Easter week in Zanzibar

The status of Easter week isn’t entirely clear in Zanzibar.  For Muslims, it does have some official religious standing, but it’s not seen as a holiday that’s particularly important.  But there are tourists who come to Zanzibar from around the world as a beach getaway, so there are increasingly Easter-oriented events here.

The Citizen, an English newspaper from Dar es Salaam, ran a big spread today on the topic of Easter.  It included quotes from high school students about their understanding of the holiday, such as the following:

“I know nothing about Easter, though I take it as a relaxing day since schools are closed for a short spell. I think it is important for Christians to celebrate it wholeheartedly without creating nuisance to others.  Parents should also keep a watchful eye on their children since many of them like to visit places which are not approved by society.”

Easter--a time to relax, but a time for children to get into trouble!

This Easter weekend, we’ve indeed found ourselves with a good bit of time on our hands.  The boys had Good Friday off, and then they’ve got the next two weeks off as vacation between terms at their school, but Brady and I will be teaching those weeks so we can’t go anywhere very far.  So we were very happy to check out the special "Easter" Weekend doings at the Zanzibar Beach Resort, which featured the following activities:

the traditional Easter Michael Jackson Thriller homage

the traditional Easter fire-eating ceremony

the traditional Easter roller board feats

overlap with a big reunion of Ismaili Muslims (Muslims of Indian heritage)

and, the traditional Easter tourist-pleasing conga line

Whether "approved by society" or not, this postmodern celebration was, in its own way, quite appropriate to Zanzibar, a place where people from a variety of cultures have met together for many years to try (and sometimes fail) to meet eye to eye.

Easter Sunday morning, the boys were sad that the Easter Bunny and his easily melted chocolate eggs hadn’t managed to make it through the heat to Zanzibar, but they gradually noticed that there were, in fact, Tanzanian coins tucked into various nooks in the room in the sorts of places the Easter Bunny usually frequents.

They also found some funny little "adroit beans," kind of like Weeble Wobbles, for those of you who are old enough to remember those toys.

For breakfast, Brady managed to find the elusive “snail” rolls—far and away the best breakfast food available here, but very rare.

After breakfast, we celebrated Easter at the cathedral.