Enthusiasm for School

Monika lives in the ‘middle of nowhere’ in very harsh, dry and dusty conditions. Her husband, who works in a town 150 miles away, had three wives but two were unable to cope with such harsh living conditions and have left. Monika has ten children and not only accepts her lot, but LIVES her life, with an incredible grace.



It is law in Tanzania that every child should receive primary education although some slip through the net due to distances from schools. Not Monika’s children. They leave home at 4am in the dark and, joining other friends along the way, they walk until they arrive at school at 8am. Leaving school at 1pm they arrive home just before darkness falls again.



The road to school with wildebeest running across the background (if you look carefully!).

Ears.....and ears.......

In every community, there is the old and the new. Both have their merits in many different ways and both are often at odds with each other.

The Maasai are no different and these two photos seem to epitomize what was and what is to come....



Maasai ears are usually put to good use. This old pill pot is most likely to be carrying snuff.



And these ears.....well they say it all!

Graham's Maasai Father

Ormonderei is Graham’s Maasai father.He has no idea how old he is but he is in the age set above Graham. The process of becoming a member of his clan began with Graham giving him a heifer. Since then he always greets Graham as ‘heifer’ whenever he sees him. Being a part of his clan has meant that all the Cow Project cows can have the Laiser markings on them as well as the ‘G’ stamped on their rump.



We were also given a plot just outside his boma to build our hut on in which the church now meets. As a son of the boma, Graham is expected to give his father presents. In this picture, he is being given a knife that Graham made for him to make up for all the times he has inadvertently arrived empty handed! He is showing him where his name is written on the blade.

Olpul

Warriors are the standing army of their people and must concentrate on building up and maintaining their strength. One of the things they like to do is ‘party’ in their own unique way. This involves a group of men finding a secluded place away from the eyes of women to set up camp for a meat feast to last from several days to several weeks. Traditionally, they would only eat bullocks but nowadays, they might also bring the odd sheep or goat along and men older than the warrior age set like to take part. They may take a few younger boys and girls with them to do the work of collecting fire wood and cooking the soup. They will eat the meat either roasted or as a soup to which they add special tree bark and herbs which aid digestion and increase strength and courage. And there they stay, in seclusion, building strength and comradeship until every animal is eaten.

In this gorge, there were three different age sets in separate olpuls hidden along the dry river bed.

The black stone remedy

This woman had been stung by a scorpion on her foot and was in considerable pain. She is sitting here with a black stone on the wound which Lekoko had opened with a knife. The stone sticks to the wound and as she sat there for an hour or so, she said the pain was slowly drawn back down her leg until it left her foot all together and the stone dropped off. Black stones are an age old remedy for snake bites, stings etc all over the world and are made from animal bones. No scientific study is known which proves them to be effective and their value is debatable. However, this woman was happy with the result and that’s all that matters! Scorpion stings, although not fatal in a normal healthy adult here, are extremely painful and we have found that the stone helps every time.