Mohammed is walking so fast in front of me I have a hard time concentrating on anything but keeping track of his black polo shirt and shiny hair. “It’s the wrong time of the day to come,” I think to myself. The sun is relentless. There is so much sand in the air it’s hurting …
The living room’s bright blue concrete walls glow under the fluorescent light. The air is full of cigarette smoke and the smell of coffee beans roasting. It’s Ramadan, Islam’s holy month. The old color TV transmits hypnotic praying live from Mecca. I’m in Harar, a historic Muslim town in Ethiopia, about 130 miles from the …
“Chilling in Zanzibar” was a phrase I used already years ago, dreaming about the place with a friend, who lived in Uganda at the time and was planning a trip there. Looking back, I didn’t know much about the island and I’m not sure what I imagined Zanzibar would be like and why I associated …