Exploring Zanzibar’s alleys on foot

I had heard so many stories about the island of Zanzibar before I arrived there to take part in a continental investigative journalism conference recently. I found the semi-autonomous island of Zanzibar and her necklace of islands to be among the most breathtaking places in Africa, and it suddenly occurred to me that I should […]

I had heard so many stories about the island of Zanzibar before I arrived there to take part in a continental investigative journalism conference recently. I found the semi-autonomous island of Zanzibar and her necklace of islands to be among the most breathtaking places in Africa, and it suddenly occurred to me that I should find out the historical facts that influenced the culture of the people of Zanzibar, and then, take a tour of the narrow pathways of the city.

Those tasks were more or less made trouble-free to achieve because, at the outset, I met a hotel attendant with a good knowledge of the history and struggles of the islanders. Secondly, one of my colleagues in Dar-es-Salam came to the conference with his newlywed bride who had stayed in Zanzibar before and offered to accompany me to the city.

Apart from the two main islands, known as Uguja and Pemba, there were about 50 adjoining others.

The attendant, who simply identified himself as Abdullah, said Zanzibar island, otherwise called the Stone Town, had existed thousands of years ago, but the Arab traders, mostly from Yemen, could be said to be the earliest group of foreigners that established a presence in it and greatly contributed in making it both a commercial and political centre in East Africa. He said a lot of Islamic scholars from the Middle East settled in the island and contributed to making it a learning centre.

As times passed, Abdullah said the Portuguese gained control of the island and established a trading centre and a mission before they were later ejected by the Sultanate of Oman. He said Zanzibar later fell into the hands of the British Empire and gained independence in 1963, and that shortly after independence, local African tribes that were frustrated by the excessive Arab government and underrepresentation in the parliament in spite having the largest population, staged a violent uprising that led to the overthrow of the Sultan and his government and merged with Tanzania.

One thing Abdullah told me, which I later confirmed when I strolled through the city, was that the Revolutionary Government, established after the uprising, maintained friendly ties with the then Communist Block, which later offered assistance to it in the areas of education, housing and so forth. While I strolled the town, I saw multiple storey homes, which my chauffeur said were allegedly built with the support of a communist country for the people of Zanzibar.

I didn’t experience difficulties in communication during my stay on the island because a good number of the people could speak and understand English or Arabic, but Swahili is the national language of Tanzania.

The people are also kind to strangers, so I became friends with a lot of them. Ironically, however, one taxi driver somewhat shared similar attributes with few in Nigeria as he tried to twist me over a ride into the city from my residence.

Although the majority of the population of Zanzibar is made up of Muslims, a considerable number of them are Christians, while many others practise traditional region.

The most interesting thing about the island is that people respect the views of others. That was indicated by the mind-blowing manner in which nearly every woman I saw within my short stay wore a Muslim headscarf.

One evening, I was invited to a dinner, which I found to be full of sea recipes because by its location, there were plenty of seafood dishes on the island and I prepared myself for an octopus meal. My inquisitiveness about octopus developed in 1985 after watching a movie in which it wreaked havoc on a vessel. Thereafter, I was told it’s the most intelligent invertebrate and suitable for eating. To tell the truth, I thought all octopuses were enormous until I was served with a grilled one and I found the tentacles to be smaller. I had a good dinner.

A friend also invited me to the seashore for swimming with others, including girls, which I couldn’t do because I thought it could be antiseptic; seawater has salinity. Again, I didn’t have tips on outdoor swimming, which I later regretted. I noticed that some elderly women frequented the hotel where I stayed, mostly in the evening to swim, but I never cared to ask questions about them. I believed they were swimming for fitness, not pleasure.  And another group of elderly women too, dressed in similar attire, came in the evenings and played an emotional song in soft melody with a musical keyboard, accordions and concertinas, as well as guitars.

Some household goods used by the people in the upper class in the pre-colonial period were displayed in strategic locations in my hotel. The items indicated the amazing evidence of the ingenuity of the people of Zanzibar. There were bronze and wooden chairs, tables and kitchen utensils, including Samawat, brought to Zanzibar by the Arabs and the Indians to heat water in Swahili households. A tray of charcoal was said to be placed under the tank and lit, heating water through the chimney and providing hot water for the house.

I and a friend of mine and his bride, both familiar with the city, walked on foot via the web of the streets, between the walls of storey buildings. I had to join them to hit the narrow and paved alleys of the island because I didn’t have a map and I wouldn’t want to get lost. I intended to go to the city centre to buy some souvenir items. I am familiar with some alley-like setting in the old Kano City, but those in Zanzibar were more enticing.

Few meters away from our destination along the pathways, we passed by a small building that housed the ward office of the Chama Cha Mapinduzi Party (CCM-Party of the Revolution) engraved on a nameplate attached to the doorway. The CCP was formed in 1977 following the merger of the Tanganyika African National Union (TANU) and the Afro-Shirazi Party (ASP). The party called my attention to a 300-Level course in Political Science, Classical Political Thought, at the Bayero University Kano, in 1995, in which I learned the political theories of some philosophers including the late Tanzanian President Julius Kambarage Nyerere, one of its founding fathers. We later passed by the Zanzibar Municipal Council Building, renovated by the Revolutionary Government of Zanzibar.

Walking was the best way to explore the city, which consisted predominantly of narrow alleys with plenty of storey houses, shops, eateries and other business centres. We dashed into some shops for souvenir shopping, and with the help of my friend’s wife, who was familiar with the people of Zanzibar and could speak Swahili and one other local language fluently, we negotiated lower prices in most instances. Most of the female shop owners we came in contact with were sociable and could leave a client in their shops to go to the nearby shops to get the merchandises they didn’t have in their shop. These shop owners, beaming with smiles, made me look special and comfortable with their way and confident body languages. I discovered extra trousers among the items I bought, back in the hotel, which I immediately gave my friend who promised to return them to the owner in the company of his wife.

It surprised me that most of the beautiful old storey houses were not entirely concrete structures, but rather constructed out of mud bricks and other natural materials, including logs. I noticed this after seeing a storey building that collapsed newly, deep in the alleys of the city. The buildings could have been made from clay bricks combined with burnt bricks while fibres and straw were added to reduce cracking. Cement plaster was added to the interiors and exteriors of the old houses before they were painted.

Few metres away from the alleys along the seafront, I caught a glimpse of the House of Wonders, which was said to have been built in 1883 as a ceremonial place by the second Sultan of Zanzibar, Barghash bin Said. According to Wikipedia, it was named House of Wonders because it was the first building in Zanzibar to have electricity and also the first building in East Africa to have an elevator. It suffered minor damages during the Anglo-Zanzibar war of 1896 and was converted to a school and museum after the Zanzibar Revolution of 1964 by the Afro-Shirazi Party. It was inaugurated as House of Wonders Museum in early 2000.

I was also inspired by the Old Fort of Zanzibar, said to be the oldest building in the Stone Town, which was adjacent to the House of Wonders. It was built out of stones by Omani Arabs after expelling the Portuguese in 1699 and was used as a garrison and prison in the 19th century, as well as a terminal of the Zanzibar railways. A new guardhouse was built in 1947 and used as the ladies’ club, and an amphitheatre was added in the 1990s. It is now the headquarters of the Zanzibar International Film Festival

Zanzibar is a bustling community of sea ferries with many fishing and cargo vessels on the sea used for transporting passengers to other islands and goods. One small canoe had the inscription ‘Ladies Free,’ which gave me a notion that possibly, ladies could use it to go on a free cruise on the sea. There were dozens of kids jumping into the seawater to swim, some in sensational acrobatic feat, they were certainly confident around the water.

I felt fulfilled after returning to my hotel because I explored a segment of Zanzibar by foot and that increased my confidence to take part in all the investigative journalism classes carried out by Code for Africa.

 

Why Nigeria needs flag carrier

My trip to Zanzibar was truly memorable and would forever stay with me because, regardless of travelling within Africa, which would have probably been direct from Abuja, I had three stops, including changes in flight numbers in two intermediate points with no arrangement to kill boring time. I had to change for a connecting flight in Addis Ababa from Abuja, where I spent approximately two hours before departing for the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, Nairobi. I had a layover in Nairobi, between 7 pm and 5 am before changing flight to Kilimanjaro, where we had a stop for about 30 minutes to get new passengers. The delay would have been minimal with a Nigeria’s flag carrier.