Zanzibar!

There’s an island off the coast of Tanzania that is the closest thing to paradise I have ever experienced. I traveled with Leslie, a volunteer who just finished her Peace Corps service. We bonded during Camp GLOW this past December and she was a great travel buddy, putting up with my goofy sense of humor all week.

After a 10-hour bus to Gabs, a 7 hour bus to Johannesburg and a 3-hour flight to Dar Es Salaam, we continued on to Zanzibar via a 90-minute ferry. From Stonetown, the commercial center of the island, we took a 2-hour dala-dala ride to Jambiani, a small beach town on the Eastern coast. As we waited for the dala-dala to fill up, people watching in the market, we were fascinated by all of the difference East Africa held from its southern counterparts. Stonetown is vibrant, colorful and very much alive.

The dala-dala ride was equally interesting, cruising down the spine of an island in a giant covered pickup truck and through the Jozani rainforest, we watched as palm trees, exotic fruits, women in colorful saris and men on bicycles flew by. When we arrived in Jambiani, the feeling of complete and utter serenity was almost immediate. Never have I seen such crystal blue water and touched sand that felt like baby powder. The shallow water extends out for over a mile before the shelf drops, coral emerges and the waves break.

We spent 3 days in this nook of paradise, relaxing on the beach, eating decadent food on the balcony overlooking the shore, and collecting seashells in the surf. I’m not sure I have ever known such total relaxation and experienced a state of mind so peaceful, so free from any thoughts whatsoever. It was heavenly.

Exploring the village of Jambiani was equally serene. It seems most tourists don’t leave their hotels, but exploring an African village seems second nature anymore. We waved to smiling schoolchildren eager to have their picture taken, bought some art at the Women’s Pottery Collective, and continued walking to find intriguing mystery around every corner.

We spent the rest of the week submerging ourselves in the addictive energy of Stonetown. The markets are so large and containing everything one can imagine that it was overwhelming to walk through the endless maze of spices, foods, fabrics and goods to be shipped, bought or traded.

One of the most striking things about Stonetown, and Zanzibar and Dar Es Salaam for that matter, were the people. Quite often, we were the only white people to be seen, but no one stared at us or laughed when we spoke, and few people asked us for money, which is all quite different from life in Botswana. Most people greeted us with a hearty “Habari. Hujambo? Welcome!” with no strings attached. The hospitality everywhere made the experience truly surreal.

We decided to have a walking dinner every night, just buying random foods in the market. I was hooked on the skewers of beef, chicken and fish everywhere. Each skewer was only 20 cents, and some of the best quality meat I’ve ever tasted. Everywhere we ate, the food was exquisite, always the perfect balance of flavors, juicy citrus and spices on every meat and a plethora of delicious fruits and fresh jams. For lunch, we usually bought a bunch of snacks at the market and sat at a beach bar to eat.

On one evening, we discovered cups of coffee sold on the corner. Every day, right outside our hotel, on a busy street corner, a couple of guys set up a table with a hundred porcelain cups and a few iron kettles of strong coffee heated on burning coals. Each cup of coffee cost a nickel.

Zanzibar is most popular for its spices. They have extensive spice farms on the island, growing everything from nutmeg and cinnamon to vanilla and turmeric. We did a spice tour one of the days and got to see all of the different spices growing in the wild. During our tour, there were several boys who would clamber up the trees to cut down an exotic fruit or spice for us to taste or smell. Throughout the journey, they also made a variety of temporary jewelry and accessories for all of us out of woven grass.

On our last day in paradise, we took a puddle-jumper flight to Dar Es Salaam for one more night in East Africa before we caught our 7AM flight back to Jo-berg. We had no idea where we were going to stay since we discovered the original place we had booked was very far from the airport, so we cancelled it. We just asked a taxi driver to take us to the closest cheap hostel or hotel when we go to Dar. The first two places we stopped at were completely booked up, but we were still so high from our experience in paradise that we honestly didn’t care if we had to sleep at the airport. Zanzibar put both of us on cloud 9. The third place we went to had a bed for us. We didn’t care that there was a small, waist-level water faucet for a shower and a squat toilet. Our taxi driver was so helpful and didn’t even want us to pay him until after he took us to the airport the following morning.

We walked around the village market where we were greeted by more “Welcome!”s and no one harassing us. Zanzibar was truly one of the most exotic, refreshing and serene vacations I’ve ever had the privilege to go on. I’ll let the my slideshow of pictures say the rest.