Dar Es Salaam, 6am. I never expected to see such a big number of people sleeping on the sidewalks. Maybe they are homeless, maybe it is because of the punishing heat. The streets of Dar are confusing and look quite alike. The highways are okay, but the back streets have no tarmack and are quite dirty around Kariokoo. There are vendors selling all kinds of fish, some coloured orange. I want to taste some, but because my stomach is unpredictable and Im here for work, I choose not to. I cannot film on a running stomach. Perhaps when I come back on holiday, I will find these fish and eat them all. We arrive at the ferry, and meet confusion. There are many brokers, just like those at the Machakos Upcountry Bus Station who offer to carry your bags or take you to an agents bookinh office which has no queue. What they dont say is that it will cost ten dollars more at the agent. A first class ticket to Zanzibar is priced at forty dollars for foreigners (no East African rates here, if youre not Tanzanian you are foreign). We buy economy tickets at twenty five dollars, go through security and get on the boat. Due to my own ignorance, I checked in my camera (yeah, I know), but I went back and got it. No decent videographer checks in a camera unless it is inside a huge flight case. After a hundred greetings from a cheerful purser in an American flag tie, we set off. I hope I wont get sea sick. The journery is supposed to take about two hours. Charlie Chaplin is on the tv screens inside the boat, and Tanzanians seem to enjoy him as thoroughly as I do. But when the signal is given that it is okay for people to sit on the sun deck, there is a small scramble at the tiny door leading to it. Of course, I got through -I have years of experience scrambling through the doors of the old KBS buses, Forward Travellers and Umoinner matatus. I got a seat on the second row just because I decided to not be too Kenyan and jump to the front row. I settled down and took out the take-away breakfast that the hotel had packed. Inside the pack is a single slice of bread, a lone smokie, an egg and a maandazi. I chew away, enjoying the breeze and the greyish blue sea. Less than ten minutes after that, we are smack in the middle of rain clouds and we have to rush down again and watch Charlie Chaplin. Zanzibar approaches. Children play soccer on the beach, some jump into the ocean with a splash. Dhows and boats bob lazily in the water against a background of two-storeyed white buildings. We disembark and meet commotion. There are no x-ray luggage scanners, so every bag is physically checked. There are only five luggage inspectors for around two hundred people. People crowd them. We decide to wait until it is a bit clear. Finally, we get our opportunity and walk up to the inspectors. I open my camera bag, they take a perfunctory peep and mark it Y using pink chalk. In Zanzibar, everyone will greet you. It started with the lovely Muslim lady who received us and insisted that we must take a cup of chai before we start working. Everywhere, people are in buibuis, and for the first time, I notice that some are more fashionable than others. Have I said I love Muslims? I really do! Whatever happens in Mombasa is not Islam; it is indoctrination into violence under the pretext of violent jihad. Islam is the lady that received us and made sure we were comfortable. Islam is the gentlemen who made sure we had everything we needed. Islam is Zanzibar, an island in which Muslim women will not take a photo without covering their heads, but will tolerate tourists arriving in hotpants. Not the radicalization of Mombasa. What I didnt like is the way groups of men sat on verandahs, staring listlessly at nothing, each lost in his thoughts except for the occassional comment. Zanzibar is a lazy island full of old buildings and people with no hurry at all. We have lunch at a restaurant in which everyone was using their fingers to eat pilau or biryani, so we discarded our spoons and dug in. Delicious. Along the road, many people play soccer on rough patches of land, some with pools of water from the rains earlier on. The buildings are old and crumbling. We see one which is a world heritage site. There is vegetation growing on the walls and on the roof, and I can imagine what an imposing structure it was in its heyday. We also see the old building which used to house orphans. Children are diving into the sea, making loud splashes and laughing. I wish I knew how to swim. I would make butterfly strokes up to the structure that looks like a floating house near the beach. Tourists are everywhere, but I notice the ladies dont do the hotpants that are common in Nairobi and Mombasa. Maybe they were told that Zanzibar is predominantly Muslim. Still, I hear a group of boys shouting greetings to girls in hijabs and telling them (when the girls dont answer) that their eyes -which is all the boys can see- are horrible. The girls answer right back and walk on. The sunset is beautiful, but we have to hurry up. The plane leaves in two hours. I film it and we rush to the airport, stopping briefly to grab a soda and something whose name I have forgotten. It is meat coated in mashed potatoes and fried. Very tasty, very heavy. We get to the...okay, lets call it an airport. The place looks like Nairobi Railway Station. No security at all, and the check-in desks look like lecterns. Very horrible. I was even surprised that they have computers and wi-fi. But Zanzibar International airport is a sorry place. It shouldnt be an international airport. So here I am, using free wi-fi, waiting for a delayed plane. I hope Ill get home safe.
Posted on: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 17:01:55 +0000
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