The Triple A Club in Arusha. PHOTO | GRAGORY NYAUCHI
On my arrival in Arusha, I was informed that the best place to sample nightlife in Arusha was at the Triple A Club, so I made my way there. I was on a visit to the town in northern Tanzania.
There was a cover charge at the door, and when I entered I thought a concert was in progress. The club has a huge dance floor in the middle, and people had gathered around it to watch a dance show.
After a while, a young man began to sing in the haunting Kiswahili that Bongo flavour seems to demand. The love song spoke of desire, loss, pain and all the things in between. Other people sang along and one reveller recorded the singer on his mobile phone; by the end of the song, I was singing along to the chorus.
When he had finished singing, I asked around for his name, convinced that he was some big name in the music industry in Tanzania. But nobody knew who he was.
I woke up the next day at Meru-Inn guest house, on the outskirts of the city. The guest house has an outdoors dining room and kitchen. There was evidence of food being prepared. The smell of vegetables, tomatoes, onions, dhania and garlic soaked in coconut milk invaded the air.
I sat down and asked for breakfast, and was brought a tasty stew known as mtori. It is made with mashed cooked bananas mixed with pieces of meat. Salted to perfection, it is best enjoyed with chapati. I advise all visitors to try this.
I left the hostel and headed to town. On the way, I saw an open bar. It was 10am. In Kenya, bars open at 5pm. Here though, I could have my beer on the balcony and have no worries about the police arresting me.
In town, I changed some money and set out to look for Arusha Backpackers, on the advice of a friend. I have stayed at various backpacker hostels and recommend them to anyone. The prices are usually below $10 a night, and there are always fellow travellers passing through the country. Conversation is easy to strike up, and friendships blossom in an instant.
The Arusha Backpackers boasted a nice bar, restaurant and socialising area on the roof. There were couches with pillows so soft you could spend days on them. However, the price of a meal was more than the price of a night’s boarding.
I took a walk around Arusha and enjoyed some chips mayai. I have this dish every time I am in Tanzania. Two eggs are broken and into a frying pan, and ready-fried chips are placed on them so that they stick in the omelette. The meal is sometimes served with mshikaki (meat kebab).
All around the city there are pink buildings put up by the National Housing Corporation of Tanzania. Motorcycle taxis, called toyos, zip all over the city taking people to where they need to be. They are so many of them on the streets that sometimes they can be a menace.
The pace of the town is generally slow. There are lots of green spaces in which to go for a walk. In the evenings, I enjoyed bottles of Konyagi, the local gin, with new friends and old. Arusha felt like a city that had just come into adulthood.
There was still the carefreeness of youth to be seen in all the ways it was bursting with life, and not as heavily regulated as Nairobi. It is definitely a place to visit as often as possible.
