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Dar es
Salaam
New
Luxury Hotels: A Sign of Confidence in Tanzania's
Expanded Tourism Sector
Kilimanjaro Kempinski
Hotel: Tanzania tourism is booming and this is
reflected in new hotel investments by well known
luxury brand hotels such as Kempinski, Movenpick
and Sun International. For the first two,
Kempinski and Movenpick, Tanzania represents their
first venture in East Africa. "These major hotel
projects, both on mainland Tanzania and Zanzibar,
demonstrate great confidence in the future of the
country's tourism growth," said Hon. Zakia Hamdani
Meghji, MP, Tanzania's Minister for Natural
Resources and Tourism. According to Peter Mwenguo,
Managing Director, Tanzania Tourist Board (TTB),
"the five- star 180 room Kilimanjaro Kempinski
Hotel opening promises to revive Dar es Salaam as a
major port of call and tourism center. This major
investment in down-town Dar es Salaam will play a
key role in upgrading the surrounding waterfront
area. In addition, the hotel will serve as an
anchor for the development of Tanzania's "Southern
Wildlife Circuit.
Zamani Kempinski
Resort: In Zanzibar, the luxurious 110
rooms and suites Zamani Kempinski Resort
will open July 1. Each room will
feature its own terrace and Indian Ocean view.
The facilities include a swimming pool, health and
beauty spa, restaraunts, bars, banquet rooms and
upscale boutiques.
Kunduchi Beach
Hotel: The new luxury five-star property in Dar
es Salaam, the Kunduchi Beach Hotel and Resort, was
officially opened in March by Tanzania's Vice
President, Dr. Ali M. Shein. The 262- room hotel,
renovated and expanded by its new owners, the
Wellworth Hotels & Resorts Ltd, features a
unique and beautiful blend of Arabic and Tanzanian
architecture. In addition to the usual five-star
amenities of a beach front property - watersports,
swimming pool, restaurants, fitness center, guest
internet access- the Hotel has a full-service
business center and seven conference rooms equipped
with state-of-the-art meeting
facilities.
Mövenpick:
Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts has signed
a management agreement to operate the 251 room
Mövenpick Royal Palm Hotel Dar es Salaam.
Amenities include a fitness centre with sauna, an
outdoor pool, a hair and beauty salon, plus tennis,
squash and golf facilities nearby. The
comprehensive range of conference and banquet
facilities which can cater up to 440 participants
and the lavishly furnished Business Centre provide
business executives with the ideal conditions to
stage successful meetings and events.
A
Couple of Days in Dar es
Salaam
by Henry Pelham
Burn. Photo by Karen Hoffman
 Planning
a trip to Tanzania for September, my travel agent
seemed alarmed that I'd be "stuck" in Dar es Salaam
for two days. She suggested a day trip to Mafia
Island to solve the problem. Since small planes
make me nervous, this idea was a non-starter. So I
resigned myself to Dar, a city mainly depicted to
me as a place to go through rather than to. As it
turned out, a couple of days in Dar proved not long
enough. Here are some of the things that happily
filled my days. When
the thrill of lolling around a pool with your
fellow tourists sipping passion fruit juice wears
thin, KARIOKOO MARKET is the place to go, to mingle
with the wananchi ("citizens")and lose yourself
among the myriad stalls. You may not be tempted to
buy a sack of rice or a dried fish or an old pair
of jeans, but you can sharpen your wits and get
some good dialogue going, particularly if you
muster a little Swahili.
Henry Pelham Burn, New
York based author and bookbinder, on a recent visit
to Tanzania, was surprised to find that Dar es
Salaam, often seen as a place to pass through on
the way to a safari or Zanzibar, is in itself, a
fascinating part of one's visit to Tanzania. These
are some of his Dar es Salaam "finds."
THE NATIONAL MUSEUM
For a complete contrast, the NATIONAL MUSEUM
downtown breathes an air of genteel neglect. You
may be the sole visitor. The fossil discoveries
from Olduvai Gorge are impressively displayed
downstairs. Upstairs, the years of colonialism and
the anti-colonial struggle are presented through a
historically fascinating mishmash of objects,
photos and yellowing documents. A poignant
sculpture tribute to the twelve Tanzanians who died
in the attack on the US Embassy is in the
garden.
NYERERE CULTURAL
CENTRE
Next to the Royal Palm Hotel is the NYUMBA YA SANAA
or Nyerere Cultural Centre. In this tranquil
setting built around an open-air pond you can
browse undisturbed among samples of local arts and
crafts - handmade paper, batik, paintings, jewelry,
even shoes - all for sale, or just sit over a soda
or lunch. I passed up a fishskin suit for the
beautifully blue-dyed skin of a three-foot Nile
Perch ($5) that as a bookbinder I intend to use in
my work.
MWENGE VILLAGE
From the main post office for 15 cents you can
catch a small bus (or dalla-dalla) all the way out
to MWENGE VILLAGE, almost to the University. Or,
for $5, you can take a cab. I must confess to the
cab, mainly because the buses filled up so fast I
could never get a seat. Mwenge Village is the site
of a score or more stalls selling carvings,
jewelry, exotic cloth and trinkets of all kinds at
bargain (as long as you do!) prices. This is where
dealers from Nairobi come to buy. In the very end
stall I found a striking Nyakusa wall-hanging of
tightly woven raffia in a geometric pattern of
contrasting browns, the smell of wood smoke still
clinging to it, ($15). In the shade of some trees
sat a line of wood carvers, chipping, gouging,
filing and sanding. The man I squatted down next to
was of the Makonde tribe from Mozambique, he told
me. The intricate design he was sculpting from a
block of ebony would take him about two months to
finish, he calculated, demonstrating the various
stages.
VILLAGE MUSEUM
Also in the Mwenge
direction, right off the busy New Bagamoyo Road, is
the VILLAGE MUSEUM. The cab driver who dropped me
off agreed to come back in an hour. I wish I'd made
it two. I had to tear myself away from some very
energetic tribal dancing that takes place here most
afternoons and of which I was the sole spectator.
'Museum' is a bit misleading. People came from all
parts of the country to build houses typical of
their tribe in this park setting. With a flashlight
(bring your own, theirs are very weak) and the help
of explanatory labels I wandered in and out of some
ten dwellings (there were many more) noting the
details of daily life and the intricacies of
construction. There was a garden planted with
indigenous crops and, in one corner, artists
painting in the colorful tinga-tinga style had set
up shop. They tutored me in the laid-back Swahili
greeting, "Mambo?" (things), to which the response
is, "Poa!" (cool) This goes over very well. I also
came across a noted potter, Petro Mayige, in his
studio, and couldn't resist a set of the clay
figurines he sculpts using traditional know-how: an
old man trouncing a youth at a game of bao,
$15.
COCO BEACH
The evening of my last day
in Dar I sat on the terrace of a humble restaurant
on COCO BEACH with two Tanzanian friends I'd made.
The beach, on Oyster Bay, had been closed for a
couple of years - they explained - following the
depradations of a killer shark. Now the shark had
been caught and the beach was open and with plates
of changu (a tasty local fish) and chips (French
fries) and bottles of Kilimanjaro and Safari beer
we watched the moon rise over the Indian Ocean. It
was very peaceful. We were the only
diners.
KIGAMBONI
Had I stayed another day
I'd have followed my friends' advice and taken the
five minute ferry-ride from Kivukoni Front (near
the new Japanese-built fish market) across to the
southern peninsula of Kigamboni and explored the
beaches there, so close to Dar yet apparently so
unspoiled, with a couple of small guest houses and
bars to choose from.
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