Tanzania Adventure

November 4, 2009

Tanzanian Adventures!

For the past two weeks, my friend Jodi and I have been traveling around in Tanzania. It has been fun and amazing and also exhausting! We left after the Lake of Stars festival and took a 40-hour bus ride from Lilongwe to Dar es Salaam. It was the longest travel that I have ever endured. On the second night, we could see the lights of Dar and Jodi even woke me up to tell me that we were almost there. But then, the bus pulled into a gas station and we were informed that we would be spending the night there. The driver was afraid of bandits attacking the bus and refused to drive into the city at that hour. Jodi and I crawled back onto the bus and went to sleep. The next morning at around 3 or 4 am, we started off and finally got into Dar. Jodi and I noticed that the British boy who had also been on the bus was no longer there but that all of his bags were. We decided to take them to the British High Commission. Finally, we were able to call my friend Pam and made our way to her place. Pam is a friend from Hopkins who is doing her internship with Engender Health in Tanzania. When we got to her place, we showered and decided to head off to the beach. It was the perfect first day in town. Tanzania as a whole is amazing and very different from Malawi. People seem to be more laid back in terms of their interactions with muzungus. If you decline someone’s offer for a service or a product, they mostly just back off instead of pushing it again for a cheaper price. Really nice!

The next day, Jodi and I ran some errands while Pam worked and then the three of us set off for Zanzibar. There was a 2 hour ferry ride across the ocean to the island and we arrived just as it was getting dark. Our arrival in Zanzibar was hectic to say the least. Huge groups of men swarmed us, trying to take us to a hotel. Even the three of us, with experience in Africa and in other developing countries, felt overwhelmed. Ultimately, we escaped them and took a taxi into Stone Town and found a hotel. Once we settled in, we found a night market for dinner and then made our way to a bar for drinking and dancing. In the morning, we woke up and headed through town and into the market to find some of the famous Zanzibar spices. Unfortunately, it was pouring down rain the whole day! At around noon, we took a van to the north of the island for our beach trip. We decided to stay at Sunset Lodge in Kendwa. It was soooo gorgeous- crystal clear water, white sand, the whole works. Our hotel room, which was perfectly nice, costed about 15 dollars per person per night. Not bad at all. We spent the day on the beach reading and relaxing and then had coconut curry for dinner. That night, one of the other hotels on the beach had a party and we went out drinking and dancing.

The next morning, Pam had to leave and go back to work. I thought that I had a bad hangover all day, but it soon became apparent that I had some sort of food poisoning. I was so sick that Jodi gave me oral rehydration salts. Nevertheless, I pulled it together for long enough to get a nice hour long massage (for about 8 bucks!) We went to bed early and hoped that the next day would be better.

I still felt sick in the morning but was determined to move through it and enjoy my vacation. We ended up walking to nearby Nungwi- another area with a bunch of hotels. We went on a Dhow sunset cruise- hands down the highlight of the trip. The man who took us offered a reasonable price and was really nice and laid back. We got to jump from the top of the Dhow (which is a sailboat) into the ocean- really fun. The worst part about Zanzibar was the trip back to Dar. The waves were massive and nearly a quarter of the boat (including yours truly) got violently ill. It was pretty disgusting to say the least.

Finally, we did make it back to Dar and stayed with Pam for another two days. We went to a local market and shopped for fabric- I got SO SO much. After this, we were off to Dodoma, the capital of Tanzania, to see Jodi’s friend Paul. Paul works for Peace Corps and stays in a village about 2 hours from Dodoma. Paul met us in Dodoma and showed us around town. Although MUCH smaller that Dar, Dodoma has a lot of character and is a really nice city. Paul speaks Swahili well and it was nice to have him around to communicate with people. Whereas most Malawians can and will speak English, most Tanzanians expect you to be able to speak Swahili. I like the sentiment but it is also really hard when you are just there for 2 weeks and don’t have time to really study it.

We went to Paul’s village for the next day. I am really glad that we went- life there is so much different from life in cities. As he showed us around the village, we stopped and talked to just about everyone that we saw. Everyone was really nice but no one really spoke English. I am sure that Paul was exhausted from all of his translation. Many different ethnic groups live in Paul’s village including the Masai, a group of rather nomadic pastoralists. In the morning, we awoke to the sound of cows as they brought them to a nearby watering hole. In Paul’s village, I also became quite ill. It was a bit concerning and I plan to visit a doctor when I get home and have everything checked out. I am not the most cautious traveler and I think that months of street food and contaminated water may be taking their toll on me. Anyway, the thing that I took away from my experience with Paul is that Peace Corps can be quite tough and remote and that it can be a lonely time. But, I also know that I could do it if I decide to make it a priority. We went back to Dodoma for a night and then bought a ticket for a 6:30 am bus to Mbeya- a town near the border with Malawi.

At 6:05, we arrived at the bus station and were told that we were late. Although they had told us that the bus would leave at 6:30, it had actually left at six. After a lot of frustration and tension, we realized that the 6:00 bus had not yet left and bought a ticket for that one instead. Despite our best efforts to get our money back, we just had to take the loss. When we arrived in Mbeya that night, we tried to find a guesthouse and realized that most of them were full or out of our price range. We were ultimately led to one that costed the equivalent of $3 per person. Although I am good at toughing it out through a lot of situations, this place was too much for me. It had roaches everywhere and lacked running water and looked just plain filthy. I was nervous about bed bugs (not a fun experience) and scabies and worse. Although we had paid for the place, Jodi and I found somewhere else and stayed there instead. After a long day of travel, I needed somewhere that felt clean at least.

We bought a ticket that claimed to link Mbeya and Lilongwe because we thought that it would be easiest. But when we got to the border, the Malawian bus that was supposed to be waiting there was nowhere to be found. We had been duped. Again, we bought another ticket and went to Karonga and took a bus to Lilongwe. We stayed a night there and then I took a night bus to Blantyre. I got in at 5:30 am- totally exhausted.

This blog post really doesn’t do the trip justice- it looks like a lot of ranting. Overall, the trip was fantastic. Tanzania is somewhere that I could definitely see myself living long term. Dar es Salaam is a big, busy city but it right on the ocean and has fun things around. People are friendly and most don’t try to rip you off. It was really fun to travel with Jodi and amazing to see Pam in such a different context from usual. Her place was GORGEOUS- I mean flat screen tv, wireless internet, leather couches…the works. It was a great experience but I am also glad to be home in Blantyre.