There's a Fort at the end of our street...

The view looking down our street

We're lucky enough at the moment to have two places in Zanzibar: the house with the 1 minute walk to the beach and gorgeous breezes, and an apartment in the heart of town.

For those of you who know where I've place in town with you it might seem obvious. But it was only a couple of weeks ago that I realised:

There's a fort at the end of our street. A FORT!!!

With like, brick walls and turrets and stuff, that's older than all the mzungu stuff in Australia. 

To backtrack, I spent the last few years in the peanut (and navy bean) capital of Australia. The last two years in particular, I had a backyard view of arguably the most iconic structures in the district: the peanut silos. 

At home in Oz with my awesome view of the silos.

At the end of my street were the peanut roasting sheds. When the roast is on, half the town smells like peanut butter. Depends on the wind direction and stuff I suppose. I love peanut butter!! So I was pigs in mud, in love with my awesome spot within sight of the silos and smell of the sheds.

Fast forward 6 months...

So, at the end of our street in Stone Town (Shangani, where the port and hotels and city tour and Persian baths and slave market and cathedrals are) is the Old Fort. It was built on the site of a former Portuguese church and later used to defend against the Portuguese, hold prisoners, that kind of thing, at the end of the 17th century. Nowadays it's a cultural and heritage site, home to festivals and markets and traditional music that floats in through our bedroom windows some evenings. 

As if that wasn't enough, when I look out the windows next to the door to the apartment, I see... Not just the neighbors washing lying on the roof, but, The House of Wonders: the Beit al-Ajaib.

The Beit el-Ajaib

To put this in context, this building has actual cannons out the front of it. Fat lot of use they were, cos in 1896 it was the site of one of the shortest wars in history (38 minutes, apparently: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Zanzibar_War). It was called the House of Wonders in part because it was the first building in Zanzibar to have electricity (I'd make a cheeky comment about electricity in Africa except we've been pretty lucky lately with power and I don't want to jinx it, touch wood). Anyway, it's a special building. A harem used to live there! Then it was a museum. Right now it's the backdrop to scenic roof-laundry pending repairs:

Our neighbours' laundry

From the roof you can see the ocean, the fort, the harem house and Forodhani Gardens simultaneously.

Turn 180 degrees and you'll see the rooftop restaurant of the hotel I booked to stay in 4 months before meeting and deciding to get married to my Mr Aussiebarian, who had a place literally 30 seconds walk from my hotel (we met in Nungwi, before I knew this, though):

And here I thought peanut silos were impressive :) (I still do!! I'll always be a nut who's 'bean' to Kingaroy :) ) but I can't help but think the fort wins :)

Any opinions?

Cathedral, Mosque and I think a mobile phone tower...

Oops! Mitandio fail!

Glossary:

Mzungu: white person. Strictly speaking, you would say "wazungu" for plural, but in our version of kiswa-english it's easier to leave the prefixes alone.

Mitandio: headscarf