A Sunday in Maasailand

The Maasai are considered a very romantic people by those of us whose lives seem drab in comparison. They are sometimes depicted advertising some earthy or exotic product that will stand the test of time in extreme conditions. There are many European women who have found romance with a Maasai ‘warrior’, chasing the exotic dream of power, rugged strength and pride, taking their place in the boma alongside their hero. It rarely lasts for long though. In truth, they are strong and proud but like every other people group, they have to ensure their survival in the unpredictable environment in which they live. And right now, there is little many of them can be sure of.



There is nothing romantic about living in the area we visited yesterday. The landscape is littered with dead or dying cows as people watch their beloved wealth fade away before their eyes. In the last 12 years I have never seen it looking as bad as it was yesterday. Where there was once grass, albeit dry grass in the dry season, there is now nothing but bare earth. Forgive us for such pictures, but it affected us deeply.



This is the scene outside the church at Baraka.



Thanks to the generosity of people back home, we were able to do another ‘food run’ yesterday. Everywhere we went, we were met with grateful thanks while we explained that we are only the channel through which the help has come. Whilst the Government is giving out maize to the very needy, the distribution process doesn’t always run smoothly enough for it to reach them.



Each family was given maize and beans and we have found soya beans that can be ground and made into soya milk porridge. This will be great for the children who have not had milk now for several months. We will have to teach people what to do with them as they had never heard of such a thing or seen the sample we took out to show them.

As we drove back to Arusha, it poured with rain in random patches. Even once the rains start properly, it will take 2 or 3 weeks for the grass to grow and then much longer for the surviving cows to return to health. Thankfully, we have not heard of people dying, but it will take a very long time for the Maasai economy to recover.

We've been to market!

There is much in the news at the moment about the drought in East Africa and many people are indeed very hungry. For the Maasai, the drought has caused massive losses of their most valued asset – their cows. We hear stories of huge numbers of cows dying, of herds being reduced from hundreds to tens and of some bomas losing their entire herd. Outside most bomas there is a place where they are burning their dead.



One woman this week arrived on our door step having walked over 30 miles looking for food. Her husband has left her with their 6 children and all three of her cows have died.

It is raining in Arusha but the rains have not reached all the outlying areas yet and cows are still being sold for a song. Once the rains hit Maasaini – which we are hoping they will very soon - the prices will rocket with so few cows left in the economy. With this in mind, we have been to market – several times – and this herd of scrawny specimens is the result. They will take a long time to bring back to good condition and we are feeding them up slowly and carefully. Some will be ready to give sooner than others.



Today’s total is 23 enabled by supporters of this project.

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.

Graham and Norman's August safari

Graham writes: We started the safari buying some Kenyan cows for the project – better stock and one a young bull calf for breeding purposes. The man was quite reticent but when we started bargaining he came alive, like most Maasai do, to extol the virtues of his cows and why they should be such a high price!
We put our usual marks on the animals that we had bought - the Laiser clan markings across the face and the Big ‘G’ on the rump.



We drove up the Rift Valley and cut across country into the dust.



As we drove near one boma, a young man and a load of children ran out begging for water. Their womenfolk had gone off in the morning and not yet returned. It was after 4 pm and they had had no water. Most of them had been sleeping to pass time and conserve energy. Lekoko opened up the maize sack and gave them some - about 40 kilos - and then gave them water which was gulped straight down.
Everyone was happy and waved us off thanking us and God profusely. It must have been so unreal for them that a couple of white men would come over the hill with food and water out of nowhere. We were to experience this again in several other places.



As the light was fading on that first night, we set off towards Saigare’s boma with him showing us the way. He began to take us through trees and dry river beds while he and Lekoko ran ahead in the headlights to make sure that the Land Rover could get through. A man who is used to walking everywhere and doesn’t know how to drive isn’t the best person to choose the path ahead in my experience! It was incredibly dry and dusty with a terrible following wind that obliterated everything from time to time.
In the end even Saigare lost his way home and asked us to stop and turn the headlights off. Way behind us we could see a dim torch light which was the boma signalling to us that we had passed so we did an about turn and found them. It is a ronjo boma - a dry season temporary boma - made up of a thorn fence and huts of leafy twigs through which the wind and dust blew mercilessly.



Luckily we were given a sheltered spot behind one of these with a couple of cowhides on which to put our mattresses.
Despite the late hour Saigare wanted to kill a goat for us. We had fallen asleep when someone came round with the liver so we chewed briefly through it with our host. We slept again and were woken up a second time for the meat! Sleep was again interrupted when some moran (warriors) came to the camp late and woke up the woman in the ‘hut’ right next to our heads asking for chai. They talked and joked whilst it was being prepared and drunk. There is no whispering in Maasai except to tell secrets it seems. Apart from that we only heard the laboured breathing of a baby with a bad cold!



The dawn was a wonderful display of light and warmth, although I tried hard to keep my eyes closed and catch up on my sleep. When I did open them I found an audience of four women standing watching me!



I soon forgave them when I had a cup of hot chai in my hand, which I make a habit of sharing with the children so we had an attendant flock of eager-eyed young ones. One of them was told to greet us and then between deep shy gasps gave us all the news of the boma, just as a grown man would do, whilst his father watched proudly in the background!



Next stop was the wells where they water their cows. The wind was still blowing relentlessly whipping up clouds of dust as the various flocks headed off in search of patches of grass to eat. The cows are being hit hardest as they need grass whereas the goats can graze on young leaves off the trees. We came across dead cows along the cow trails in many places.



It is reputed that the British dug the first wells to help the Maasai who have continued digging them since then. Each one is variously owned by a group of men with bomas and flocks in the vicinity. There is a small group of young men from other tribes who live and work here doing all the digging on contract. Saigare’s well had run out of water the night before so he had asked to water his cows at a neighbour’s well. He waters the cows in the evening and the goats and sheep in the morning. The water is thrown up in a half galloni - about 10 litres - in three hands up to the trough where the animals come down a path to drink.







Saigare showed us the skull of a hyena he had killed. It had large heavy incisors a couple of flat topped teeth and the back teeth which should have been molars were incredibly sharp and long single teeth. He took us to where he had tied up a piece of cow hide through which he had threaded two sharp sticks with meat on. Directly below it he had dug a stake into the ground and tied his sime (bushknife) to it pointing upwards. The hyena had come along and jumped up for the meat and come down right on top of the sime. Suddenly Saigare was grunting fiercely and running backwards and forwards waving his stick and sime agressively. He was apparently showing us how he saw off a lion that had come after his goats - very impressive show of psychological testosterone! I’ve often wondered what I would do if I met a lion. Statistically it has to happen at some stage if I keep going out into the bush.



We set off again through blinding sand finding a new way through the scrub. We had just cleared the thick scrub when the exhaust came apart and the engine started to roar so we made for a tree and cooked up some tea. I managed to make something up from a tree root and with Lekoko’s help we tied it in place - it lasted until I fixed the thing properly a week later!



At our final stop we found it was market day and as we were desperate for some water and to have a good wash we also headed for the water trough. We stayed again in Norikito’s boma in a hut that was partially built and very comfortable.





Jenny and Lisa joined us here and arrived just in time to dance with the women whilst the men slaughtered the goat under a tree out of sight of the boma - morans (warriors) can’t eat meat that has been seen by a woman.
We were given a portion that we set out on some leaves and sat and ate with the men of the surrounding bomas. It was very tender and we all relaxed and enjoyed it.