After 30 hours of traveling, I made it home safe and sound this afternoon and was greeted by a very excited Jacob, who picked me up from the airport. The flights were fine, although long. I watched a bunch of movies and didn’t get much sleep. That probably explains why I needed a 4 hour nap this afternoon. It’s great to be home and I appreciate things like not needing a bed net, not hearing the water pump constantly, and having hot water to shower in so much more. Thanks for sharing my adventures and I hope you join me for more in the future!

Wednesday was my last full day in Zanzibar! I decided to go to the office with Tanya to say goodbye to everyone while Jaclyn and Hai went into the field. Sadly, most of the people I had interacted with most were not around so I didn’t get to properly say goodbye. Also, there was no power in the office and the generator was broken so we didn’t have any internet access and couldn’t print anything which made working pretty impossible. Since we couldn’t do anything, we left the office around 11:30 and went to town for lunch. I had my last bunny chow and juice at Lazuli and they were so good. It’s probably my favorite restaurant in Stone Town and I’m going to miss the fresh fruit juice which is blended with ice and is so good.

After lunch we biked toward home and stopped at Mbweni Café which has free internet access. We found Hai there eating lunch so we joined him and cruised the internet for a few hours. It will be nice to be home and have better access to the news. I really have not been able to keep up the world news very well and I hope someone will update me when I get home.

In the evening we went out for dinner at a new restaurant called House of Spice. Tanya and I shared a vegetable pizza and seafood linguini and they were both so good. We also got an appetizer of eggplant with mango and avocado salsa which was amazing. Sometimes I miss the variety of foods I can get in the US but then I eat really good food here and it makes up for it. I have probably gained five pounds since coming here with all the eating I have done.

After dinner we went to Tatu to watch the end of another women’s soccer game. Japan crushed Sweden in the semi-finals and will now play the US in the finals on Friday. Maybe I’ll watch the final if I’m home and awake then.
And thus ended my final day in Zanzibar. Right now it is Thursday, just before noon and I’m back at Mbweni Café using their internet to post my last blog entries before I go to the airport in an hour. I’ll probably post one more entry with the final pictures when I get home. Thanks for reading and hopefully I’ll see you in person soon.

On Tuesday only Makame was available to go into the field so Tanya and I went together while Jaclyn and Hai stayed home to work on some reports. We had a great day up in the northwestern area. We mapped 20 cases and completed all mapping activities in three different shehias. Tanya and I took a bunch of photos and videos for our program as well. We didn’t accomplish quite everything we wanted to because one health facility was closed by the time we were ready to go there, but overall it was a good last day in the field.

We got home around 3 pm and I had some lunch then read a little bit and took a short nap. Hai made dinner for the first time that night and it was decent although he needs some practice timing things and choosing the courses. He made pasta and sauce with curried potatoes and garlic bread (also known as starch, starch, and starch). First he cooked the pasta then started making the sauce and once those were done he started on the potatoes. It was a fine first attempt and hopefully he gets better.

After dinner the girls went to the book club meeting and returned the books we had checked out last month. I wrote down some book titles to read when I get home. We had to leave the book club early so Tanya and I could get into town for drinks with Ranil and company.

We met at the Serena Hotel, which is the fanciest place in Stone Town. The food is very expensive but we shared samosas and a veggie burger which were not too highly priced. Deler got a bottle of champagne for the table to give Ranil a proper farewell toast and we had a great time hanging out. Since Ranil’s flight was at 5 am, he didn’t want to stay out too late so we got a lift home from him around midnight. I have been staying up later than usual here and getting up between 6 and 6:30 every day which has led to some tired afternoons; hence the nap.

With having Bryan around over the weekend we didn’t have time to plan ahead for the week so when I got up on Monday we didn’t have any cars organized to go to the field and only had a few things to do in the office to plan for Tuesday. Tanya and I discussed the possibility of going to the office early, organizing for Tuesday then taking off and going to a beach for the rest of the day. At breakfast we ran the idea by Jaclyn and Hai with very mixed results. Hai was all for it, but Jaclyn, who originally suggested taking Monday off since we worked on Saturday, no longer thought it was a good idea. She got super upset when we suggested going to the beach and stopped talking to anyone. Sometimes she can be very childish. Jaclyn ran off to her room and we didn’t see her again so the three of us agreed that Hai and I would go to the office while Tanya worked at home and if we could finish everything by 11 am we would go to the beach. If it took longer than that time, we would scrap the beach idea because high tide was near noon.

Hai and I biked to the office and spent the morning printing sheets that Tanya made and e-mailed to us, getting cash at the ATM, talking to Makame and Madja about the week, and trying to find the cashier to get a fuel voucher. 11 am, our point of no return, came and went and we were not done with the work so we gave up on going to Matemwe and just finished our work and went home. Just as we were approaching the house we saw Jaclyn riding her bike in the opposite direction, heading to the local beach.

When Hai and I got back and heard about Tanya’s morning with Jaclyn, I felt so sorry for her. Jaclyn was so awful: she didn’t talk to Tanya at all and started doing some of the work without cooperating and thus wasted a lot of time because Tanya had already done the work. Basically, Tanya did everything useful and Jaclyn sulked in her room. Plus, Jaclyn refused to go get drinking water, which we really needed and wouldn’t let Tanya use her bike to get water. I just don’t understand her.

To make up for the awful morning, I bought some chocolate bars when I got the drinking water and that seemed to cheer Tanya up a bit.

Since we didn’t have anything for lunch and we were done with work for the day, I suggested we go to Mbweni Ruins hotel, order lunch then swim while it was being prepared. That definitely put Tanya into a good mood and we set off shortly.

I used the last of my large bottle of sunscreen today. Eight ounces of sunscreen in eight weeks! I have never used that much sunscreen in my life. And I have still gotten fairly tanned.

Hai doesn’t swim so he hung out in the shallow water while Tanya and I went on an epic swim. We started from the pier and swam parallel to the coast for over 15 minutes. We took a two minute break then started heading back so our food didn’t get cold. Going back was much harder because the wind had picked up and there were many more waved crashing into our faces and we were swimming against the current as well. It took over 25 minutes to return and I swallowed a lot of seawater on the way. I felt sort of like a drowned rat by the time I made it back. That’s the longest I’ve ever swam without stopping and we were both proud of our accomplishment. After that swim, we really earned our lunch of grilled fish and mango salsa, which was delicious.

We saw Jaclyn at the beach but she ignored us so we didn’t try to approach her either. She was obviously still pissed about the morning for some reason. We spent the afternoon on the pier reading our books and working on our tans. It was very pleasant and relaxing.

We went home around 5:30 and showered then Tanya and I got ready to go out for dinner in town to celebrate Ranil’s final days in Zanzibar. Since it was a bit cool (only in the mid-70s) I broke down and wore my black pants and the one shirt I had not worn the whole trip. I felt very clean for a few minutes until we took the dalla dalla and I got sweaty in the enclosed space. It was totally worth it to wear different clothes for one evening.

We met everyone at La Taverna, which was one of the restaurants I wanted to eat at one more time, and we had a great evening eating and talking. There were nine of us total and I think having such a large group overwhelmed the staff because the service was very slow. Luckily they serve bread before the meal so we didn’t starve but we didn’t eat until after 9:30. I had a great seafood pasta dish and could feel the mercury level in my body rising with every bite. 😉

Bryan was heading to Uganda on Sunday, but his flight wasn’t until noon which was unfortunate for us because that meant it would be too late to go to the beach after he went to the airport. In the morning we had breakfast with him then organized the living and dining rooms while he packed. Over the past four days the house had become a bit of a disaster with all of the work stuff migrating home and whatnot.

The hours flew by and soon enough Bryan was picked up by the taxi and then we were four.

And as soon as Bryan left, a switch went off in Jaclyn’s head and she became so strange again. I just don’t understand her. She was hiding in her room when Tanya and I decided to go to the beach for a swim so we went without her. We swam for a bit then laid on the beach chairs to dry off in the sun when we see Jaclyn come down. She doesn’t say a word to us or acknowledge our presence but puts her stuff down at the table farthest from us and goes swimming. There is no possible way she could of missed us because she would have seen our bikes at reception and there were only three other people at the beach; she pointedly ignored us.

After she was done swimming, she sat at the table by herself and stared at the ocean, having not brought a book or anything to do. When we were getting ready to go, I went over to talk to say hi and to make sure she knew about the details for our afternoon and that she was invited to go to the sandbank with us. She said she was “fine at the beach and just wanted to stay there.” Okay, that’s cool. We went home, gathered our things and got Hai then waited for the dalla dalla that would take us to town. Before the bus even arrived, not 20 minutes after my conversation with her, we see Jaclyn ride home and go inside the gate. It seemed like she hung out at the beach just long enough to miss us at home on purpose. She could have just said she didn’t want to go, but to do something like that is just tacky and rude.
Anyway, we went to town and met up with this British woman named Lorraine who moved to Zanzibar a few months ago with her partner who is a pilot for one of the local airlines. We met her at the book club last month and we see her around the area often because she lives in the neighborhood. She and a friend had planned the trip to the sandbank and invited us along. Hiring a boat is a fixed price no matter how many people you have so it was in their cost-saving interest to bring others. And who wouldn’t want to hang out with us for the afternoon, right?

We literally walked down to the beach area in town where the boats are beached and talked to a few different guys getting quotes about renting a boat. It’s high tourist season now and all of the prices have increased because of the influx of people to the island. A few of the boat operators were trying to charge double what Tanya paid last year so it took a while to find someone that was willing to bargain. We overpaid a bit, but the total was only $4 per person, so it wasn’t much in the grand scheme of things.

The boat took us, Lorraine, and her friend Enrique out from Stone Town to this sandbank, which is exactly what it sounds like: a spit of land with no vegetation on it that gets covered by the ocean during high tide. Obviously we planned it so we were there during low tide when some sand is exposed. There were two other groups there when we arrived but they departed shortly afterward and we had the place to ourselves. The sandbank is not very big; you can easily see from one end to the other and can walk the long distance in about 7 minutes. The short way across is about 15 feet and at the highest point you are about 3 feet above sea level. It was really windy out there which made it feel quite chilly but it was very peaceful because of the solitude.

The water felt cold because of the cooler air temp but we braved it anyway. Between the five of us, we had three snorkels so we took turns swimming out over the coral to see the fish. There weren’t a ton, but the water was very clear and calm so you could see really well. I saw one of the fish that lives on the bottom of the ocean and blends in with the sand! Both of its eyes are on one side of its body and it resembles the sea floor so much that I only saw it when it moved. I saw some other small fish peeking out of the coral and was reminded of the movie “Finding Nemo”. It was really cool. Sadly, no pictures because no one had an underwater camera.

After a while we all got out of the water to warm up a bit and we had a snack and walked around the sandbank looking at the crabs and sea shells. We watched the sun set and got some great photos of that then headed back to town. It was a great afternoon.

We left Lorraine and Enrique at the Serena Hotel and the three of us met up with Paulo at a restaurant called Beit el Chai which we had never been to but wanted to try. We had just ordered drinks when our friend Ranil (the guy who dominated our team during the first quiz night) came in alone. He was going to have dinner by himself but then joined us when we invited him. Then Paulo was in touch with Kristina and Deler who joined us as well and soon we were a party of seven.

Ranil was super stressed because he is leaving Zanzibar on Wednesday, after having lived here for two years and he’s trying to finish work, sell his car, pack, and move out of his apartment. We had lively dinner conversation about everything that’s been going on and I had amazing pan fried red snapper with mango salsa and breadfruit gnocchi for dinner. We wanted to celebrate so we ordered dessert and I had the passion fruit cheesecake which was unbelievably good. I might have to go back for dessert before I leave on Thursday.

Everyone knew that Bryan was giving a presentation at work at 9 am but even when I got back from my run at 7:30 no one had made breakfast or packed all of the things we needed to take. There was a rush of activity in the half hour before our taxi came with Bryan finishing slides, Tanya packing food, me making pancakes and Jaclyn hiding in her room.
We picked up the food for the small party and got to the office just a few minutes later than we thought. No one was in the conference room we reserved only ten minutes before the presentation.

This presentation was meant for the district supervisors and everyone at ZMCP that worked directly on this research project. We were planning on a 30 minute talk to summarize the data we collected and tell them what is left to do in San Francisco, then we were going to have a small party with snacks and drinks and hand out certificates and gifts. Well, on Thursday Makame told us he made an announcement at the staff meeting on Monday and invited everyone from ZMCP (25+ people) to come to the presentation. When Tanya ordered the food on Wednesday, she only ordered food for 15 people so we were going to be in trouble. We couldn’t uninvite everyone from the talk, so we tried to make it clear to Makame to tell everyone that the food and drinks were only for the district supervisors and us.

Well, something about that message got lost in translation, because when we arrived on Saturday Makame told us that he called all of the district supervisors and told them not to come to the presentation, but to show up at 10 am for the party! The whole point of the presentation was to give an update to everyone who had worked on the project and suddenly half of them weren’t there! Tanya was so upset.

Since other ZMCP staff members were there at 9, we couldn’t wait forever so Bryan started talking at 9:20 and some of the district supervisors arrived early so they didn’t miss the whole thing. It was a good presentation, then Bryan handed out the certificates and gifts (he bought everyone a headlamp to use when the power is out) then we had water and juice with chapatti, samosas, these balls of potato filled with beef, some other bread, and some candy. The food was gone in 20 minutes and everyone dispersed by 11 to get home to their families.

We got a ride back home then went to the beach for a quick swim before the tide got too low. It wasn’t exactly the beach day we were hoping for, but it sufficed.

I volunteered to make lunch because then I could guarantee that it would be good but cooking for five people takes a lot more prep time peeling and cutting vegetables than cooking for two or three people. Plus Bryan eats enough for two, so it’s really like cooking for six. I made glazed carrots (luckily Hai peeled them all for me), curried potatoes and stewed red kidney beans with green peppers, onion, and garlic. I thought it turned out well.

In the afternoon Bryan, Tanya and I took a dalla dalla into town so Bryan could buy some souvenirs for his kids then we met up with Kristina and Deler for sundowners at Livingstone’s. We saw a gorgeous sunset and I got some nice photos with the boats sailing past that I’ll post later.

Livingstone’s is not known for their food so we went to Tatu for dinner and I had a really good fish pie that came in a casserole dish with mashed potatoes on top. I almost never take pictures of food because it seems like such a silly thing, but I made an exception this time and will include the picture later.

After dinner we went upstairs to the bar and had a drink. I had a weak, but cheap vodka with mango juice that was quite tasty.

We had seen a sign advertising a belly dance performance that evening so we went to the Old Fort around 10:30 to check it out. The performance had started at 9:30 and was still going strong. We saw three different women dance to traditional Zanzibari music, which is called Tarib music. It was really interesting to see, especially since all of the dancers were clothed very modestly. Instead of wearing the short tops that show off their bellies and the shear pants, these women were covered head to toe in very flowing outfits so it was hard to see their bodies. They all wore elaborate belts with beads and sequins so you could see how their hips moved. The music was not really to my liking; it has a lot of string instruments but is very whiny and almost screeching at times. It was well worth 2,000 TSH ($1.33) for the experience. We didn’t stay too long because Bryan was starting to not feel well due to his anti-malaria medicine so we came home around 11:30.

sunset

On Friday we had vague plans to go to the beach with Bryan but we didn’t set anything in stone the night before which was a mistake. Only Bryan and I were up at 7:30 and since high tide (and the best swimming) was at 10 am we quickly realized a trip to the beach was not going to happen. It’s probably best that we didn’t go because we spent all day cleaning data to prepare so Bryan could make a presentation about the project for Saturday.

Cleaning the data involved going through our hand written lists of names and coordinates and matching people up with the information in the database then recoding the name associated with the waypoints to line up with the barcode in the database. Could I have written that in a more convoluted way? It’s actually not that complicated, but it took three of us all morning to go through everything because we had 250+ waypoints to verify. I suppose it was better than Hai’s job, which was to cut these filter paper packets in half lengthwise and put them into separate boxes so they can be shipped and processed in two different laboratories. I cut 500 of those stupid packets earlier in the week so I was glad to do something else.

We didn’t have anything to make for lunch and no one was in the mood to shop and cook so we decided to go to Mbweni Ruins hotel to eat. Since the last time we had lunch there we waited over two hours for our food, I cycled down to the restaurant early and read the menu to everyone over the phone and placed the order so everyone else could continue working. It was really nice to have some alone time to read and watch the ocean from the covered patio. Living with so many people really makes it difficult to have time and space to myself.

After lunch Bryan showed us some cool tricks in Microsoft Access to link data together and to query for missing information. It was interesting to learn but it took all afternoon because some data points were missing or two points were labeled exactly the same. It took a long time to sort everything out and by the end everyone was very tired of sitting around one computer, staring at the screen. It’s funny how the days spent doing office work make me more tired than the days where I walk around all day.

We finished with all of the data processing pretty late in the afternoon and Bryan still had to make the presentation that he was going to give at 9 am. Needless to say, we didn’t have time to do anything fun that afternoon. We were supposed to have dinner in town with Kristina and Deler but we were still working at 6:30 and were not really close to being done. We rescheduled dinner for the following day and went to Mweni Café for dinner. They have a buffet on Fridays which we got, but the food is not really good and I decided I’m not going to eat there ever again. That’s really not a hard goal to meet since I only have a handful of meals left in Zanzibar.

We worked pretty late into the night making maps and slides for the presentation but finally got everything finished.

I went running this morning for the first time in quite a while (really only since Saturday but it felt much longer). I’m getting a bit bored to running over the same flat ground so I tried to run faster today. I ran 5 km in a minute less than normal, which was pretty good. But I’ll be glad to have some new places to run when I get home.
Speaking of home, I only have one week left in Zanzibar! I can’t believe how quickly the summer has gone. I’m looking forward to going home and seeing Jacob and all of my friends and catching up with everyone. I haven’t forgotten about you!

Today is Saba Saba (literally meaning seven seven, or July 7) and it’s a national holiday in Tanzania. Zanzibar has it good when it comes to the holidays because they celebrate all of Tanzania’s holidays plus they have their own! Saba saba is also called President’s day and it’s a celebration of the founding of the Tanganyika African National Union in 1954, the first African political party. This holiday is similar to labor day in the US, but more places are closed for the day to celebrate. There are some events going on in Dar es Salaam but nothing big here.

Because of the holiday, we could only get one car to go to the field today so Tanya went with Bryan to show him what we’ve been doing while here. I went to the office and brought home all of the data that needed to be entered so that we could divide and conquer. Jaclyn, Hai, and I spent the morning entering data and when Tanya and Bryan got back they helped as well.

I took a break around 11:30 to go buy energy credit and food for lunch. I made a vegetable coconut curry with yellow rice while everyone else entered data.

After lunch, Bryan went to the office for a meeting while we entered data. Are you seeing a trend? It took most of the afternoon, but we finally finished entering all of the data…in entry 1; there’s still entry 2 to do (two different people have to enter the data so we can compare the two entries for any dissimilarities), but someone else can do that. I have entered enough data.

There’s still a lot to do to prepare for next week, but we stopped around 5 and hung out until Bryan got back then discussed the plan for Friday. We went to Lazuli for dinner and I tried one of their yogurt smoothies instead of the plain juice. It was equally as good but creamier so I think I’ll stick to the juice from now on. We got two Zanzibari dessert pizzas (which are like crepes) with banana, mango, and nutella afterward. These were crispier than the ones Tanya and I had previously but the filling was not as good. The sweetness did hit the spot though.
By that time it was after 10 so we came home and got ready for bed.

The last of the district supervisors were due to bring in the last of the data on Wednesday morning so Tanya and I teamed up for the last big office day while Hai met Bryan at the airport and Jaclyn did the grocery shopping and lunch preparations. We got the last of the data checked in and all of the money sorted by noon. There were over 500 cases of malaria in the past month, just in the parts of the island where we work. That’s kind of scary. The pile of questionnaires that needed to be entered started to topple over so we ended up with three stacks of data, about two feet high each. There’s still a lot of work to do!

When we had done all we could and were really hungry, we biked home and met Bryan and had a good lunch of spaghetti and vegetable sauce with garlic bread. The five of us spent the afternoon at the dining table catching up, informing Bryan of everything we’ve been doing, going over the budget, and organizing the rest of the week since Bryan’s only here until Sunday. We got a good plan set and were even able to schedule a bit of free time in.

In the evening we planned to meet up with two Swedish researchers that work at ZMCP and watch the women’s USA vs. Sweden football (soccer) game. I don’t follow many sports but I was told that the tournament is basically the women’s world cup and that it was a semi-final match. Both teams would advance but the winner would get a better spot in the next round.

It’s a good thing we planned to get dinner out because the power went out at 8:15 pm. It was a scheduled outage so we were expecting it but it’s a bummer just the same. We walked down the road to the local, cheap-but-not-great restaurant and I had the fish curry.

The football game was exciting but Sweden won 2-0, with both goals coming on penalty kicks. We had a lot of good conversation while watching which made the evening very pleasant. The game was played in Germany so for us it didn’t start until 9:30 pm, which means we didn’t get home until nearly midnight. Everyone was pretty tired by that time so we all went to bed.

Since our cleaning lady didn’t have time to wash our sheets on Monday afternoon, she came back to our house on Tuesday morning to do the laundry. I stayed home while she was here and Tanya went to the office while Jaclyn and Hai did some more mapping. It was nice to have the morning sort of off. I read about a third of “The Invisible Man” by H.G. Wells.

The laundry was hanging to dry by noon and I ate some lunch quickly then biked to the office to help Tanya. The office was chaos! Three of the district supervisors had come in that morning and brought in over 300 malaria cases. There were folders with questionnaires and samples everywhere. Poor Tanya! She spent the entire morning counting samples, paying the supervisors, and doing the accounting all alone. At 1 pm she still hadn’t had lunch. When I got there we still had to deal with over 80 cases and make sure that everything was accounted for. It took two of us the entire afternoon to organize things again and we still left the office with piles of data surrounding the desk and more to come the following day.

After work we took a well-earned swim at our local beach. Sadly, Hai doesn’t really swim but he wanted to come so we hung out with him in the shallow water a bit and tried to give him some swimming tips. Then Tanya and I swum out and watched a gorgeous sunset over the ocean. The clouds were just coming in and they obscured the sun for a few moments, but just as it was on the horizon, the sun broke through and shone really deep reddish purple. It was spectacular.
On the way home we stopped and got some vegetables then made an excellent dinner of glazed carrots, curry potatoes, and stir-fried green peppers and beans. It was a nice change from our typical one pot curry meal.

After dinner everyone had to change bedrooms because Bryan was arriving in the morning and he’s too tall to sleep comfortably in one of the twin beds in Hai’s room. Now Tanya and I are sharing the room with two twin beds, Jaclyn moved to my room, Hai moved to Jaclyn’s room, and Bryan will take Tanya’s room. It was really complicated. Luckily we all had nice clean sheets and not too much stuff to move.

Monday was a very boring day. I went to the office while Tanya, Jaclyn, and Hai split up and did some mapping. Meanwhile, (back at the ranch) I organized RDTs for our advisor, Bryan, to take back to UCSF and I cut filter paper packets in half and organized them. The highlight of my day was using the barcode scanner a lot.

I went home at 2:30 in order to meet a cleaning lady who was going to make our house livable again. We don’t have a lot of stuff so the house isn’t messy but a lot of dirt gets inside despite leaving our shoes outside and the bathrooms and kitchen needed a good scrubbing. The girl who came didn’t speak much English but I was able to get across what we needed. She spent three hours cleaning and didn’t even get to washing the sheets like we wanted (we were out of laundry detergent so that worked out though). At least the soles of my feet are no longer black from walking around the house. We paid her 20,000 TSH ($13) for her hard work and felt like we got a pretty good deal.

In the evening, Tanya, Hai and I went into town to meet up with the other Americans to celebrate America’s Independence Day. There were no fireworks here or anything and there’s not even a good burger place on the island so we went to La Taverna, the really good Italian restaurant and had pizza for dinner. That’s American, right? The friends we met up with were going out for drinks afterward but I was a bit tired and we were next to the dalla dalla stop with a bus going toward our house so we just got on that and went home.

We got up at around 7 am wanting to go running but the tide was still too high and water covered most of the beach. Instead we took an early morning swim in the ocean to get some exercise. After showering we went to the complimentary breakfast and gorged on bread, mandazi, fruit, chappati, and fresh juice. When I was already feeling full, the waiter came by and asked if we wanted to order an omelet or pancakes. We decided to split a vegetable omelet and some banana pancakes. I was really glad that we went for that swim! It was all very good and very filling.

We were able to get a late check out because no one had booked our room for that night so we were able to leave our stuff inside and get ready for a walk. Sadly, it started to rain again just as we were headed out. We didn’t want to get wet since we had to ride home later so we sat in the common room and tried to learn the local game of Bao. The staff couldn’t really explain the rules well and when we looked them up on-line they were really complicated so we gave on that idea after about an hour.

It stopped raining in the early afternoon so we were able to take a walk along the beach in the opposite direction. We walked around the northern most tip of the island and continued south along the eastern side. We passed a lot of resorts then a part of the beach with a lot of seaweed and fishing boats, then the local part of town and finally we came to the fanciest resort I have ever seen in my life. I was sad that I didn’t have my camera but I left it at the hotel in case it rained. I would have liked to get pictures of this place. There was a guard standing at the stairs leading up but he said we could take a look around. There was a huge infinity pool set in this perfectly manicured lawn and surrounding the pool were these small bungalows, all with floor to ceiling windows. Set back from the cliff edge was a huge building with a thatched roof with a solid glass front. It looked unbelievably expensive. Out on a jetty was the resort’s restaurant and we went to look at the menu. Everything was priced in US dollars, which gives you an idea of the cost. The bathroom in the restaurant had motion activated lights and smelled so good. I wonder what the rooms we like. I don’t think I could ever afford to stay at a place like that and I don’t know if I would want to anyway.

We turned around after that huge resort because the beach didn’t look very inviting and headed back to our hotel. We laid on the deck chairs and read our books then ordered some lunch at 2:30 when we were finally feeling hungry again.
Finally around 4 pm we decided it was time to head back even though neither of us wanted to go. The hotel owner had arranged a taxi for us because he knew a guy who was dropping off some clients earlier in the day and just asked him to wait until we were ready to go. Because of his help, the return cost half as much as the taxi there!

It was the best overall weekend I’ve had in Zanzibar and I’m so glad I went and would highly recommend the Langi Langi resort to anyone coming here.

I went running with Tanya in the morning then made pancakes for breakfast. Over breakfast, Tanya asked if she could join me for the weekend and I agreed. We get along well and I knew she’d be fun. We had Massoud pick us up at 9 am and headed up to the far northern coast.

I hadn’t booked a hotel in advance so we spent a bit of time looking for accommodation. We went to one cheap place and it looked okay, but then we went to Langi Langi Resort and found out they had a room with two twin beds for $85 a night. After looking at the room and the pool, we realized we would be crazy to stay anywhere else. The room was clean and the shower looked good, there was a private porch with several chairs, and the beds were Zanzibari style, which had tall posts to drape the mosquito net over so that you don’t get tangled in it while sleeping.

It was still early and the room was being cleaned, so we hung out on the patio and enjoyed a complementary juice while watching the ocean and people walking by. We settled into our room and were getting ready to take a walk on the beach when it started raining.

It poured!! Mvua kubwa (large rain). But we were not going to let that spoil our holiday, so we walked along the beach anyway and even went swimming. The ocean water felt very warm compared to the rain and we didn’t want to get out. We walked south along the ocean, passing many fancy resorts and a lot of people taking shelter from the rain. We were the only ones out. The tide was coming in so we eventually reached a point where the beach disappeared and we couldn’t walk anymore. We tried to cut through one of the resorts and continue, but we were shooed away by a guard.
We returned to the hotel and ordered lunch. While it was being prepared the rain stopped and the sky cleared up. By 3:30 you couldn’t tell that it had rained at all. For lunch I had calamari in a spicy sweet chili sauce. It was delicious but very hot.

After lunch we talked to the owner of the place and he said we took take two of their kayaks out for free so we changed back into our bathing suits and got two staff members to help us launch. We paddled south for about 4 kilometers until we came to the northern end of Kendwa, the beach we went to last Sunday. We beached our kayaks and swam for a while to refresh ourselves. We didn’t want to stay too long because we knew it would take 45 minutes to paddle back and the sun was setting quickly. We made it back with plenty of time to spare and handed our kayaks over to some other clients who wanted to use them.

We took a dip in the pool which was a nice change from salt water, then we rushed to shower and change in order to watch the sunset from the restaurant, which looks out west over the ocean. The horizon was cloudy so we couldn’t actually see the sun set, but I enjoyed a nice pot of spiced tea and we chatted about a number of things. The restaurant only serves a limited selection of beer and wine, but they allow you to bring in any alcoholic drinks you want. We wanted to get some Savannas (a hard cider from South Africa) and tried to go to the grocery store but it was really dark because the power was out so we didn’t feel safe walking around by ourselves. We talked to the owner about having someone go out and buy them for us, but he couldn’t find anyone. Instead, he gave us both a free glass of wine because he couldn’t solve our problem. It was really nice.

We spent a long time at dinner watching the tide slowly recede. At high tide, the beach at Nungwi completely disappears and you can only enter the ocean via stairs leading down from the cliff on which everything is built. It was a lot of fun to listen to the water crash on the rocks then slowly drift out until it was just a murmur on the beach. There aren’t any waves here so when the tide is out the ocean is very quiet.

After dinner we weren’t ready to retire so we walked down the street a bit to a local bar on the beach. It was called Mangi’s and they serve some really strong drinks. The owner of our hotel warned us that they would be strong and he wasn’t kidding! After one drink we called it quits and returned to the hotel. The power had gone off and on all day (it’s more common in the north because of all of the resorts which suck a lot of power) but luckily we had power all night so the fan remained on. It was actually quite cool at night and I was nearly cold in my skirt and t-shirt. I even used the light blanket for part of the night.

https://picasaweb.google.com/115644650404072729236/Nungwi?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCOal8vT0jdi3TQ&feat=directlink

Friday was a rough day; I’m not going to lie. I went to sleep at 5:30 am after the crazy night at Mercury’s and Tatu. I slept soundly until 7:30 when the sun woke me up. I got some water and saw that everyone else was still asleep so I took a nap for another 45 minutes. It was not enough sleep.

After I talked to Jacob on Skype I heard the others getting up so I met with them to discuss the day. There was no field work scheduled because of Friday and four of us can’t fit at the one desk in the office so Jaclyn and Hai stayed home while Tanya and I went to work. (I think Jaclyn and Hai slept most of the day; they certainly weren’t productive.) Tanya and I had a busy morning talking to the district supervisors and sorting things out. Data collection officially ended on Thursday, but there was still a lot to do with distributing certificates and summary sheets, receiving data, paying people, and data entry. My 11 am it calmed down a bit and we had a few minutes to chat with Ishan and Sarel, who were giving a presentation at 2 pm then heading back to Durban that afternoon.

We didn’t have any lunch with us and were both very hungry and tired by 1:30 so we skipped the presentation and came home. We cooked some pasta for lunch then hung out in the afternoon. I read a few Sherlock Holmes stories and caught up on some blog entries. In the evening I told everyone that I was going away for the weekend to have some alone time. This house is making me a little crazy and I need to get away from it all.

I went to bed around 9:30 pm feeling very tired and ready for a good long rest.

Our second car was still at the shop so only one group went out mapping on Thursday. Since Jaclyn isn’t good at communicating her feelings or desires it wasn’t until Makame was at our house waiting that it was decided that Jaclyn and Hai would go to the field while Tanya and I went to the office again. I don’t know what I can do to make the situation better because every conversation I have with Jaclyn is awkward and forced.

Tanya continued working on the final reports while I did more data entry and organized things in the office. It was a pretty boring day and I already forget the details even though it was just yesterday. It was successful though because we got everything printed and entered and were ready to go home by 4:30. We saw Sarel and Ishen, the South Africans we had dinner with on Tuesday, and told them about Quiz night at Mercury’s that evening. They said they would try to come if their dinner meeting got done early.

Just when we got home and I salted the eggplant to have in a pasta sauce, the power went out. There went cooking dinner. That meant going out to eat in town for the third day in a row. Jaclyn said she didn’t want dinner so the three of us took the dalla dalla and went to Lazuli’s where I had another amazing mango banana juice and a chapatti filled with seafood curry. It was so delicious, and I think the best value for food in town.

After dinner we went to Mercury’s and met up with all of the wazungu (white people). Sarel and Ishen were there and Jaclyn came as well so the six of us played on a team. The categories were “basic science”, “man land”, “assassinations and executions” and “miscellaneous”. We chose “basic science” to count for double but I was a bit disappointed in some of the questions, like “what does DVD stand for?” I don’t consider that science. But there were some good ones, like “at what temperature do the Fahrenheit and Celsius scales intersect?” (-40 in case you didn’t know). There was also a bonus sheet where your team had to draw some country flags, name the 5 countries outside of Europe that start with “L”, name the 5 European capitals that have 4 letters in their names, and write in the name of the country based on it’s outline. Overall, I thought it was better than the first quiz night. Our team came in second out of seven, which was not too bad.

When the quiz was over most people went home but we decided to go out to a whiskey bar called Tatu that Sarel and Ishen had discovered next to their hotel. It was near 11 pm then and the party was just getting started at Tatu (which is the number 3 in Swahili because it’s on the third floor). We met some medical students from the UK and Ireland and watched some older ladies dance in the corner. We tried a few of the many whiskies they have available then I had a margarita while the others had beer. The owner of the bar was there, acting as DJ with his iPod so I requested a few songs and got the entire bar on their feet, singing “Livin’ on a Prayer”.

Our conversations were really good and before we knew it, 3 am had come and gone. By that time we were getting hungry again, so we went to Sarel and Ishen’s hotel, the Serena (the most expensive hotel in Zanzibar) and ordered grilled chicken and chips (French fries) then swam in the pool while our food was being prepared.

It was the most outrageous night and it ended with us arriving at home in a taxi just as the morning call to prayer went off (at 5:15 am). I haven’t stayed up that late in ages. We had gotten most of our work done for Friday but Sarel and Ishen had to give a presentation to everyone at ZMCP at 2 pm! But sometimes when you are having such a good time, it’s worth the pain you know you will suffer the following day and this evening was worth it.