STONE TOWN

So Brian is sick.  Not so much sick as malaise, and this has been happening since yesterday.  Today, having mastered a visa to India from Zanzibar, he comes into the room, all the places on his body touched by his shirt and his backpack soaked with sweat, and simply collapses.  His last gesture of courage is to drink a beer with me, the ritual of our friendship.  But after that, he’s down for the count.  Being helpless but not whining, sick but not really sick, maybe just needing a day off, a day without unrelenting heat, the imploring whispers of vendors. Anyway, he lies down in his bed at 3 o’clock in the sweltering afternoon, and he becomes inert.

He’s down for the count.  A/C turned up to max, he’s removed his one good cut-and-sewn shirt, worn out of respect to the Consulate, and lies on the bed.  And, dear heart, apologizing.  That is Brian’s charm, he has empathy without being controlling.  He doesn’t expect me to take care of him, but he’s conscious that he is removing himself from the ‘us’ that has been traveling together for over a week, the ‘us’ that has found a solid companionship.  The ‘us’ that has felt the softness of each other's lips.

I’m not worried about him.  He turns over, drinks water, doesn’t have a fever, doesn’t need to use the choo excessively.  I myself am having a wonderful day.  I’ve found, after only a little effort in the souk, a good computer fundi to get my computer working yet again. I’ve found a couple of good guesti’s for the future.  While Brian is off dealing with the bureaucracy of travel, I‘ve cut my hair in a style that I can look at in the mirror and admire, with a little squinting.  I’ve cut my nails and washed underwear.  So it’s been a good resting day for me, and I’m content to have Brian have one, too, even if he has to suffer the giving in while I do not.  I’m not really worried about him.  Tomorrow will tell.  I watch a little TV on my newly revived machine, put on lipstick, and go out.

Stone Town is a really special place.  As I joked with my girlfriends on Facebook this afternoon: “all Babar, unfortunately no elephants”.  Cities and places in Tanzania are not usually this old, or so dedicated to the Prophet. I imagine parts of Cairo and other storied places in sub-Saharan climes have this air of antique Occidentalia.  Carved doorways, strange minarets donated by rich men of the provinces in creative and opulent homage to their wealth and their religion. Crenellated forts along the water, the ornate Victorian overlay of some official buildings, the domed palaces of the Sultan. The narrow passageways of the souk, the grasping shopkeepers, the sequined abayas of the women, the restless young men.  Two things stand out:  So small and so African. Less than a square mile, it has a preserved feeling, and indeed, modern Zanzibar Town stretches far beyond the unwalled boundaries of the original city.  And I see the Swahili thread, the link to the antique world of the first tribal men and women of East Africa who met the Eastern world with eyes wide open and sailed with it. Their emblem is the triangular sail of the dhow, drawing the eye offshore and always moving downwind, it seems; the same boats that brought the captives from Bagamoyo.  I’ve seen the slave market, seen the fort and the church that protected the commerce.  It’s all preserved here without irony, but also with very little commercialism. Tourists are now the new commodity, ready to be resourced. Ultimately, I admire the creativity and grace that abounds in Stone Town and seems missing from the rest of my adopted country, even missing on the island outside of the Town.

I walk around the perimeter of the entire Old City under a new moon. On the tack back to the hotel, I walk along the waterfront and Forodhani Park, where I can buy supper from one of the al fresco grills that line the paths. In the soft evening, I'm glad of my clean nails and clothes, my bagless ease, my new shorter hair.  Half a dozen young entrepreneurs greet me and ask softly if I need anything.  I imagine: the shops are closed, so it must be a joint, or an escort, perhaps a new relationship. (When before I've talked more with them, they always promise a relationship in a way that seems like children hoping to be adopted.  I've seen enough of these couples to know that it is a worthwhile sales technique).  I think of Brian back in the hotel room and am glad he’s there, not because I want him to be there, sick, but because I like being alone out here with the idea of a man with me, a reason not to feel vulnerable to the opportunistic Swahilis. So I walk along fearlessly, not swinging my arms or whistling, not even meeting the eyes of men, but happy, and confident. 

In the park I chide the little boys for begging by telling them in KiSwahili that they must use good English to beg properly; this is my idea of an ironic joke.  I keep my schillings in my pocket until I have reached the food court, where I easily buy a huge piece of pweza (octopus) grilled, with salad, for dinner.  It's served with the traditional toothpicks for implements and costs six bucks.  Brian showed me how to do this when we were here before. While the holiday crush is over, the park is comfortably filled with families and travelers. On my own, I seem to understand the life of the Park, the community of it, and I chat with some of the other diners, toss a bit of fish to a patient cat.  There is a cooling breeze off the sea and a place to buy a liter of cold water for the room on the way home.

On the streets walking back after it’s quiet now.  The subsiding of the frenzy created by the cruise ship passengers passing through for the day, and the New Year’s holiday makers, has left the shopping streets shuttered, de-populated. To me it seems a normal Friday night in Stone Town, as if 5 nights in a hotel for locals has given me a neighborhood. This also is a pleasure, even if a self-indulgent one.  I think, since this is the second time through for me in a week, that people recognize me, they know what I’ve bought, what I will not be enticed to buy. It’s a small place, this Stone Town. I can walk around it in less than an hour. They know I come from the interior, that I’m not looking for souvenirs, that there is a good man traveling with me, for now, and that I speak a little of the language.  I feel safe, and happy.