Before heading to Zanzibar, I spent a night in Dar es Salaam. Luckily I met Daniel at the airport. He was on business here and works as an accountant for an Australian mining company. We chatted about the mining business over a couple of beers. Chinese are buying up all his company's nickel.
I arrived just in time for the Zanzibar International Film Festival. That's where I went my first night here, but only after spending 3 hours walking around looking for a hotel room. Every place was booked up or way too expensive.
The Film Festival was pretty cool because screenings are outdoors in the courtyard of the Old Fort. It's a cool venue but the concrete seats are not conducive to 4 hours of watching movies and that's what got to me the first night. Or perhaps it was the first movie which was about 2 Kenyans, male and female, stuck in a bathroom or toilet as they call it. This movie was 2 hours long which involved lots of political conversations. I think the toilet was a metaphor for Kenya and only by working together were the two people able to get out of their mess.
The next couple of nights I spent up north on the beaches of Nungwi. After negotiating a decent rate for my hotel room with Ali at Safina Beach Bungalows, I headed to the beach. On they way I was accosted by all these "beach boys" as they call them. These guys offerred snorkeling trips, rides back into town and many other things. After staying in Nungwi sometime, I realized they all seemed to know everything about me. They had sized me up, knew which place I was staying and what I had already done. After I went snorkeling, I didn't get asked to do it again.
Nightlife in Nungwi revolved around Cholos, a bar with hammocks right on the beach. I went there every night with Peter, a Brit I met on the ferry ride over. He was a fellow solo traveler who worked up in Kenya. Peter and I had a good ole time meeting people at the bar. We even persuaded a couple of them to go for a night swim our first night. Interesting enough, I probably met the most number of Americans at this bar. 2 guys from Austin, 2 from New Orleans, 6 girls from the Bay Area and then most amazingly, two girls from Cleveland, Ohio (Avon and Elyria to be exact).
Peter was staying with 2 other Brits whom he had met on the ferry as well. They headed back early and Peter and I split a room. We had to renegotiate with Ali and agreed on a price of $25. But we disagreed on the conversion rate resulting in Ali getting 1 USD less than he wanted. We stared him down for awhile. He said "It's only a dollar" and we echoed right back saying "It's only a dollar." He acquescied but wasn't willing to shake Peter's hand. Apparently I was still on good terms with him because he gave me the thumbs up all the time.
One thing I really like about Zanzibar is how people signal hello to each other. It's thumbs up. Ali and all the beach boys used to do that to me all the time. I gave them the thumbs up right back.
I also became a local hero at the internet cafe there, having fixed their copy machine and demonstrating how it worked. Little did they know that I was an expert on copy machines having worked in litigation consulting where I would spend whole days just photocopying.After Nungwi, I returned to Stonestown and caught a film at the festival, only to head out to the East coast of the island the next day. The east coast was very relaxed and very few resorts. For dinner, I had to order 2 hours in advance so that they could get it ready.
Now, I'm back in Stonestown and plan on going on a spice tour tomorrow.
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