Zanzibar: Between Mecca and a Hard Place

On the occasional evening when the absence of both a breeze and electricity brought me to wonder if I was residing in a kiln, sanctuary existed under one of the bread fruit trees at Migombani, the only prostitute-free local bar in my quarter of Stone Town, Zanzibar. And when you’re a broad-shouldered American, in a region where size is roughly equivalent to wealth, you tend to get plenty of smiling faces approaching your table in the shade. Perhaps stemming from the island’s legacy of trade, perhaps because they posses nothing else to peddle, one becomes accustomed to the fact that […]