Masai on the beach and other tales from Zanzibar

Last time I had a chance to sit down and devote some time to an update, I was in Arusha, Tanzania sitting under beautiful Mt. Meru (spitting distance from Mt. Kilimanjaro) and doing research at the UN International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). I'll write more about Arusha some other time (For now, the pics are here: http://smith.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2010862&l=339a4&id=5902101 ). They seem very distant from me now as I sit in this small internet cafe hearing the evening call to prayer echo through the streets of Stone Town on the island of Zanzibar.

The formal academic program ended about 10 days ago and since then I've had some much needed vacation time. Last week I was in Nairobi with my Kenyan friend Muthoni from Oxford. She showed me around town a bit--and by town, I mean the suburbs, since downtown Nairobi is notoriously crime-ridden, thus the moniker "Nairobbery." We quickly got tired of the dreary weather and decided to head to the coast. Transport in Kenya, as in most of the continent, is quite challenging, but we decided to brave the roads and go from Nairobi to Mombasa by bus... The bus wasn't exactly your air-conditioned Greyhound, but at least there weren't any goats or chickens in it. I was, as usual, the only mzungu on the bus, which the gaggle of veiled women thought was just about the funniest and strangest thing they had ever seen.

The 500km over the bumpy pot-hole ridden highway through the Kenyan plains only took 9.5 hours, which includes the fact that a) we left 30min late, b) had a 45min rest stop, and c) stopped for another 45min to change a punctured tire. For most of the ride, I napped and between dosing enjoyed the beautiful scenery... Lots of little villages, really just glorified groups of shops and street vendors, squatted along the highway in the ever-changing scenery of hills, sharp escarpments, and plains dotted with cattle and their young Masai herders. As I sat there thinking about the Kenyan landscape and the artificial and imperialist creation of the national park systems, I saw some zebra along the side of the road... Who needs national parks, which just dispossess local populations, when the whole country is basically a big national park? Oh goodness, my last semester of college is haunting me (thanks Prof Newbury).
Anyway, we finally got to Mombasa and installed ourselves at Muthoni's flat at the Tamarind on the North coast, about 15min from the city centre. Sitting on the balcony, in the evening warmth, hearing the soft laping of the Indian Ocean below me, I was in absolute heaven--except for the mosquitoes which quickly smelled out their sweet new prey. After a couple of nights in Mombasa, we flew back to Tanzania down to Zanzibar to meet up with Page, an American friend from the academic program.

Zanzibar is an island in the Indian Ocean that historically served as an important trading centre between Africa and the Middle East. For hundreds of years, ivory and African slaves sailed one way on the monsoon winds, and spices and silk went the other. In the meantime, lots of Arabs settled in the Zanzibar archipelago (including, rather famously, the sultan of Oman who decided to relocate his capital here in 1832) and intermarriage between Arabs and Africans ensued, which gave rise to a coastal community with distinctive features, and a unique hybrid language derived in part from Arabic and the local Bantu dialect... That language is now known as Swahili, a name which comes from the Arab word sawahil which means 'coast'.
Skip forward a hundred years or so: Zanzibar finally gained its independance in 1964 and together with the mainland (Tanganyika) formed the nation we know as Tanzania (look at that clever little word melding ;-) ).

Anyway, sorry for that historical digression, but the history is absolutely fascinating and still very visible, most notably in the architecture and the predominantly Muslim population (97%). When I arrived, the light cloud cover over Stone Town could not mask the beauty of this UNESCO World Heritage Site... Traditional dhow boats float on the bright blue harbour waters that suround the bustling little bazaars, cobblestone streets, narrow alleys, and white-washed houses with dark wood carved doors--oh just see for yourself: http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&q=zanzibar%20stone%20town&sa=N&tab=wi
After an overnight in Stone Town, we drove out to the south east coast to Paje, a miniscule fishing village on one of the most beautiful beaches I have ever seen. The quiet palm tree-lined beach extends for miles; silky soft white sands trims the Indian Ocean; and the sun glistens in gold and silver flecks on the surface of the warm and shallow turquoise waters. We just tanned, read (I'm rather appropriately in the middle of the Zanzibar Chest), ate freshly caught seafood, got pekoe (black henna) tattoos, watched fishermen come in with the daily catch, dodged some tiny jelly fish, did a little souvenir shopping (with the random local Masai who roamed the beach), and went for long walks down the deserted beaches. We must have been among only 50 or 60 other tourists (mostly Italians and some Brits), and we felt like we had the place to ourselves as we lay comatose on the beach for 4 days.
But that mini-escape from reality is over, as I'm back in Stone Town this evening before flying back to Mombasa early tomorrow mornaing. I have about 5 more days of holiday before moving out to Kisumu in Western Kenya to do some volunteer work with Africa Now, the NGO I worked for last summer.
Anyway I'm off to enjoy my last evening in this little island paradise (I seriously recommend it--check out the link to my pics)...