After dinner, we went next-door to a bustling local bar and shared a very yellow, very sweet fanta (which we’ve recently discovered to be passion-fruit fanta!) and there, we made the acquaintance of our waiter – named, oddly enough, German, a mid-20s Kenyan, working as a waiter in Bagamoyo. We spent the evening chatting of this and that, and by the end of the evening, had been invited by German to visit his girlfriend Asma and their 3-year old son Hamisi in a little village about 10 minutes’ walk (20 minutes if you’re walking at the local Bagamoyo pace) from Bagamoyo city centre.

We accepted. The next morning, before meeting with German, who was to take us to Asma’s house, we decided to have breakfast at a local place, close to the New Market. And this turned out to be a great decision! Since arriving in Tanzania, we’d been avidly searching for ‘local food’ that we’d heard and read about. For instance, ‘uji’, a white, fluid maize soup to which sugar is added (for our Indian audience, this is much like a maize kheer), chai and chapati. Or, something we’re still looking to try, a fish or bean soup. All of these treats we found in a little one-room shack, maybe 4 ½ meters long and 2 ½ meters across, open to the street all along its front. Tin-roofed, the small pavement in front of the tea shop was taken up by small coal-burning stoves, over which pots and pans bubbled and sizzled merrily. Inside the shack, blue tiled walls and a grey concrete floor enclosed two rows of long, wooden tables, each flanked by two low wood benches, the table and benches running the depth of the shack. Here we each found room on a bench and ordered chai, uji and chapati. (For the record, the African way of making chapati involves a lot more frying in oil than the Indian. And of course, it tastes correspondingly yummier!) All together, our breakfast came to 900 Tanzanian shilling (approximately 0.80 USD). The company came gratis! Opposite us, three Masaai warriors in traditional clothes were involved in their morning fish soups. Not just the clothes, but their physiognomy clearly distinguishes Masaai from the other locals – much taller than the average African (most Masaai are 6 feet tall!), with a long face, high cheekbones, a prominent forehead. Often clad in the traditional, loose, red or purple cotton clothes, they wear large pieces of bead jewelry around their arms, ankles and throat. Other than our Masaai co-breakfasters, we shared the space with two teenagers with black baseball caps, two older men with round, white Islamic caps and two workers on their way to the fields or factory. All in all a gastronomic and scenic delight!

After our exotic breakfast, we met German and strolled to Asma’s place. Having visited, lunched deliciously on more ugali and samaki, chatted with Asma’s family as much as we could in their limited English and our more than limited Swahili, we somehow ended up invited to stay with the family for the rest of our time in Bagamoyo! And then followed five FUN days of staying with Asma’s family (consisting of her father – a judge or some other high administrative official in Bagamoyo politics, an extremely kind and hospitable mother, two of her three brothers (the oldest brother being away from home, working as a manager in a hotel in Dar), little sister Dera and the little baby (who took an instant dislike to us, crying within minutes every time he saw us and could not be won over, despite much playing hide and seek, crooning, whistling, and making faces, actions that have usually won us the undying affection and favour of little children across the globe). We’d wake up in the morning, breakfast at Asma’s (despite begging the mother, in our very best Swahili, to not specially prepare breakfast for us in a houseful of people fasting for Ramadan!), and then go out with German to “checki” the town, “checki” his rafiki (friends) and generally walk around. Just walking around could be kind of magic and a real excitement for two non-Africans, too. Especially when we headed for dinner which was always at the little one-room hut of German’s brother Juma, a fisherman, eating (out of a common plate, and after saying Bismillah) ugali, or cassava, or coconut rice along with fresh fish from his catch, all deliciously prepared by his wife, Mama Bakari. On our way to Juma’s house the last beams of sunlight lit the scenery in the warm, yellow light of the evening sun which faded into the gentle greyness of dusk. We walked through settlements of traditional clay huts with surrounding banana and papaya trees and a calm atmosphere of people having got home after a long day’s work. In particular Muslims could look forward to their first sweet, hot chai since the early morning hours and their first meal of the day – because it was still Ramadan. And the air was filled with a dense smell of charcoal, a unique, slightly wooden odour that carries a certain cosiness. And this smell fit so well into the calm, silent, vespertine mood through which we glided like through a dream.

The abundant and always extremely tasty dinner was followed by hours of chatting with Juma and German, getting a completely new perspective on Tanzanian politics (what the socialist policies of Nyerere and Kikwete mean on the real practicality of prices!), culture (how a boy must write a letter enclosing Tsh 10,000 (approx. 8 USD) to the father of the girl he wants to marry and how the subsequent bride price is negotiated) and increasing our practically non-existent Swahili by nearly fourfold. And sometimes with Richa (whom we know to be a good little Indian girl), learning to cook coconut rice and helping Mama Bakari wash the dishes. Mama Bakari and Juma remain, I think, the highlights of our time in Bagamoyo. A kinder, simpler, more down-to-earth, welcoming, generous, hospitable couple it would be difficult to find.