Zanzibar Beachclub

Almost half a year of an increasingly stricter lockdown has passed. And now we're here on the beach again. In half a year, much can change. There were elections in the United States of America that put an end to the bizarro presidency of Donald Trump; Great Britain finally crashed out of the European Union for good, four years after voting to do so in a referendum, and spending most of the time after that sitting on the treshold like a cat that pestered you to open the door but now refuses to go outside; we had elections in the Netherlands too, but although many new tiny parties were voted into the parliament, it seems not much will change in the Dutch political make-up. 

Since December, I had to work from home and my brain is all over the place. I find it difficult to concentrate, or prioritise between my tasks. I've started to spend at least a few days in my office in Groningen every second week or so. The building is getting increasingly busy as more people flee their homes - officially we're supposed to stay home as much as possible, but management is getting more and more lenient as folks get more and more depressed - but it's still eerily quiet. It's good that we've got our trailer in Groningen, allowing us a change of scenery now and then; but like everybody, I feel stretched increasingly thin.  

Anyway, since a week now, cafes and restaurants are allowed to open their terraces to the public from 12:00 to 18:00. Breakfasts are therefore not possible, and the time is somewhat inconvenient given that Billie Stormzy normally has his afternoon nap around noon, but it's about time we started our trips to the beach again. So here we are. For this first outing of 2021, we're joined by Billie Stormzy's big sister Rihanna Gaga and a friend. 

In fact, we recently discovered that this friend made an appearance on this blog many years ago, when I visited the Fat Mermaid together with Rihanna Gaga when she was still the prime focus of these entries. Funnily enough, that blog ended with the girl asking if she could visit us sometime; impossible back then because we were returning to Tunisia soon after that, but now she lives around the corner from us and during the previous lockdown Rihanna Gaga and she became close friends. When I saw this friend interact with Billie Stormzy a few months ago, I suddenly remembered how she reacted to Rihanna Gaga when she saw us arrive in the Fat Mermaid all those years ago. A nice coincidence. 

We came here by bicycle, cycling up to the stairs that lead to the newly built Legoland at the Scheveningen Boulevard (that finished last autumn, but hasn't been open at all yet because of the measures to stop the spread of Covid-19 in the Netherlands). The girls are hyped up - Rihanna Gaga had a sleepover at her friend's last night and they've been having a lot of fun together. Billie Stormzy has taken a book with him. As we arrive at Zanzibar Beachclub, I let the girls choose our seats and they pick a low couch and two lounge chairs around a fireplace that's not on. They sit down together on the couch and Billie Stormzy also climbs on the couch. The last time we were at the beach, he'd only recently learned to walk, now he's running everywhere. But for now, he sits there quietly, reading a book he brought with him. He loves books and can spend hours getting them from his room, and bringing them to us to read them for us. And, like now, he'll even retreat to read quietly by himself for a surprisingly long time, given that he's only one and a half year old. 

I tell the girls to take their feet from the table - something I will have to repeat several times because they keep forgetting - and we wait for someone to come and take our order. A waitress arrives quickly - a pleasant, polite young woman who clearly is trying hard to do her very best - and brings a menu. I tell the girls, who want to run off to the beach, to wait until we've ordered our drinks and food so that I'm sure they get exactly what they want. They order a nutella pancake each. Rihanna Gaga also takes a strawberry smoothie, while her friend takes a sparkling strawberry and raspberry lemonade. The girls chat a bit about their choices. Her friend doesn't understand that Rihanna Gaga doesn't like fizzy drinks ("You don't like cola? Seven Up? Sinas?") while Rihanna Gaga is equally bemused by the fact that her friend does. Then they run off to the beach and Billie Stormzy immediately hurries after them. 

They return when their drinks are brought. Rihanna Gaga lets Billie Stormzy have a sip from her smoothie because he clearly wants to. But then he claims the whole drink for himself and I have to correct him and tell him to share it. He knows quite a few words now and it is getting more and more easy to communicate with him. When I tell him "Rihanna Gaga too" he very much gets what I mean, although he's very reluctant to actually do so. His big sister dotes so much on him, there's always a risk that her own interests are not fully acknowledged, so I make sure she also gets to drink from the smoothie. They leave again to play at the beach a little more, this time Billie Stormzy leads while the girls imitate - as they often do - his funny jumpy running. 

I relax. Zanzibar has a lovely African theme going on. There's some amazing woodcarvings here. Next to our table, an enormous wooden idol stands and I marvel at its style and the fact that it is clearly cut out of one piece of enormous wood, imagining the sheer size of the tree that would have been needed for this. The rusty metal boabab looming over the beach club's roof is also a nice touch, although I remember when it was a full boabab in the middle of the terrace many years ago and I thought that was actually nicer. There's a dog lying besides the table next to ours, where the management of the beach club are having lunch and discussing how they experienced the lockdown. It must have been difficult for everyone working in cafes and restaurants, but they sound surprisingly upbeat and optimistic. On the soundsystem, there's Latin flavoured lounge songs. Lot's of bongos and acoustic guitars over lazy electronic beats. It's a very sunny day, but it's still chilly. I have my winter coat on as this spring has been unusually cold.

The girls return with Billie Stormzy and Rihanna Gaga, embarassingly, shouts: "when are the pancakes finally going to arrive?" unaware of the waitress walking behind her, holding the plates with their food on it. I've ordered a spicy African sandwich myself, which is brought a bit later. Very sweetly, the girls try to share bits of their pancake with Billie Stormzy, but he's not interested, despite the fact that he enthusiastically shouts "food" from time to time. He's not an easy eater, so I've made sure he had his lunch at home, a rice pudding I often make for him, with cooked rice, rice water, coconut oil and fruit. It's a dish I invented a while back when we were concerned about his weight - at the child consultation clinic they'd established he's below average and almost below what is considered healthy, and one of their advices was to add a little cream or oil to his regular food. It's also a good way to get him to eat fruit, but it also makes it a bit more difficult to get him to eat vegetables and bread. 

My sandwich is a tasty affair, with chicken in a sweet and spicy sauce - a little too greasy, but overall quite nice - and the girls also eat their pancakes with relish. I regularly have to get up to follow Billie Stormzy, who is more interested in the beach than in the food and keeps heading off towards the sand. He wants to climb a pile of beach chairs again and again, I suppose something he was also doing with the girls. In between following him and carrying him back, I manage to finish my sandwich, and also an ice coffee I've ordered - a nice, mocca-tasting drink, although slightly too sweet for my taste. Rihanna Gaga's friend asks if they can get another pancake, but I want to get Billie Stormzy to bed, so I tell them they can get a popsicle instead. I'd noticed the boy was getting a bit shaky on his legs and now he sits on my lap, his dummie in his mouth and holding onto his two favourite sleeping toys, a toy sheep (the
same Rihanna Gaga used to have) and a toy duck.

When the girls are almost finished with their popsicles, I pay and we get up. Billie Stormzy waves goodbye to the beach club, the beach and the sea as we climb the stairs to get back to our bicycles.

Also on Breakfast at the Beach: Jump back in time to when I visited this place with Rihanna Gaga in 2014