When we got off the plane in Nairobi, our team was greeted by 2 Maasai warriors in full Maasai traditional dress. They were our drivers and protectors throughout the trip, in addition to several of their friends. Our first stop after we left the city of Nairobi was the Great rift valley overlook.
Then we headed to the guesthouse on the Maasai Mara, which is the largest safari destination in the world. It is a desert savannah with red dirt like southern Utah. We saw baboons on the road along the way. The first thing that struck me as different in Africa, even in the city of Nairobi, but also in the rural areas, was the amount of people walking everywhere. Well dressed women in heels, barefoot kids in rags, business men, and everything between, all were walking long distances along the roads and in the ditches. There were cars but a lot of people don’t have them. We also saw motorcycles carrying things like couches, goats, and 4-5 people.
This is the Emparnat cultural center where we stayed for the first half of our trip. There is a guest house (pictured), a guardhouse, a water tower, and while we were there, a new well was drilled and finished and piped to the road, where we had a filling station built for the community to get clean water. There is also a seedling garden and a training center on the grounds, which was finished a few days after we arrived. It will house literacy lessons (Swahili and English), and in the future there will be a sewing center for sewing garden towers and reusable feminine hygiene supplies, and eventually, training held there on reproductive health and abuse prevention. The property was donated 7 years ago by Moses, one of the warriors who works with 100 humanitarians, and is the result of a shared vision between him and 100 humanitarians, for the Maasai people. It’s a beautiful place already, being built before our eyes throughout the trip. The training center will also be a place where the Maasai can preserve their culture and their stories. Since they don’t have a written history, this will be a part of the work there in the future to help gather their stories and artifacts.
After we got settled in at the guest house, we went to a nearby Maasai village. The people there have preserved their culture and traditions for hundreds of years. They welcomed us with singing and dancing, beginning with the warriors and then the women. The young men showed us a jumping contest (which is how they decide who gets to pick the prettiest bride in their village), and gave us each a shuka to wear.
The Maasai used to be nomadic, until the government forced them onto reservations much like the native Americans. Now it is harder for them to get food in their traditional ways. We have been helping them learn to garden to supplement their food, using garden towers and natural pest control and fertilizers. They showed us how they make fire by rubbing sticks together, and how they build their houses. The women build the houses, and they are made of sticks, and a mixture of clay, dirt, and cow dung. I went inside one and was surprised to find 3 tidy rooms with beds and one room for cooking (no chimney or windows, so it was dark and smoky, but tidy). Their homes form a circle and all the families work and play together in the center of the circle. Polygamy is legal there and is part of their culture. Each wife builds her own house. They keep cows, goats, chickens, and lambs, and they hunt occasionally now. They do hunt lions sometimes but mostly as a rite of passage. The young men are taught to defend the village against predators from the time they are little. Many of the people did not speak English but they wanted to see us and communicate as best they could. The children crowded around us and were so sweet.
I almost forgot. I saw my favorite African animal on our first day. It’s a beautiful bird that happens to live on the grounds of the cultural center. I couldn’t catch a picture of it of my own so I looked it up to share with you.
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