---
title: Random Travels: The Mercury House in Zanzibar
author: George Mandis <george@mand.is>
date: 2014-04-30
tags: post, post, freddie mercury, zanzibar, queen, farrokh bulsara, tanzania, travels
---

<p><a href="https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/georgemandis/media/2013-07-05-21.23.57.jpg"><img class="aligncenter size-large wp-image-921" src="https://s3-us-west-1.amazonaws.com/georgemandis/media/2013-07-05-21.23.57-768x1024.jpg" alt="2013-07-05-21.23.57" width="768" height="1024" /></a></p>
<p>Sometimes I choose the places I want to visit based on very little or very random information. I went to Nairobi almost entirely based on recalling my old college music professor saying that is was 74 degrees every day of the year there. I went to Penang because there's an island there called Georgetown, and I reasoned anywhere I go that had my name in it couldn't be that bad. I went to Tokyo because, shortly before I left someone told me "You should go to Tokyo!" I went to Uruguay because I wanted to take a boat somewhere from Buenos Aires and I stopped in Porto Alegre because I'm a sucker for any place that has Happy or Good in the name.</p>
<p>So what brought me to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zanzibar">Zanzibar</a>? In high-school I was something of a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_(band)">Queen</a> junkie. It was a phase that left me with a somewhat embarrassing, encyclopedic knowledge of Queen trivia, including the fact that Freddie Mercury was actually born Farrokh Bulsara, in Zanzibar, Tanzania <span class='footnote'>(In these halcyon days of Wikipedia and the like it's become less impressive to know obscure things, but I assure you dear reader, these facts were etched in my brain well before such convenience)</span>. So when I realized how close that was to Nairobi I knew I had to go!</p>
<p>When I was in Zanzibar last year I visited the Mercury House in Stonetown. Supposedly it's the house Freddie was born and raised in. In a country that's 90% Muslim and fairly conservative there's something funny about walking the streets and seeing a poster with a bare-chested, Freddie Mercury prancing around no stage, wearing a crown and a robe.</p>
<p>So, like a good tourist I bought a refrigerator magnet.</p>
<p>If you're in Zanzibar it's probably worth a visit, if for no other reason than the fact Zanzibar is really not that big.</p>
<p>Another time I'll talk about the days I spent scootering around the entirety of the island, swimming with dolphins and the night I spent in a British expat's home that could've been straight out of Swiss Family Robinson.</p>
<p>&nbsp;</p>