Zanzibar
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There is one big, fat, jam-packed, teetering curio store in Stone Town where you can find the coolest stuff ever. The owner’s passion is enamel signs, and he has so many amazing ones, many of which he won’t actually sell. This Eveready guy hangs out in our bathroom, watching my CONTINUE >
On Zanzibar there is awesome driftwood from mango trees. The wood is smooth and rounded and has the collest colors. One summer when we lived there I collected a couple of crates of those bits and dragged them back here. I screwed them to a plywood frame and varnished them. CONTINUE >
These tiles are ubiquitous in Stone Town. They normally reclaim them from discarded furniture and then sell them by the piece. I really, really love the crumbly, old paper on the back of the glass, A lot of people use the tiles to make wooden benches and decorate the back CONTINUE >
The first time I saw these, in a teetering curio shop in Stone Town, they spoke to me. These beads are very old, and were used as trade currency. I feel a lot in them because they served as the means for exchange and were therefore carried next to someone’s CONTINUE >
Zanzibar is a fairly quick ferry ride from our house in Dar, but, as it is not truly Tanzania, but maintains a semi autonomous polticial identity, it’s nothing at all like the mainland. Stone town, with is trembling old stone buildings and cobblestone streets is so romantic. When you eat CONTINUE >