It might be worth getting a cup of tea while your read this... it's a long one.
In May last year Jeff, Rob, Ash and I decided to go to Zanzibar for a holiday in December. I was so excited about this trip that I spent every spare second I had researching about the island, the places to stay and the activities that we could do while we were there. By the time we boarded our plane I could've been a Zanzibar tour guide even though I'd never set foot on the island.
One of the activities that I was desperate to do was called 'Safari Blue'. This is a full day trip on a dhow that takes you island hopping from one postcard picture white-sand beach to the next and includes snorkeling, a visit to a mangrove forest plus fruit and a seafood lunch fit for a king.
When we arrived at our beach side resort the first thing I checked out was how much the Safari Blue tour would cost. It was expensive. I chatted to Jeff about it and we decided that as we still had two and a half weeks on the island we wouldn’t do it straight away and would see if we still had money for it at the end of the holiday. So I pushed Safari Blue to the back of my mind.
A few days later we were sitting having breakfast when one of the reception staff came to our table:
Reception dude: "Safari Blue for you today? Leave at 09h00."
Jen: *Sigh* "Sorry you have the wrong table, no Safari Blue for us today"
The reception dude walks away disgruntled and comes back 2 minutes later now with more insistence.
Reception Dude: "Safari Blue for YOU people TODAY!"
Jeff: *Through clenched teeth* "No Safari Blue for us today thank you!"
Reception Dude: *Puzzled* "You room 13?"
Jen: *Confused* "Yes, we're in room 13."
Reception Dude: *Staring at Jeff* "Yes!! YOU – Safari Blue today, you ask me yesterday!"
Jeff: *Apologetically to Jen* "Surprise Jen! We're going on Safari Blue today."
Jen: *Squealing with delight* "YAY!! Jeff, you're the best boyfriend in the world, oh my goodness I'm sooo lucky!! Yay yay yay!!"
So we went and packed our day packs and set off with Rob and Ash on a bumpy taxi ride to the South-East part of the island. We boarded a wooden boat and set off with our guides for a day of sea, sun and fun.
Our first stop was an island with a large Mangrove forest, we waded through the ankle deep water in-between the curling mass of tree roots and picked up a crab the size of a small dog! We then swam around the boat and did a bit of snorkeling. It was then time to move to our next island which was basically a deserted sheltered white sand beach surrounded by azure water and nothing else. We played Frisbee, ate fresh coconut and pineapple, drank ice-cold water, tanned, swam and snorkeled. Time for our next destination. No island this time, just putting the boat's anchor down next to a reef that was teeming with underwater plant life and the most incredible fish and strange sea-creatures! We jumped in and had a solid snorkel around the reef. Jeff and Rob found an underwater tunnel in the coral and decided to see if they could swim through it - which they did, but not without some scrapes and cuts. What can I say… boys will be boys! At this stage I think I need to mention that Jeff had been carrying the engagement ring in the pocket of his boardshorts the whole time and he had attached it to a key-chain thinking it would be safe. After this male 'swim through the underwater coral tunnel' competition, Jeff checked his pocket only to find that the ring was gone. It was no longer attached to the key-chain. Heart-failure! Luckily it was swimming around in his pocket (which was only held closed away from the vast ocean by a piece of Velcro the size of a fingernail). Jeff promptly whipped out a caribbeana (MacGyver style) and made sure that the ring wasn't going anywhere!
Now it was time for our last stop. Another beautiful island… Our guides prepared a gourmet array of seafood whilst we relaxed. Jeff went on a little "rekkie" and came back to find the seafood ready and waiting. We tucked in and didn’t stop until our bellies were about to pop! Jeff then announced that he wanted to show me something. We waddled around to the corner of the island and he told me to stand there, count to one hundred with my eyes closed and then to come and find him. I protested asking him what was going on and he just smiled and walked around the corner. "Strange!" I thought but closed my eyes and started counting, as I had been told. It took forever to get to one hundred with a million thoughts butting in to divert my attention. I walked around the corner and saw arrows in the sand. They lead me to a quiet shady spot where Jeff was waiting patiently for me on a sarong with a present wrapped beautifully in silver paper, with ribbon and shells. I sat down and he told me to open my present. Inside was a red book. The first page says "101 Reasons why Jeff loves Jen" and each double page after that has one reason why he loves me and a picture to describe each reason. The reasons started off fairly light-heartedly but proceeded to get more serious and meaningful as the list went on. When I hit about the 60th reason it suddenly dawned on me… "This is it, he's proposing… OMG!!!!" I was so anxious and overwhelmed with excitement that from reasons 60 – 101 I could hardly read, I was just flipping through the pages like a crazy woman trying to get to the end. The third last page says "These are just a few reasons that make me want to know…" and then you turn over to a picture of a guy on one knee saying "Will you marry me?". I looked up to see Jeff on one knee offering me a coconut with the top cut off. I peered into the coconut and sitting unassumingly on the white flesh was my beautiful ring with three fat sparkly diamonds staring up at me… I was so overwhelmed I started balling and hyperventilating and messed up my answer which should have been a screaming "YES!!!" with a shocked "No Jeff, No!" Jeff looked like he'd been hit by a bus and said "Are you saying 'No'?" and I was like "NO!! I'm saying 'YES', of course I'll marry you, oh my goodness ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh" and then after about five minutes of happy tears and taking a few deep breaths we were interrupted by one of our guides. It was time to go back to Zanzibar.
We walked back around the corner of the island grinning like kids with a naughty secret and we saw Rob and Ash. I thrust my left hand forward and revealed my shiny ring and Rob and Ash went mental. There was so much jumping, screaming, tears and hugging it was just incredible. It's a very special feeling to experience sheer unbridled happiness and to have three of the most awesome people in the world to share it with! The guides noticing all the commotion asked me what "it" was. I thought they were talking about my ring and proudly showed it to them. What I didn’t realize was that they were actually interested in the coconut that I was still desperately clutching in my right hand, wanting to save it as a souvenir. Haha. We had a good laugh about that!
We hopped back on the boat and the ride back to Zanzibar flew past in a blur of excited chatter, high fives and smses home. We got back to our resort and Rob and Ash bought us champers and we drank and danced the night away. It was such a special day, one I'll never ever forget .
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