Mume Wangu

Imagine the park near your house, the one where you go for walks or picnics. Now imagine it with plastic bottles, wrappers, containers, and all sorts of litter strewn all over it. That was Mnazi Moja Stadium. It was the result of three days of eid fairs and celebrations. When the vendors took their stalls down, they neglected to clean up the area they were in. When the families came to celebrate and buy food and toys, they threw the trash on the field. And finally, the government failed to have trash cans in public places such as soccer fields and stadiums.

This is a common theme I have noticed in Zanzibar. While shopping one afternoon and drinking a can of Shani, I asked the storekeeper where I could throw it out thinking there was a trash can in his store. He took the can from my hand and tossed it on the ground outside his store while saying: “In Zanzibar, Hakuna Matata.” I was appalled. It is the collective responsibility of the government, the society and the people that live in it to ensure they are doing their part in keeping the places they frequent free from litter. This will prevent an even greater effort required to clean up after the fact. We saw about five or six people picking up the litter for the next couple of days, piece by piece and then putting it all in small piles and burning the trash. It took almost a week for all the trash to be cleared from the field.  Keep in mind; some steps have been taken to mitigate this issue in the form of plastic bags being banned which means everyone uses brown paper bags for shopping. That’s one thing Zanzibar got right before Toronto.

The island of Zanzibar is predominantly Muslim with 99% of the population practicing Islam. About 1400 years ago, when majority of the men in the city were at war and there was no one to look after and protect the women, men in Islam were allowed to have more than one wife – up to four at any given time. This is still in practice in Zanzibar. Gentlemen, don’t even think about moving here. This raises some interesting conversations with the women that are part of these marriages, as first, second, third or even fourth wives. One of our friends interviewed a few young educated girls to ask if they would be willing to be part of multiple marriages and the answers varied for each of the girls. One of the girls commented that she wouldn’t mind being a second wife because it meant that she wouldn’t be attached to her husband who would be splitting his time between multiple wives and she could focus on her education. Smart girl! When all the women are living under one roof and they get along, they live like they are sisters, sharing responsibilities and forming a sense of unity between them. It doesn’t always work out this way though. Nonetheless, there are some interesting things to discover in a culture where it is common to have more than one wife.

During the weekend, we decided to visit the second largest island on the Zanzibar archipelago – PEMBA. Pemba is about 50km north of Unguja (the island we live on) and is accessible by boat or plane. We chose the latter as it was the safer option, but once we got on the plane, I wasn’t so sure. Check-in didn’t open until thirty minutes before the flight was to depart. We got on the plane at 7:56, the pilot said ‘Karibu’ and took off at 8 – at least it was on time. There were 12 passengers on the entire plane and we sat directly behind the pilot. No such thing as flight attendants. It was absolutely amazing to see the pilot flying the plane and we were able to see the many islands below us that make up the Zanzibar archipelago as we flew over the Indian Ocean. When we landed, I stopped praying for safety, and found our tour guide, Ali, who showed us around for the day.

 

He told us that Pemba has five names: Green – for its lush greenery, Magic – for the large number of people that practice witchcraft, Emerald – for the emerald waters and marine life, Sister – for being the second largest island after Unguja, and of course Pemba. Ali took us to the Essential Oil Distillery where they extract oil from the numerous plants that are farmed on the island such as clove bud, clove stem, eucalyptus, and lemongrass. These oils are mainly used for exporting to other countries (as much as one ton is exported each year) but are also sold in Pemba due to the number of health benefits associated with them. We then continued our tour at the flying fox conservation area – these creatures are indigenous to Pemba and are basically really hairy bats, not cute at all. There were hundreds of them and it was fantastic to see them hanging upside down from the trees. It was hard to imagine that before the conservation project, these were hunted and eaten by the locals…barbecued fox?! No, thank you. While the foxes were hanging peacefully having a good day’s sleep, a few local children noticed we had come to see them and began clapping to wake them up. The foxes began flying between the different trees and we quickly snapped pictures.  

We had seen enough hairy bats for the day so we proceeded to Ngezi forest where we went for a hike around the conserved forest area. We saw lots of different trees (both dead and alive), monkeys, and millipedes. We then proceeded on to Vilumbwani beach where we cut open some jackfruit, among other fruit Ali had brought and had a picnic at the beach. On our way home we visited an old lighthouse built by the Germans witnessing some spectacular views of Pemba Island and were able to see both the south end of the island and the north end – not a very large island, might I add. In the distance, we even saw the coast of Mombasa, Kenya.



Flying fox



Driving through the island, I noticed that Pemba’s landscape is very different from that of Unguja, in that it is hillier and greener with lots of trees and forests. Pemba’s economy is worse than that of Unguja along with an even higher population density. The real eye opener was to see the other volunteers’ places - cement floors, no running water, no hot water, no fridge, a crouching toilet, and no sink. There were no real restaurants in any of the major towns (Chake Chake or Wete), besides street food stalls where we had barbecued octopus (yum!). We met Dave and Jack, Peace Corp volunteers that are teaching in Pemba, had some chipsi mayai (local dish with fries and eggs) and called it a night.

Double rainbow off the north tip of Pemba

 The next morning we journeyed on the dala dala to Chake chake town and then to the port of Wesha to catch our boat to Misali Island, a marine conservation island where we went snorkeling for the day. We were lucky we got low tide so we were able to see the beautiful corals and colorful fish quite clearly in the water alongside the sea urchins. We headed back in rough waters, the waves splashing onto us the entire 45 minute ride. Needless to say I was enjoying every second of it, getting soaked and hanging on for dear life. That night, we went over to Dave’s place for dinner where we all cooked a delicious meal straight from the Peace Corps cook book. We spent all of Sunday, hanging out, playing cards, drinking Rwandan coffee, listening to Dave sing to us (and the local kids hanging out on the porch) until it was time for our flight back to Unguja. This time on the plane, I sat next to the pilot – an unforgettable experience and an extraordinary end to the weekend.