How do century-old history and modernity go together? “No problem” for Malia and Tessa, Zanzibar’s next cosmopolitan generation, who modelled for us at one of the most intriguing spaces of Stone Town, the Secret Garden. How to preserve the past and yet aim at the future, is a question often asked in traditional societies like Zanzibar – on this double-page THE FUMBA TIMES looks at some aspects of it. Scientists trying to save ancient palaces. Policy-makers challenged by little budgets.

But for our modelling students Malia and Tessa, at home in Fumba Town and Stone Town, all this is simply IRL – “in real life”, as local youth slang has it. With their families, they have become a part of Zanzibar, as generations of immigrants before them.