travel
WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE Hungry hippos and manly Maasai on Tanzanian safari BY NED KELLY, PHOTOS BY NOEMI CASSANELLI
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lying down the east coast of Africa, awe is inspired before airplane wheels have even touched tarmac. First, the brown rugged highlands of Ethiopia and the Rift Valley from which all humans emerged gives way to Hemingway’s Green Hills. As you pass into Tanzania, the snowcapped majesty of Kilimanjaro appears – the highest peak in Africa and the largest freestanding mountain in the world. A few minutes later and, off the coast, the blindingly white beaches of Zanzibar loom into view. A trading post since at least the 1st Century AD – producing cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon and black pepper – the island holds a couple of quirky claims to fame. As well as being the birthplace of Farrokh Bulsara, or Freddy Mercury as he would become famous as the flamboyant frontman of Queen, it was also the scene of the shortest war in history. In 1856 the Sultanate of Zanzibar had become a protectorate of the United Kingdom. The death of the pro-British Sultan on August 25, 1896 had seen the succession of Sultan Khalid bin Barghash, who
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was somewhat his own man. The British authorities preferred having a puppet in power, and sent an ultimatum to Khalid demanding that he stand down. Khalid called up his guard and barricaded himself inside his harem. Two days later, on August 27, and the British had gathered three cruisers, two gunboats, 150 marines and sailors and 900 Zanzibaris in the harbor area (the Brits really didn’t mess about when it came to their empire back in those days). The ultimatum expired at 9am, and at 9.02am a bombardment began, setting the harem on fire and disabling the defending artillery. The flag at the harem was shot down and fire ceased at 9.40am. The conflict had lasted just 38 minutes. Finally we touch down in Dar es Salaam. Meaning ‘Haven of Peace’ in Arabic, the Tanzanian capital is the most populous city in eastern Africa. Founded by Sultan Majid bin Said of Zanzibar in the 1860s, it became the administrative and commercial centre first of German East Africa, and then of Tanganyika when it was captured by the British during World War I, which saw a large influx of South Asians.