Zanzibar, Friday evening

The Koalaman and I dragged ourselves out of bed at 3:30a.m. on Wednesday. We had to get a taxi to the airport because not even the Tube runs at that time of night. We hopped on a plane to Zurich, Switzerland, then changed planes and flew to Nairobi, Kenya, let a few people off the plane, and then on to Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania.
This is a crazy place. You can't walk down the street without someone, sometimes several people accosting you. They say,"Jambo! How are you? Where are you from?" and they walk along beside you, but they are not only being friendly. They want to sell you something. They want to take you in their taxi. They want to show you the way to your hotel for a tip. They want to sell sunglasses to you. Or necklaces, or handkerchieves, or artwork, or carvings. I haven't bought anything yet simply because I hate being pushed like that. But I will. I really need sunglasses, actually. 
We got to the hotel on Wednesday night just fine, but we were so tired after our long day of travelling. The next morning we got up and ate breakfast and then headed to the ferry terminal. The guy that sold us the tickets scammed us - he sold us economy class tickets for the price of first class. I'm sure he pocketed the difference. I got slightly seasick on the two hour journey across to Zanzibar, but not too bad. We got off in Stone Town, once again to be greeted by a lot of people wanting to give us some sort of service, but we managed to eventually shake them off and wander through town a little bit. 
Stone Town is full of sights and intense smells. The meat market, in particular, I hope to never smell again. Or see, for that matter. They don't seem to care whether flies land on the meat and fish or not. But the fruits and vegetables are beautiful.
We decided to go to our destination village of Nungwe the way the natives go - by daladala. It's most like a flatbed pickup truck with a low roof on it and hard benches around the edges, and it functions as a bus. At one point we had at least 30 people in ours. It seemed a long ride to Nungwe.
When we arrived, we had a bit of a walk to get to our hotel. It seemed impossible that there would be a hotel in this place. The 'roads' are such that you need to have a four wheel drive vehicle in order to navigate them. The houses are cinder block, and very very basic. But we followed the signs to the hotel and then entered a different world. 
We were greeted with cold, wet towels to wipe the sweat from our faces. It was the most refreshing thing I have ever felt. They brought us fresh cookies and guava juice as we were checking in. Our room overlooks the swimming pool and the Indian Ocean, and there are coconut palm trees. The sea is turquoise and warm, with clean white sand. Of course, this changes as soon as you walk down the beach. It's dirty there, covered in litter, and we even saw a boy pooping in the sand today.
Today we wandered the beach in the morning. We found a company to go diving with, and this afternoon we went back for the training bit. I SCUBA dived! In a pool, but still. We'll go out to Mnemba Atoll tomorrow in a boat and do some real diving. I can't wait.