Our Journey as Tanzanadians

February 6, 2023

3 minutes read

It all started 10 years ago, when I met my husband, Adil, while volunteering in Tanzania. It was a whirlwind, cliché love story that had me moving back to Africa to see what had me so smitten. After two years, we were married on my husband’s home island of Zanzibar.

Afterwards, we worked hard on getting Adil’s permanent residency in Canada, so we could start building our lives together in Canada as well. In May 2016, my husband was granted permanent residency, and we began our life in Calgary. While in Calgary, we created our little family by adding two children, a boy, Sheby and a girl, Zai. During this time, Adil was working within the hospitality industry and I continued my career with at risk youth.

We had always intended to create a life living back and forth, but by Adil’s first winter in Canada, we knew we needed to start making a plan if we wanted to achieve this. We very quickly noticed that the lifestyles were extremely different. Canada was fast-paced, hustle culture, with many material things. This is not wrong, but after living in Tanzania, I was introduced to a much different pace. They call it “pole pole” (po-lay po-lay), which means “slowly slowly”, there’s no rush in Africa. And ultimately, that’s what we set out to create, a feeling, pace, and lifestyle.

So by the end of 2017, we purchased our first piece of land on the island. Since that moment, we have been consistently been sending money back and building brick by brick, purchasing bags of cement, coral and small rocks to build our property. Building a home in Zanzibar is completely different from anything we do in Canada, including how you pay for it. Everything is paid for as you go, no such thing as mortgages. So over the past years, all the money we could set aside went directly to our project.

In November 2022, we sold our home in Calgary, so we were able to align more with our goal of our pole pole lifestyle, realizing that the big city life wasn’t for us anymore. We moved our little family to my family farm in Eston and then have been able to make a big leap in our building process. Now, after seven years of being in Canada, we’ve finally arrived back in Zanzibar, where it all started. This time with our children, a pool, and so much gratitude.

There is still a lot to complete, but we’ve arrived to help with some of that process and introduce our children to their culture and lifestyle in Africa. The project has also morphed into something pretty amazing, with plans of completing 10 rooms to be able to rent out for tourists who come here from all around the world.

When we started this journey years ago, it was often frustrating and difficult at times to envision this coming to life. However, working at it pole pole for years has now brought this dream to reality and has also made it feel much sweeter now that we are here and see what we have built.

We are unsure of how our story will continue to unfold, but are excited about the possibilities. With our life here and my husband’s previous work, we have friends from all across the world, including many friends in Tanzania who run amazing safari companies. Our hope is to share this beautiful country and lifestyle with our friends from all over the world. When planning an international trip, it can be difficult to always know who you can trust. With our friends and contacts throughout the country, we will be happy to help book an African adventure while supporting local Tanzanian people. So as they say here, “Karibu Sana”, “you are most welcome” !

If you or your family would like to hear more about our adventures and when our property will be open for booking, please kindly send an email to jenna.adil.omar@gmail.com and we will add you to our exclusive list.

Best wishes, Jenna Omar (Tunall)

Note: Paje is the village; Zanzibar is the island; Tanzania is the country; Africa is the continent. We live in the village of Paje, located on the east side of Africa, on the Indian Ocean. Tanzania is also the home of the Serengeti National Park and Mount Kilimanjaro.