NAIROBI, KENYA – We spent the morning visiting another remarkable charity: AmericaShare, which is sponsored by our safari organizer. It right in the middle of an extensive shantytown – a favella if it were in Brazil – and it provides a variety of services (including education) to badly at risk children in the area.
AmericaShareAmericaShare
One of the needs identified by this program is reusable sanitary napkins which facilitate school attendance by teenage girls. They are manufactured on the spot.
AmericaShare
In a study in cultural contrast we had lunch at home with Anna Trzebinski and her father, Michael Cunningham-Reed. Anna is a talented fashion designer, her father a remarkable raconteur.
NAIROBI, KENYA – Sadly, here we are loading our bush plane to return to Nairobi where we have planned a busy day
Bush plane
In Nairobi we visited the David Sheldrick Animal Orphanage, one of the two remarkable charities on our itinerary. Founded by Dame Daphnne Sheldrick the orphanage rescues orphan elephants (the most come cause of the mothers’ death is ivory poachers). The animals are cared for intensively for five years, and then reintroduced into the wild. You can walk among them at their feeding time.
Elephants
Our constant companion on the trip, Patrick, playing soccer with an elephant.
SINGITA GRUMETI RESERVES, TANZANIA – We made a short trip by air to another spot on the Mara River (in Tanzania) known for its crossings. The wildebeest didn’t cooperate so there was little drama in the excursion. We did see a lot of hippos – managed to capture some of my best hippo images.
Hippos
We visited Singita Sasakwa Lodge for lunch and a ride on trail bikes. Singiti Sasakwa is the lodge built by Paul Tudor Jones that I mentioned in an earlier post. Here’s a link: Sasakwa Lodge.
Here’s an image of a burned out area from our bicycle ride:
Controlled burn
Finally, a sunset back at our tented camp – our last in the bush as we return to Nairobi tomorrow.
SINGITA GRUMETI RESERVES, TANZANIA – More images of the moon-like landscape
Zebras
We had a dramatic moment in the late afternoon. A hyena ran down a young wildebeest. As noted elsewhere hyenas eat their prey without killing it first. Here the hyena eats the wildebeest starting with its hind quarters as we hear the wildebeest’s continuing screams. That night in our tent I imagined that every sound that I heard outside of our tent was a hyena.
MAASAI MARA, KENYA – Ride back from the crossing and late afternoon bush walk. Here’s a heard of Maasai cattle. As noted in an earlier post the Maasai are semi-nomadic cattle herders. They prefer large horn cattle in white with small black markings. The Maasai believe that all the cattle in the world belong to Maasai, leading to behavior that is considered cattle theft by others. Historically their diet consisted primarily of milk mixed with cow’s blood drawn from an artery – they patch up the wound after drawing the blood. They supplement it with sheep and goats. Cows are to valuable as a measure of wealth to slaughter for food.
Maasai cattle
This gives some idea of just how ugly the spotted hyena is:
Spotted hyenas
We took a late afternoon bush walk. This is Maria with our Maasai guide, Ping, inspecting a termite hill. Ping is an amazing story teller; he’s the fellow who spent six month’s in Orlando advising on the safari ride.
MAASAI MARA – In the late afternoon, under dull skies, we visited a Maasai village. The Maasai are nomads – they tend cattle which are their primary index of wealth. We find the Maasai friendly and welcoming. Their culture is sufficiently binding that they tend to return to their roots after being educated, and even after travel to the US. Our Maasai guide in the Maasai Mara, Ping, had spent six months in Orlando as a consultant to the Safari feature at Disney World. They are under severe pressure to change some of their ways, For example it was a coming of age rite for a young Maasai man to kill a lion. The Maasai population is East Africa is around 400,000, the lion population is around 25,000 so the numbers no longer support this practice. The Maasai also historically practiced female circumcision, a practice that has appropriately been banned by the governments of Kenya and Tanzania. Here’s a link the the Wikipedia entry on the Maasai: The Maasai
One interesting theory on the origin of the Maasai that we heard from several guides: A Roman legion was sent to explore the sources of the Nile and vanished. The theory is that legion trained a local tribe as legionnaires and that the Maasai descended from them. The Maasai wear red cloaks (colour reserved for soldiers in the Roman army) draped like togas and use spears which resemble the Roman Pilum and short swords which resemble the Roman Gladius.
Maasai
Nancy and Maasai:
Nancy and Maasai
Maasai chickens:
Massai chickens
Maasai child at play:
Maasai child at play
We were taken into a Maasai house – they are constructed of acacia branches driven into the ground and covered with cow dung. There is one very small window – 6 cm or so in diameter.
Inside a Maasai home
Maasai children in the door of a Maasai house. Maasai boys
