Representing Us

Behind a fence at the Paradise Beach Resort, originally uploaded by rockriikka.

I’ve been reading quite a lot of Edward Said’s (1935-2003) texts lately. He is/was a brilliant writer, I have to say. Said was the one who raised the issue of representation of other cultures and criticised the present (then year 1978) academic scholarship, implementing the power theories of Frantz Fanon, Gramsci or Michel Foucault. Although Orientalism is The Book he is known for, he has written so much more – I especially enjoyed browsing and reading “Reflections on Exile and Other Essays” (2002), anthology of some of his writings. Said’s essays covered topics such as “Representing the Colonized”, “History, Literature and Geography”, an essay for honouring a famous Egyptian bellydancer – and lastly, one of my favourites: “Jungle Calling”, a praise of Johnny Weissmuller’s Tarzan on the movie screen compared to Edgar Rice Burroughs’ books. Quote: “Weissmuller’s African jungle was never filmed on location, but it had a modest integrity unlike the primitive and mischievous hyperrealism of Schwarzenegger’s Conan films, whose relationship (and debt) to Tarzan is similar to the way plastic toys resemble, but are somehow inferior to wooden toys…” Just a side comment on this: Conan actually reminds me that I've been seeing disturbingly much World Wrestling on TV here - in a boat, in a disco, in a cafe...people just seem to love it here. Oh well, greetings to all wrestling fans in Finland!


My Body Is A Cage

But all these questions of representation, identities and power questions has led me to think of how I am representing myself here in Zanzibar, right now. Some of these thoughts are already covered in the Dressing Up section, but it still seems to be an important issue, for myself at least. No matter if I wanted it or not, I am not representing just myself in every interaction I have with other people, but I am also representing the community where I’m coming from. Labelling big groups of people goes in both directions: just as “Arabs”, “Muslims”, or “Africans” are all being chucked into the same, immutable groups, white people (Europeans/Americans/Western people) are also being regarded as being all the same.

For example, let’s take this question of reggae. Surely many Tanzanians, and Africans like it, but I would bet that young people here like just as much – or more – the local music (already several times mentioned bongo flava, or modern taarab). So why is it that in all the tourist bars they play either terrible Western music (read: Shania Twain, Shakira, europop from the 1990s…) or reggae (Bob Marley, the late South African Lucky Dube or Alpha Blondy from West Africa)? When questioning this I was answered that “mzungus like reggae, so that’s why they organise these reggae parties”. Great. It might be obvious already that I am not the biggest fan of reggae. I just find it boring, monotonous and impossible to dance, and I would like to strangle the next DJ who plays Bob Marley to me. It didn’t help that I lived in Benin next to a rasta bar ‘Coco Beach’ which played reggae pretty much non-stop, so I heard the Best of Bob Marley about five dozen times involuntarily during the three months I lived in my house. But since I am a white person coming to EXPERIENCE Africa, I must like reggae too, don’t I? Ish.


Neighbourhood

Being white in Africa gives some benefits, too: it gives one a protective colour, a possibility to swap worlds in a second. I can go from the air-conditioned, white-washed hotels with pools and mouth-watering chocolate blackout desserts (terveisiä Minnalle! : )) to the local bar with loud music, people dancing obscenely and drinking Konyagi (papaya vodka)…sure you can do that in Helsinki as well, to have a drink in a fancy bar in downtown with very upscale prices and then go to a local hole in Kallio with the drunkards to soak up the ‘real’ atmosphere. Everything changes: customers, in decoration, music and most importantly for students, the prices. And tell you the truth, I’ve always felt more uncomfortable in those hip bars in the centre of Helsinki than I ever will probably anywhere in Africa. Or when it comes to fancy hotel restaurants – I don’t think they would even let me in Hotel Kämp in Helsinki (the most expensive hotel in Finland, if I’m correct), not that I could afford to have anything there anyway. However, here I can visit these both worlds, feeling maybe slightly uncomfortable, but more just weird to switch the environment so completely.

I also feel like being in a cage concretely, when I step into the ‘white world’ of hugely expensive hotels where there are often more people working there than actually staying there. In Bagamoyo I visited a hotel called “Paradise Beach Resort”, a huge complex looking more like a little town than just a hotel. They had workers with duties such as watering the sand (apparently so that it wouldn’t start flying with the wind - see the photo) or the pool tender (looking after all the needs of the hotel guests at the pool, bringing towels etc). The barriers of the hotel were very clearly marked: big fences, security guards and signs telling “we don’t want you here”. All these prohibitions make me feel like being in a prison more than anything else, the normal world being locked out. I felt more free when sitting on plastic chair in “Alpha Bar and Guesthouse” (place where I stayed in Bagamoyo, only 4000 shillings = 2,5 euros per night…) and sipping local ginger ale called Stoney tangawizi – even if there is someone coming every five minutes to ask the usual series of questions (where are you from? how long are you here? what are you doing here? are you married? how do you see Bagamoyo/Tanzania/Africa compared to Finland?).


Rebellion (Lies)

From all these people (95 percent of them being young men) coming to chat you in every possible situation we get into the question of images of white sexuality, especially that of women’s. Sexualising black skin since colonialism (see Frantz Fanon: Black Skin, White Masks, 1952) is acknowledged already, but what has happened with tourism and modern media is that now white skin has also been exposed for the gaze of the others. Scantily dressed white women are not only seen on the screen in Hollywood B-action movies, but they are also visible right here on the streets of Zanzibar, representing the demoralised, loose Western women. Thus we (meaning we all white women) are most of the time being treated as such – sluts, or easy women at least. It is very tiring sometimes to explain young men in discos that no, I don’t need a man, or no, you can’t sleep with me. The several Masai boys loitering on the beach of Nungwi in the northern Zanzibar seemed to take it granted that some of us would like to go with them. “You? No? And her? And she, no?” I would imagine that partly thanks for their behaviour goes to some of those women passing here, looking for holiday love. Zanzibar has been dubbed as the Thailand for women during last few years, but I haven’t really bumped into these guys in other places besides Nungwi, not at least on such a massive scale.

I am definitely being the other here, there is no way going around that. But it doesn’t seem fair that I am being judged by the behaviour, real or imagined, of other white people. The images transmitted through bad movies, MTV music videos and irresponsible tourists (I wouldn’t want to blame them so much all the time, but their behaviour is often just so appalling) are being straight applied to me as well. But maybe, just maybe, I can try to represent a better side of me to the Zanzibaris, and maybe, just maybe, they won’t think that all mzungus are the same. I want to fight against the image that has been forced upon me such as the subaltern have fought for their voices to be heard. I admire some of my friends who have taken the matter in their own hands and started talking with the people harassing them. I don’t have the energy to have deep conversations with every single person harassing me - there are too many - but at least I can try to have one per day. It is a beginning for a change to represent me in a way I want to, not the way I am being represented without my consent.