To Zanzibar

I take the ferry to Zanzibar, surely one of the most evocative names on the east coast of Africa. Its rich history of trade, Omani sultans, and the jumping off point for the great 19th-century expeditions against a backdrop of Swahili culture deserves its UNESCO World Heritage status. In many respects, the historic center of Stone Town is a fantastic place, but I must look past the neglect, trash, and dereliction to imagine what must have been. Like parts of Havana, Cuba, incredible architecture is turning to rot. Some restoration efforts are going on, but not all will survive. In the 1970s the government, during its failed socialization experiment, redistributed many of the structures to people with no vested interest in protecting anything, increasing the downhill slide into deterioration.

The shell of the old courthouse looks ready to fall over.

View from my hotel rooftop.

Now, Zanzibar has made a pact with the tourism devil, and this has brought prosperity at a cultural cost. Package tourists fill the beach resorts, and I see hoards of western college types, with boobs bursting out of tank tops, cracks showing, and who are loud and foul. What must the deeply Islamic Zanzibaris think? And neither of these groups of tourists are particularly friendly.

To compare with Lamu up in Kenya, here you flop on the beach and swim in the divine Indian Ocean. In Lamu, which is smaller and more intimate, you stay and write a book.

Tourists are swarming about and rooms are tight. Because I've spent little during the last month and I face a few weeks of hard travel ahead, I splurge on my last day. For the same price as a Travelodge in San Francisco, I end up in the presidential suite in a former palace. There's no reason to go out the door.

This is just one of my rooms.

Before I leave the country in a few days, I must comment on the extraordinary kindness of the Tanzanians. A case in point, the immigration officer back on the border between Burundi and Tanzania sent me an e-mail a week later, saying: "hi! madam it's me Dickson Mwanyasi an immigration officer at manyovu land boarder,i would like to extend ma warm greetings!where are you now?have you already departed to zanzibar? have a nice tour enjoy a lot, happy"

Can you imagine that happening in Europe or the US?