Stone Town, Zanzibar

Hujambo!

Our group made it to Stone Town, Zanzibar.  For the past few days, our group has explored the town and all it has to offer.  The atmosphere and feeling here is very different than our firts location, White Sands Resort, Dar Es Salaam.  This however, is not surprsing.  We are staying in a hotel called Kiponda Hotel, located in the middle of Stone Town.  Although the conditions are not nearly as nice as they were before, I find this place to be simple and charming.  We do have a fan and a personal bathroom for the four of us in the room, which has proven to be quite nice.  The first night though we had a bit of a scare.  As our group prepared to leave for dinner, the power cut off.  Immediately I was concerned we would not be able to keep the fan on in the room, but in time the power cut back on.

Over the past few days, we have gone to several local restaurants and the food here is actually quite good.  The most interesting dining experience was when we went to the local food market.  Upon entering the food market, as a tourist, you are immediately targetted by multiple food vendors saying they "will give you the personal experience and fresh food that the other stands do not".  I heard this statement quite a few times, leading to my conclusion that their food was neither personal, nor fresh.  I avoided these people.  The trick I learned from dr. farris and byceson, is to sit back and see where all the locals are going as well as avoid the people who go up to you personally.  The people who wait at their stands and are very casual typically are the safest places to go.

The marketplace itself is not absent from agressive vendors.  A perfect example is when I was followed for give or take 40 minutes by one guy who wanted to sell me a necklace.  After I told the man no thank you many times to no avail, we entered a shop hoping to ditch him.  Sadly the man waited for me in the shop, hoping I would notice the great prices he was offering compared to what was in the shop.  A friend of mine John-Michael even turned and literally said to him "please stop" which resulted in the man only becoming upset, saying we needed to be nice to the Zanzibar and give him money.  This man was out of luck, as he was obviously unaware that I am not a nice person, and felt like being mean.  

Thus far, we have enojoyed two lectures from different professors here in Zanzibar.  One professor, professor Narma, tought us about women's involvement in pearl and shell farming here in Zanzibar, and how she is fighting hard to overcome the cultural barriers that prevent women from obtaining equal pay in their work.  Her work focuses on getting women to learn how to make different types of jewelry and sell them in the marketplace.  Many of the women start off shy and timid as a product of the muslim culture here, but over time through their work, they learn to be more open and feel free to talk.  We also learned the history of Tanzania from Dr. Bryceson as he traced the trajectory of social and economic development over-time.

A bug literally just fell into my Ipad case...it wont leave.

Tomorrow we leave Zanzibar for jozani national park where we will spend a few days learning more about the botany there and medicinal uses of plants.