ZIMBABWE: Great Zimbabwe
Stone Town on the island of Zanzibar is
redolent of the mixed cultures of traders visiting the Swahili coast of
Africa. Its tall, tightly packed houses characterised by wooden balconies
and carved doors reflect a fusion of Indian and Arab architecture. Two
outstanding monuments are the Old Dispensary, which was built in honour of
the Golden Jubilee of Queen Victoria, the `House of Wonders` dating from
1883 and said to be the first building in East Africa to have an elevator
and the Beit al-Sahel palace-museum devoted to the era of the Zanzibar
sultanate. Stone Town's population of some 16,000 is predominantly Muslim.
Among some fifty mosques are also two grand cathedrals - St Joseph's
Catholic cathedral and the Anglican Cathedral of Christ. The latter on the
site of the old slave market contains a cross made from the mupundu tree in
Zambia where porters buried David Livingstone's heart before carrying his
body to the mission at Bagamoyo on the north coast of Tanzania. Livingstone
began his epic African journey from Zanzibar. Like other buildings, his old
house overlooks the Indian Ocean where traditional lateen sail dhows still
blow before the East African trades. Another characteristic of local
architecture is a mafraj room at the top of the house where fanned by ocean
breezes male members drink tea. Stone Town was inscribed on the World
Heritage list in 2000.