Twanda Scales (centre) and friends share a light moment.
PHOTO | COURTESY
It’s the sparkle of one’s eyes while they smile at her or the subtle gestures of respect and admiration that she receives that let her know she is loved and welcomed here.
For a person who belongs to a generation of African Americans who were brought up in the 70s and 80s with American mainstream media depicting Africa as an impoverished dark continent, Twanda Scales, now at 60 years old, shed a tear upon seeing the beautiful continent, rich in culture and proud people full of warm hearts and embrace for her.
She spoke with a quivering voice, holding back tears of joy and relief as she was about to board her plane back to the United States.
“My heart is full; I have come to Africa; I have come home,” she stated. Since her college days, she had always wanted to come to Africa. She retired in 2021 and just knew she couldn’t wait any longer. This trip seemed long overdue. She was thrilled it was finally happening. Her trip to Tanzania started in Charlotte, North Carolina, to Heathrow Airport in London, where she had to meet her friend coming from San Diego, California.
She was ecstatic about joining her for her safari; both ladies were celebrating their 60th birthdays, and they wanted to do that in Tanzania. One would bet every dollar that Twanda is not above 40 years old; her skin glows, and her smile only adds to her luminous look.
She and her friend have been travelling buddies for more than 27 years, and it was only right that on the trip back to her motherland, she would accompany her.
They arrived in Nairobi on the seventh day of June and went to Maasai Mara for five days before crossing over to Tanzania on 12th June, passing through the Serengeti National Park, and they stayed at the Serengeti Serena Safari Lodge.
She was stunned by how vast the park was, endless terrain that stretched as far as her eyes could see. “We saw all the big five except for the rhino,” she quipped.
The Serengeti was spectacular; her most memorable moment was when she saw a herd of elephants frantically running from what she assumed was a predator. The huge elephants were trumpeting, making noises like they were warning others of an impending danger. At that moment, Twanda watched something amazing: the big elephants from two different herds all came to a circle, surrounding their calves, forming a defensive wall around them.
“Their backs were facing the baby, their trucks were up in the air, ready to protect the baby,” she observed.
That was what she calls her ‘elephant experience’. She had never seen anything like that.
She also witnessed the beginning of the great migration, the annual movement of wildebeests, zebras and other herbivores from the Serengeti to Maasai Mara, where she also witnessed another astounding symbiotic cooperation between zebras and buffalos: “The zebras hear better than buffaloes, while the latter smell better, so they travel together,” she said.
That’s how they get to depend on each other as they travel the path full of predators.
They later left for Zanzibar, another jaw-dropping haven she had yet to see. A beautiful experience she recalled. They took a boat to the middle of the ocean, coming to a stop on a sandbar. “You don’t see any land while you’re far into the ocean, and all of a sudden the boat stops, and there is sand right there in the middle of the Indian Ocean,” she said. They stopped, and their tour guide brought them fresh fruits.
They just started having fun and enjoying their time while munching on the freshly cut fruits on this tiny tidal island. They also took the glass-bottom canoe and took pictures; the seawater was as clear as the water coming out of the shower, she remembers.
The most favourite place they have dinner at is ‘The Rock restaurant’, a scenic dinner built on a rock right by the shores of the Indian Ocean in Zanzibar. “It’s the most beautiful beach I have ever seen, where The Rock is,” she mentioned. “The water was amazing; the food is the best I have ever had by the beach,” she added.
The restaurant served her delicious lobsters while the jazz band was playing. This trip to East Africa inspired her to see more of Africa, and she is planning on coming back soon. She doesn’t want to wait as long as she did the first time.
Her only previous travel to Africa was to the North, where she visited Egypt. Twanda is well-travelled; together with her friend, they have been to Italy, Paris, Spain, and many places around the world. She, however, says Tanzania stands out because of the number of Black diasporas from Europe and America who have relocated to the country.
Tanzania is a melting pot of African culture, and what impressed her the most was the kindness of the people she encountered. From the people working at the hotel to the Bajaj (tuk tuk) drivers.
While in Dar es Salaam, they did a tour of the village museum in Makumbusho and the National Museum, where they got to see the history of the origin of man, what they called the seed of mankind. She was conflicted at first upon seeing it. “In America a different story is told,” she said, “where it’s portrayed that mankind was derived from monkeys and that man evolved from amphibians, ‘creating an image that homo sapiens evolved to a white man’,” she said.
But at the National Museum located in Dar es Salaam city centre, what she saw on the ‘evolution tree’ was a man starting as Homo habilis to Homo sapiens, who emerged around 300,000 years ago.
“It shows that we start as men, looking like an ape but not an ape, just looking different from the modern man,” she said. She was intrigued and excited to hear history from another standpoint.
From where her heritage comes. She is glad African Americans are now disputing the misconceptions about Africa and the poverty-stricken narrative that they were told. More are travelling to the motherland.
She met a group of Black American women in Zanzibar and the Masai Mara. Black women are travelling to Africa and sharing their stories to let others know the truth and not what was portrayed on television.
“Africans are not starving, malnourished, and living in slums,” she said. She was amazed by the advanced architecture of the Dar es Salaam metropolitan area, the infinite swimming pools, and the rooftop bars and restaurants. People are working, making a living, and striving.
“They treat us guests with so much respect and kindness; we don’t always get that as African Americans back home,” she mentioned with a tearful voice.
To be embraced by Africans from different countries they have visited has filled her heart.
“You can write that I teared up talking about the hospitality and the sheer gratitude they showed us coming to their country,” she said.
My friend whom I came with is Latina. We have had the best moments here; she has thanked me over and over again for bringing her along. My heart is full; I have visited Africa; I have visited Tanzania; I have come home,” she mentioned. While in the country, Tanzanians kept calling her ‘Twende’, a Kiswahili word for ‘let’s go’; the word sounds like her name, Twanda. Amazingly, she has always had an energetic and ‘ready-to-go’ attitude.
“I now know what my name means; I wish I could tell my mum about it,” she chuckled.
She didn’t fly out empty-handed; she bought tanzanite gems, the precious stones only found in Tanzania, and she bought the African material ‘batik’ prints in shirts and pants.
She also got brass jewellery with the map of Africa to gift to her friends as well as Tanzanian coffee beans, just a piece of Tanzanian memories she will carry to cherish her unforgettable time in the country.
