Category: Tanzania

We just visited perfect beach #3 of our trip. The beaches of Zanzibar are indeed quite nice with their amazingly fine white sand, blissfully torquoise waters and unlimited opportunities for lounging under palm trees. Beachfront massages, cosy bungalows, and thatched-roof bars serving deliriously fresh seafood are all the typical perks of this paradise, just like…

  In the past 8 months, we’ve gone to see 5 movies. In 4 days on Zanzibar at the International Film Festival of the Dhow countries, we saw over 35 movies ranging from 4 minutes to 104 minutes long. Most, if not all, will never reach US movie theatres, and there were a few attempts…

We’ve only been in Zanzibar for a few hours, and we already know we’re going to be here for longer than expected. We’ve seen more tourists today than in the past month. The tourist kitsch to go along with it is seemingly ever-present and the prices are outrageous (for Tanzania) even after our minimal swahili…

As we were waiting for our dinner in the village of Sitalike bordering Katavi National Park a man approached us asking where we were staying. As he suspected, we were at the one tourist hotel in town and proceeded to warn us not to walk back after dark because that’s when the hippos leave the…

To recap: We arrived in Kigoma after a hellish 22-hour train ride. We spent 1 frantic day failing to get cash. We spent 1 day gallavanting with chimpanees. We had 3 options to leave Kigoma – MV Liemba – an overnight ferry ride – taken over by refugees Reboard train – already booked Many days…

Had an excellent time at Gombe Stream National Park. Will write more after transportation woes. More: Our 2 nights at Gombe Stream were exactly what we needed: Beautiful sunsets followed by quiet starlit nights Sleeping to the sound of the lake lapping the shore Tracking chimpanzees through the forest Playing soccer with the staff and…

We expected to have a lot of transit time in Tanzania as the distances between places of interest are long and the infrastructure connecting them poor. We wouldn’t presume that Dr. Livingstone would complain about our ordeal to his expected source of the nile (since at no point did it include months of walking through…

We head a wonderful few days together, and we will never forget you. Unfortunately, we must end our relationship. Even withstanding the ocean between our homes, we cannot afford your high maintenance lifestyle. So long and thanks for all the wildebeest, zebras, warthogs, giraffes, lions, cheetahs, antelopes, jackals, hyenas, hippos…

Tanzania is a poor country. AIDS has reached epidemic proportions. Only 5% of students finish secondary school. In short, when we were in the United States and we envisioned poverty, this is what we envisioned, not the overwhelming squalor of Delhi or the near infrastructure-less Cambodia, but this dignified and developing country with a long…

We’re off to tour the northern national parks of Tanzania for five days. Tanzania is interesting in a mostly good way. The food could be better, and we’ve been a bit overwhelmed by touts in the hugely tourist areas, but the latter should get better while the former gets worse over the next few weeks…