Happy Birthday, Daddy (Duck Brown)!

It's my father's birthday, but there's limited access to the Internet and no long distance phones for public use, so I send him a telepathic message. Did it get there, Dad? We meet Baba J. at 9am and are led to a medium-sized dhow manned by Hasan and Jamal, two slim 23-year-olds. I hear a female voice and turn to see a beautiful smile and know immediately she's American. It's Anita, our boatmate for the day. Anita lives in Washington, D.C., but she's taking a vacation from work during her school break and she'll travel around East Africa for two months. Lamu is her first stop. After this, she's going to Arusha and will climb Kilimanjaro! We'll stay in touch so she can let us know how the rest of her trip goes. Anita is energetic and funny and extremely warm. Her family is originally from India, though her father now lives in Cairo and her mother lives in Philadelphia. We have quite a great time talking as Hasan and Jamal periodically tell us to move to the opposite side of the boat. We climb under the sail or over the sail, avoiding aged ropes and swinging boards. As Anita talks about her travels, I tell her about the woman who rode her bicycle from Ireland to India. "Dervla Murphy," Anita yells before I can complete the sentence. "Yes," I laugh, pleased she knows the author. "My father would marry Dervla Murphy if he knew where to find her. He's read all her books," Anita says. "She must be 73-years-old now," I say, "if she's still living." "Oh, I think she's still living," Anita says. We're both thrilled to have Dervla in common. Anita has read several of her books. I carefully climb over the boat boards to pull the book out of my bag. Anita yells with delight at seeing the book in the boat. She says most of Dervla's books are out of print and hard to find. I tuck the book back into the bag to keep it safe from sand and moisture. I've been reading it slowly, and re-reading some sections, not wanting to finish the book before the end of this trip. Hasan and Jamal are serpentining across the channel, on our way toward the Indian Ocean. But we're not going to the ocean. We'll eventually cross the channel and sail up a narrow passage, lined with Mangroves, to reach the Twapa ruins, a Swahili town founded in the 15 century that can only be reached when the tide is high. The sail is full and we're clipping along at a pace that stirs a breeze. Very relaxing. Jamal is seated at the back, his right arm casually resting on the rudder. He holds up a fat joint and asks if we mind if he smokes weed? We laugh and say no. Marijuana, or bangi, is illegal in Kenya, though it is legal in Tanzania. Just when he has a great mellow buzz going, our dhow collides with some mangroves, which become tangled in the back poles holding up our canvas cover. We all grab Mangrove branches and push, push, trying to get away from their grip. Finally, we're free with no damage to the dhow. Hasan announces it's time to fish for our lunch. The guys pull out blocks of wood with fishing line attached, a weight wrapped about 12 inches from the hook. They thread prawn on our hooks and show us how to toss the lines. I was expecting a rod and reel. Or perhaps a cane pole like my Granny used to fish with. When will I realize I'm in Africa?!! We float and snag seaweed while the fishes eat the bait off our hooks. Hasan pulls in three fish. Then Jamal pulls in two. They're very good. The idea is to jerk the string when the fish tugs at the bait. So I wait, holding the line every so lightly between my thumb and forefinger and when that tug comes, I pull back, jerking my wrist. The tension holds. Can it be I've caught a fish? As I roll the line onto the wooden block I see the form of a fish surfacing. Yes, it's a white snapper, about ten inches long! Anita pulls in a fish and then we tighten down the boat to move up the stream toward the ruins. While Ed, Anita and I tour the ruins with our guide, Mohammad, Jamal and Hasan build a fire on the beach and cook our fish. They also toast bread and make a wonderful salad from shredded cabbage, tomatoes and onions. Lettuce is hard to find on the coast. And when it is found, it's in rather bad shape due to shipping. So cabbage is the mainstay of salads on the coast. The ruins are built on a land intake that practically reaches to the beach on the other side of the island. As we walk around the old houses and examine the city wall, we can hear the surf of the Indian Ocean. Walking from the wooded area to the beach, we see a goat herder, his goats spread about the white sand. Think of Robinson Crusoe, an untouched and unspoilt beach (except for goat droppings). We look at a tomb on which Anita can read the date, since she knows a little Arabic. Mohammad tells us people still travel to Twapa to worship at this tomb. It seems Twapa was invaded by a tribe from the Pate Island, which is very near here and part of the archipelagos. When the people fled Twapa, they went over to Lamu Island and started the Shela village, only a 30 minute sail away. Shela shares the island with Lamu town and is the most developed part of this area. Rich Europeans have built second homes here, including Princess Caroline of Monaco. Vidal Sassoon's house is now being constructed. Shela also has the only beach on the Island and its sand dunes are gorgeous and high, protected from development by the ministry. Of course, the minister is building a home for himself on the dunes. His house is going up next to the strangest sight in Shela, a "castle" built by an Italian. It's rather ugly and makes no sense with it's tiny, tiny windows facing such a fantastic view of the Indian Ocean. After Anita plays Mohammad in a game of checkers, using metal bottle caps as the checkers, we climb aboard our trusty dhow and eat and eat and eat with the sun streaming down. Fresh grilled fish is tasty, especially the white snapper (of course, I write this only because I caught that fish). We're headed to Manda Island, across from Lamu, where Manda Beach Resort usually draws Italians and Germans. There are three white men on the beach, one who appears to be in his 40s and is totally un-selfconscious in his Speedos. But we pull up in our unpainted dhow and climb out, wading toward the beach, which we'll soon have to ourselves. If it were high season, the place would be packed and we'd be prohibited from setting foot on this exclusive property. As it is, we're practically the only people around. While Anita takes two shots of sugar cane liquor at the bar, I drink a Coke and Jamal joins some guys in a side boat and puffs bangi from a pipe. We walk into the blue waters of the channel and race, swimming against the tide that carries us down the beach. Hasan, Jamal and their friend are on the shore doing push-ups. Then they're practicing a stylized form of karate. Then they're performing acrobatics on the beach, handsprings and back flips. Then they're in the water, racing each other. Ed, Anita and I can only laugh. Where do they get the energy after manning a sail boat through channels and up and down currents? We board the boat once again and head toward Lamu. It's nearing 5:30pm. Jamal and Hasan begin singing "Take me home, country road, to the place I belong." And when they get to the part where they're supposed to sing, "West Virginia, Mountain Mama," they instead sing, "West Lamu, Ocean Mama," and I laugh out loud. Then they want me to sing it, the original way, and I do, loudly, thinking of Susan Stone Tallant and her mother, Fay, who's from West Virginia. I remember driving up to West Virginia with Susan and her family when we were 13, reading Steve King's "The Shining" along the way. West Virginia really is fantastically beautiful. Susan would love to hear Jamal's version of the song. We sings some Beatles and the guys sing songs in Italian, learned from tourists, while they play water jugs as drums. We disembark and hand over hard-earned tips to Jamal and Hasan, saying goodbye. Then I say to Anita, "Do you think Ali Hippy has room for us at dinner tonight?" "Let's go find out," she says and we walk toward the Sun Sail Hotel.