happy holidays from zanzibar!

We're in Zanzibar for our first official vacation! We spent the first 7 nights on the beach in a town called Paje, and it was lovely: nowhere to go, nothing to buy, simple bungalows on the beach, good Japanese food at our Japanese-owned hotel (we found the 1 tiny local cafe, too, because we were missing our usual beans and rice!), almost empty beaches with powdery white sand, more seashells than I've ever seen on a beach in my life, and, of course, swimming every day in the Indian Ocean. Really, really nice. Yesterday we left the serenity of the beach for the chaos of Stone Town, which is the main tourist town on the island. We're staying in absolute luxury: our hotel has air conditioning, cable tv, fluffy towels, and a bathtub! Yep, we're living large before we head back to the realities of our town. Speaking Kiswahili here is a secret weapon, because NO ONE expects that we can; thousands of tourists come here for vacation(for the beauty of the ocean, the great shopping, and the famous doors of Zanzibar), and almost no one can speak the local language, but we can, and people stop in their tracks! I have to admit that it feels really good to have this ability, and it definitely helps when it comes to bargaining for all the treasures I'm dragging home. So we're tanned and relaxed and had a nice time for our first Christmas in Tanzania.

Funny glimpse of Peace Corps Volunteers on vacation: our hotel in Paje had clotheslines on the porches for people to dry their beach towels and bathing suits. In very typical Peace Corps style, we all washed our clothes--all of them--in our rooms, and dried them on the clotheslines instead of our bathing suits. You can spot a Peace Corps Volunteer from a mile away because you'll spot the jeans and socks drying on any available surface.

So tomorrow is New Year's Eve. My plans for the last day of 2007 include receiving a massage (my first in almost 7 months!!), eating Indian food, shopping a little, then putting on a new dress and listening to a dj on a rooftop bar overlooking the ocean while the New Year comes around. I am wishing you all health, happiness, contentment and gratitude for 2008.