Help I'm Melting.... February 3 - 4

Everyone from Fadhila to taxi drivers tells us it is hotter now than usual even though February is normally one of the hottest months on Zanzibar.  My body stays in a permanent torpor even when all the fans are blowing and I'm drinking cold water from the refrigerator.  It's not until late afternoon and early evening that any breezes bring a hint of relief, and those breezes never enter our room, which is on the wrong side of the house next to the cages for the doves and kennels for the dogs. Last evening, John and I took a walk down our street past small shops and mishitaki (kebob) stands just to enjoy a bit of cooler air. We stopped at the neighborhood store with the best inventory so that John could buy another notebook.  I bought a 2-litre bottle of water and had drunk almost all of it by the time we returned home.  We also bought two chicken kebobs from one of the street vendors for only 30 cents a piece.  Already people in this neighborhood know that Fadhila's wazungu are back.

A street grill with octopus for sale

 John brought along a game "Inline," a knock-off of "Connect Four," as a gift for the older boys, Amin (18) and Marthad (16).  At first, they weren't sure it was their kind of thing--they have video games on their phones, of course--but one of their friends dropped by, and they soon had a heated tournament of some sort going.  The three little girls also begged to try it, and Aisha (12) soon got good enough to beat John a couple of times.  Shehe (3) just drops the markers in randomly and enjoys the noise they make.

John and the children

These first two days, yesterday and today, have not been very good ones for me.  Fahdila is as John says "a force of nature" who is always doing something.  She has had her spare car parts store in front of the house for a long time already, so now she is venturing further and setting up a small cantina near the airport.  It isn't meant to draw tourists as customers but rather airport workers, taxi drivers, etc.  She has already named it "The Executive Chef Cafe" and hopes to open it for business in a week or so.  I'm not allowed to go with her and see it yet.  Anyway, she gets up early to help the dadas get the children off to school at 7:30, and then she leaves too, and is gone all day until late afternoon.  When the three girls get home from school at 2:00 or so, they change into their white veils and head for madrassa until 5:30 or 6:00.  So, I have been left here alone each day so far and have done little except try to catch up on Facebook and read.  Not a healthy way to live at all.

John, of course, gets up so that he can be at SUZA for the morning Swahili classes with the students. Yesterday, they were all tested and then divided into two groups, basically those who had only one semester of Swahili at Whitworth and those who had three semesters.  Fortunately, John made it into the higher group and now feels pressure to study each evening.  By being in class he can monitor how the courses are being taught as well as keep regular daily contact with the students, who are scattered out in host families. I am the one who misses seeing the students now, though once we take field trips, I will see them then.

This afternoon, after John got home from SUZA at 1:30, ate lunch and then napped, we decided to take a daladala downtown and spend some time in a cafe that fronts on the ocean.  There was a lovely breeze there and it felt as if we were in a completely different place. We watched fishing boats going out for the evening and runners on the beach. There was a large group of Chinese at a table, too.  We have noticed more Chinese than we ever saw in 2012, many of them walking about with big cameras and shopping bags.  Fadhila told us that each month two big planes full of Chinese tourists fly into Zanzibar.

Fishing boats

After we left our beachside haven and walked to The Stone Town Cafe for coffee, we passed Tippu Tip's house, which is a UNESCO Heritage Site, and I spotted Chinese men in their underwear
inside.  John went in and saw more of the same and wondered what was going on.  In 2012, squatters lived in the house, but a passerby told John that the government had moved out the squatters and let the Chinese in because they promised to refurbish the house and turn it into a hotel.  When we returned home and John reported this to Fadhila, she went on a big anti-Chinese rant.  The locals resent the shabby Chinese goods that flood their markets and the fact that Chinese are also setting up little shops and competing with local merchants. Fadhila said they call the Chinese "washamba," which loosely translated means "hicks."

While the children are in school, the house is very quiet, but once they are home, it gets pretty lively. Our bedroom is probably the hottest room in the house; however, if we move to the living area, where there may be some breeze coming in and the fan works well, the children mob us and want entertainment.  They love  watching YouTube animal videos, looking at picture books and having me make animal noises (My lion's roar sends Shehe into shrieks of laughter), and exploring my Kindle. The girls cannot read the Kindle, of course, but they love making the pages change and going through my list of books.  Aisha is most fascinated with the dictionary function.  I realize that I introduced all of these activities to them, but honestly I had forgotten the addiction to repetition that children have.

Ammal (front), Ahlam and Aisha (back)

I had not forgotten how solitary our meals here would be, but it still seems odd when we go out to eat our meals and we are alone at the table.  Once in a while in the evening, Fahdila will join us with a glass of juice or cup of tea, but otherwise the table is set only for John and me, and the dadas tell us when it is time to eat. The chidren are usually gone to school by the time we eat our breakfast, and they are not home yet when we eat lunch, but in the evening, while we are eating our last meal, they are next door in the kitchen eating too, seated on a mat on the floor.  This is the way the whole family would normally eat together.  We've eaten like this at other Swahili homes, but Fahdila likes to set the table for us.

Dada Saumu and children at supper

Tomorrow, I'm getting up in time to ride the daladala into the city with John and spend the morning in the one place I know I can sit for free in air-conditioning:  The American Corner.  It's a small building donated by USAID to SUZA and has a little room with a small collection of donated books in English.  That's nice, of course, but more important is its air-conditioner.  Sitting on a metal chair for three hours of silent sustained reading will be a small price to pay for a bit of coolness.