“African husband” kindly told me to move out of this cursed house every day, saying the house really wasn’t safe. I found those words to be so overused by then... I had just settled in and got used to all the pros and cons of the house. I really started having fun. The pristine nature that surrounded me, the singing of the birds, who would wake me up every morning, millions of butterflies... It was so peaceful. There was no one to control me and I didn’t have to tell anyone where I was going and when I’d be back. Complete freedom. The only time I felt uncomfortable was just before I went to sleep, when I turned off all the lights and realised I was really all alone, accompanied by all the sounds of the wilderness.
And then I started having monologues with myself. If someone wants to steal anything in from the house, be my guest. There aren’t any valuables in the house, anyway. If someone steals my old computer, I’ll survive, since I plan on buying a new one, anyway. Moisture had already left its mark on my headphones and bugs had eaten the cable... All my valuables were locked up safely in my room, and I never went for a walk outside the estate at dusk or at night. If I’m meant to get stabbed in the middle of the night, then so be it.
One evening, when I was returning from Prison Island with “African husband” and his buddy, they both kindly walked me to the front door. I already noticed in the morning that the generator by the well wasn’t in its place, as if it had been moved, and that there was a piece missing that was used to turn on the water pump. Still, I didn’t really give much attention to it. As a thanks for walking me to my house, I sliced a watermelon and first pointed out that I WAS COMPLETELY FINE staying at the house and that I had no intention of moving anywhere else, except extend my stay, and then I finished with: “I think my water pump was stolen.”
And that was the end of story! That was the last straw!
“African husband” gave me an ultimatum. I would move out of the house either that very same day or the next one!
“Frankly, I’d rather move out tomorrow or in two days or so, so I can take my time packing my things,” I calmly replied.
I can’t describe how the house had grown on me! But “African husband” had already found new accommodation for me. Never leave that till tomorrow which you can do today was suddenly his motto. And then his buddy’s horrible Zanzibar stories pricked my conscience, so I immediately agreed to move out.
It was ten in the evening, it was pitch dark and it was time for me to move out of my Zanzibar house. I packed all my things in ten minutes, “African husband grabbed my bike, and his buddy helped me carry the 20-litre water tank. It was like a scene from some kind of film. It felt like we were running from an occupied territory and towards freedom!
We loaded everything onto “African husband’s” old banger and drove for five minutes to some kind of a suite where I was supposed to get a holiday apartment in a residential complex. Since it was off-season, lots of these tourist complexes were empty. Of course, “African husband”, the owner of the lodge and a real businessman, knew everyone in the village and found the best replacement for me. The apartment had a fence and a guard, a Maasai.
But not everything went as smoothly.
We drove onto my new little apartment’s property when an angry German tourist stopped us at the entrance with: “Was ist das?”
The scene was really creepy.
Can you imagine a beaten-down car with two black people and an underage-looking white girl in it stopping outside your holiday apartment at ten in the evening? With lots of luggage and a bike in a half-open boot? Well, it would give me a heart attack!
It turned out my future room was given to German tourists that day, and the Maasai hadn’t notified “African husband” about it.
Of course, the tourists would be the first in line for the apartment if they paid a fair price for it. I would’ve basically stayed there for free, anyway.
It was a complete chaos. Our arrival had led to a certain amount of bad blood. The Germans were angry at “African husband”, he was angry at the Maasai for not notifying him about the change, and I received many a stern look. Fuck, what a mess! The funny thing was, I didn’t even want to leave my lovely house! I cursed everyone around me. As usual, “African husband” solved the whole situation. There was another lodge a minute’s drive away that hadn’t been completely booked. The caretaker was a good friend of “African husband’s” and he agreed to the whole thing right away. All it took was mention that I was living in the “house” all by myself (every local knew the house) and everyone would feel really sorry for me! It only took five minutes and my luggage was already outside the new apartment. It was quite a luxury compared to the house I had stayed in before. The apartment had a double bed and a power socket, and ants were nowhere to be seen!
So, I spent the last week in another location, about five minutes from my previous house. It was a wonderful experience and the locals were nice. I went cycling in the mornings, and cooked with a local and learned Swahili with her son in the afternoons, until I got really sick.
I woke up in the middle of the night with a serious fever. I was shivering so badly my teeth were chattering. Great, I never get sick and then when I travel somewhere, like Africa, I always get sick like this. The same thing happened in Mozambique. WHY?!
I was all sweaty in the morning, had a terrible headache, felt completely lethargic and didn’t feel like eating. What now? Should I call mom? She wouldn’t be able to help me from Slovenia, plus I’d be making her even more worried. “Don’t be a child, Ida!” I don’t really want to deal with doctors and my travel insurance expired one week before my return home (don’t do what I did). It can’t be COVID, I have a PCR test in three days! “Then it must be malaria.”
I did some googling. Zanzibar has a small per cent of malaria cases, but I was in Tanzania before I got here, in Dar es Salaam which was swarming with mosquitoes. The disease can manifest itself even weeks after the first bite. I cancelled all my plans for that day and decided to just rest. I skipped breakfast because I didn’t feel like eating, and my neighbour brought me ugali with fish for lunch.
The German family who accompanied me to my previous house, told me to take a free malaria test in the village. “If it’s free, then I’m in!” I grabbed my bike and drove to the center of the Kizimkazi village. The nurse wasn’t interested in my symptoms, she just pushed the needle in my non-disinfected finger, took some blood from it and told me to wait ten minutes. When it became awkwardly silent, she asked me where I lived. Since I was basically staying at the apartment illegally, I told her my previous address (Peponi). She started laughing out loud. When she caught her breath, she asked me if I knew what that meant. Luckily, I had advanced enough in Swahili to reply with confidence: “Yes, I know, PARADISE, but that’s what that house is actually called!” And I also live in paradise. ;)
“Ma’am, you don’t have malaria.”
And the PCR test I took three days after was, apparently just like all tests in Zanzibar, negative.
When I was in Zanzibar, I enjoyed the simplest of things, such as when I joined the locals as they were running errands. Since I visited Zanzibar in the off-season, the locals spent their time investing in the upcoming season. I accompanied them as they went to buy tiles to renovate resorts, look for new life jackets for diving with dolphins, and visited a mechanic to get a car fixed. I’ll never forget the urge to pee that day. Time is regarded completely differently in Africa as it is back home, so I believed them back then when they said the car was going to be fixed “quickly”. And I was going to hold it until I’d get back home where I could go to the toilet. But “quickly” turned out to last about two hours. :)
It was truly hard to say goodbye to all the locals and friends I had met in Zanzibar. And going back home after having spent three months in Tanzania was especially hard, as I had to get used to a quicker pace of life again. But I have to admit that my longer stay in Africa has completely changed me. Even today I still remember how I cried in the car when I came back to Slovenia. Everything seemed so grey and dull. People looked reserved, absorbed in thought and joyless. I immediately started to miss the openness in people and the fact that people greet each other in the street in Africa, or that a neighbour invites you over for a cup of earl grey for no particular reason. I also missed the colourful clothes, people being at ease, African dance and African music. I love African pop songs. I wore my African skirt the whole week after I had got back to Slovenia because I just couldn’t get used to wearing trousers again. In Tanzania, where I stayed, women only wore skirts. Trousers were a western influence and, since I wanted to integrate into the local culture as much as possible and respect it, I never wore them, let alone shorts or too-revealing t-shirts (mostly because of the majority Muslim population, especially in Zanzibar).
Tanzania helped me spread my wings. The trip was a huge milestone for me, since it was the first time I travelled on my own outside Europe. The more I travel alone, the less afraid I am and the more I trust myself that I can do it. When I “survived” Tanzania, I got a feeling I was ready to go anywhere I wanted all by myself.
Travelling is definitely a life lesson for me, as the world traveller Alma Karlin, my great inspiration, already wrote. I learn a lot about myself and other cultures each time I travel, especially if I travel alone. I’m constantly forced to leave my comfort zone and face all kinds of fears. Two years ago, I would never have boarded a plane alone! A year ago, I would never have used the Couchsurfing app. I like to set myself challenges and then try to take them on. It’s all so much more fun when you do it through travelling!
I’ve also learned a lot through working abroad. Adventures like these broaden one’s horizons. People have different view things differently and they think differently, too. And maybe things we’re used to in our culture are not always the only ones right. By travelling, we embrace the differences, shed some of our prejudices and become more grateful for all the commodities.
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