Zanzi - day 1

Zanzibar is hot - much warmer, and much more humid than Arusha. After haggling for a cheap cab to Stonetown from the airport, the driver was nice enough to give a brief overview of Zanzibar. After getting about 3 minutes in, he had to pull over to re-close the front passenger door, which he did, and then he pulled back onto the road. He then began the Zanzibar overview again - from the beginning. It was an all-or-nothing type of thing, and apparently he couldn't pause it in the middle and resume later. One of the things he pointed out (twice) is that Zanzibar is 90% Muslim (unlike Arusha, which is probably 90% Christian - which is one of the reasons why they feel like they are in completely different countries). The other interesting thing that the cab driver said was that, while Zanzibar was very safe, I should stay away from "Beach Boys." After a minute of confusion, and the realization that he wasn't going to volunteer an explanation so I needed to follow-up, he explained that "Beach Boys" were young men who loiter around (often on the beach, I gather), smoking marijuana, drinking wine, selling things, and asking lots of questions (rather than the 1960s musical group).

I spent the first night wandering around Stonetown, Zanzibar's capital, in awe of the beautiful old and derelict stone buildings, seperated from each other by narrow alleyways filled with people and bikes. One striking thing was the number of children walking around the town, often by themselves. Sometimes, there would be very little children (3 or so years old) being led around by slightly older children (5 or so years old). This seemed to be the case at all times of the day/night (the playground by the waterfront was busy until at least 9 or 10 at night). The same goes for the seemingly hundreds of children playing soccer, hanging out on the beach, or that could be heard singing from buildings that I presumed were schools. Interestingly, I ended up meeting someone who was there making a film for a UK charity on the exploitation of children in Zanzibar, which is apparently quite common.