By Ramadhan Karali

There is a quiet habit many of us carry.

When something good happens, we shrink it. Someone congratulates you and the first instinct is to laugh it off. “It was nothing.” “Just a small thing.” You say it quickly so you do not sound arrogant, so the moment does not appear bigger than you.

But the truth sits somewhere deeper. Some moments take months, sometimes years, to arrive. Long walks with a camera. Long hours learning how to see. Small opportunities slowly building into bigger ones.

Getting to Dar es Salaam was one of those moments.

The trip happened through an invitation to join the Colour Photowalk organised by Picha Stock, and I remain grateful for that opportunity. It is not a small thing for a photographer to be invited into spaces like this, even though we sometimes pretend it is.

The flight from Nairobi is short, but the shift in atmosphere feels much bigger.

Dar carries a softness that you feel almost immediately. The city breathes differently. People greet you like they already know you. Conversations start easily. The pace allows you to notice things.

It makes you think about Ubuntu without anyone needing to say the word.

You simply feel it.

The First Night

Before the photowalk even began, we went out to walk through the city at night.

It happened to be the month of Ramadan, and the streets were alive in a way that only certain moments in a year can create. People were moving between mosques, shops, and homes. Food vendors lined the streets preparing meals for those breaking their fast. Groups gathered quietly for prayer.

The atmosphere felt communal.

Strangers sat side by side sharing space and conversation. The streets felt full but calm. A kind of brotherhood was visible everywhere. You could walk for hours simply watching life unfold.

As photographers we lift our cameras often, but there are moments that asks to be experienced first and photographed second.

Those are always the best ones.

Where the Artists Gather

The next day we visited Nafasi Art Space.

Inset: **One of the Galleries at Nafasi art Space**

If you ever want to understand the creative pulse of Dar, spend a few hours there. Studios filled with painters, sculptors, performers, musicians, photographers. Conversations moving easily between disciplines. People making work without the need to explain why.

It reminded me that strong art scenes rarely appear by accident. They grow because people choose to create together.

You leave a place like Nafasi feeling slightly jealous of the community they have built there.

The Colour Walk

The Colour Photowalk began with something simple. Walk the city and pay attention to colour you have been given and I got the color red

Dar makes that easy. Colour lives everywhere. In fabrics hanging outside shops. In the painted kiosks that line the streets. In the clothes people wear as they walk past you.

Photographers drifted through the streets slowly. Someone would stop suddenly because light had fallen perfectly on a wall. Another would wait five minutes for the right person to step into the frame.

The same street produced completely different photographs depending on who was holding the camera.

There is a quiet excitement in that kind of walk. You look around and realise everyone is chasing the same thing. Not fame. Not attention.

Just that one frame that feels right.

**My shots for the day, Red, being my color**

Crossing the Water

The following day we took the ferry across to Kigamboni.

The ferry itself already feels like a story. People packed together, motorcycles squeezed into corners, the city slowly pulling away behind you while the ocean opens ahead.

On the other side the air changes. The beach stretches quietly. Fishermen move between boats preparing their nets. The work looks slow, deliberate, practiced over years.

Watching them reminded me how photography often rewards patience more than speed.

You wait. You observe. Eventually the moment reveals itself.

A Conversation That Stayed With Me

Later that evening we found ourselves at Zionzuri Art Gallery, spending time with Ras Mambo.

That evening quietly became the highlight of the entire trip.

Ras Mambo speaks about life in a way that makes you slow down. He spoke about livity. About living consciously. About respecting what you put into your body and the rhythm you move through the world with.

He spoke about food, health, balance, and spirit with the calm certainty of someone who has thought deeply about life.

The conversation stretched into the evening. We walked through his gallery. The city slowly dimmed outside.

Some moments travel with you long after the trip ends.

That was one of them.

Leaving Dar

Soon enough it was time to pack up and return to Nairobi.

Trips like this never look big when you describe them. A few days in another city. A photowalk. Some conversations. A handful of photographs.

But something stays with you.

Maybe it is the streets during Ramadan. Maybe it is the artists at Nafasi. Maybe it is fishermen working quietly along Kigamboni. Maybe it is the wisdom shared over conversation at Zionzuri.

Or maybe it is the realisation that moments like these are exactly why we carry cameras in the first place.

Not for the photographs alone.

For the doors they open.

For the people they introduce you to.

For the cities that begin to feel familiar even after just a few days.

And sometimes, when you look back at it all, you realise something.

The moments we often try to call “nothing” are the ones people secretly wish they had experienced too.

Dar Stayed With Me