TIA Mzungu

For those of you who aren't great with acronyms, or haven't seen the movie "Blood Diamond" with Leonardo Dicaprio, the letters TIA stand for "This Is Africa." Mzungu is the term locals use when they see a white traveller. The African ways take some getting used to, often different, time consuming and sometimes even shocking, but are almost always explained with the simple phrase of TIA. When our Serengeti tour guide got out of the 4x4 and said he would be back in 10 minutes, we learned about "African Time", after he arrived 1 hour and 20 minutes later, TIA. Whilst driving through Zanzibar Island I saw a man dragging a dead cat by a rope, TIA. Upon our first arrival at the Indian Ocean I dove in with enthusiasm, only to be surrounded by 20 locals, and subsequently groped by any and everyone within swimming distance, TIA. When getting our bags off the ferry after Zanzibar Island you literally get pushed, elbowed, and knocked into while people try to scramble for their bags (I will never again get upset if someone steps in front of me while at a US airport), TIA. During every drive we constantly get locals staring at us with confused looks or waving to us with enthusiasm, some yelling "Mzungu", some giving thumbs up and even some giving the middle finger. While driving through Dar es Salaam traffic, we had our first video taker, so I hammed it up for the camera and did a little smile and dance, only to later learn that while this video enthusiast distracted us, his buddy was stealing our truck's taillights, TIA. Needless to say, "This is Africa" and these are some of the things that come with it, but I promise it does have many redeeming qualities.


After meeting up with 8 members of my group in Arusha, we headed bright and early, via 4x4 vehicles to the Serengeti National Park. It was a long bumpy ride, especially considering Frank our local driver smells pretty fragrant to begin with compounded his manly aroma with consistent flatulence. On our drive in we were lucky enough to see a beautiful Cheetah, giraffes and a lion in the distance. We weren't allowed to get out of our trucks, so anytime we thought we saw something we would pull over, and all 8 of us would pop our heads out of the roof with cameras in hand.



At a lunch pit stop a hawk attacked us for our boxed lunches, coming so close that it scratched one of the girls in the face, but made for a hilarious story afterwards. After a night camping in the Serengeti (making sure our tents were at least 6ft apart in case Elephants decided to walk through) we woke up for an early morning game drive. This morning was amazing as we got to see a tree filled with baboons, ponds swimming with mud covered Hippos, families of elephants, two leopards and more giraffes. That night we camped on the edge of the Ngororo crater - a volcanic collapse thousands of years ago created this breathtaking circular enclosure, permananetly inhabitating a wide variety of animals that do not need to migrate because of the diverse climates within the crater.




The next day we did an early morning game drive in the Ngororo crater and the best way to describe it was a scene right out of The Lion King (minus the singing, dancing, and stampedes in the gorge.) With tall jutting rocks encircling you, Zebras, Wildabeests, lions and all other wildlife walk around freely. We spent most of our day saying things like "Simba, hes alive", "Rafiki", and "Asante Sana, Squashed Bananana" (scenes from The Lion King). In Swaheeli Simba means Lion, while Rafiki means friend, and Asanta Sana means Thank You very much. I didn't know I was learning Swaheeli while watching The Lion King all those years ago, and that someday it might actually be useful!


On our way our of the park we stopped at a Masai camp, a local tribe of people who wear orange and blue plaid material draped over their bodies, and thick beaded jewlrey on their arms and necks. (Some of the more stylish Masai Warriors on Zanzibar island also wore man purses and designer sunglasses.) We were directed into their small dirt huts and told about their culture, where each man gets as many wives as he wants (the Patriarch of this family had 15 wives), the women build the houses and the men tend to the cows. We later performed a traditional Masai dance (and I showed them some traditional American dance, which made them laugh) and were forced to haggle for traditional Masai jewlrey. That night we headed back to Arusha to gear up for our early morning drive in the direction of Zanzibar Island.


After one night camping in Dar es Salaam, on a beachsite overlooking the Indian Ocean, we arose early to head via tuk-tuk, short but packed with people ferry, and then 2 hour ferry to Zanzibar Island. Stonetown is part of the island developed by the Ottoman empire in the 1800's for slave and spice trading, and is exactly as it sounds - made of white stone. Although historical, and boasts an amazing night market where you can buy skewers of all types of seafood (I got octopus and calamari), I wasn't too impressed with it.

After one night in stonetown we headed to the beach, to stay three nights at our "resort". Located directly on the most amazing beach I have ever seen I saw past the dirty bathroom and ant-infestation to have the most relaxing 3 days of scuadiving, swimming with sea-turtles, and sunbathing. Currently badly sun burnt and super relaxed, I am in 12-hour transit in the direction of Lake Malawai.