Happy Honeymooning Days 5.5 & 6: Thunderstorms

Friday, March 28th, 2025

10:30 AM

Konokono Resort, Michamvi, Zanzibar

The Rock restaurant is an Italian restaurant (as in, Italian-owned) and a bit of a tourist spot. It's extremely instagrammable, which is how I found out about it before we left, and still worth it anyway. The view is spectacular, and it's definitely a very unique and adorable little restaurant. I imagine it will be our most expensive meal in Zanzibar, and it was still a pretty great deal with all things considered.

We walked out onto a beach and had to take our shoes off. Kenny regretted not wearing sandals, and I realized I never told him exactly what this restaurant was or even showed him a photo. He got over it pretty quickly.

Kenny got over the shoes thing pretty quickly.

The view on our walk to the restaurant.

Walking into the restaurant.

Our seating.

View from our bench.

I am going to complain about two things regarding the restaurant, both of which are related to its instagrammability, and then I will let it go forever (this last part might not be true).

Complaint #1: while we sat outside and had a gorgeous view, this meant that the South African women in their 20s/30s decided to take a ton of photos literally right next to me. I did not care for this.

Complaint #2: a trio of Italian people in their 60s facetimed everyone they knew. First, their children. Then, their friends. Then, their accountants (maybe, I don't know, they were facetiming different people the entire time we were there). Every single time, they would pan out to show the other person the view, and every single time, Kenny and I were unwitting participants in their panout.

AND NOW THE COMPLAINTS ARE GONE I will never mention them again (in writing).

Kenny and I each got a drink -- he got something with hibiscus, and I got a drink with Tonyagi (a local liquor from Tanzania) that had actual cardamom seeds in it. We went straight to the main event -- The Rock Special, which was a seafood platter of lobster, king prawns, octopus, and calamari all from their grill (and some fried plantains and vegetables). It was incredible, grilled to the point that the meat in the lobster and prawns just fell out of their shells. For dessert, we had fresh fruit and vanilla ice cream -- fresh vanilla, the tastiest vanilla I'd had in maybe ever.

Tonyagi gin drink with cardamom seeds.

Seafood platter for two.

Fruit and vanilla ice cream for dessert.

"You don't like watermelon?" I asked Kenny after I asked if he was going to have any.

"No."

"Why not? Watermelon is delicious."
"Feels racist."

"But you eat fried chicken."

I don't remember Kenny's response to that. He doesn't either.

I called Haji as we were finishing up to let him know we would be ready soon. He told me he'd be there in 5 minutes, and so we walked out. On the way back to the parking lot, Kenny bought a little statuette, as we are planning to collect some piece of art (statuettes, masks, tapestries, paintings, etc) from wherever we travel. Kenny has always wanted a "study," and I kinda like the idea too, so it would likely all go in there. We already have a statuette of a Muay Thai fighter from when I went to Thailand last year that I bought for Kenny, so this would fit right in.

In the parking lot, Kenny and I were met with some very friendly local workers who told us to join them for a bit while we waited for Haji. They all knew Haji -- everyone knows Haji -- and spoke with us a bit. Once again, they asked Kenny where he was from. Kenny is loving this attention, as a Black man from the US who is being talked to just a touch differently than all the other tourists here. I am loving being able to try out the little Swahili I've learned, which is always fun.

Haji returned, clearly having hung out with some friends, and clearly hoping to return to them pretty quickly. I get it. It was about 8 PM at this point.

We got back to our room and tried to play a very confusing board game called Fog of Love, which is a role playing game about two people falling in love. We are creating a story together, but at some point, Kenny got very tired and said he had to go to bed.

We are going to try again today, because it's thunderstorming all day, and our plans were to go to Kuza Cave, and going to a cave pool in this rain would be silly. This is likely our first very lazy day of our honeymoon.

Friday, March 28th, 2025

7:04 PM

Konokono Resort, Michamvi, Zanzibar

We did indeed have a lazy day, hanging out by the pool, then the beach, then back at the pool. It was a beautiful afternoon after the morning rains, and it left some time for some nice reflection and relaxation.

Reflection -- like remembering that the languages available on the Ethiopian Airlines TVs were English, Arabic, French, Spanish, Amharic (the national language of Ethiopia), and Mandarin, but not Italian, which is hilarious when you consider that the Italians were gifted Abyssinia (modern-day Ethiopia) when the European powers met to split up Africa for their own interests back in the second half of the 19th century. Italians could not conquer Ethiopia, however, and Ethiopia was one of two African countries going into the 20th century that was not a colony of another power (the other being Liberia, a nation created by Americans who for some reason felt they held the moral high ground when it came to this continent). (Look up Emperor Menelik II and the Battle of Atwa if you're curious how Ethiopia defeated Italy in 1896. That dude is one of the all-time great political leaders. We don't hear about him as much because -- well, you know why.)

Reflection -- like the Spanish-speaking couple that got into a loud argument for maybe 30 minutes by the pool after blasting dance music from their portable speaker all afternoon (this woman, at breakfast yesterday, tried to ask for a whites only omelette, which is lowkey hilarious). Kenny and I mostly avoided it by going to the beach for about an hour.

Reflection -- like how excited I got when one of the Maasai tribe security guard fist bumped me after we said jambo to each other while I was walking to breakfast.

Reflection -- like explaining to Kenny some of the different aspects of the romcom board game we played. Why would "nerdy glasses" be an attractive trait on a man? I googled "Idris Elba glasses" and showed him the photos.

"Oh, you just want Stringer Bell."

"Yes. Look at him. Yes."

We swam in the ocean, which Kenny said was cold, but he was wrong. He left when we saw a jellyfish. He showed me later that the jellyfish was very venemous.

"That means you don't approach it," I replied. "Just leave it alone and you're okay."

"No, that's poisonous."

"Oh. Well, it was swimming the other way, and it doesn't have a brain. We were fine."

We went back to the pool, relaxed some more, and booked a honeymoon meal to eat on the beach. Which we will be getting shortly. And then another attempt, of course, at the romcom board game, because I think I figured it out!