by M G Vassanji
I ask the mukhi about his business. It’s slow, he says, but will pick up. He sells plastic goods; periodically he takes them in a truck to sell in Congo. Isn’t that risky? Yes, but we have to do it. He is a small, soft-spoken man with cropped hair, wearing a dark grey Kaunda suit. A man trapped by circumstance, in a geography he doesn’t belong to anymore; time passed, took his lifestyle with it, and here he is. The trade he does has a continuity back to the times of Tippu Tip and Stanley, his truck an extension of the caravans; but what future for his boys?
Before heading home we take a drive to Ujiji. We pass Mwanga first, a village where the highway becomes hectic with shopping and street life, shadows fleeting or standing around among lights dim and occasional. There seem to be no bars here. We drive on at a leisurely pace. To our right is the lake, a dull black space with a chain of glowing lights running through it like a strip of gold. These are the fishing boats. The fish will be sold at markets at the ports, some bound for Congo. But there is banditry on the lake too, Congolese pirates robbing fishermen of their outboard motors.
Ujiji is quieter, the nightlife here is of a subdued sort—men gathered or sitting outside their doorways. The streets are dark, people saving on electricity.
We turn around. As we approach Kigoma on the dark road, a row of closed shopfronts to our right, Shabir tells me, “All these shops were owned by Asians once. Every night they would be sitting outside, relaxing, chatting. It was the perfect life, of having enough, wanting little. A few hundred Khojas, a few hundred others.”
“What happened?” I ask. “Why did they leave?”
The tale goes back to the late 1960s.
Tejpar Lalji, the town’s most prominent businessman and a community elder, Shabir relates, had exceptionally lovely daughters, the eldest just out of her teens. The Regional Commissioner had his eye on her. When Tejpar got wind of this, he sent all his daughters off to Dar. One day Tejpar’s nephew happened to cross the road in front of the RC’s car as it was passing. The RC came out in a fury, told off the young man, and straightaway had him put behind bars. When the young man’s father went to inquire about his son, he too found himself behind bars. Finally, Tejpar Lalji himself paid a visit to the RC, who told him plainly that he wanted to marry his eldest daughter. But my daughters are all in Dar, Tejpar said, which immediately landed him in jail. This sounds like an incident from a spaghetti western. There was at that time no free press to resort to, of course, and always fear of intimidation by some political bigwig, especially in the smaller centres of the nation. Dar es Salaam was always far, and every Regional or District Commissioner was a local sultan. Tejpar Lalji decided to move his entire family to Dar, and thus began the exodus.
What amazes me now is how easily, how readily a complete way of life was picked up and folded away like the props of a travelling show. Now in this pitch-dark Kigoma night as we arrive through the gates in Shabir’s SUV, as I hear the gates clang behind us and a dog bark and watch the two women precede us to the oversize door of the house, cheered by the family’s outing, a gloomy epiphany descends on me. The elegant salwar-kameezes reveal only a longing for elsewhere, where the Laljis have gone. The only place in Kigoma they can wear these bright, beautiful costumes is within the confines of that desolate, gated little khano with its fourteen people that is only a sad reminder of a thriving, hopeful past. Shabir on the other hand completely belongs in the local scene—early tomorrow he heads off by road and lake to the villages for party meetings, and for a few days will brave all the discomforts of rural existence. Meanwhile his wife spends her days at home watching Indian dramas by herself, and at night watches them with her daughter, the two daily discussing the vicissitudes in the lives of Priya or Ram, or some other young Punjabi fantasy creature dreamed up in Bombay, keeping Indian women enthralled from Kigoma to Nairobi to Vancouver. They are a lonely people, with no social life, no friends in town save for that decimated community. The daughter must marry. The frustration and cynicism that the man of the house occasionally throws up fails to convince entirely—I recall the smile on his face as we landed in Kigoma and he jumped out, and I recall how he knows everybody, and they in turn know not only him but remember his father as well. The negativity is contrived perhaps to prepare him to yield to the desires of his family and depart to a future with grandchildren.
14.
The South Coast: A Journey Shortened
EARLY MORNING AT SIX IN DAR, I am waiting anxiously in the front compound of the Serena for Joseph to join me. This is a convenient meeting spot, though all is quiet at this hour, except for the bus traffic slowly picking up outside on Ohio Street. With me is Kumar’s impatient driver. Just about when I’ve given up on Joseph, wondering if it’s worth taking on the journey south—to Lindi and farther—on my own, he arrives in a bajaji, calm as ever, and we head off to the bus terminal. It’s not Ubungo, as on previous journeys out, but Temeke—a muddy patch of ground with only one other bus waiting to depart. Kumar got me the tickets, not well in advance obviously, because our seats are at the very back, and every speed bump and rough patch is sheer torture. The bus, bearing the woman’s name Najma, is old and dark inside, the seats partly torn, and carries a strong body odour. It’s not been washed since arriving last night—we are going to a neglected part of the country, after all. Joseph has a smart phone this time, so our chats are shorter, I have to share time with news arriving from Nairobi. It’s no surprise he’s been so hard to get hold of. Staying close to the coast, we cross a bridge over the mighty Rufiji, which is muddy and swirling, bypass Kilwa, and arrive at Lindi midafternoon.
Our local contact here is Abbas, courtesy of Kumar, and we find him in the cluttered back office of the local petrol station, from where he runs his little empire. He has a spare white beard on the chin, wears a plain bush shirt and trousers, and is ensconced permanently—it appears—in his stuffed chair before a large and ancient wooden desk, dealing with business over the phone as it arises and despatching one of his waiting assistants to take care of it when necessary.
In answer to a query, he tells us cashews are abundant here in the south, the problem is distribution. He gives us the typical Asian story about local inefficiency and waste. During the days of socialism, the government in its wisdom acquired five cashew processing and packaging plants, instead of an experimental one to test the market. The factories could not compete with Indian products and now lie abandoned. He himself runs a water-bottling plant that supplies water to the entire region. He is wealthy, but appears modest and straitened.
His driver gives us a tour of the town. Lindi consists of a lovely beach, behind which is the meagre town centre, and beyond that are the hills. One of the hills is called Mtanda, where the Europeans once lived. Abbas’s son has a beautiful house here, but the area looks rather barren, the vegetation consisting of trees and scrub. We pass through Wireless Hill, where the government offices were moved in anticipation of the sea level eventually rising and washing over the old town. Of the town itself there is not much besides small shops and houses on mostly unpaved streets.
Abbas has made reservations for us at a hotel called Adela. My room is called Mosko (for Moscow), Joseph has Cuba, reflecting an outdated political culture. Abbas also tipped us with the name of a restaurant which makes good biriyani, and that’s where we head for dinner. The streets are dark and quiet, but for the occasional pedestrian and a lamp in a house or shop. The restaurant is run by a Somali woman, and she tells us they have run out of biriyani and pilau, so we have rice and curry instead.
What does one do at night in a town like this? From what I know, there used to be a healthy Asian population here; their activities would have centred around the prayer houses. There was an excellent high school in town, with a cricket team to match. Now the few Asians here spend what time they can in Dae. That is where Abbas is headed tomorrow.
In the middle of the night the power goes out, the room turns black and feels unbearably hot and claustrophobic. The next morning
at seven we take a bus called “Happy” to Mtwara. On the way, after a stretch of mangrove swamp, we arrive at the town of Mikindani, overlooking a beautiful bay. Mikindani is ancient, and it seems a good idea to stop and look around. We go for chai and chapati at a roadside restaurant and make it known to the boy waiter our interest in the local historical sites. He looks nonplussed, says he’ll ask around, but then an elder, neatly dressed in shirt and trousers and a kofia, who’s also having chai, offers to take us around.
(Photo Caption 14.1)
We cross the road—the small Lindi–Mtwara highway—and walk up a short distance to come to an old ruin. It’s extensive, with the remains of several rooms, the broken walls revealing their coral stone, and was a prison once upon a time. There is no information here, but we guess the ruin goes back to German times and must be a little more than a hundred years old.
After passing a modern clinic and a ruling-party office, we come upon a rather large, defunct Khoja Ismaili khano. Across is the Ithnasheri Muslim mosque, which is only occasionally used now, but well kept, and dated the first decade of the twentieth century. Next comes a building under renovation, painted yellow, where—a plaque tells us—David Livingstone stayed in 1860. Johann Krapf had already made a brief stop here in 1850. The Germans came in the 1890s. Opposite the Livingstone house, to one side is the former slave-holding place, according to the guide, and on the other, on a rise, looking out to the bay is the former boma—the German administrative headquarters—now completely renovated and turned into the posh Boma Hotel. We climb up to it from the back, enter a lovely, well-kept garden, go inside from the front door. There is a reception desk here and we are pointed to the poolside, where we order coffee, which is very expensive but excellent, arriving in a French press. There’s no one else around the hotel except for the two waiters and the girl at reception. A lot of money has been spent on the hotel, but who comes here?
Our guide tells us that a number of properties have been bought by foreigners. Part of the beach has become private; and from a notice on the road we have already surmised that a boating club is in its infancy. But there’s no foreign-looking person in sight today. Perhaps they come on weekends. Our guide’s name is Salemani Esmail, and he says he has a farm, and he can always be found at the mosque. He came with his mother from Mozambique.
Mozambique is very much a presence here, as Congo is in Kigoma, Kenya is in Arusha, and the Indian Ocean is in Dar. In Lindi our bajaji driver and the hotel manager were Mozambicans and hardly understandable. All were fluent in Swahili yet there was a hesitancy in their speech that made it hard to comprehend.
A crowded minibus, stopping frequently and with a sick child aboard, brings us to Mtwara at the busy town market. Here we walk around, drink sodas to quench our thirst, and catch a taxi to River Ruvuma, at the Mozambique border.
The drive is over a dirt road and an hour long; the sun is hot, the vegetation mango, coconut, grass. We reach a customs office, where the driver explains his business and then proceeds. We come to the immigration office, where he goes to speak to the officer, a young chubby-faced man in a uniform, reposing on a chair under a tree, who stands up, comes to have a look at us, and says, Proceed; but if you want to see the hippos, see the parks fellow. We proceed.
At the border there’s not much to see. The river is wide, and broken up into segments as it slowly makes its way to the sea. At the docked ferry, a truck has been stuck since yesterday, when it tried to come out. A young European couple in a white Land Rover, looking rather worried, bring out a jump cable. Meanwhile those without a vehicle take a boat and it chugs away. It’s all slow and easygoing.
We return, wave to the immigration officer, still reclined under the tree, and to a security officer, relaxed inside a kiosk. He was not there before. The driver is a Makonde. If the coast up to Lindi appears ethnically Swahili, in Mtwara it is Makonde. The Makonde are Muslims, at least on the Tanzanian side. They are famous for their characteristic and famous wood carvings, depicting caricatured human figures piled atop each other in various postures that supposedly represent relationships. The Makonde were considered backward because of their prominent face markings and the lip buttons on the women. We used to see many Makonde in Dar when I lived on Uhuru Street; they typically worked as night watchmen, and ours was a short, stocky, and gentle man called Sabini. The driver, a thin, somewhat taciturn young man, tells us the face marks were there to frighten people, but we are not convinced. His name is Livowa. It seems to us that he understands English, though he pretends not to, and he opens up only when we start discussing local development.
There’s been considerable resentment directed recently at the offshore drilling in the area that will supposedly bring prosperity to the nation, but of which the locals have yet to see benefits. Harbours run entire nations, Livowa says; we too have a harbour. We have gas, and it’s taken to run factories elsewhere. Where are our factories? Joseph and I are aware that there was a riot in Mtwara some months back, when a court building was set on fire. We ask Livowa about it. Our man indicates that he was very much there in the protests.
Joseph asks Livowa about slavery. He snaps, If the market was at Mikindani, who else but Makonde would be taken away? Then he becomes silent. He is angry.
The stendi (bus stand), where we return, is at the bustling Soko Kuu, the great market—which sells grains, spices, fruits and vegetables, clothes, auto spares, bicycles, cooked food and refreshment. This is a cassava area, besides cashew, and we sit down on boxes and treat ourselves to roasted cassava from a street vendor. A stall nearby sells cans of diet Pepsi, Red Bull, and other sodas, which reflects in some way the recent changes in lifestyle due to the offshore drilling that Livowa railed against. Mtwara is also a college town, and rents are high; there are foreigners about, and female students take to prostitution.
We take an evening bus back to Lindi, and arrive just in time for pilau at the Somalis’.
Our plan is to go west to Songea, turn north towards Iringa and Morogoro, and finally arrive in Dar, having made a full circle. It’s ambitious, but we’re going to try.
We leave Lindi for Masasi, Abbas having informed us that it’s a thriving sort of place, a junction. We depart after a breakfast at the station. One section of the road west has been flooded by rains, we are informed upon departure, but the bus driver says not to worry, he can easily drive over the water. The bus—called Buti la Mzungu—“the white man’s boot”—is painted all over with a Liverpool Football Club theme, including the picture of a prominent player, and is almost empty when we start. But the driver, sitting back, eating his breakfast, casually picks up whoever steps up to the road and waves him down, and soon we are full beyond capacity. Several times, policemen in immaculate white get in, have a look, greet the passengers and let us go. It would appear that the only real work they do is to keep those uniforms clean and pressed. That the bus carries double or more of the number of passengers allowed doesn’t distract them. But there’s no cynical comment or complaint about them from the passengers, they are part of the scene.
We arrive at the place where the road has been washed over. The bus stops, instead of driving over the water as promised, and we are told to get out. We are returned a portion of our fare and told to make our way by foot across the water and find a bus to Masasi. There’s no choice. And so a walk across the shallow lake, barefoot, pants rolled, through muddy water over a rough and uneven surface. I realize as I totter, trying to avoid potholes, that I need help and acquiesce to a young man’s offer to guide me; he even offers to carry me—I firmly decline—and like Gandhi with his hand on a young person’s shoulder I cross some three hundred yards of water. Joseph is in slippers and walks unaided, but allows someone to carry his bag. The young men are in peak mood, and tell us jovially that the water sometimes reaches chest height, and once when the level had completely subsided, a crocodile was found at the side of the road. Tall tale or true, a frightening thought in the middle of the crossing. Our helpers a
re paid, and we find a bus to Masasi and depart.
Masasi is, as promised, a busy, thriving market. It’s a cashew centre, where villagers come from the countryside to sell their produce. The highway is lined with guest houses and restaurants, there are a shopping centre and two banks; bajajis, motorbikes, and buses ply the road. The town is a junction for the Tunduru–Songea (west and north), Lindi–Dar (east and north), and Newala–Mtwara (east) routes. Tunduru–Songea beckons, but it’s long, and part of the way, we are informed, is under a rainfall. The road is rough, and only four-by-four transports get through, which means sitting at the back in the rain; there are breakdowns and we could spend a night in the forest. And so, bidding farewell to the Tunduru road, eastwards to Newala we go.
Newala. Uncanny: it seems to be nowhere, really. A village between two small towns, a square about a mile from the little bus stop on the highway where we were dropped off, with a single street leading away from it. It has many trees. The bajaji driver who brought us to the hotel, which is out of town, was a distracted teenager. On the way he met a girl, arranged to meet her at the shops later, and his day was made, it seemed, because then on he drove erratically, speeding over bumps and potholes, once almost hitting a tree, and it seemed we’d not arrive in one piece. But we did. The hotel (“gesti” for guest house; “hoteli” means restaurant here and other places) is a new houselike structure. For our dinner, the folks made us chicken, which was slaughtered and fried, but it was as tough as though tightly wrapped in polythene. After dinner we sit outside on the veranda with beers, chatting; it’s cool, dark, clear, and absolutely silent. And I wonder, Is there another world really out there? Or could it all be here, and the other one, with all its buzz and bustle, a mere dream? Could one simply abandon that other one and disappear here, in Newala?