Zanzibar

It's not quite Venice, but still best approached by boat. Even before I knew anything of the place, its name alone piqued my curiosity. Plus, if the Sultan of Oman was willing to move his capital thousands of miles to live there, you know it has to be good....

Zanzibar is a small island off the coast of Tanzania, about two hours by ferry from the port of Dar Es Salaam. Though it's now part of Tanzania, it has a history all its own. Trading sandstorms for monsoons, the Sultanate of Oman ventured all the way down from the Arabian peninsula to colonize the island in the 18th Century. From then on it served as a hub for the African slave trade, funneling captives from the mainland to the middle east and beyond.

I first landed in Stone Town, a historic city with the kind of narrow, winding pedestrian streets one expects to find in medieval Europe. It's a fascinating melting pot of Arabian architecture, Indian cuisine, and (who would have thought) African inhabitants. Perhaps like New Orleans, it's a place where foreigners become acutely aware that they'll never fully understand its mysteries and complexities without being born there.

After a few days of culture, it was high time for the beach. I think the pictures say it all:

Kilimanjaro

Snow on the equator....what will they think of next?

Here's Kilimanjaro (or 'Kili' as they say) in a nutshell:

Day 1: Rainforest


Day 2: Steppe


Day 3: Desert


Day 4: Glacier


The Swahili phrase 'poli-poli' (slowly slowly) is applied to nearly every facet of life in Tanzania, usually to the chagrin of overly-eager tourists. But on Kilimanjaro even the most type-A westerner must learn to breathe a bit. Yes, literally. Increased altitude = less oxygen. Though I started my ascent with a brisk stride, my final steps were baby steps indeed!

Night three was spent at the foot of the glacier at 15000 feet. Bedtime was 4PM, though no one could sleep because of the altitude. At midnight, everyone got up to begin the final ascent. Fortunately it was a clear night, though flashes of lightning from clouds below illuminated our shadows on sheets of rock. I felt dizzy for the first two hours, but my heartrate doubled after taking my second dymox. It was extremely easy to become demoralized when gazing at the behemoth ahead of you. Eventually I kept my head down, taking one step, then the next, until reaching the Uhuru Peak, over 19000ft above sea level.

Altitude sickness pills, aspirin, and my iPod certainly boosted me along the way, though I don't think I would've made it without my prime source of inspiration: a team of 30 Iranian paraplegics that accompanied me every step of the way. They all lost their legs in the Iran-Iraq War of 1979, a conflict fueled by loads of U.S. military aid to Iraq. Contrary to all the negative press Iran gets in the West, I have never met a nicer group of people. They wanted to share everything they had, and would've given the shirts off their backs if asked. I had never thought about visiting Iran before, but now I'm dying to go.


I should also mention that you're reading the blog of a soon-to-be C-rate Iranian celebrity. On the way down, I was interviewed by an Iranian journalist documenting the climb. The tape should be airing on Persian International Television (Jamjam) at some point in May. Stay tuned.....

Masai Mara

Indeed terror is in all cases whatsoever, either more openly or latently, the ruling principle of the sublime. -Edmund Burke

Okay, so I'm not a huge fan of Burke, but his essay on the sublime made a lot of sense after my trip to Masai Mara, the vast game park in western Kenya. His main point is pretty basic: things that scare us also have the potential to transport us into some sort of rapturous ecstasy- the "sublime," I guess.

From this perspective, Masai Mara was certainly beautiful, but not necessary sublime. From dawn till dusk, eight of us toured the plains of the Serengeti in a safari van, getting up close and personal with dozens of our favorite zoo animals (lions, elephants, and cheetahs, to name a few). Yet even the lions lethargically slinked along completely indifferent to the vans that continuously cut off their paths. I wanted to fear the lion, to feel like my life could be taken at any moment by these meat hungry felines. I wanted the lion to fear me. But alas, they had grown all too accustomed to photo-snapping Europeans in funny looking beige hats. They knew better than to attack.

On the third day, I had the opportunity to visit a Masai village on the outskirts of the park. Each hut is made of hardened cow dung. The women provide all the manpower; the men serve the indispensable function of supervising the women (sorry guys, I don't think

becoming Masai is quite as easy as, say, converting to Presbyterianism or joining the vegans). They're on the Atkins diet and they don't even know it- milk and beef are their main staples. More than anything, I was impressed with the beauty and style of their traditional clothing. Tres chic. Look out, Versace- Masai couture will be huge!