Dar es Salaam

      From South Africa we took a direct flight to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Upon alighting the plane the thick moist East African air filled our lungs with a tropical warmth. Filing off of a plane into a new country always is a time of nervous excitement, new lands, the unknown is at hand. Police line the immigration ports of the Dar airport uttering commands in Swahili and English, like sheep we wade along, queuing up with worn passports in tow. An officer asks us for our passports and ascertains our citizenship, upon finding out we are American he tells us that the Visa fee is $100 US dollars. Unapologetically, I demanded that we should only have to pay $40 for a short term visa. The officer then retorted that it is just not a good time to be a US citizen... Suffice it to say, we paid the fee. 

      By some good fortune, we met up with a good friend in Dar, completely by accident. He kindly gave us a tour of the city and had dinner with us. 

Our friend, Sospeter at at a cafe in the city.

This was the start of our East African culinary experience. The food is quite good. This was a fish cooked in coconut and spices with some greens and rice. 

We went to the local fish market. A bustling, dirty, and all around crazy place. Fish is brought in all day and this is the place where they fry some of it up for eating.

Some of the local fish. We ate a lot of fish here as it is so plentiful

Fishing boats along the shore

The docks are so full of people throughout the day. Filing on and off of fishing boats, it is a crazy place.

Fishing boats getting ready to make way in the morning.

The coastline is so colorful and alive in Dar. We could just sit and watch the small fishing industry bustle here all day, with intrepid fascination. It is hard to realize that this is really just a normal day in these peoples lives.