Maasai lands
on It began in Africa (Kenya), 24/Oct/2011 12:44, 34 days ago
For anyone short on time, this blog post can be summed up as: "the Maasai people are flipping awesome". Those who prefer rather more detail might like to read on...I spent most of last week moonlighting and doing some work for VSO directly. One of their large projects in Kenya is due to wind down early next year and as it's EU funded there is a big evaluation task ahead, so VSO asked for volunteers to help by writing case studies. Quite frankly, I jumped at the chance to escape "capacity building" for a few days and just do some good old fashioned work, and asked if I could write case studies on a bead work project with women from the Maasai communityNorth of Nanyuki.Luckily for me not only is the project generally accepted as being one of the more successful examples of VSO's work, with a brilliant and hugely committed volunteer in place (Sally), it is also in a very remote and beautiful area of the country: reaching the women's groups involved a 2-3 hour 4x4 journey from Nanyuki each morning, most of it on what we might loosely call dirt roads, but which in places were more like rivers of mud. We wound up hills and through tiny villages, collecting Maasai ladies ad-hoc on the way. Our journey even took us through a game conservancy as a short cut - it isn't every day you see a cheetah chowing down on a gazelle on your commute.With such poor roads there is no public transport so it was lucky that I could arrange my trip to fit in with a week's training on bead work and join the VSO trainers for two days. This is Beatrice (right) showing Florence Murian a new beading technique.I think one of the reasons why I like the Maasai so much is because they share a lot of qualities with the British. They don't make a fuss, dislike busy-bodies interfering and have a kind of reserve that's very different from many of the other peoples of Kenya.When I've arrived at KAIH's groups there is normally singing and welcome speeches, and then quite often people try to get me to give them money (little do they know they're dealing with what might be the tightest Mzungu in Kenya). I find it all very well meant but, being English, also rather embarrassing and, well, just a bit much. But when we arrived at the Maasai villages the ladies would already have picked a tree and settled themselves down to start work (after walking miles to reach the village), and would be laughing and teasing each other, shouting out for thread or chai, showing little interest in the random mzungu.Most other Kenyans seem to find the Maasai something of an enigma. One of my colleagues at KAIH once said to me: "Allys, I am thinking that you Mzungus are very much patient. You people are even working with these Maasai, and for me they are the most difficult people in the world. I could not work with them." (Never mind that KAIH's policy manual has a section on not discriminating against people on the basis of tribe). Even on our trip Sally told one of the trainers that they had applied to the government to repair one of the roads to the villages and maybe even establish a matatu service. The trainer looked puzzled and said: "But why would we build them a road? The Maasai like to walk so much." Hmmm...Anyway, I set about the "work" of interviewing the ladies (frankly, I couldn't imagine a better excuse to be really nosy), and luckily they were unfazed about talking to me. The language barrier was a challenge though: at one point I had someone translating my English to Swahili, then someone else translating the Swahili to Maa and back again! Here's me and Esther trying to get to grips with the "trialogue":I'm still not quite sure we got to the bottom of what these two older ladies were saying but we all had a nice chat:As a rule of thumb the more elaborate necklaces a lady wears the more important she is, and if she has lots she will normally be a first wife. Yep, men are polygamous in traditional Maasai culture, although this is starting to change, particularly as some people are converting to Christianity. You can also see the enlarged ear holes on the older ladies, but not on the younger woman - a sign of the times.While I enjoyed spending time with the Maasai people every community has it's challenges. The women I met are isolated, and getting access to health clinics, schools and even food can be a big problem: even very young children often walk miles to school, and getting a sick child to a doctor usually means carrying them cross-country. One of the things that Sally does to help the ladies is selling beads on her visits, because getting as far as Nairobi is all but impossible for most women. Traditionally men hold all the cards too, and female circumcision, early marriage and large families are commonplace.Things are changing. In contrast to the ladies in the photo above, many of the younger women I interviewed spoke English and/ or Kiswahili, wore much less traditional dress and had an entrepreneurial outlook, managing shambas and shops or taking evening classes in accountancy. And all the women I met told me how much the bead work project had helped them, allowing them to pay school fees for their kids, invest in small businesses and earn more respect and consideration from the men - no mean feat in this very patriarchal society. The community is working hard to tread the fine line between development and retaining their culture.I was sad to leave when our second day of visits came to an end, so it was lucky that our trip coincided with a return visit to nearbyIl Ngwesi, the lodge that you might remember frommy earlier blog post. The lodge is affiliated with the bead work projects and entirely owned and managed by the community, with all profits reinvested. Of course, the best thing about my return visit was that this time I got to share it with Eddie (although up to the very last minute he remained paranoid that something would stop him!).We went on a safari-walk in the morning, but this time finished up with an amazing bush breakfast (only slightly perturbed by being told that the trees were "perfect for leopards").Then in the evening we visited a Maasai cultural village, where we got shown how to start a fire, trap animals and, of course, the incredible Maasai jumping.Check out how much air that guy is getting and the massive grin on his face! Back at the lodge that evening the staff did more jumping accompanied by the most amazing singing and rhythms. Chatting to one chap, Joseph, later on, he asked us what our traditional dress and dances were like in the UK and my home suddenly felt a bit drab. I decided against trying to explain what a night out in Bristol city centre is like.That night Eddie and I asked for our bed (on wheels) to be rolled out onto the terrace so we slept under a sky brimful of bright stars and woke the next morning to views over the watering hole. I can honestly say that being a VSO volunteer is probably the most spoiled I have ever been in my whole life and that I have had experiences I simply could not have dreamed of at home. I will try to make my next post a bit less smug but sometimes it's ruddy difficult!A massive thank you to Sally Renshaw for her support and her hard work organising our trip, and to the staff and community at Il Ngwesi for being so awesome.