Auggie and the rest of our snorkeling crew!

Fleeting Encounters

"Oh, there are so many lives.  How we wish we could live them concurrently instead of one by one by one.  We could select the best pieces of each, stringing them together like a strand of pearls.  But that's not how it works.  A human life is a beautiful mess."

                                      Gabrielle Zevin

I have been absolutely blown away by the awesome people I’ve met while traveling.  Each and everyone of them has been so cool, whether they’ve been following their dream, saving the world, making a return trip to a beautiful place, or all of the other reasons for their appearance in the same place as me I’ve met some truly incredible people.

Ken and Alex lounging on the beach.

Ana Maria: I met on the plane here.  She works for the UN in the Sudan and was on her way back after spending some time in New York.  Originally from Mozambique she’s lived and travelled all over the world, speaks five languages, has a daughter my age who she just advised to take a semester off to find herself (so cool), and believes in peace for the Sudan she’s just not sure she’ll see it in her life time.  When she found out that I was a volunteer she told me about really cool volunteer opportunities through the UN and gave me her phone number and email address and told me that if I ever found myself in Mozambique I must contact her so that she can set it up for me to stay with her family.

Kenn: I met in Zanzibar on my second visit there.  He’s from Denmark and is currently traveling the world researching soccer training regiments because he’s really interested in youth soccer and one day hopes to right a book and open a training school in Dar es Salaam for individuals who want to work on both their futbol skills and also continue their education.  Kenn’s in his mid 40’s and he left a computer tech job in Denmark where he made a ton of money to follow his dream of opening this school.  

Stephen and I in the pilot and co-pilot seats!!!!

Alex: I met in Zanzibar on my second visit there.  She is originally from Barcelona Spain and recently moved to Zanzibar to manage the hotel that I was staying in.  Only 22 she said that she and her three best friends decided that they all wanted to do something different so they all spread out.  One is in New York City, one is in Belgium Germany, one stayed in Barcelona, and she made her way to Zanzibar.  (Kinda reminds me of four other best friends...).  She said she wasn’t totally sure if this was where she wanted to end up, but for now she was loving her time in Zanzibar, she had a good job, and she got to wake up on a beautiful island everyday...life can’t get much better than that.

Stephen: Our pilot from Dar to Zanzibar.  Since the plane we took only had six seats I got to sit in the co-pilot seat and Stephen taught me everything there is to know about flying planes (or at least what all the controls meant).  Originally from Tanzania, but he lived in the states for over 10 years spending most of his time in Maryland where he went to college.  He said he moved back because flying between Dar and Zanzibar meant he would get to fly smaller planes which are more fun to fly than the big jet liners.    He was so nice and gave us his phone number saying that any time we need a pilot to just call him. 

Auggie: I met on the first trip to Zanzibar.  He was one of the divers on the snorkeling trip.  Originally from Argentina, he followed his wife, who is volunteering, to Zanzibar and has been spending his time getting his master diving certification.  So funny, he and the other master diver who was local kept all of us laughing even when Kit and I got slightly seasick.

Alex: I met on the second trip to Zanzibar.  Alex had been to Tanzania a few years ago, teaching English in Dar for seven months and enjoyed the country so much that he decided to holiday here for two weeks.  Originally from England, he had a fantastic accent, was incredibly sarcastic, and really knew his way around so it was really fun to hang out with him for a few days.  However, he did make all of us feel really bad about our lack of swahili skill with his superior ability to communicate with the locals.

Woman from Snorkeling:  I really wish I could remember her name but she’s originally from Greece and said she ended up in Zanzibar because she was bored at home and was looking for a change and that the moment life in Zanzibar stopped being fun she’d make another change...how cool is that!

Even if I never see a single one of these people again it’s really cool to think that our paths have crossed and that sometime in the distant future we might have a fleeting thought about one another again.  Regardless of how brief the encounter there is always the possibility that the connection will have a lasting impact...amazing.