Zanzibar, the land of contrasts

The image that will always stay with me of Zanzibar was at the airport. If for some reason I lose all forms of memory recall of my travels, I will not lose this one. I wish I had had my camera out and ready to snap the situation. But alas, it was not. And so in lack of picture, I resort to descriptive language.

The Zanzibar airport is tiny. International, but tiny. And so the collectors-of-passengers stand outside. And as with all airports there is a security guard posted outside. At one point in my time standing outside there was a young man who had either set off an alarm detector coming out of the airport or wanted to enter through the exit. In either case, he had to be frisked and then have a metal detector run over his whole body. And so this happened.

He stood with his legs apart and his arms up in a “hands up, you are under arrest” position, as a woman, the security guard, frisked and then metal detector-ed him. And what was amusing about this? She was dressed in full Muslim regalia, long black dress, long sleeved in the melting heat, head scarf, everything minus the burqa. With her official security guard name tag. Totally more important than this man in front of her.

And it made me giggle inside and then hope that the position of the woman within Muslim worlds is in fact getting better. Islam does have a bad name, a bad stereotypical name, much true and false about it. Maybe Zanzibar is setting the standard for Muslim woman around the world?

T.I.A. This is Africa. The Land of contrasts.



The inside of a dala dala, Tanzania's equivalent of a taxi/chappa/minibus taxi. In Zanzibar however, it is an open sided pick up truck.