By ChicaMod Editor
I know people from all the way in Europe who swear by Mombasa. They say that if it had ever been up to them to choose a birth place, then this island would be it!
I think they exaggerate it a little. Or maybe it is the fact that I was born right here in Kenya that makes me look and look and look and not see anything in particular that would shackle anyone here.
Don’t get me wrong; I find Mombasa absolutely enchanting. However, I am not bewitched. And I mean it; my friends are bewitched by this place. They go back to Europe and weep every day because ever since they came to Kenya, Europe doesn’t make sense anymore.
So I went to Mombasa again, to look at it not with my apathetic native eyes but with the appreciative eyes of one who truly was blind and is now seeing.
Mombasa is a sleepy city, at least sleepier than obsessive compulsive Nairobi which cannot stop fidgeting and moving its feet. You can date Mombasa’s history to at least two thousand years back. Such history!
It is a mish-mash of the old and the new, the exotic, ancient and the contemporary. The old town is a maze of narrow streets and pedestrian lanes lined with quaint shuttered houses and open fronted shops. The smell of spices is always present. Dominating the entrance to the Dhow harbor and overlooking the old town is Fort Jesus built by the Portuguese in the 16th century. A museum in the fort displays antiques from the length of the Kenyan coast, and is always open to visitors.
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