Welcome to the Zanzibar blog!
Below you will find blog entries about current issues that are happening in Zanzibar and to Zanzibaris...we want to take you a bit further than the white beaches and turquoise blue waters so that you get an insight into the culture of this beautiful island. Written from locals' and expats' perspectives we hope it will incite your interest in exploring Zanzibar together with Lau and his friends. Enjoy!
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For the budget traveler: Backpacking in Zanzibar with lots of information on budget accommodation
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ZANZIBAR ELECTIONS 2015 - TRAVEL TIPS here:
Safety Guidelines for Travellers During Zanzibar Elections 2015
Soldiers have been patrolling the roads a bit more, unfortunately a side effect of the looming elections. Last elections in 2010 were very peaceful, same is expected for this year. Still, it is good if you take some precautions: don't travel unnecessarily at night time, keep political discussions at minimum and avoid large gatherings. Chances are that you won't notice an election going on if you stick to the beach, hotels and/or touristy areas.
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Prices, prices, prices...and other money issues in Zanzibar
Peak season is in full swing, and with all the guests on this island, there are also lots of discussions going on between guests, hotels, tour guides and taxi drivers...mainly because of prices. There are no fixed prices as such on Zanzibar, although tour operators and hotels tend to advertise their prices publicly for obvious reasons. Some things should be mentioned though, since some guests come to Zanzibar and expect low prices or being able to push prices to a minimum.
Let's start with hotel prices. While Zanzibar should be promoted as a backpacker destination and leave plenty of room for budget accommodations, you will find that it is somewhat difficult to find guesthouses or B&Bs with price tags like those to be found in rest of Africa, Asia or South America. Unfortunately, this is not the case. There are two main reasons that sleeping in Zanzibar comes with a pricey tag: firstly, Zanzibar is an island with limited resources - most things have to be imported which raises the initial costs of setting up a hotel or guesthouse. Secondly, political reasons: the Zanzibar government does not accept the reality of Zanzibar's limitations but instead pushes for big, luxury tourism developments (the first golf course is apparently under construction on this island). To add to that, the government charges a $8 bed night tax or 18% tourism tax, whichever is highest. This means, no matter what the price, a minimum of $8 per person per night is supposed to go to the government just for sleeping alone. And in addition to this, not only does the Zanzibar government wants its taxes, but the Tanzania Revenue authority later swoops in for a 30% profit tax. Do the calculations, add additional operational costs (labour costs, supplies, electricity and water, etc) and you see why it is a challenge to get a real budget deal.
What about tours? Well, this is trickier. In Zanzibar you have two choices - go for an established, registered tour operator and you get professional service, insured cars and quality experience. Many guests decide to go for one of the papasi or beach boys (individual locals selling tours in the streets or on the beach). The latter tend to be cheaper, but it is a bit like playing lottery: some do excellent work and go out of their way to provide a good experience, some just want to rip you off.
Should you go on tours with locals, remember two things: Agree on what is included before the tour (taxi, entry fees, equipment, food, etc) and DO NOT pay an advance. We have heard of many guests who fell for a beach boy who would offer a tour at a cheap price but once on tour guests were expected to continuously pay for things along the way. It helps the guide if you pay something at the beginning of the tour, but it is not necessary to pay anything before - even for food.
When haggling or negotiating with prices, please bear in mind: you don't want to be ripped off, but the guides want to make a living as well! Don't expect them to work for you for free - if you were to share your time with strangers for a day or half a day, you would expect some reward for your time as well, wouldn't you?
Let's look at something like taxis: If you drive from Stone Town to the East Coast, it is about 70 kms. Calculate that the car has to go back as well and that a liter of petrol at the moment is 2,200TZS (about 1 Euro or 1.5USD). Also consider that most cars on Zanzibar are not new, but already older models imported. A taxi driver also has to pay about $15 every month for a license, and driver's licenses have to be renewed every couple of years, etc. Please don't expect the driver to then take you across half the island for only about $20. If you take a taxi from the airport or town to the South East Coast, you should pay a minimum of 60,000 TZS or $40. Anything below is just taking advantage out of the driver. Just take as a guideline to pay 1,000/= for every km. Of course, hotels will charge you premium prices - you can negotiate down a bit, but don't forget that they have chosen their drivers/taxis for a reason, the service and reliability is higher than picking a taxi on the street.
Same applies for tours - most guides don't mean to rip you off. Some bad boys are around, but again, consider the taxi prices and other costs. For example, one of the most popular tours is the Dolphin Tour in Kizimkazi. In addition to the taxi, there is an entry fee of about $4 per person to be able to access the marine national park. There are also charges for the boat - if you agree to get on the sharing boat, it is only about 20,000/= per person, but if you want your own boat, it costs a little extra, probably around 50,000/= to 60,000/= per trip. Of course you can arrange all of this yourself and then pay exactly the prices above, but if you are asking a guide to help you arranging it, don't expect to pay these exact prices - you should reward him, too! If you are based on the South East coast and want to do this Dolphin tour, you should be prepared to pay $50 per person to make sure everyone makes some money along the way. Of course, the bigger the group, the cheaper it will be.
Other tours just are a bit more expensive because of entry fees - Jozani Forest has raised its entry fees now to $10 per person. And that is just for the forest and the monkeys. If you want to visit the turtles and the mangroves, expect to pay extra. The Zanzibar Butterfly centre has raised its prices about 3 times in the last year alone and now charges $7 per person.
When negotiating prices, also consider that the person that you are dealing with is probably supporting a whole family. Every Zanzibari has about four to five family members that are relying on the money that they bring in. Don't let them drag you into giving them a lot of money and you don't want to ruin prices for fellow tourists, but keep in mind that you are also paying guides for their services. Try to go down from the original price by $5 or $10, depending on the tour, but if you don't want to pay more than necessary, do the tour yourself.
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December 2014: NEW BLOG ABOUT ZANZIBAR - Zanzibar Insider Buzz
Written by a local expat and constantly updated. Interesting and informative. You can also visit the facebook group here.
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Taken from the blog of an expat, from August 2013.
Doing business in Zanzibar or doing business with Zanzibaris
For one month last year, Lau took on the management of a guesthouse in Jambiani. The owners were keen on Lau helping out and they were waiting for him to finish a training course in town for three months, and finally, at the beginning of July, he agreed to take on the management of The Guesthouse.
Apart from Lau, Halim was there to help with reception and cooking, and Chidi (gardener/juicer/server/man-for-everything) and Issa (only male housekeeper on the island) as well as Abra (don’t know what his role was) completed the team. Furthermore, artist RH started to set up his workshop and shop, which was cool and convenient.
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| Chidi in the rooftop restaurant |
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| Halim and Issa |
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| Abra |
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| RH in his shop |
Here was the concept: budget and basic on the beach, promoting it to travelers with little money, while at the same time also doing some recycling projects (getting old stuff and rubbish from the beach and the boys and RH would turn into decoration for the place) to promote sustainability and environmental consciousness. We also had the idea of the boys giving something back and later starting lessons with local boys in football, English, beach clean up etc. And it worked well. The website and facebook site got revamped a bit, and the boys pulled in some walk-in guests. We weren’t doing it by the books, and locals have a different way of dodging anything to do with tax – ah well, business is done differently here.
Running The Guesthouse was a good experience as you got to see how the boys can manage a place. It is something that you can see a lot here: the mzungu desperately tries to do things his/her way and getting all frustrated if it doesn’t work. You can get examples of I-don’t-know-how-many-places here but in the end, it was actually better to just let the boys do their thing. It was a bit chaotic, of course, but the thing was – the guests didn’t pay much and they sort of expected the African chaos, not necessarily the perfection that Western managers like to see all the time.
The problem in the background was that the owners were happy to let the boys do the work, but were expecting all the money. As we got guests in, we made good sales – but almost all the profit went straight to the owners without them re-investing any. If they had been around, no salaries would have been paid – at least, this way we could make sure that the boys got each their salary before all the money disappeared somewhere. Because this is one thing that you can see among almost all Zanzibaris: they cannot plan for the future. Money comes in, it gets spent right away. But not necessarily back into the business. In theory, they know that you need to spend money in order to make money, but they forget it as soon as money comes in.
The same problem happened here, and the boys got more and more frustrated. That the owners came back in between without announcement was not a surprise. But the obvious mistrust in the boys was making the boys feel stupid and unappreciated, so as the days went by, they were increasingly unhappy with the owners.
After five weeks of living and working there, the boys had the guesthouse almost full and an evening with lots of outside guests for a BBQ – the place was buzzing and humming, and everyone enjoyed the place. With the exception of the owners who had come back and behaved as if it was their home, not their business (visitors coming and going and guests not knowing who was who, the owner meddling in with the boys). The next morning, the decision was made to leave the guesthouse again – it was just not working out, and as the owners seemed to have come back for good, they seemed to be almost happy of us leaving again: we got it going and they saw how much money could be made, so now they were happy to do it themselves again.
We cleared our stuff and made sure to hand over the finances and bookings/reservations that were still outstanding. It was a shame to leave it again after such a short time, and in between there was some considering to rent the place, but again, trying to do business with Zanzibaris doesn’t work. For example, The Guesthouse could make some money, but only if you go for budget, just because the standard is not high enough. For a monthly rent of $200-300 plus the extra costs and some extra investment, you could possibly make it work. There are two-three similar places around Jambiani – all with a lot of potential. But thing is: Zanzibaris are greedy. They are. Because all the owners are asking a minimum of $1000 per month, which you just cannot get back in. No idea where they get the prices from, but a lot of people here seem to more go by the credo ‘this is how much I want’ instead of ‘this is the value’. Furthermore, the government just doesn't support the idea of budget places and the taxing system makes it very difficult for any budget place to survive. So, for obvious reasons we didn’t pursue the idea.
It would have been nice to just leave it with a clean end. However, there were still outstanding bookings. Two we could move with us without any problems (because they came via Mambo Poa Tours), but we would hand over three (two of which were a full house). We were a bit worried about these bookings, but we did not want to move them. To find room for 14 people is difficult during August, particularly at the rate that was negotiated. The first booking, which was just one night, got cancelled – after that we were worried that the owners would not take the second booking serious (although the communication and confirmation had been done in the name of The Guesthouse and they would have been able to check this online easily). As Mambo Poa Tours was going to do the pick up, we kept on going back to check whether the guesthouse was ready for this, but the day before the group was due to arrive in Jambiani, it seemed that they really did not care about it as they still had guests in the room and in the end we decided to find alternative accommodation – thankfully Garden Bungalows was still able to take them. As the group did not know anything about the whooha, Lau had to explain it all when picking them up. Of course, it does not make a good impression and we were worried a bit, but in the end, they settled at Garden and were quite happy there. In the evening, we also met with the head of the group and explained what had happened. It seemed ok, and at the end of their stay they were happy with the way that everything went. Phew.
Of course, as soon as the group had arrived in Jambiani and settled into Garden, the owner of The Guesthouse had called to say that the rooms were available. And later we saw that the owner of The Guesthouse was sending messages via facebook, apologising 'for the inconvenience caused by the person that was in contact' with them. Unfortunately, it did not stop there as for weeks after our leaving, Lau was told how the owners are accusing him to be a thief (well, easy choice to blame as the owners are not honest with each other - no wonder, money is missing). Thankfully, Lau has a good reputation, and no one believes it.
After this experience, we were still a bit down with how it went, but we kept on reminding ourselves that it was a good experience despite the unhappy ending: we spent the entire month of Ramadan with a group of nice guys that shared the iftari with us every evening, we realised that the boys - particularly Lau and Halim- are able to manage a guesthouse and all boys went away with a good salary, even if it was just for 5-6 weeks.
NOTE FROM MAMBO POA TOURS: This Guesthouse is now under new management - the changes (and managers!) couldn't be any more different, and you should check out the complete transformation (included renovated rooms, new outside area and nice beach bar)here: Blue Reef Fishing Lodge
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Taken from the blog of an expat, from September 2013.
Driving a Vespa in Zanzibar
When my father visited me in Zanzibar, we bought a Vespa together. It was nice for him to explore the island on the Vespa during his holiday and me later on – if it wasn’t for the police…
One day, he came back and told me that the police took his license away. The one that he’s had for 50 years, featuring a picture of him as an 18 year old. Anyways, he was told to go to the police station in Makunduchi to get it back. Knowing my father and his tendency to react allergically to people-who-think-have-all-the-authority-in-the-world-and-act-accordingly, I sent my former student (also taxi driver) with him. Turned out to be a good idea, as my father admitted that he would have done everything wrong. After all, the way the police works here is very different. In the end, my father got his license back against a small fee (was it the fine or some extra cash for the police men? I cannot remember.) Afterwards, we made sure he got a temporary license to be able to drive in Zanzibar (against another fee, of course).
When my father left, I got all the papers in order for my driving: driving license, insurance and registration. I also got two helmets, so by now we were basically set to have and use Lolita as a firm part of our daily life. If it wasn’t for the police…
First it started with police stopping me twice and both times insisting that I was wearing the wrong helmet. They would have probably gone for the “well, it’s going to be a fine so why don’t you give me a bit of money now”, but as I had a Zanzibari license, I got away with pretending of not knowing anything. Well, actually I was unaware that these helmets were no good. When I got stopped the third time and they were about to take the Vespa away from me, a call to a friend was enough to let me go and he organized new, lawful helmets.
One day, Lau and I drove to Paje – I was driving, he the passenger, but he wasn’t wearing a helmet. Police stops us. Both Lau and I did the mistake that we got pissed off with them (yes, I know that he should have worn a helmet!), and in the end they took my license and the Vespa. When I got back to work, I went back to the police stop with another taxi driver and after a bit of talking and some money, I got Vespa and driver’s license back. Lau wasn't happy that I paid them money as he said the police should have let it go through and help us...how exactly that works here, I haven't figured out.
This week, I asked a friend to come and visit me for lunch during work. Half an hour after he left again, I got a text “Police took Lolita”. Argh! This time, the police took the Vespa because he drives without a license (yes, I know that he should have driven with a license!). I was trying to argue with everyone that I could still collect the Vespa from the police – I have the registration to show it is mine, I have a license and I haven’t done anything wrong. The problem is between the police and my friend. But no one sees it like that here. “Why do you let him drive the Vespa without a license?” Well, how am I supposed to stop him? (Not that I’m really trying, he’s a better Vespa driver than I am, despite not having a license) Good to know a lot of people though, and with the help of one of my colleagues, a taxi driver and his father I got the Vespa back (after two nights at the police station) and the fine was dropped. For 20,000 TZS (or 13 USD). As opposed to a $50 fine. The policemen said that we are helping each other...
Reading this, you probably all think that we have no rights to be angry with the police, after all they have always stopped us for valid reasons. Yes, you are right. And you could also argue that the locals should just get a license, as in the end paying those bribes and fines will add up to the cost of a license. Also true. The problem here is though that the locals don’t have the money to get a license (which is about 200,000 TZS, or $130).
Despite the fact that the police always had reason to stop us, there is a lot of other things that bother me about the police. Guests repeatedly come back from trips with a rented Vespa and tell us how often the police tries to get money out of them. “This permit is no good!” – “We got it from the police station!” / “There is a crack in the mirror – that is an offence!” – “Show me the law where it says that” … It gets annoying for guests, and I get angry at the police because they are showing the most obvious behavior which reflects the way of thinking here – white people have money. And they don’t know anything, so let’s just screw them over. What bothers me in particular is around Christmas time – the Muslims always show their pride in their religion and ignore the idea of celebrating Christmas, yet, the police stops you and asks for a small Christmas present. ???? On really bad days, I’m also imagining the most uneducated ones thinking that white people are not Muslims anyways, therefore they are infidels, hence it is not really bad to cheat them. Or it comes from colonial heritage, like in Southern Africa as a knock on effect from the apartheid regime – you whites exploited and stole from us for many years, now it is our turn. It is unfair to think like that, but every now and then you meet a person that seems to be thinking like that.
I’m also a bit bothered by the fact that, despite my hightymighty attitude towards bribe and corruption at the beginning, three times now I have opted to go for the cheaper bribe instead of paying the fine. As of yet, I’m not sure how to deal with this – when in Rome, do as the Romans do, hence it’s fine? Or am I starting to betray some basic principles of mine?
And although I get so annoyed with the police for taking bribes (and thereby not doing their job), I can even understand why they are doing that. Bribery and corruption runs from the very top to the bottom. If the people at the top are not setting a good example (and yes, guess who is driving the most expensive cars in this country? Right, the government), then how are you expecting everyone else to do the same?
Sometimes I argue with my friends here – but they come with the same double standard that applies to many here: although the Qur’an says that you should not spread corruption in the land, they easily joke that Zanzibar is the capital of corruption. Don’t you guys see the hypocrisy?? But then again – I’m the same. I get angry at the police asking for bribes, but I’ve paid them already 35,000 TZS so far in bribes. I think I have to take 35,000 TZS and donate it to a worthy cause to make my conscience feel better...oh hypocrisy, thou art a funny thing.
NOTE FROM MAMBO POA TOURS: We love guests to explore Zanzibar on their own, but unfortunately, when you rent a car or a vespa, the police will hassle you. Not only do you need a valid international driving license, you also need a special permit which can be obtained by local police station and is about $10. And even then the police will stop you and continue to look for 'chai' (tea, or a little something). Make sure that you have everything in order, check with the person you are renting from, and if the police stops you, remain calm and polite. ANOTHER NOTE: PLEASE DO NOT DRIVE VESPA ON THE BEACH! Contrary to information from locals or some tour guide books, it is illegal and carries a fine of 100,000/= TZS. And come on, it is just not good for the environment!
