Weekend Warriors

And the power is back on after a 12 hour hiatus. I was a little concerned I was going to venture into the dark hours with only a candle to light my way and without a cool breeze in sight. It was noticeably hotter in Dar this week and a functioning a/c is creeping up my list of essentials.

My friend, Maggie, came down from Arusha this weekend to explore the metropolis of Dar. Maggie and I met in PLTC 2 years ago and instantly bonded, as she had recently returned from working at the International Criminal Tribunal of Rwanda in Arusha (where she is currently doing round 2) and I had come back from Gulu in Northern Uganda. I think we were both a little startled to find ourselves back in Vancouver in the midst of a bar admission’s course.

Maggie and I became weekend warriors and packed in as much as possible into 48 hours. Friday night was an exploration of Dar’s, or more accurately, the Msasani Peninsula’s night life. It was my first real night out on the town. Maggie and I made our way to a club called Garden Bistro (which made me think of the Bread Garden) at 11 p.m., only to find that we were several hours ahead of the curve. My impression is that the Garden Bistro is the last stop on the club tour, as it stays open until the sunrise hours. After a few hours of dancing, a couple of local beers and a closely avoided altercation with a prostitute, we were ready to go home. It was just about as much excitement as we could handle in one night.

Saturday morning saw a bleary-eyed trip to Bongoyo Island. Bongoyo is a beautiful marine reserve with sparkling, aquamarine water and fine, white sand. It is a cliché I’m willing to buy into, complete with the coconuts. The swimming is amazing at Bongoyo, although getting in and out of the sea got a little more complicated as the tide changed and well-rounded waves started to roll onto the beach. I had one or two teakettle moments when the waves swept my feet from underneath me. The waves became a bit more of an issue when the small fishing boat, which would take us to the big fishing boat for the trip back to Dar, came to retrieve us. When Cristiano and I went to Bongoyo a couple of weeks ago, it was a matter of taking off your slip slops and taking a lady-like step into the small fishing boat. It was all very calm and orderly. However, this time, it was a finely timed operation that required a quick dash down the beach into thigh-high water to scramble into the boat while it was in the trough between two waves. The whole process was set to the urgent “faster, faster” of the black men holding the boat in place. It was a no-holds barred operation as people were physically lifted into the boat and those on board leaned this way and that to keep the boat on an even keel. A little shot of adrenalin to end the day.

Sunday started with a quest to find Dar es Salaam’s oldest graveyard. The graveyard is Arabic and is said to date back to the 17th century. We quickly found that, despite its age, the graveyard is still very much operational. It is a little unclear where the path ends and the graves begin, as the majority of the headstones are diamond-shape markers loosely held by the sand and scattered in a seemingly random pattern. The headstones are occasionally interspersed with what we assume to be mausoleums, each gently crumbling into the sand. It is my understanding that the mausoleums were constructed using blocks of coral cemented together with and then covered in mud. The crust of the mausoleums has shed over time to reveal the underlying coral skeletons. The graveyard contains some of the biggest baobab trees I’ve ever seen. The baobab has green-suede, cylindrical fruit that is the size of a 1L container. I had the opportunity to try the fruit the other day, the inside of which is white and crumbly. I’m not sure how to describe the flavour, other than saying that it leaves a lingering, slightly sour taste. Some people grind the contents of the fruit to a powder and use it to make a starchy, somewhat stiff mixture (similar to pap) that is eaten with stew.

Onwards and upwards to a quick tour of the famous buildings of downtown Dar – the Askari monument built to honour those that fought in WWI, the Court of Appeal, the High Court and the State House. We were shooed away from the State House by a military man who was not amused by us peering through the State House’s gate. In typical Louw fashion, we also trooped off to the National Museum where we engaged in a quick round of bargaining on the entry fee. The National Museum was surprisingly interesting with a basic, pictorial rendition of Tanzania’s history and some interesting footnotes on Tanzanian culture. It also has a coelacanth floating in a bath of formaldehyde and a concrete impression of the footsteps discovered by Dr. Leakey in Olduvai Gorge. The footsteps indicated that man was an upright being much earlier than had been previously thought.

On a side bar, I officially became a TZ resident this week. I got my permit after multiple trips to the Dept of Immigration to photocopy my entire passport, photocopy my application (again) and provide them with more passport pictures. The major perk of the resident permit is that I can stay here for the next 6 months. The minor perk is that the ferry tickets to Zanzibar are $20 cheaper for residents.