first trip on an airplane. Also on the aircraft was Inga, Joy's friend (who in turn in Nsesheye's friend, my host sister). Inga was flying back to Germany to spend some time with her family. I really believe that it is a small world now. I arrived in Zurich just 60 days after first arriving in Zurich.

When I got off the plane, got through immigration, baggage claim, and customs, I was met by my mom and grandparents. It was great to see everybody. And being back in the US is great too. Tomorrow, there will be an entry on my final thoughts about my whirlwind Tanzania adventure. Keep reading!!!

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