Zanzibar

I have always wanted to go to Zanzibar, I lived country next to it and never got a chance to go there but it was one of the things on my bucket list.

When I met my husband, he already knew a lot more about Tanzania than I did (he took African history classes in college). He told me about a beach called “Nakupenda Beach” in Zanzibar and I didn’t believe him because he would throw a joke to your face and keep a straight face so it’s not easy to tell if he is for real or not. I had to look it up to believe him. I also teased him that he planned to get himself an African girl early on after I saw a picture of him in college reading a book about Africa.

The trip to Zanzibar was going to be a trip to a place where I am not from but I would be able to communicate perfectly because I speak Kiswahili sanifu(perfect Swahili). Even though I am not from Tanzania I still claim the 15% Tanzanian I have in me. My paternal great grandpa was from Tanzania, his name was Mwinyi Selemani, he was from Mndengereko south of Dar es Salaam. He is one of two people who brought Islam to Rwanda.

It felt so unreal hearing people from Zanzibar asking me if I was from Arusha because my accent sounded like people from there. I would proudly answered that I was Tanzanian like them, and when they would ask about my name I would just tell them to call me Binti Juma which means Juma’s daughter.

We stayed at a nice hotel in Matemwe, right at the beach, having breakfast with the sound of ocean waves was the best type of life anyone could dream of. We took a few different tours while we were there. First, we went to Kendwa to swim with turtles at a sea turtle sanctuary. I was so excited but when I got there I realized they were way too comfortable swimming and going over people then it freaked me out, they were all over us and my heart would skip a beat. I felt like I was about to pee my pants, but then I warmed up to them and got comfortable, it was amazing getting to swim with them and feed them. After that we then went for a sunset cruise that had Zanzibar traditional singers and they sang one of the songs my paternal grandmother would sing for me when I was little. It’s hard to explain how it felt. The songs goes: “Ongera mwanangu eehh ongera, nasi tuongere eehh ongera”, which means “congratulations my child, and let us congratulate ourselves too”.

Later we toured a spice farm where they plant a variety of different spices with some samples to show on tours. Zanzibar is also known as the spice island, which is the reason why their food is just to die for. I got to see cinnamon, vanilla, cloves, and many other trees in person. At the end of the tour they had us eat some fresh fruits and drink fresh coconut water straight from a coconut.

The next day we went to swim with dolphins, we were able to leave straight from the hotel and go to where the dolphins were swimming in the ocean. I still don’t have the perfect words to explain the feeling because everything I am coming up with I feel like it’s underrated. It’s one thing swimming with dolphins in a pool but it’s a whole other thing swimming with them in the ocean! The vision under water is so breathtakingly beautiful, looking at different fishes swimming next to me felt so relieving, I have never seen such a beautiful view in my life like the underwater view.

Our last tour was to the prison island and stone town. We took a short boat trip from Zanzibar to a smaller island with some historical buildings. It used to be used as a prison but now houses a tortoise sanctuary with a lot of tortoises roaming around the island, some of which are surprisingly old! We got to take some pictures with the tortoises and since we were at the island during feeding time we were able to feed them some lettuce as well before we headed to the old prison. Once we finished checking out the island we took the boat back to the city and toured the old part of the city called stone town. There was a museum there called The House of Wonders that we did not get to check out as it was being worked on while we were there, but our tour guide made it sound pretty interesting and I definitely want to check it out whenever we go back! We took a picture next to an old cannon outside the museum that used to be on the fort to defend the town against any attacking ships. Stone town had a lot of narrow winding streets through a lot of beautiful old buildings with a lot of shops both with touristy items as well as more general items that locals would go for. We got to take a view of the town from a rooftop which gave a really breathtaking perspective getting to look out across the old buildings with the ocean in the background.

I’m glad that we got to go to Zanzibar it is such an amazingly beautiful place and a great experience. I hope that we are able to visit again soon!