Don’t Give Up

Just after we finished breakfast, the skies open, and the rain came pouring down. Juma, our driver, showed up just before 9am, and he was all smiles, even though he’d had to walk a few block in the rain to our hotel. Stonetown’s interior streets are too narrow for cars; it’s all foot traffic. But Juma had a very close parking space—just about as close as any car could get.

We wanted to check on our bags, but alas, the phone at the hotel would not call out, Juma, though, allowed us to use his cell phone to call the airport to inquire about our bags.

The best we could understand, with me having troubles over a thick accent and only limited English, was that the bags indeed arrived Saturday night. At first, we thought they said they’d bring the bags at 8am, but that was in Swahili time—eight hours after sunrise, which translated to about 3pm. Well, that’d never do as we were on our way to Chumbe Island. But I got on the phone and asked the man if we could come get the bags at the airport. He said, excitedly, “Ah, you come here?”

“Yes,” I replied, “We come there.”

“You come here now?”

“Yes, we are on our way.”

At least, that’s what I hoped the conversation was. Frankly, I wasn't completely certain, but we decided the short detour to the airport was worth a try.


Juma took us to the airport, which wasn’t too far from the turn-off for the Mbweni Ruins Hotel, where we were to catch the boat to Chumbe Island. When we got to the airport, we went to the transit office, peered in the window, but we did not see our bags in the cage. Sigh.

But I wasn’t ready to give up. We found another man, having been directed to the customs office when we asked. He had to go find someone else, and while he did, Mimi wondered off to look around the corner.

The man from the customs office returned with the designated official who unlocked a door, and I almost turned and gave him a great big hug: our luggage! (Of course, though, I did not actually hug him; he didn’t have the “hug me” look on his face.) The bags were among a pile of about twenty or thirty other pieces. But still, we couldn’t get the bags. We had to wait for the other customs officer to come, assure they were our bags, and then we were allowed to leave with our bags in tow.

And so, back with Juma, we headed off for the Mbweni Ruins Hotel to begin our journey to Chumbe Island.