Who are the maasai?

If someone visits Tanzania or Kenya, there is a high chance that they will meet maasai people, who are easy to recognise. Yes, even for Europeans. They live mainly in south Kenya and north Tanzania around the national parks: in Kenya, around the Masai Mara, and in Tanzania, around its continuation, the Serengeti and the Ngorongoro crater.  

Why are they so interesting, and why would I want to introduce them to you?

There are two main reasons I chose to write about the maasai: firstly, because they still follow the matchless semi-nomadic lifestyle; secondly, because I came across with an interesting book, The white masai, some weeks ago, which presented some more incredible things about their culture, on top of that, from a Swiss woman’s point of view. I remember that the first description I heard about them from the others when I travelled to Tanzania – either from the taxi driver in Arusha, or the guy with whom I was waiting at the hotel in the first morning of my safari, or even our safari guide – was that they are primitive. There was no hatred in this, but I could definitely sense a kind of superiority towards them. They were somehow always mentioned distantly, on a different page. It just got more intense in Zanzibar, where they were counted almost as immigrants. But I will talk a bit more about this later.

What is their lifestyle like, and what traditions do they follow even today?

First, it’s important to note that there could be differences between the Kenyan and the Tanzanian maasais; I only saw the latter, and unfortunately, I didn’t get to visit their village, so I don’t have authentic sources. Hence I can only talk about what I experienced during my trip, and what were told about them. First of all, their appearance and clothing are unique. They are all tall, slim, lean, without any exception. They wear the special red and/or blue checkered sheet, the so-called shuka. (At the end of my safari, I got one as a gift from the organisers as thank you for choosing them.) I mostly saw them in red, they could be spotted in the rangeland from quite a distance. They wear such bright colours as they think that they scare the wild animals away with it. Apart from their dress, they always carry a club/stick. Moreover, they wear different jewellery, such as necklaces, earrings, bracelets, ankle bracelets, belt, rings, head ornaments. It is more typical among the young warriors that they ornate their body.   

As we might assume from the previous naming, the maasai are traditionally warriors, and they still keep their tribal-military organisation, even though there is no need for that any more. The maasai never mixed with other tribes, and back in time, they were so combative that the other tribes feared them. They say that when the Arab slave traders moved more and more into the African land, they had a saying: “Just let us be saved from maasais, lions and elephants!”.    

However, a boy has to go through a strict ritual to become a warrior. They collect the boys in their age of 7-15 in every few years for the initiation. During the ceremony, they shave their hair off, got circumcised, then they dress in black, pain their faces, ornate their heads with feathers, and go to live in the wilderness to learn how to survive, and at the end to return as warriors. Some time ago, the part of the ritual was also to kill a lion with their own hands; however, it’s been banned concerning the decreasing animal population.

We met such warrior-to-be boys on our way, but we have to note that if we stop for them, they beg for food. This wouldn’t be a problem in itself, but they usually ask and get chocolate and sweets, which could be harmful for them; moreover, it ruins their teeth, and they don’t get dental treatment. When we stopped for these boys, as we wanted to take a photo of them, they asked for food, too. I had Belvita biscuit with me in small packs, and decided to give it to them. They were three of them, so I gave each of them one small pack. It wasn’t chocolate or candy I gave them, so I do hope that I didn’t do anything bad to them.

 

Going back to traditions. Until a boy becomes a warrior, he lives at home in the manyatta (hut) of his parents, and they are responsible to take the cattle out grazing, and also to acquire the different rituals and traditions. I saw little boys many times along the road, alone, far from any inhabited area grazing their animals. It’s so hard to imagine how it is possible at all, as in our world, children go to kindergarten and school to play and learn, instead of shepherding cattle somewhere in the rangeland, God knows how many kilometres from their village. They don’t have mobile phones to call their Mums at what time they get home, or GPS not to get lost in the nowhere.

Guarding the animals is a big responsibility at the maasai, since animals mean real value for them. The more cattle and/or goats a family have, the wealthier they are, and the higher they are on the social ladder. Even the value of the girls are determined in cattle. Unbelievable, isn’t it? They slaughter and eat their animals only on special occasions. Otherwise, they mainly eat porridge and rice, and drink milk and tea. They know their animals so well, that they immediately notice if one goes missing. They can’t count so they identify them by their shape and size. This would be doable even for me if it were about 10 animals, but I don’t think I could do that for a bigger herd. But thank God, I haven’t become a shepherd. 🙂

The other wealth measurement is the number of children. So the more the better. Thus it shouldn’t be surprising that a man can have more wives, but he has to take care of all of them, and he has to provide a separate hut for all of them. This is an absolutely accepted custom, and based on this, we can already assume that women don’t have much word in this society. They were basically bought for animals, so they are possessed by the men. Don’t misunderstand it, men respect women, as they ensure the tribe’s survival. But I would rather say that they are the tools of reproduction than true value. They have to obey, and they cannot contradict their husbands; otherwise, they can be beaten. Women’s resposible for cooking, building the hut, bringing water, making jewellery, and raising children.

Where do the maasai live?

As I mentioned above, they live in so-called manyattas. These are circular huts made of mud, grass, cow dung and sticks, and built by women. About 10-15 such manyattas make up a “village”, which are enclosed in a circular fence built by the men, and which is made of thorned branches to protect their families and livestock from the wild animals.

We could have visited a maasai village on our safari, but it would have been only an exhibition village with the aim of getting as many tourists as possible spend as much money as possible. It wouldn’t have showed us their real world. It shows that tourism and the western world have their impacts on them, too. They know that they can earn money with such organised exhibitions and shows, and with selling souvenirs to tourists. We talk about hand-made jewellery, but it loses its magic when it’s all about money, and they only look how much you give for them, and how many you buy. Obviously, we cannot blame them, since they also have to live on something.  

Many of them move from the wilderness to bigger cities to get jobs, and secure living. Many take jewels, pictures, small statues, clothes that were made by the women at home to places where there are lots of tourists, and they can sell them. That’s how the maasai got to Zanzibar, too. Since there they steal the business from the locals, who also do everything to make money and “milk” the mzungu, i.e. the white people, the maasai are not too popular. They are kind of economic immigrants, if you like.

Should we envy them for living in such harmony with nature and still far enough from the problems of the western world?  

I don’t think they know stress, or what a deadline and being in a rush is. They don’t live for their work, and instead of the city noises and smog, they graze their animals in the quiet of nature, they know the plants, the tides of the rivers, and the wild animals. They live in peace with each other and their Enkai, their God. I played a bit with these thoughts, whether they are right, and maybe it is a better and happier way of living, until I was thrown out of my daydreams by the book of Corinne Hofmann, The white masai.

I don’t intend to write a long book review, I’d rather highlight some points from the book I found interesting to think about. First of all, this is a story of a Swiss woman: how she fell in love with a maasai warrior on her holiday in Kenya, and how she got to give her earlier life up, and moved to Kenya, to a maasai village, and got married to this warrior, from whom she had a daughter at the end. The whole story is a huge adventure, series of lots of difficulties and many compromises. It is already scary that a maasai village is a few days of walking from any bigger towns, or many hours of driving on not too smooth “roads”. So there are no bigger stores or any doctors at hand. The houses (huts) are quite small and smoky, practically there is only one room, where even more generations can sleep together, even with smaller animals. There is no bed or table. You have water only if women take some from the stream. Then this water is used for washing themselves, washing up and cooking. They, of course, cook on fire, and their diet is not too varied. They have no gardens to grow vegetables, as their culture doesn’t allow them to “pierce through” the mother earth. Washing clothes is possible only in the stream, with hands. There is no bathroom or toilet, they have to go outside the village, over the fence to do what is needed. This cannot be too pleasant at night, especially knowing that there can be wild animals out there. If someone gets sick, they try to heal them with organic infusions, or they give some raw blood from the artery of a cow, just for strengthening the immune system. 🙂

The maasai speak the maa language, or maybe a bit of Swahili, but only few of them know English, so the communication is not easy with them either. As I mentioned, traditions and rituals are very important for them, and there is no gender equality. So it’s maybe not surprising that men and women cannot eat together, and it also matters a lot which bites can a woman eat, especially from an animal. And it’s absolutely normal that a man has more than one wives, but the women have to be faithful. It’s already suspicious if she’s chatting with another man. It could lead to a big jealousy issue. Furthermore, you are exposed to mosquitos, through which you can easily get malaria or other diseases. To treat it, you need to get to the hospital somehow. Finally, giving birth must also be a difficult job here.   

All of this are things that we take for granted to have and reach easily: electricity, gas, clear water, doctor, groceries, etc. The book is an incredible demonstration of the everyday life, that this woman conducted for 3 years – I have no idea how. I was, however, dragged back to reality, and was shown that the simple, stress-free life has just as many drawbacks. So we can daydream about the idle pastoral life, but I wouldn’t ever be a maasai. Though on the coasts of Zanzibar, along the ocean, it might be a completely different case. 🙂

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