0,99 €
Mehr erfahren.
- Herausgeber: Valentina Gerini
- Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
- Sprache: Englisch
Many girls dream about a charming prince but Federica, a tour operator representative, dreams about a black husband. She wants to travel, to see the world and get to know different cultures. She goes from one part of the world to the other with an open heart, embracing what the journey offers to her. As she lands in Zanzibar, she understands immediately that Africa will mark her definitely. The Masai, the smells of the spices, the colours of the sea. Everything seems to show that she has found her place in the world. But the tour operators she works for sends ther working in another country, in Dominican Republic. The longing of Africa is so strong to seem like a real disease. Then the bachata, the merengue and the dominican warmth begin to work as an antidote, and she gradually falls in love with this land.
Das E-Book können Sie in Legimi-Apps oder einer beliebigen App lesen, die das folgende Format unterstützen:
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017
Ähnliche
Valentina Gerini
Black Husband Wanted
BLACK HUSBAND WANTEDcollana Gli scrittori della porta accanto
Copyright © 2016 Valentina Gerini
Cover: Stefania Bergo
First edition December 2015
Second edition December 2016
ancient Masai saying
Dedicated to my Masai Friends and my husband
The series Gli scrittori della porta accanto
The series Gli scrittori della porta accanto collects a selection of unpublished books or already published books which have passed through a careful editing. You can find books of various authors such as the short stories collection Un racconto per capello, the collection of recipes inspired by our books L'appetito vien leggendo and the collections of poems dedicated to our fathers Caro papà. We also published novels by different authors, both in Italian and English.
Who are Gli scrittori della porta accanto?
Stefania Bergo, Valentina Gerini, Genero Elena Santoro, Tamara Marcelli, Silvia Pattarini, Ornella Nalon.
We are a group of independent writers, mothers and bloggers. We met on the web, through our books. We learned to esteem each other by reading our works, even before we met us personally. Actually, living in cities far from each other, we rarely meet - during some literary fairs, for example! The idea of starting a blog came to our minds by chance, just before Christmas, in 2014. We were thinking about how to promote our books and we thought of a blog, a lot easier to manage than a site. The name has also come to our minds by chance: we thought of something that would identify a writer as the "neighbor" that hypothetically everybody could have, with a great passion for writing and much to say. Over time, however, we decided to extend this virtual library and decided to include other authors. Now we are not just a literary website but a real cultural web megazine, that is now managed by the original group of six writers, supported by very valid collaborators who help us a lot with new content. We offer with services for not famous authors and propose daily articles that deal with art, painting, poetry, literature, cinema, travelling, music... By using our site you'll find yourself walking through the stories of books, you will have the opportunity to get suggestions for your next reading or learn what is new in the library for this month, to talk about painting and music, or even to travel thanks to one of our travel articles. Enjoy the reading!
www.gliscrittoridellaportaaccanto.com
www.facebook.com/gliscrittoridellaportaaccanto
Who is Valentina Gerini?
Valentina Gerini was born in Pontedera (Pi) in 1986. After a scientific diploma she studied English in a private and started to work abroad. Traveling and writing are her greatest passions. She is a tour guide, a blogger and writing is her hobby. She works for a monthly magazine dedicated to the stories that happen in the Valdera area (Pi), Il Ponte di Sacco. Her debut novel is "Black husband wanted" published by 0111Edizioni, October 2013, in Italian, inspired by real life experiences. Her second work is another romance entitled "The night of the shooting stars", published by Letters Animate, May 2015. Now Valentina does not travel so much any more, she got married, became a mother and now lives in the village where she grew up , Ponsacco (Pi).
www.facebook.com/valentinageriniautrice
Chapter One
Africa
Africa. "This is the center of the world!”, I thought as soon as my feet had touched the ground of Zanzibar airport. A stifling heat made my breathing Labored, a high humidity did not allow the sweat to escape. From the runway I saw towering palms, lush vegetation of a deep emerald green peeked behind the small building used as an airport. In the blue sky there was a big sun already high, hot and sunny, and it was only 07:00 in the morning of December 1st. We were told to go into the airport to fill out the visa form and pay the entry fee. A full plane of at least 200 passengers were crammed into a small room, clogging the passage between the hall and the baggage claim. I began literally to die of heat! Compiled my visa, I paid the fee and went to pick up my luggage. The air conditioning had now become a necessity for survival, but it seemed that there was not a trace. In search of the conveyor belt I came upon a simple wooden counter, behind which the baggage handlers were waving in the air suitcases and bags as if they were vegetables in a market, looking for the owner. Got my two small red suitcases upon payment of a gratuity almost obligatory, I managed to go out from all the crowd still waiting for the bags. Directed towards the exit I was stopped by two police officers. They were impaled in front of me and decided that I could only pass through if I opened the suitcases for inspection. All the suitcases were locked with a padlock, and I had absolutely no idea where the keys were! Begging them to let me pass I did not get any results, so I offered them the smallest note I had on hand, $ 20, and they parted like a curtain letting me go like a queen.
I got out of this nightmare, and I was finally thrown into a mass of people, mostly men, kids and old people, who offered to help you as they were porters in exchange for two pennies. I saw my tour operator and I went to the counter to inform of my arrival. I was sent to Tanzania for the winter season as tour operator representative. I was doing this job for a while in fact I spent the previous summer in Greece. Sarah, who turned out to be my manager, after having kindly welcomed me, told me to leave my luggages to a local guy, put a label on to recognize them, and to go to the bus number ten. I left my bags not very convinced, looking at them as they were put, or rather launched on a cart, and climbed on the bus number ten. Even here there was no air conditioning, the seats were built in a gnomic size and the driver looked like he came out from a cartoon. When the bus was full of those who, in later days, were the guests that I had to take care of in the village, we set off in the direction of Nungwi, north of the island.
The roads were in poor condition as well as the shock absorbers of the bus, so the trip seemed more a journey by ship than by bus. During the trip I should have listened to the short briefing done by the representative I went to replace, full of information and useful knowledge on the spot, but I was enraptured by the images that overlapped out of the window. Vegetation, houses, huts, people, cows. Women with turbans brought on their heads large baskets full of things, children with uniforms went in and out of school, carts were pulled by cows with a hump, towering palms filled the gardens and the woods on the two sides of the roads, banquets sandwiches and grilled meats were all around the streets, I could hear shouts and screams from the market coming from every side, I could hear the noises and smell the smells of the continent I had always heard about but never thought I'd see: Africa. Here in Africa the smells are more smells than in other continents, the colors are more colors, the sounds are more noises. In a kind of trance I arrive to the village and just got off the bus I stopped to observe the dance of welcome done from the Masai, a dance they made in honor of the new customers arrived, full of jumps, screams and chants.
Some black figures, long-limbed and strong were wrapped in colored cloths, mainly red, bracelets, beads and earrings, maces and daggers. The Masai, I had heard maybe once up to that point. Beautiful in their being themselves, they were wonderful people, I could read it in their eyes. After waiting the customers checked into at the hotel I was taken to my room, in the staff house, where I had to sleep for five long months ... IN AFRICA! I kept telling myself that I would have been in Africa for five months. Excited, I kept thinking that I would have been in Africa until April.
Africa...
A short break was given to me after the long flight. I used that time to take a shower and meet the first giant cockroach of this adventure, quietly perched on the handle of the shower. After that I was immediately called to report by the manager. I had to see what I should do once I arrived in the village with guests: meeting and greeting, going to the beach to check the customers satisfaction, greeting them at entrance of the restaurant, selling trips and excursions. I was not tired, time zone is only two hours more than in Italy, but the heat was making me feel weak. I was literally stunned, the sun seemed to hit on my head with a hammer, the air was so hot and dense that it seemed to come out from a hair dryer at full power. I went to the beach where there were our main office, the theater and the restaurant. Practically the vital center of the hotel was developed on the beach. I put one foot on the white sand and I was surprised to feel that it did not burn, it was just lukewarm. Wherever I had been before the sand was always hot due to the heat of the sun, but this sand no. The manager Sarah explained to me that it was sand of coral origin and for this reason it did not burn. True or not this explanation, the sand did not burn at all. I spent my first days quite well, I was immersed in the work and had little time to discover the new territory until Saturday night. That night there was scheduled a festival dedicated to the full moon in the bar on the beach near our village, the only bar within 3 km. The Full Moon Party is a party organized every month and it is very famous throughout Zanzibar, people come to dance and listen to music from all over the island. The heat was very strong even if it was ten o'clock in the night. The only difference between day and night was the presence of the sun or the moon in the sky, because the degrees and the humidity did not vary at all. Me and my co-workers dressed with light clothes, a denim skirt and a tank top and with no shoes or slippers we walked barefoot to the bar, walking on the shore. As soon as we arrived we saw that a kind of entry was created with networks surrounding the area, like a tennis court, close to the beach bar. We paid the entrance 10,000 shillings, the equivalent of five euros, an amount that included two drinks. At the party there were many people: tourists, many locals poorly dressed boys, women, girls well rigged for the occasion and the Masai. Many Masai dancing with their typical movements adapted to modern music. The speakers spreading reggae music, some local songs and a bit of hip-hop music. We all danced in a circle, surrounded by the Masai and some beach boys, the local boys who earn their living by selling pirate excursions to the beach, so they define themselves ‘beach boys’. We danced barefoot on the sand for hours, with the sea as background and a big moon that looked like falling to the ground at any moment. The sky in Zanzibar was a different sky from what I had ever seen, not only because Zanzibar is located in the opposite hemisphere than Italy, but perhaps because being an island not far from the equator, the stars and the sky seem closer. This was the feeling I got every time I looked at the sky in Zanzibar, at night. It seemed possible to actually touch the stars with a finger, to be able to tickle the moon. A huge expanse of small luminescent bulbs on a very black robe, infinite. There were no artificial lights or streetlights to spoil this vision. The only lights were those of the few hotels in the area, and the few bars on the beach. Nothing more. No lit streets, clubs with important signs, shops and supermarkets with signs lit day and night. Only the sea and the sky, the blue of the night mingled with that of the sea and the stars lit up everything, supreme. Looking at the sky, at that moment, I felt alive, alive as I had not felt for a long time. And I decided that I wanted to live fully every moment of this experience that I was being offered.
I used to go to the airport four times a week to welcome new guests arriving and to help the old ones with the check-in procedure for the departure, always at night, when the sun has not arisen yet, and four times a week I watch a dawn that has no equal. The sky turned from dark into a mixture of shades, made with a brush, from navy blue to orange and pale yellow, until the sunrise, among palm trees, surrounded by green plants. At six the sun was already high in the sky, shining and radiant as every day. I used to leave the resort at around 3:30 am and I could breathe the African night, during which the people repose in their huts made of mud and stone, with no air conditioning, ceiling fans, or mosquito nets, upon contact with the ground, in the middle of the clearing. I used to pass through small villages built close to the main paved road, I could see some people wake up early in the morning, before the sun, to embark on a journey to another village. The public transport, the dalla-dalla, is a small open cart with the engine driven by local chauffeurs, on which could be seated both men and animals, especially chickens, it can be loaded with suitcases, sacks and bags. Only God knows how it can move! I saw them around the streets since early morning, but not at night. Those who were traveling at night did it walking, and most of the time barefoot. I loved to watch in the dark of the night to see the very white eyes of those people who were already on their way for hours (or perhaps they had not yet stopped for days), languid eyes reflecting the headlights of our bus. Some animal were heard during the night, especially some monkey in the forest just outside our village. The most famous monkey forest of the Zanzibar is named Jozani Forest, situated in the south of the island, about 4 hours drive from where our hotel was located. It’s a quite famous forest visited by many tourists and lovers of nature. We used to sell a tour that included a guided walk in the forest, with the chance to spot and often caress some monkey with the red seats, an endemic monkey in the island called red colobus. The night in Zanzibar seemed to be the real night, different from what we are used to see in Europe. Night, with a capital N, no noise of cars, motorbikes, factories, without electricity and rowdy bar. Only the sounds of nature, the rustling of the leaves of the palm trees due to the slight warm breeze, the verses of some animals, the steps of the people on their way. As we got to the airport the streets started slowly to become a little bit more populated, and we were promptly stopped at a checkpoint, one of the many checkpoints established on the island by the police, for a routine check on the license of the driver of the bus and documents . The guests always had fun, they couldn’t understand that our warning not to show cameras and valuables, was not a good habit in a Muslim country was only a simple alert to avoid being ripped off even by the police. Fortunately nothing strange happened traveling at night on the streets of Zanzibar. The drivers, who drove in a very unsafe way, were like little babies, obedient and reverent. One morning, coming back from the airport with a few customers that had just arrived, the driver, lost in thought, passed at high speed on the first of the three bumps that we always met along our path. Speed was so high that the handbags of the people fell from the seat to which they had been put, and people jumped on their seat; some of them, the taller, slammed their heads against the ceiling of the bus. I complained to him in a very understandable English and I threatened to report the incident to the boss of the bus agency if he wasn’t henceforth going to be more careful driving. His attitude of reverence and submission following my complaint frightened me. In that moment I realized that it was not the first time, nor was he the only one to have this attitude. It was like some of them had an enormous respect or fear of foreigners, the white foreigners called mzungu which in Swahili means white. I began to hate this behavior and often I tried to dissuade them from this attitude, trying to establish an equal relationship, even between men and women, as we're used to in Europe. It wasn’t really a good idea, because any person with whom I was trying to establish this type of relationship of equality always misunderstood my normal behavior as it was an interest. I understood it was not easy for them, especially for those who lived without an education, to understand that there can be friendship and mutual respect between men and women, from different countries. One of our helpers, with whom I had often joked and talked at the airport while waiting for the arrival of the flights, began to bombard me with calls and messages until the night of December 31. That night I found him at the party next to our hotel, and he started to declare his love for me. That party was my first official New Year's Eve away far from home. I went to the party dressed in light and simple clothing, without thinking a lot to chose them. At that time I had forgotten how to choose clothes with care, how to wear them and how to wear makeup. It was too hot and also the simplicity of the place and people automatically allowed you to forget certain habits. Before the party we had to attend the gala dinner at the hotel organized for the guests. Fish and delicious Italian-African food. The tables were set directly by the sea, and a few candles and torches to light the place, and the stars above us watching us. Before celebrating what was called “Italian New Year's Eve", the countdown to uncork the champagne and celebrate midnight at the same time when people would have done in Italy two hours later than us, Sarah and I decided to go to the party organized in the bar near our village. Arrived at the party we had a coca-cola. The relentless heat had made me never want to drink alcohol of any kind. A lover of wine and good Tuscan as I am, had given up the habit of drinking it shortly after arrived in Zanzibar. I did not drink wine or beer at all in Zanzibar. My friend Sarah was a Muslim and did not drink alcohol. This probably helped me in my unusual behavior. That night we immediately started to dance, as we did whenever there was a party. I never danced as much as I did in Zanzibar! Sarah and I used to go out a couple of nights a week in search of beach parties, in the bars adjacent to our resort. If there was a party with music and some people, we went there and danced. I always told her that she was very rude to the boys who always asked her to dance. She always responded categorically no and they went away defeated. It was a pleasure to party with her, we were almost inseparable. People called us "the two little parrots" because we shared a room, worked together every day with two different positions (she was the boss and I was the assistant) and we spent the rest of the time together on the beach or watching movies, or laughed like crazy even without reason. Going with her to parties was also nice for the sheer pleasure of dancing. We always went back to the hotel tired, exhausted but happy. The evening of December 31 we danced a bit at the party organized at the bar next to our hotel, but when Mike, t [...]
