Zanzibar VI: Breezes

The Best Things About Breezes:
1. The Shower. Water pressure!
2. Rum punch

The Worst Thing About Breezes:
1. All of their other cocktails. Terrible.



Things We Got for Free at Breezes Because It was Our Honeymoon:
1. Bottle of (really, really bad) Prosecco
2. 20 % off my massage
3. A “sundowner,” which included glasses of wine and “bitings” delivered to our room one evening
4. “Bed Under the Stars.” Does this not sound amazing? Terrifying? All of the above? A note was left in our room notifying us this would occur on our last night. What could this be, we wondered? First, you need to understand that the room at Breezes had A/C. Second, you need to be reminded that it is absurdly hot in Zanzibar and humid. Now, when we came back from dinner and drinks Thursday evening, we discovered that the bed under the stars consisted of two twin beds pushed together out on our balcony, surrounded by a mosquito net. But since the mosquito net needs to be hung from something, the bed was actually set up underneath the balcony’s overhang, so if you’re in the bed, there are actually no stars to be seen. So this is as close as we got to using the ever-so-romantic bed under the stars:


(The pictures are blurry because the camera fogged up when we took it out of the air-conditioned room and into the rain-forest-like air outside.)

Thing I Learned While at Shooting Star

bush baby=monkey squirrel thing. noisy little suckers.

Zanzibar V: Snorkeling

While pretty cool, snorkeling turned into a bit of a nightmare, for me anyway. We took a boat from a neighboring resort (after waking up around sunrise - above) with about a dozen other people on it out to the reef near Mnemba Island, a tiny little island about a 40-minute boat ride from the resort. There was very little cover from the sun; we were wearing wet suits for protection, but still it gets pretty darn hot. Most of the other people on the boat were scuba diving. Abdul was our snorkeling guide. He took us to two different spots on the reef with an hour break in the middle of sitting on the boat, eating fruit.

At the first spot everything was going swimmingly. Just as I thought I was about to be engulfed by a school of yellow and blue striped fish, I felt pricks of burning on my right wrist and my left elbow. I looked to my right and saw almost invisible strings tinged blue hanging down from the surface. I lifted my head and Abdul and J were both yelling. “Bluebottles!” I had no idea what the hell a bluebottle was, but guessed pretty quickly it was this stringy thing next to me and that it was not good. Panic. Abdul motioned us in another direction. I had only been lightly stung, but J had gotten hit on his ear and his cheek pretty good. I spent the rest of that swim in constant fear of running into more. As were getting out of the water, one of the guys who worked on the boat threw me one of those round, red life tubes to hang on to so I wouldn’t drift too far from the boat. I grabbed on: bluebottle. It got me right across my left hand. Holy cow does it sting.

We sat next to Abdul as the guys on the boat swabbed our wounds with vinegar. “It’s no killing,” Abdul said about the bluebottle. We felt greatly reassured. Abdul told us he got stung on the wrist but he felt it in his armpit. Weird, we said. Then J and I went and sat under the covering to get out of the sun. Soon enough I understood what Abdul was talking about. My armpit started to ache. It reminded me of when I had shingles on my back. Just a nice, dull ache in my left armpit that lasted about half an hour.

By the second dive we were feeling pretty alright again. In the second spot the waves were much rougher. I’m embarrassed to say that it made me seasick. I had to get out of the water. For the rest of the ride I was pretty much in misery: all I wanted to do was curl up back on my little daybed on our deck at Shooting Star. It seemed to take an eternity to get there.

However, I was greatly entertained by another woman on the boat with us. We saw some pretty amazing fish, but this woman was perhaps the most amazing. She seemed to me the happiest, more carefree woman I have ever been around. She had enormous boobs which were barely encased by her white string bikini. She wore her bikini bottom so low you could see the top of her butt crack. She had short blond hair and a huge smile—her teeth were crooked which made her only more attractive. She spoke English with a British accent by way of Russia. Her boyfriend was an old British dude with a pockmarked face who seemed incredibly charmed by everything his girlfriend said. They wore matching oversized Prada sunglasses. The girl asked the brash, large, loud, South African dive master to apply sunscreen to her back while her boyfriend watched from the other side of the boat. Every time the boat stopped, this woman jumped off the back for a swim, laughing the whole while. She had everyone on the boat mesmerized. I loved her.

Zanzibar IV: Shooting Star

I love Shooting Star. Since we were there for the beginning of the rainy season, the place was practically empty. We had a little bungalow to ourselves, which was pretty awesome. The daybeds out on the deck were incredibly comfortable:



We also had the beach bar all to ourselves.



The water (my first time in the Indian Ocean!) was super warm.



In the mornings they left coffee in a thermos on the ledge outside our door. We had picked up US Weekly and People in the Nairobi airport and saved them for the beach. All of this equals heaven.

Zanzibar III: Spice Tour

Victor, our driver from the Serena Inn, hooked us up with George, who has an air-conditioned taxi, to drive us across the island to the Shooting Star resort on the east coast. We asked him to stop on the way so we could take a short spice tour. George said he knew a guy.

Mr. Paulo met us on one of the government owned spice plantations where they grow cinnamon, cloves, vanilla, cardamom, turmeric, ginger, lemons and limes, lemongrass, bananas, coconuts, star fruit, jackfruit, jasmine, peppercorn, chilies, and these furry red things that women used to break open and smear across their lips in place of lipstick:



Mr. Paulo walked us around for an hour and we were followed by two boys, around 15-years-old, who wove presents out of banana leaves for us:





James climbed a tree for us:



So we could drink coconut juice and eat the pulp—we each felt very obligated to eat/drink the whole thing, even though we didn’t really want to. These were not the brown furry coconuts that have more of a milk in them. These had more of a coconut water, refreshing and all, but there was a lot of it.

Zanzibar II: Emerson & Green

We were told that dinner at Emerson & Green in Stone Town was not to be missed. Now that we have experienced it, I’m not sure I agree with that statement. It was one of the most bizarre and awkward meals I’ve ever eaten.

We made reservations and arrived at sunset. The “restaurant” is on the roof overlooking the city. Very beautiful. Guests are seated on pillows on the floor in a square around the edge of the roof in front of low tables. They squeeze in maybe 30 people, all of us staring across the square at each other. Dinner lasts for two and a half hours and by the end of it our legs had only fallen asleep, oh, a half dozen times.

There was a five course meal and the food was decent. Even more awkward than trying not to listen in on everyone’s conversations or even make eye contact with them, in between courses there were three musicians playing traditional Swahili music and—here’s the kicker—a woman comes out and dances.

The only thing to do was drink more wine. We chose the brand called “Goats Do Roam.” Too good of a name to pass up.

How do I do this dancer justice? I’m so sorry we didn’t bring our camera. She wore a white dress with a cloth belt twisted thickly around her waist. The belt seemed necessary to dance—perhaps to enhance the suggestive pelvic thrusts?—because when she finally lured one of the guests on to the dance floor at the end of the night, she made the person wear her belt. The dance was overtly sexual. There were really no other nuances to it. There were really only two moves: pelvic grinding or her ass in your face. She was out there all alone and her goal seemed to be to make extended eye contact with each of the guests as she thrust her groin at them. J and I kept our eyes on each other and ordered another bottle of wine. She was not getting to us.

But by far the best part about this woman was the look on her face. When she could no longer find anyone to make eye contact with her, she would stand in the middle of the room and get this orgasmic look on her face. She half closed her eyelids and wore this taunting little smile. Her teeth were slightly bucked and her look was so self-satisfied. Amazing. Amazingly awkward.

Five courses! She just kept coming back out for more. Lesson learned: Goats do roam. Dogs will hunt.

Zanzibar – I: Stone Town

But let me start from the beginning. We arrived in Zanzibar last Friday, a holiday in Uganda, as it was Good Friday. 80% of Zanzibar is Muslim, so the holiday was much quieter there. Our bags were held up in Nairobi during our layover. I think the plane we took from Nairobi to Zanzibar was too small to hold all the baggage. It was also small enough to make me feel a little ill. The flight goes right past Mt. Kilimanjaro, though, which is pretty darn cool.

Victor was the driver sent by the Serena Inn to pick us up at the airport. He helped us sort the forms to have our bags delivered to the hotel—we were quite certain we were never seeing that bag again, but luckily had packed extra clothes (including swimsuits) in our carry-on. Our room at the Serena was amazing, with a great balcony complete with hammock and wonderful views:



The Serena is in Stone Town, the major town in Zanzibar. Stone Town reminded us a lot of Venice, without the canals. The streets are narrow and curvy and too small for cars but you constantly have to dodge people coming through on mopeds and bicycles. People in Zanzibar are aggressive. Each store you pass, the storeowner is out front yelling for you to come inside. Kids will follow you trying to sell you art or jewelry. To all of these people you have to tell them no a dozen times before they will give up. It can be quite draining.

Saturday we left the hotel in the morning to walk around some more. We didn’t have a guide book or any real idea of what the “sites” were, we just wanted to wander and take it easy. We made it about 100 yards before a guy started walking in step with us. He started talking about some of the buildings we passed, asking us questions. We realized we either had to tell this guy very explicitly to bug off or we would be stuck with him until he did and at some point he would expect some money. So J asks how much he would charge to show us around for an hour.

“Hakuna matata.”

Disney did not make that up, which I still find surprising. I can’t seem to get over people actually using it.



Anyway, Ali showed us around for about two hours. He was an excellent and knowledgeable guide. He showed us this door:



Which was carved by a slave who carved only one other door, a bigger and more intricate one in the Old Fort, with his signature eagle, lion, and snake carved into the top. Then the slave was killed so he wouldn’t create any more doors that beautiful to compete with the two he had already done. The copper spikes in the door are to keep away the elephants, though of course there are none left on the island.

Ali also took us to the spice market:



Amazing looking produce and I saw my first breadfruit (called shelli shelli in Swahili). If someone could tell me which book I read about a boy stranded on a desert island who survived on breadfruit, I’d be very grateful.



By the end of the second hour I was feeling pretty hot and sweaty, and I looked down at my legs and noticed that my feet and ankles were covered in red bumps, which I decided was either a reaction to the pedicure I had that morning followed by a 2-hour sweaty trek through a pretty dirty city or I had been attacked by bugs. Whatever was going on, I was freaked out. (Turned out to be bugs, we think. Whatever it was, I'm fine.) We told Ali it was time for us to go back to the hotel.

“I’ll show you a shortcut,” Ali said and started leading us down a pretty deserted alley. At this point I was pretty sure that “I’ll show you a shortcut,” was code for “This is where my friends jump out and we steal all your money.” But it was really code for “You are a very distrustful American and should be ashamed of yourself.” It was a really good shortcut.

Jambo!

Karibu back to the blog. We are back from Zanzibar and the tannest I have ever seen us. Honestly we didn’t even spend that much time directly in the sun—it was just so hot—and we never wore anything less than 30 SPF. Plus, I now know about seven words in Swahili. (Jambo=hello; karibu=welcome; did you know people actually use the phrase hakuna matata in all seriousness? They do. Often.)

I have many stories to tell, which I will parcel out over the next week or so, but I’ll start with this: I saw my first non-zoo monkey. Let me set the scene for you: It’s the last day of our trip and George, our driver, is going 110 km/hr on barely-paved roads on which people, poultry, cattle, bicycles, small children, and slower cars are constantly getting in the way, causing George to swerve and slam on the breaks/speed up. I am certain we are going to die.

George has picked us up in a different car this day, one with tinted back windows so that when we go through the many police roadblocks, they will not see that he has tourists in the back seat and so will get away without paying them a bribe. Tourists in the car mean you palm the guy 500 – 1000 shillings. (Less than a dollar, but with four or five roadblocks each way crossing the island, these things can add up.) Incongruously to the death-defying driving and the tactics to evade the corrupt police, George’s car is filled with giant stuffed animals and his front dashboard is lined with fake flowers; a pokemon figure dangles from the rearview window.

Jozani Forest lies in the middle of Zanzibar and in the forest lives the Red Colobus monkey. I think this is one of the only places this particular monkey can be found, but I would not take my word on that one. Our first time crossing the island and going through the forest, we had no monkey sightings and, having just finished a spice tour (more on that later), we didn’t feel like paying for a monkey tour.

But on this, our last day, there are monkeys. Oh, there are monkeys! First, I see one dart across the road—luckily for this monkey there are speed bumps at this juncture, forcing George to slow down considerably. Then, George leans into the back seat and rolls down my window. Look, he points. And in the tree are three monkeys, just chilling. They look at us. They have little tufts of hair sticking up over their eyes. They are mostly white with dark tails, but they do have a red tint to them.

Then George is yelling at me—roll the window back up! Police block. We cruise on through—there will be no bribes paid by George on this day. And indeed, we make it to the airport in one piece—only to find our flight has been canceled.