Dream, Plan, Travel, Repeat.

I like the way the name of my current location, Zanzibar, rolls off my tongue when I say it aloud. Try it: Zzaanzzibaar.From the first moment I saw images of Zanzibar’s palm-fringed white sands and turquoise waters on Google, I counted down the days to my arrival. Now I’ve been here for nine days and, having found that it is exactly the type of island paradise I dreamed of, I’m not interested in leaving. Sorry mainland Tanzania– I’m going to have to see the rest of you on some other trip.Zzaanzzibaar. Really, just try it.Years ago, Zanzibar belonged to the Sultan of Oman and traces of Arab culture remain throughout the island– men in robes and embroidered caps, women in headscarves, mosques, windows with onion-topped arches. Narrow, pungent market alleyways and intricate carved wooden balconies– so similar to those I saw in Delhi and parts of Rajasthan– and the prominence of Indian shopkeepers also reveals the proximity and influence of the Indian subcontinent. Intermixed within all of it are the familiar sights, sounds, and smells of tropical Africa. Huge segments of the world come together on this island. A global blend. I love it.Besides wandering around and enjoying all of these people and their surroundings, my daily life on the island involves eating massive quantities of delicious food. (Sadly, this comes at the same time that I spend most of my days on the beach, wearing a bikini.) The best place to eat is Forodhani Gardens, an oceanside outdoor night market beloved by tourists and locals alike that is lined with dozens of inexpensive street vendors grilling seafood and meats, frying vegetables, and displaying juicy slices of fresh fruits. Matteo and I have fallen into a routine– first, we head to “our” seafood vendor (a lovely man who doesn’t try to charge foreigners extravagant prices), where Matteo orders grilled barracuda skewers wrapped in chapati bread and I have crab claws with plantains. Next, we make our way to “our” juice man, who pours us fresh glasses of sugarcane juice seasoned with ginger and lemon. Then, despite protests from our full bellies, we head over to “our” kabob man, who gives us a plate of beef and fries drenched in spicy pili pili sauce. Afterward, groaning but unable to control ourselves, we’ll have some ice cream, or a crepe with bananas and chocolate. (Best of all, the whole meal will cost us about $4 each.)A good way to digest all of that food is to spend hours lying on the beach and reading. After some time, swimming in the warm, clear ocean also helps. So, after traveling up to a beach on the north of the island, and renting a cozy bungalow with a porch overlooking the ocean, I did that too for five wonderful days.Now, lured by the promise of colorful tropical fish and coral reefs hidden beneath the water’s surface, Matteo and I are back in Zanzibar’s main town, enrolled in a four-day PADI Open Water Dive course. (I’ve read that there’s also wonderful diving in Egypt’s Red Sea, so I think this may be the beginning of a long relationship with scuba equipment.) I spent all of yesterday studying dive theory; today, I wore scuba gear for the first time and took my first breath underwater in a hotel swimming pool. Tomorrow, I go on the first of the course’s four ocean dives– I can’t wait.Once I finish the dive course, I may travel to another beach on the east coast of the island and stay there for a few days. And then, despite my longing to stay here forever, I (probably) will leave Zanzibar to return to Nairobi. I have a flight to Cairo booked for August 7, and the excitement of traveling to another region of the world is beginning to run through my adventure-addicted veins.

Yes, the title of this blog entry is excruciatingly boring, but I couldn’t think of anything clever (or even “clever”) and I’m running out of time at the internet cafe. Sorry.At this moment, I’m in sunny Dar es Salaam, a large city on Tanzania’s coast that Lonely Planet describes as “the country’s capital in all but name.” (The actual capital of Tanzania is a rather dull inland city called Dodoma– southern Californians will understand the two cities’ relationship if I compare Dodoma to Sacramento and Dar es Salaam to Los Angeles.) Tomorrow, if I can survive the awful touts swarming around the ticket offices, I will take a ferry to Zanzibar. And after that, you may never see me in the United States again because I will take up permanent residence on that island paradise and spend my days drinking coconut milk and gazing at the turquoise ocean from my swaying hammock.So that’s what I’m up to at the moment. But I also need to write about the rest of my trip in Rwanda— I hardly want to leave all of you with my robbery story as your final impression of the country.During my last few days in Rwanda, I visited some of my former organization’s rights education classes for their female program participants. The classes, which I attended both in Kigali and in a small rural town located several hours east of the capital, were conducted in Kinyarwanda; thankfully, a wonderful woman who works as a vocational trainer offered to translate for me. Topics discussed among the groups I visited included business etiquette (such as the importance of marketing, self-presentation, and honesty in trade), the value of women’s work at home (or, why unpaid work still contributes to a family’s prosperity), and reproductive health (which initially involved lots of giggling by women with babies on their laps who were too embarrassed to say “vagina,” but later developed into earnest conversations about menstrual cycles, pregnancy, and infertility.) I found the women’s discussions fascinating—and, through our enthusiastic translator, they seemed to have found me pretty interesting too. Besides being asked if I was married, if goat meat was popular in the United States, and how Americans spend their summer days, I was asked questions related to the classes, such as how business was conducted in America and if my father helped my mother with housework. (Ted, they applauded when they heard that you cook and help clean up the house.)What sticks out the most in my memories of meeting these women, though, is the appreciation with which they spoke to me of their ability to participate in the organization’s programs. At the end of the classes, it was common for women to provide me with testimonies of how their lives have improved since they joined the organization—using money from their overseas sponsors, one woman has built herself a kitchen, another sends her children to school, another has a small garden plot of tomatoes, and yet another has purchased bricks for her future home. Some came to the classes holding letters or pictures from their sponsors. All the women who talked to me—all of whom had experienced innumerable tragedies and obstacles over the years—spoke of hope. And that was wonderful to hear.Other brief memories of Rwanda……I saw the president and his motorcade of black and gray SUVs speeding down a village road, scattering children and animals out of their way. While I have great respect for the progress Rwanda has made while under the president’s leadership, I really question the necessity of his driving (as my driver estimated) some 200 km/hr through a busy countryside……I recently received an e-mail that asked, “Can you tell who is Hutu and who is Tutsi?” The answer: no. And very few people that I met volunteered this information. I think, with the government’s strong encouragement, people are doing all that they can to erase the divisions of the past and re-define themselves as “Rwandan.” On that same note, I often found myself looking for evidence of the genocide; to me, it didn’t seem obvious that genocide had occurred. But then I would hear bits and pieces about others’ past—how some had come to Rwanda at the end of 1994, returning with their families from years of exile in nearby countries; how so many young men and women have AIDS; how 14 and 15 year-old boys were studying at a nearby school for orphans; how a woman who once had nine siblings now has only two. It’s clear that scars run deep through the society, and while so much progress has been made, there is still so much work to do to make Rwanda whole again.…for my final night in Rwanda, I had a delicious dinner (or really, a feast with a dozen dishes or so) with David’s aunt, uncle, and cousins. I was so happy to be invited to their home, and felt equally thankful for all the opportunities I had while in Rwanda to interact with Rwandans—to dine with them, and to hear their stories and debates while sharing some of my own. I think I learned more about their country while among them for a week than I could have learned as a typical tourist in a year.And that’s all for now. Once I get my hammock arranged, I’ll write from Zanzibar.

Last night, following five years of travel through sixteen countries, it finally happened-- I was robbed. Goodbye, digital camera. I'll miss you.It was the perfect scenario (for that bastard robber, I mean). It was dark, I was alone at a ... [Continue reading this entry]

Today, I visited the Kigali office of an organization I worked for in Washington, DC. In my former position, I spent so much time writing about the organization's overseas programs and listening to other staff members talk about them that ... [Continue reading this entry]

I fell in love with Rwanda at 20,000 ft. From my airplane window, I stared at the gorgeous countryside surrounding Kigali—rolling green hills divided into thousands of rectangular garden plots edged by banana trees that, from the sky, look like ... [Continue reading this entry]

I visited the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda today, the Arusha-based court established by the United Nations to try individuals alleged to have participated in the Rwandan genocide of 1994.Over two hours, I sat in on two different cases. In ... [Continue reading this entry]

When I wrote “July 7” in my last post, I guess I really meant “July 11.” Sorry.The last time I posted, I was in Kenya preparing for an eight-day safari to Lake Turkana, the world's largest permanent desert lake. Since ... [Continue reading this entry]