Category Archives: Luxury Holidays

The Spirit of a Volunteer

11 Replies

dsc_4555a.jpg

Its one of those words that people utter with awe and amazement. “Volunteer”… Thats what a plucky band of us had the privilege of being called when we taught English and were thoroughly fulfilled with our lot.

It took place on the Island of Zanzibar and it was probably the best experience of my life. Getting to meet the other volunteers who came from all over the world was awesome.

These people chose to spend a chunk of their youth to assist another community, while, at the same time, learning and growing through an experience that will leave a mark for the rest of their lifetimes.

Their wisdom, even at their young ages, brought a sense of hope and joy to the East Coast of the Indian Ocean‘s Spice Island.

The project was teaching English and also at primary schools, along with various community assistance such as school DIY. I was one of the oldest volunteers at 23 years of age.

It is without a doubt that I mention that these most uncommon of people, combined with those we aided are a shining torch to future generations to carry on this tradition.

Lets meet a few of them. There was Manoel, an Economics student from Zurich University. He had studied there for a year and also was in the process of completing three weeks national service for the six years after his first year, when he completed nine weeks worth.

DSC_4902

He was completely different to me, money savvy. He advised me on more than one occasion. What about Aidan, an Irish bank employee who worked in Frankfurt.

His girlfriend, Catherine and himself gave us a great time for the first week. It was later understood that, after leaving us, they headed for the Maasai Mara on Safari and it was here that he proposed to her.

That was happy news, despite us having heard it second hand. They met at a Catholic summer camp, I’m not sure where.

Andre and Lilya, from Bulgaria? Andre had his Private Pilot’s License, something I hope to gain in the future. They had met and then been apart for two years before their relationship started.

This is what he told me, anyway. Lilya and I had some interesting conversations, namely about Shakespeare and the fact that she had formed the opinion that Romeo was on drugs. She may not have been wrong:)

What days we had together. Our free time was spent playing volleyball on the beach or at the bar sipping punches on those sensational white Indian Ocean sands listening to Reggae music from Culture and Tarrus Riley, to name a few.

DSC_4090(a)

We’d buy ten drinks at a time and party till 1:30 a.m. with the same breeze of the Indian Ocean current from the south that cooled us during the day now warmed us. It was a tough life:) Also brutal was the fact that that we had to watch twenty-something women in bikinis.

DSC_4605

As for the people who we met at the bars, they would sit with us and talk all night on the beach. The night sky was like the heavens had been sown with white crystals that set your eyes alight. These were dazzling and we almost always had a clear sky.

Want to try some of their Stoney Tangawizi ginger beer. Its worth buying just for the name but the taste of the cool, fragrant liquid inside means you’ll buy it again and again.

These drinks can be found at almost any bar along the beach and you’ll generally pay between forty to sixty pence per bottle. As for the alcohol, there’s Havana Club and Black Vodka. Preferably you’ll have more sense than to mix these together.

One night a guy, thinking that my half-filled glass of rum had whisky in it, topped the other half off with that drink. Wow! I may be six feet five inches, but even I felt like my head was in the clouds after that one. It was the next morning that I went dolphin swimming at 6 a.m. What a rush!

Well, we bounced around in a ten foot boat the next morning. It was with great excitement that we saw these happy creatures in their natural habitat. They leapt out of the water, dove, swam away and were just fabulous! No decent photos, I’m afraid. I borrowed this one.

A dolphin leaps out of the water in the Indian...

A dolphin leaps out of the water in the Indian Ocean, off the coast of Zanzibar, Tanzania. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Other excitements included the Spice Tour, which also takes place in Jozani Forest, the sanctuary of the Red Colobus Monkeys. Of particular interest is the mangrove swamp, where our guide showed us how the seeds fall off the mother tree and embed themselves in the mud.

Ecology is central to the Archipelago. We were given an eco-tour the first Wednesday after I arrived. This showed us much about the island and its delicate ecosystem.

This tour consisted of us visiting the seaweed plantation, going to a family’s home to see how coconut milk is made…by grating the innards of the fruit out… and paying a visit to Jambiani‘s much revered herbal doctor. These were useful chunks of knowledge tht we could gain an insight with.

Our guide told us that seaweed was the main cash crop on the Island and we were well-reminded of this every morning, when we would look out over the beach into the rising Indian Ocean sun and see handfuls of women and men toiling over their plots, trying to make a few pennies here and there.

They were the coolest people I’ve ever met. They were fun, smart, beautiful in the case of the women, and generally happy with their lot in life! What a place, where your heady dreams of fulfillment and paradise come to fruition!

Related articles

Related articles

Spice Island Soaring

1 Reply

DSC_5308

I had booked a flying lesson the previous evening. Now, here I was up in the microlight, soaring like a young man dreams to from the age of three. How about that. How about flying high above the Indian Ocean‘s torquoise waters?

There was a deep blue, cloudless sky that Saturday and Cedric, my instructor, took me into the hangar where his Kitfox microlight was and he showed me around it before having some people roll it out onto the tarmac.

It was at this point that I was asked to take a seat in it. So I did and soon I heard the engine turn over.

The first thousand feet or so after takeoff was a bit bumpy. Its always a rush, though. Soon we started heading east and already could see the east coast where Jambiani is located.  Cedric asked me if I wanted to take the controls. I said yes, of course.

I handled it through a few shallow turns with the stick and a little bit of rudder. I was in paradise. What could be better for a young man like myself.

After we got on the ground, Cedric said that he thought it would be a easy for me to gain a Private Pilots License. This thrilled me! Wow! an instructor had just spoke those words to me!

Related articles

Maltese Margherita

1 Reply
Courthouse, Valletta, Malta

Courthouse, Valletta, Malta (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In Mediterranean warmth, it is easy to get carried away with yourself. I wasn’t. I was stuck in Sliema, Malta, with no Euros. Plenty of money if you counted the Pounds Sterling. This happened for a simple reason.

After being deterred from transferring my money into Euros three days later, I had decided to wait too long. Now I was there with no money.

This wasn’t going to be solved easily either. It was a Sunday, when businesses are closed, and I had arrived on the day, of all days, when the Labour Party won over the Nationalist party for the first time in twenty-five years.

That meant that the following day was a bank holiday. Great. This meant that I would have a hard time finding a place to transfer money the next day.

But, for now, all I needed was to eat. Eventually, I found a pizza hut where I ate a Margherita and was able to have another customer put the meal on their tab, later transferring the pounds sterling they received. That was really nice of them!

Related articles

Don’t Buy Ivory

8 Replies
Stone Town streets

Stone Town streets (Photo credit: Berlotti)

Don’t buy ivory. Thats what we were told. None. Therefore, when I walked down the row of shop in Stone Town and entered one selling little souvenirs that were hopefully only made of Malachite. This hope, I was to find out, was ill founded. My young eyes wandered over the rows of items that included little hippos that you could hold in the palm of your hand and tiny cooking pots, hehe.

One could smell the malachite in these places, a wonderful sense. You could also duck into these buildings, made of cool stone, as the name of the city suggests, to escape the heat. Not that that was intolerable. In fact, it was no worse than you might find in the Mediterranean. They had the most lovely vibrant colours in their products as well. Its as though someone had splattered fifty different shades all over the walls and just let it dry.

Hanging in Stone Town

Hanging in Stone Town (Photo credit: Camera, Lights)

I wanted to buy one to bring home to my mother. I came back off that trip to Zanzibar with an entire carry-on bag just full of souvenirs. Everything from silk to kitchen utensils. I casually strode over, with the floor creaking below me, and, with my long reach, plucked one of the pots off the top shelf.

We asked all the time about the materials used to make them. “How much?” I asked the owner, showing him my prospective merchandise.

“18,000 shillings”. I nearly died! That was almost seven pounds. I was going to ask him what the base material was but that high price made me know inside. “Ivory?”, I again queried him. “Yes” was the answer. I promptly put the item back on the shelf.

A bedrock rule of the charity I was with, teaching English in a place called Jambiani on the east coast, was “Do not buy Ivory!”

The charity was African Impact.

Related articles

The People Of Zanzibar

14 Replies

DSC_4707(b)

If ever there was a truly tolerant and hard-working people, it would that of this pearl of beauty in the Indian Ocean. It lies approximately twenty miles off the coast of East Africa and fifty from Dar Es Salaam.  They work as hard as can be and the best way of thanking these people for providing me with such a rich, unforgettable and life-changing experience is to write this post and spread their wisdom, though, in truth, it should be kept a secret.

Coming up to two years ago in July of 2013, I embarked on a voluntary placement with African Impact; a project called the Zanzibar Rural Teaching and Community Project. The local people and other volunteers are some of the most extraordinary people I’ve ever met. Take Dulla, one of the project managers.

Seaweed

Seaweed (Photo credit: Horatiu Curutiu)

He would arise at three a.m. to tend to his mother’s seaweed plantation. This was the main cash crop in Zanzibar when I was there. That was at least two hours work. Then he would return home to cook breakfast at five. Another hour. Time to get his son up.

It’s at least twenty minutes walk either way. Next is lesson planning. Afterwards, it’s now eight-thirty. Hop on the bike now and its up to the Jambiani Tourism Training Institute.

Arrive at nine. Teach the class. Good. Ten-fifteen now. Over to the primary school for ten-thirty. Teach at the primary school, actually there were three, till twelve. Go home. Eat lunch. One o’clock now and lesson planning for the football boys’ lessons in English.  Three o’clock.

The kids are home. Head out to set up and undertake football practice. That means it is now four o’clock. After that, you have to teach them English until 18:00.

Then, and only then, does he go home and help his wife to cook and the kids with homework. What a day!! If anyone was forced to do that in rich parts of the world, people would tell them to get help. The seaweed workers could be seen when we woke up and gazed onto the beach at 6 a.m.in the morning, the the eastern sky the colour of a blood orange.

Lets take the inhabitants of Stone Town. Extremely resourceful in making money. They do it any way they can think of. Some will try to sell nice souvenirs such as very fine arts and crafts, music CDs and Zanzibar football shirts. Others will helpfully give you directions. But perhaps the most interesting and educational of these entrepreneur are the tour guides.

English: A food seller displaying his items at...

English: A food seller displaying his items at Forodhani park in Zanzibar (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

However, once we were given a tour without being asked and were expected to pay afterwards. Its always wise to carry a bit more money than usual around the town. Just in case. Now, you won’t see many beggars, during the day. They only come out of the woodwork at the night market. They are completely harmless and won’t usually ask for more than a thousand shillings, or forty British pence.

Considerate? They are very much so. There is a Red Colobus monkey reserve in the middle of the island and, when we drove through this area, the drivers always slowed down and I never saw one of the creatures lying dead by the roadside. They are an endangered species and this area, plus the rest of the island, is their only known habitat.

Red Colobus monkey in Jozani forest. Endemic t...

Red Colobus monkey in Jozani forest. Endemic to Zanzibar. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Want to have some fun and games? Why not see Makunduchi festival. The occurrence of this party is at the end of every month.

The idea behind it is simple. At the end of every month, all the men-of-age in the community gather into groups and are issued banana sticks. Then they gather in a large field with the women cheering on their partner.

It is up to the mayor to then to basically say “Alright, chaps. Any bad blood between you, take it out in three-two-one…NOW!”, at which point he blows the whistle and the men start whacking one another. One shouldn’t be alarmed,though.

The sticks hurt a little, but not for long. Its no worse than a bee sting.  The fight will spread all over the field and you should be prepared to leg it, quickly, lol:)

The point about these people is not the cliche that they have less and are happier for it.  Nor is it the fact that they work hard or that they have a permanent smile upon their face. It is the combination of all three.

Their strength is that, despite the fact that they desire better healthcare and education, they know enough not to complain.

“Gallantry and wisdom without knowing it”. That is the way I would describe the inhabitants of the archipelago. Their plight is not that of other countries in the area. They have thriving tourism and crop industries.

It is that most common of foes, environmental destruction and, on the part of foreign tourists, carelessness. The main perpetrator of these crimes are the large, global hotel chains that set up shop on the island.

The swimming pool at Baraza Resort and Spa pip...

The swimming pool at Baraza Resort and Spa pipes music into the water so you can hear it while you are swimming. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

There was once a time when, on one of our week-end activities, we decided to attend a full-moon party in a place called Nungwi at the northernmost tip of Unguja, the main island of Zanzibar.

We came into the village in our minivan and I observed, in front of us, two children playing on either side of a brown puddle that straddled the road. I said “Look at those two kids playing in the mud”. It wasn’t mud.

Cute Young African Boy

Cute Young African Boy (Photo credit: terbeck)

The full-moon festival was great! Not for Manoel, a Swiss volunteer, though. He took one bite into his burger on the first evening and prudently chose not to eat the rest. However, that did not stop him from being violently sick.

It was also the weekend where I met Jennifer, my girlfriend of the time. She was a lovely person. She was from the mainland where her dad worked, or possibly still does, on the Serengeti as a park warden.

These people have resilience and humanity at every turn. They are quite happy on their little island. What a marvellous adventure!

Skansen, a guide to Stockholm’s 19th century exhibit

11 Replies

DSCF0001   DSCF0108

A fully-functioning 19th-century village? Thats what you’ll find in Sweden’s oldest open air museum, formed in 1891. Truly magnificent in both content and scale, it is a must-see for anyone wishing to visit this Bastion of Scandinavia. The Post Office still operates and arts and crafts are taught all year round. 

DSCF0101

Its name is…Skansen!

If you like the smell of timber and architecture of the 19th century then this is the place for you. The sight of people in period costume  of the place and the architecture will leave you breath-taken. The staff are informative and there is an authentic Swedish chef. Ever seen the muppets? He’ll remind you of them. It is truly the heart of 19th century Sweden. The open air cafes are abundant. So is cycling…

DSCF0118

There are places like Helin and Voltaire that serve coffee tea and pastries, the smell of which you’ll never forget, plus more, or there is Skansen terrace, a wonderful open-air venue where you can sit and drink under the sky of a long summer evening. Want to have your own little glass moose? Why not go to the glass-blower and watch him make it before your very eyes?

All the fauna of Sweden are kept here. If you find seals cute and cuddly, a grey one is fed every day at his aquatic enclosure. He looks happy all -day long. The size of the enclosures is large. The animals have plenty of room and are loved by both staff and visitors.

DSCF0014

Its harmony with nature leads you to think of all the dream you dreamt as a child.

Related articles

The Adriatic (Credit to Rebecca Cox for photography)

Leave a reply

croatia 3 196

It was a late August day. We set out under bright blue summer skies in what is generally acknowledged as warm weather in England. It was an eventful journey. After having stopped in a lay-by and bought the usual assortment of refreshments for a journey from Gloucestershire to Luton Airport.

Ryanair EI-DPC taxies at Luton airport

Ryanair EI-DPC taxies at Luton airport (Photo credit: bigpresh)

After a while, though, around Milton Keynes, my mother began to get agitated with “my navigation”. I was responsible for failing to identify three roundabouts that didn’t appear on the map. As it turns out, they weren’t on the map. Anyway, after a heated argument, we realised this and continued normally.

Upon arrival at Luton around six in the evening, we began the check-in procedure. No biggie. Neither was the flight.

We took off around eight and landed at ten. What WAS worrying, however, was that my father, who had set off across Europe some time previously to meet us at Venice’s Treviso Airport, was nowhere to be seen nor heard from. We tried calling his mobile.

No luck. While, initially, I thought this was probably a mobile phone reception problem, my mother began to worry. She began to fear he had had an accident and went frantic.

This lasted for a couple of hours, during which time I had to ask a cop, or carabinieri, for some money to use for a payphone. For the next hour or so, my mother seriously fretted due to the fact that we could not get in touch with him.

To clear my head, I stepped outside. It was then that my father, quite by chance, drove by. This was a great relief to my mother and I. It transpired that he had no signal and was lost. Right now. Time to hit the road.

Its after one o’clock in the morning and we need to rest so the first night will be a “pit stop” in an autostrada, their motorway, service station. The car we were using was a Volkswagen Polo and it was CRAMPED.

I had to stuff my foot through, then wedge my shoulder in and, finally, use levering force to get into the car. Good times! So we arrived at a spot just outside Trieste where the next four or five hours was a combination of restlessness and hovering a round in the shop with some hanging out under the stars.

That was cool! On the road again…We went to see the famous Lipizzaner Stallions at the Lipica 1580 Stud Farm. Lipica’s history is heavily influenced by the Habsburgs who ruled the Austro-Hungarian empire for circa 650 years.

English: Favory Pallavicina, approved Lipizzan...

English: Favory Pallavicina, approved Lipizzan stallion, Australia Deutsch: Favory Pallavicina, gekörter Lipizzanerhengst, Australien (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Horses, especially the Spanish Horse, were valued for both military and commercial reasons. Archduke Charles chose to build the Royal Stud Farm in 1578.

We hung around the stables while being given a guided tour and took photographs. The farm was a lovely place, greenery abound!

The port of Trieste was highlighted by bright Italian sunshine that laid the container ships bare in the light of day. We crossed the border shortly thereafter and promptly found a market on the Croatian side and bought the best grapes I have ever tasted from the lady depicted below.croatia 3 116

It was a hot day and I had my T-shirt off, (wolf whistles) after having stepped out of the car, and strode over to the barrier, from where we could see the brilliant Azure of the water in the bay. I can still remember the radiance of the sun against the tarmac. It was tremendous that day.

The first night at a campsite was spent at a reasonably cheap place on the coast that had a traditional style Slovenian seafood restaurant. Every meal I ate at a restaurant on this trip was dead seafood still looking at me.

Fish dinner

Fish dinner (Photo credit: The Hungarian Girl)

It was a lovely restaurant, surrounded by terracotta houses that, in turn, surrounded the bay. However, I didn’t finish my meal and never got to grips with the cuisine in the region.

The sea by the campsite was crystal clear. As dusk set, we decided to have a dip. It was a good choice. Water that seemed to come out of a hot spring greeted our feet and we were “bitten by the bug”. Pitching the tent was fun and games. It was a two-man tent, which meant my dad had to sleep in the car.

That was interesting. It was a noisy night. We had a group of teenagers for neighbours and they were four or five in number, shreiking till all hours. More than that, there was an equal number of guys to girls. I’ll leave the rest to your imagination.

croatia 3 067

A little while later, we made a stop in a small Croatian town that struck me for two reasons. Firstly, because of the Croatian architecture. The buildings were made of granite and were quite different to those on the Slovenian side. At least in appearance anyway. This could have been Rovinj.

The second reason was that a woman behind the till in a shop was the only person we encountered who recognized my father’s North American accent. We stopped by the waterfront for a while and had a drink there, the cool stone pavement was a relief.

Street Walking

Street Walking (Photo credit: Let Ideas Compete)

We were sat by the harbour. I don’t recall if it was the one featured at the beginning, but it was lovely.

croatia 2 013

Later on, in the city of Pula, we saw the roman amphitheatre shown above. The amphitheatre is amongst six of the largest surviving, out of 200, amphitheatres from the great empire and was constructed between 27-68 A.D.

It is also unique because no other survivor has four side towers and all three architectural orders, or styles, intact. Please don’t mistake me for an expert. In fact, that is information off the net and we never went inside. But we got a few good shots of it, laugh.

Split was the best! It wasn’t much to look at from afar. Lots of old soviet-style apartment blocks straddle it to the North and South. However, the harbour and old city were gorgeous. This is a typical scene.

We rested here for a night and spent some time around the harbour. It was paradise.There were tenors singing in the Mediterranean warmth. Heaven.

split 039

Dubrovnik, nestled in the hills, afforded us great views…but it was the residents that were fascinating. The parking arrangement was crazy.

croatia 3 216

And so, I’ll leave you there. Bye!

(Credit to Rebecca Cox for the photography)

Related articles