Hilary in Kenya: Zanzibar (Subtitle: Traveling with the British)

It’s official - I can now add Zanzibar (Tanzania) to the list of places I’ve visited while in Africa. Last weekend was a HUGE music festival in Stone Town (the biggest city on Zanzibar Island), and so a bunch of the Kenay ADPers decided to make a trip over to experience African culture at its finest. The ADPers staffed in Tanzania were our hosts - these are the same folks who we went on safari with back in December. We’ve been planning this visit since that safari trip, and it definitely did not disappoint.

I arrived in Stone Town on Friday evening. The first word to describe Zanzibar is HOT...the second is MUGGY. Think Houston on its worst day...with no air conditioning. Now imagine that everyone is Muslim, so you can’t go walking around in clothing too revealing. This is why everyone has a nice “glow” about them in all of the pictures from the weekend. But, I digress.

Stone Town is a quaint little town with definite Arabic influences in the architecture and people. The streets are narrow and winding, with intricate carvings above the doorways and lots of little alleyways. The culture is heavily Muslim, which means the women wear lots of bright colors and scarves, which adds to the mystique of the place. Every year, there is a music festival called Sauti Za Busara (Sounds of Wisdom), which is “the” music festival in East Africa. It’s all African musicians, and it takes place in the old fort in the middle of downtown. There’s a main stage where the acts perform, and there’s another small area where food / crafts are sold, and a small amphitheater where they show films. We saw 5-10 acts in the time we were there - my favorite was a group from South Africa - a woman and a man. I’m no music critic, so I can’t say if they produced “quality”, but the beat and energy of their act was incredible. You could literally FEEL yourself getting sucked into the music. Amazing.

The next day we got up semi early (we had crashed in a very budget hostel with a definite lack of AC) and headed over to the east side of the island to a hotel called Arabian Nights (not to be confused with Arabian Night - turns out, that one is not as nice). We had an amazing day of laying out, swimming, walking the beach, massages...once again, I was struck by how beautiful the coast is here. Nothing but crystal blue waters and dhow boats as far as the eye can see. It was pretty quiet on that side of the island (our group of 15 took up most of the hotel) but we made our own party. Dinner was at a place down the beach called Paje by Night. Let’s just say we ordered dawas...by the bucketful. Yes, they came in buckets, similar to the buckets we use to chill wine in the States. Incredible. After a very boozy and hammock filled time at Paje, we decided we weren’t done for the night. Thus, we had one of the waiters take us to a local “bar”. Thus began the Harrowing Adventure of Saturday Night. In short, we had this guide (who of course none of us had ever met before) leading us through a deserted village...after midnight...in the middle of nowhere. We all had a moment of panic (oh man this guy could kill us at any time and no one would know) as we realized this might not have been the best choice. After a 15 minute walk, we arrived at the “bar”, which was deserted - turns out the locals had heard us coming (probably the mumblings of fear) and, thinking we were the cops, had shut the place down. They came back quickly though and things got going again. The amazing thing was that this “bar” was basically a concrete slab with a fridge where they stored the beer. The party was cut short by the power going out, but that just made our walk back with the guides (who were now our best friends) all the better as we could stare at the stars that seemed to go on forever.

Sunday dawned bright (ouch) and early. Most folks were leaving that day, so it was a pretty informal afternoon - pool time, more massages, and beach walks. I did get to use my first aid kit (first time since I’ve been here!) as one of the guys stepped on an anemone - nothing serious, but we had to get the spines out. I also had the most amazing beach nap of my life that afternoon...not sure why it is that beach naps are always so satisfying. By early evening, most folks had gone - only 5 (Vicky, me, Laura, and Vicky’s friend Helen, who is visiting from the UK for the week) were left. This is where TRAVELING WITH THE BRITISH begins. It started innocently enough (with a low key dinner and a semi-early bedtime on Sunday to help us recover from all the fun the past two nights) but it was destined to be comedy.

Monday morning we woke up and headed over to the north side of the island, looking for a bit more of a lively atmosphere. An hour and a half later, we were checking in to Flame Tree Cottages, which were quaint little beach cottages with verandahs. No pool here, but more amazing views, and a great sand filled terrace with hammocks and sun loungers. We immediately made for that area, and the rest of the afternoon was filled with drinking talking and relaxing. I was (constantly) made fun of for my American ways, which apparently are nothing but amusing to my English counterparts. They were rolling in laughter when I explained about Baylor’s live mascots and that we teach them to do the “sic ‘em bears” symbol. They couldn’t seem to get enough of the fact that we get new bears every two years, and that students get to keep the bears. Sadly, the “sic ‘em” hand signal (which I very clearly showed them) is now mocked by everyone in our group...it resembles jazz hands more than I’d like to admit. They also loved the fact that I have become very picky since being in Africa - for example, I studied the lunch menu, and, finding nothing that suited me, proceeded to make my own order. In addition, my English (and the tone in which I say things) has definitely become “British” tinged...being around the English all day has made me start saying things like “please may I” and “golly gosh” with alarming regularity, which of course makes them laugh all the harder. We started our evening off with a good old round of Ring of Fire (who doesn’t love that game) and using accents “not your own” was one of the rules - “proud to be an American” (said in a very low gravelly voice) became the catch phrase of the night. After Ring of Fire, we headed down the beach to find some dinner - we nearly had a catastrophe as most of the restaurants had closed down (we didn’t realize it was already nearly 11), but Laura, being the ace that she is, managed to convince one of the local restaurants to do take away fish and chips. I have to say, that was the BEST fish and chips I’ve ever eaten - sitting at a table by the sea scarfing down fresh fish...amazing. Afterwards, we headed to a post-music festival party, where we danced like crazy people until the morning hours. I’m definitely becoming much more of a dancer here in Africa - can’t say I’m getting any better at it, but it’s more fun than it used to be!

Tuesday we headed back to Stone Town for a bit of shopping and sightseeing. We ate lunch at a great little cafe, then it was time to jump our flight back to Kenya. I really hope to get back to Zanzibar before I leave Africa - I know I say this every post, but this was definitely one of the best weekends I’ve had since I’ve been here.