The
Masai are a nomadic tribe of goat/cow herders that live in Kenya and Tanzania. They live on a diet of cow's blood, milk, and beef. They trade the goats. Most of them wear traditional dress (a big red piece of cloth wrapped around their bodies), get circumcised as teenagers, carry spears and clubs for killing lions, and have many wives. They are also very tourist savvy, at least in the Masai Mara area.
Last week I learned a couple of things about them after we stopped at a Masai village so we could go inside and get a real view of Masai culture. For this, the villagers asked $1000KS each (that is about $12US). The intern and I elected to stay outside, while Kate & Dabney went on in.
We sat on a bench and a bunch of Masai warriors gathered around. A few of them spoke pretty decent English - they had been sent to school by the villages to return and help the community deal with government / business issues.
One of them pulled out his machete and showed it to me. I said it was nice (my mistake) and I learned lesson number one. Everything the Masai show to you is for sale, and they love to bargain. They tried to sell me everything from earrings, braceletes, and machetes to the teeth of the lions they had killed.
I learned my second lesson when one of them saw the knife sheath on my belt and asked to see it. I couldn't really think of a polite way to refuse, so I pulled out my gerber multi tool and showed it to him. Puzzled, he asked me how it worked so I quickly opened the pliers with a flick of the wrist and closed it back up again.
He took it back and tried to open it, flicking his wrist and arm in different directions to great comical affect. Pretty soon the entire group of them were laughing and yelling in either Swahili or Masai while they took turns trying to figure it out
Imagine a group of 6 guys holding spears and clubs, with elongated ear lobes (from their huge piercings), wearing red robes, and sporting elaborately bound hair, all shouting excitedly in an incomprehensible African language while jumping and swinging their arms about, all in an effort to open the multi-tool.
Once they figured out how to open it, however, they decided it was too cool. They just HAD to have it. They wanted to trade me - and I could have gotten just about anything I wanted from them. Unfortunately, a good multi-tool is hard to find, so I really didn't want to let it go. I managed to get them off the subject by telling them it was my father's and that it wasn't possible to trade. So, lesson learned - keep your gadgets hidden (or better yet, have an extra to trade).
