Lamu

Lamu was one of the Swahili towns strung along the East African coast, trading mangrove poles, ivory, tortoiseshell and slaves with Arabia, Persia and India and receiving cloth, ceramics and Islam in return. Settlement on the island goes back at least to the 14th century, and for a long time Lamu was the lesser rival of Pate and of Manda, whose towns eventually failed; the ruins of Takwa on Manda stand for that older order.

In 1652 an Omani fleet helped the northern towns against the Portuguese, and Lamu spent the following centuries under a system of town elders with shifting allegiances to Pate, Oman and finally Zanzibar. The town's high point came in the 18th and 19th centuries, when victory over Pate at Shela in 1813 left Lamu dominant and the money from trade built the tall coral-stone houses, carved doors and plaster interiors that survive today. The fort beside the square was built between 1813 and 1821 with Omani assistance.

The abolition of the slave trade and the rise of Mombasa's port and railway left Lamu behind, and the town's isolation preserved it. A German post office, the first on the East African coast, operated here from 1888 to 1891 before Britain took over the coast. In 2001 UNESCO listed Lamu Old Town as the oldest and best-preserved Swahili settlement in East Africa. Since 2014 attacks on the county's mainland have hurt tourism, and the deep-water port at Manda Bay, the cornerstone of the LAPSSET corridor and in operation since 2021, is the biggest change the archipelago has seen in centuries.

Lamu's culture is Swahili in its most concentrated form. The town is almost entirely Muslim, with 23 mosques on the island, and the religious calendar sets the rhythm of the year. Maulidi, the celebration of the Prophet's birthday, is centred on the Riyadha Mosque and draws pilgrims from across East Africa and beyond for recitation, processions, dhow and donkey races and swimming contests.

The local dialect, Kiamu, is prized for its poetry: Lamu is a centre of the Swahili verse tradition of utenzi and of sung poetry, and craftsmanship runs in families — the carved doors and furniture, plasterwork, silver jewellery and the building of dhows in the yards along the shore. Taarab music, with its Arab and Indian roots, is played at weddings, and henna, kanzu and kofia for men, buibui and kanga for women, remain ordinary daily wear.

Etiquette is conservative and easily met: cover up in the lanes, greet before asking, remove shoes at a threshold, ask before photographing anyone. Donkeys are part of the social fabric rather than a curiosity, being the only practical transport for goods, and the town's donkey sanctuary treats them free of charge. Visitors who stay a while notice how much of life happens on the baraza, the stone bench beside every front door.

Lamu town holds most of the island's people, with smaller settlements at Shela, Matondoni, Kipungani and elsewhere; Lamu County as a whole had 143,920 residents at the 2019 census, the smallest population of any Kenyan county. Households are often large and extended, and many families have relatives in Mombasa, Nairobi or the Gulf. Fishing is the oldest livelihood, with mangrove cutting, boat building, small trade and farming on the mainland alongside it; tourism has been the other pillar since the 1970s, employing guides, boat crews, cooks and house staff.

The day starts before dawn with the call to prayer and the boats going out, fills the lanes with school uniforms and handcarts by mid-morning, empties in the afternoon heat and revives after sunset, when the seafront becomes the town's living room. Donkeys, not vehicles, carry building sand, water and luggage, and the rubbish, water and sanitation of a dense historic town are perpetual municipal problems.

Recent years have been difficult. Attacks on the county mainland from 2014 collapsed visitor numbers for several seasons and recovery has been slow. The new port and the transport corridor planned inland promise jobs but have raised arguments over land, fishing grounds and what large-scale development will do to a small island whose value rests on being unchanged.

Lamu's cooking is Swahili coastal food at its richest: coconut, rice, fish and the spices of the Indian Ocean trade. Fish curry in coconut sauce, prawns, crab and octopus, and grilled kingfish are everyday eating, served with wali wa nazi (coconut rice), chapati or ugali. Pilau, rice cooked with cumin, cloves and cardamom, and biryani are the dishes of weddings, Maulidi and Eid, and the local version of biryani is a point of pride.

Breakfast means mahamri, lightly sweet fried buns made with coconut milk and cardamom, eaten with mbaazi — pigeon peas simmered in coconut — followed by strong chai. Street snacks include viazi karai, potatoes in spiced batter, mishkaki skewers and samosas, and sweets run to kaimati, small syrup-soaked dumplings, halwa brought from the Omani tradition, and kashata made with coconut and sesame.

Limes, mangoes, tamarind and coconut in every form come from the island and the mainland farms, and fresh juices are drunk all day. Coconut water is sold from the husk, and mnazi, the tapped palm wine of the coast, is the traditional drink, though this is a Muslim town and alcohol is confined to a few hotels.