My Coin Buying Adventures While In Tanzania

This past summer I took a 2.5 week trip to Tanzania, East Africa, with my family. My older sister just graduated, and I will (hopefully ) be doing the same this June. Hence it was our last summer that we were sure we would be together as a whole family. It was decided that a life experience was in order. On July 12 we flew from Calgary-London Heathrow (8hr flight). We then proceeded to wait in Heathrow for 7 hours, before boarding a flight to Nairobi, Kenya (9 hrs). After a short layover in Nairobi we flew to Arusha, one of the largest cities in Tanzania. All in all we spent almost 30 hours in transit and flew through 9 timezones. Being a typical teenage boy, I decided to "tough it out" and attempt to not sleep for the duration of our travel time. I spent over two full days (about 50 hours) not sleeping. At the time I didn't really notice it but at about 7PM Arusha time it hit and I simply collapsed on the bed still fully dressed. By the next morning I had completely recovered, (maybe some of the older, smarter members will remember being this youthful, adaptable, and perhaps somewhat mental.) and we made a visit to an orphanage which was an experience I will never forget. It was so touching to see kids as young as 4 being so carefree and simply being kids. Money and material objects did not matter to them. I did not hesitate to join in their games and, as one of the other tour members had brought a mini American Football to give, we had a lot of fun playing catch and showing them some of the basic rules of the game. The next 10 days were spent on safari and simply enjoying what little African sun we saw (Tanzania is in the southern hemisphere, so they have Winter when us Northerners have Summer. I apologize to anyone else living in the Southern hemisphere, I do not mean to disclude you when I say "us".) But I digress, this forum is for coins and so I will skip to the coin part.

Near the end of our journey, we went to Zanzibar, which is a small tropical island off the Tanzanian coast. Here we finally experienced some African sunshine, with temperatures reaching over 35 degrees celsius. Our lodging was a short distance away from Zanzibar's largest city, Stone Town. I took every chance I could to head to stone town and look through antique stores, markets, and boutiques. There was no shortage of street-merchants who would follow you through the streets offering anything from CD's to t-shirts to faux sunglasses. I had many memorable experiences with such people, bargaining for trinkets and trading hats (my father had brought a stock of fresh, unused ballcaps with the logos of now defunct oil companies, which had clearly never had a chance to be handed out. We had been told that a hat is a hot commodity in Africa, and I had a lot of fun handing them out. Another way shopkeepers make money is to hire young men (usually students around my age) to bring tourists to their shops. These so-called "guides" receive a portion of the shops daily take. However, you can also find such a person and ask them to take you to a specialty shop, for example a store which sells coins. In exchange, you are usually requested to make a "donation" to the mans cause- which I was all too happy to do since he did a great job in showing me various coin stores. When approached by a youth who asked me if I needed a guide, I replied I would like to see some stores, which sold coins. (As a sidenote, Tanzania used to be a part of German East Africa, which struck many interesting silver and copper coins until the WWI began in 1914, and Germany was eventually pushed out of the area by the British. Interesting enough, many battles were fought between the Germans and the British here during that war. I will elaborate on the German coinage of the era at a later time.) The man replied he would be glad to show me such stores, so I set off following him through narrow alleys and bustling streets. In retrospect, it probably wasn't the safest thing to do. I was the only white person for miles, and I was only 17 years old, following blindly a man who I had just met, and having more money in my pocket (About $30.00 US, or 30,000 Tanzanian Shillings) than he would probably make in a week. At the time, the thrill-factor of such an adventure was enough to justify it in my mind. As we wound our way through the inner-city streets I was beckoned to come into stores and followed by street sellers, who however still kept their distance as my guide had the authoruty (and the command of Swahili, Tanzania's main language) to tell them to shove off. In the end, everything turned out fine, and I was very pleased with my coin-buying results, picking up a number of nice pieces (which I will post pics of later on) for good prices. However, I think the adventure in itself was worth far more than any of the coins I could have bought. I paid my guide 2000 Tanzanian Shillings (more than he would make in several days from his store-take cut.) In all my time in Stone Town I never felt threatened or pressured, and the kindness of the people there is something I will never forget. Our trip back to Calgary was a repeat of our 30 hours to Africa, only this time, I took the chance to sleep and was much better off. It was most certainly the experience of a lifetime, and I will post a few of my favourite photos and some of my coins as well if members would like to see them. Once I have some replies I will elaborate on Tanzanian coinage and the particular coins I purchased.

Regards,

Andrew