Zanzibar!

Ok, so I fixed the link to the pictures on the previous post. It should work now. Anyway, I guess I should continue with my spring break recap as some of you weren't too thrilled that I left you hanging... There will be pictures to come, but Facebook seems to be very unhappy with me right now and won't let me upload pictures.

We checked into our hotel called the St. Monica Guest House which is a part of the Anglican Church in downtown Stonetown. St. Monica's is a huge church and the only church that I saw in Zanzibar which makes sense as Zanzibar is about 94% Muslim. I guess the main attraction of the cathedral is that it was built where Zanzibar's slave market used to be. The slave market was closed in the late 1890's when the slave trade ended and the British immediately began construction on the cathedral.

We got to tour the church the next day as part of our stay there and saw the "chambers" that were under the Guest House. The chambers held the slaves between the time that they arrived in Zanzibar and the time that they were sold at the market. Then we went outside and saw the tree that the slaves were auctioned under (a beautiful tree, ironically). Then we went into the actual cathedral which had beautiful stained glass and a few tributes to David Livingstone, the missionary who named Lake Victoria and is often credited with abolishing the slave trade in Zanzibar. At the front of the church, right in front of the altar, is a circle about 6 inches in diameter that marks the spot where the whipping post stood. It was a very eery experience, especially since a few of the students on my program didn't even know that there was a slave trade in East Africa. I forget sometimes that most people only learn about the North Atlantic slave trade, but I was still surprised that they didn't know that the Arabs had a slave trade as well. Needless to say I, as the resident history major, taught a little bit of African history and even learned a few new things myself.

We also went on a tour of Stonetown and visited the former Sultan's palace and the House of Wonders which was Zanzibar's main legislative building and also the tallest building in East Africa (and the only one with electricity) at its construction. Zanzibar was ruled by Arabs until the 1960s and has the most incredible buildings. As we walked around, it felt like we stepped into the middle east as we tried to navigate through the "labyrinthine" streets as they're often called and rightly so. We stumbled over the hundreds of cats on the island to make our way past the shops filled to the brim with scarves and fabric and find our next site to see. The people wore traditional Muslim clothes and the call to prayer woke us at sunrise every morning (very loud). Most of the architecture in Zanzibar has Arab and Indian influences (even in the Anglican church) and was so interesting. I know that my dad would love the ornate wood carvings and extraordinary architecture. My favorite part of Zanzibar was the way that so many cultures, religions and lifestyles are mixed in one small island and how peaceful everything is there.

Every night, street vendors from all over Stonetown set up in the Forodhani Gardens, a patch of green grass on the edge of the city with the beach on the other side of a brick retaining wall. The food was beyond delicious. We ate beef kabobs, octopus and chocolate and banana "pizza" and drank sugar cane juice (delicious) on the beach and admired the incredible stars. The gardens had the most incredible ambiance with each vendor's table dimly lit by a lantern and locals and tourists laughing and talking about how much they loved this place. I could've eaten every meal there and will definitely be taking Chris there when he comes to visit.

The next day, we went on a spice tour outside of Stonetown. It was so interesting transitioning from the Middle East back to Africa in a few short minutes in our taxi. We arrived at one of the many spice farms and our guide came up and took us around from tree to tree, plant to plant. At the first tree, he grabbed some leaves off of a vine that covered a huge tree. He crumples up the leaves, passes them around and says "smell". We obey and hey asks us what kind of spice it is. We're completely at a loss. He says "ok" and pulls off a small bunch of berries that looked a bit like a raspberry and says, "now guess". We throw out a few ideas and after each one he answers "No, thank you". Finally he says, "You take these and let them dry in the sun and they change from red to black and then you grind them up. Now do you know?". We finally realize and say "black pepper" and he says "aha, yah". I immediately thought of how excited my dad and Hollis would be to learn about black pepper and then I realized that they probably would have known what it was right away.

We moved around and in the same fashion, we attempted to guess at the spices. We saw cocoa plants, "lipstick" plant, cardamom, tarragon, ylang ylang, cloves, cinammon, vanilla and many more and then moved on to fruits. Oh my goodness. A lot of you know that I don't usually eat much fruit, but I decided to suck it up and try all the fruit they brought us. That was probably one of the best decisions I've ever made. We had grapefruits, bananas, starfruit, clementines, pineapple and I learned about a new fruit called jackfruit. It's a mix of a pineapple and a banana and is huge. We didn't get to try it, but they sell them in Arusha so it's on my list of things to do before I leave. As I thought things couldn't get any cooler, one of the guys weaved us little baskets out of palm leaves to hold our leaves, spices and seeds and then weaved hats for the boys and necklaces that looked like frogs for the girls. Amazing!

The next day we left Stonetown for Nungwi, a town at the very northern tip of Zanzibar known for its beaches. We quickly checked into our hotel and went straight to the beach. As we walked up we saw a small beachside bar, tucked under some palm trees with hammocks hung between them - basically your stereotypical beach paradise. We set our stuff down and ran out into the crystal clear water. The water was pretty shallow so we kept going out farther in an attempt to find deeper water. Little did we know that tide was still pretty far out because it was only 11:30am. Well, I learned pretty quickly that there is something to be said for waiting until the tide comes in a little more. I stepped on, well kicked actually, a sea urchin and ended up with 5 spikes in my right foot between my toes. I made my way back to the beach in a lot of pain and hobbled up to the bar and asked the bartender if he had a remedy for sea urchins. Lucky for me, he did. He told me he'd be right back with some papaya and kerosene. I sat there, a little nervous about what he was going to light on fire and whether it would be more pain than I was already in and I should just run (or hobble) away. Luckily, he came back quickly and put some juice from the papaya on my foot and then poured a cap full of kerosene and told me to wait 5 minutes and then I could walk around and that the papaya and kerosene would help the spikes come out later. I waited patiently and actually felt much better. I think I still have some spikes in my foot. They're kind of like splinters so it may not have worked completely, but at least it felt better.

The rest of the morning was much more relaxing and we swam and enjoyed the beautiful beach. I had a pina colada that was made from real pineapple and coconut milk and it was delicious. Later that afternoon we went out on a dhow cruise. We went out, anchored and snorkeled for a while. We jumped off the boat and swam around and then put up the sail and went a little farther and then turned around to head back and saw the most beautiful sunset I've ever seen. We went back to the beach that night and listened to music and enjoyed our last night on the Indian Ocean. It was an incredible few days in Zanzibar. I just wish we could've spent more time there!