An experience of the Maasai culture (2)

• Food & meals

If you ask any Kenyan what the Maasai eat, you will get a lot of “meat and milk answers” and “blood” sometimes. I am not about to deny any of these answers. But here is what I saw and learnt:

In the morning, breakfast is white tea. The tea has plenty of milk in it (given milk isn’t a nightmare for most community members here anyway). There is not any Maasai whom I came across who takes black tea. It is actually viewed as a sign of extreme poverty to enjoy a cup of black tea. Albeit, there are kids here who do not know anything like black tea. While there, I   I was confronted severally about taking hot water with sugar; not tea. People barely realize that tea is the tea leaves, not the combination of milk and water.

Nobody worries about breakfast “escort”. Most people take at least 2 cups of white tea with nothing. There is no worry of buying bread, or preparing sweet potatoes or mandazi etc for breakfast, because it is normal to have the tea with nothing! This was quite unique to me. In my community people only take tea with nothing if there is no money or means to get the escort. For us, it is not a choice to have a breakfast of tea only, it is a circumstance.

I was at home rarely for lunch, but for the very few times I was present, and from my interaction with the community members, I learn't that the Maasai do not prepare ugali for lunch most of the time. Even in my former high school, we never had ugali for lunch as it is considered too heavy a meal for an afternoon. For lunch, the typical meals are: rice, potatoes, matoke, githeri, beans, pumpkin and green grams. There may be a few people who prepare ugali for lunch, but in my host house there was not a single day that ugali was the meal served for lunch.

Having said ugali is not a typical meal for lunch, this may have sounded like the community doesn’t like it. Well, that is not true! The Maasai do actually like ugali very much! It is “the meal for dinner”. To prove that, I noticed my host family prepared ugali every single night of my stay except for 2 nights. And asking Naserian, she would tell me she has to eat ugali at night or chapatti as the alternative….no other meal! It is believed that ugali gives people enough strength to take them through the night to the next morning. Any other meal would literary wake people out of slumber in the course of the night.  I am not about to complain or judge this mentality. Usually, the ugali is prepared with very nice tasting vegetables. I loved pumpkin leaves vegetables of all the vegetables I ate, they are very delicious and usually had a tinge of milk/cream in them. This makes the whole meal balanced.

A cup of fresh or fermented milk every day is a routine in the Maasai community. For those who have enough cows to supply milk, everyone gets to enjoy a cup of milk every evening (I believe) as they relish the meal of ugali. I noticed that even the local boarding schools will strive to provide students with a cup (or half cup) of milk once a week as part of the schools’ meal. Milk is therefore a signature delicacy of the community. I am still tempted to think that is part of the secret behind most Maasai children leading a healthy life. They rarely experience protein deficiency diseases.

I learn't that in as much as the community owns plenty of livestock, they do not slaughter them every now and then nor do they feed in meat always for that matter. During communal occasions, large cows would however be slaughtered. Save for the occasions, meat is not an “everyday” meal as stereotyped by most of us about the Maasai.

• Greetings verbally/non verbally.

The non-verbal greeting

Growing up, my mom always reminded us to greet the elderly. Anytime we had visitors, we were expected to drop whatever chore we were doing, walk to the living room and greet the visitors before embarking. Every child is raised up to respect older people, and more greet them. It has never been an elderly greeting a child, it is the other way round. The common salutation style is a hand shake.

In the Maasai community, younger people bow to  “blessed” by the elderly as a form of greeting. I call this the “blessing method of greeting”. My first encounter with the greeting was when a colleague and I were strolling. We came across a group of elderly people and she signaled that we should greet them. I went ahead to give a hand-shake only to notice that my friend was “receiving a blessing!” I was very curious to know why she/they did that! In Uganda, ladies get down on their knees when greeting elderly men. Almost a similar culture is in Tanzania where women stoop a bit while greeting the elderly. In Kenya, we probably have some of these greeting cultures but not in my community. While in Enoosaen, I would feel great and important every time children presented their heads so I could greet them. As long as one is older than the second party, he/she is culturally allowed to 'bless' the second party.

Personally, I think greetings by “blessings” are a lot more fun, courteous and “healthier” than plain handshakes. This should be the way to go!

The verbal greetings

In the Maasai culture, men and women have a different phrase used to greet either party. I recall the phrase used when greeting a lady because it is what I was accustomed to. Saying hello as “Takwenya” to a lady and getting a reply of “ikoo” from her is not the unique part of the culture. The unique part is ‘from whom and to whom the greeting is directed in relation to the age difference’. In this case, the older person (man or woman) takes the initiative to say “Takwenya” to the lady. And the younger party (a lady) responds by saying “ikoo”. Again, I was very curious to know why it had to be an older person saying Takwenya  when our African culture expects a younger person to greet the older one. This is the reason I was given, ‘if you translate Takwenya into English or Swahili, it conveys a meaning similar to hello or habari (which thereby makes it right for anyone to say hello). However, in the Maasai language, it doesn’t quite portray a similar meaning literally. It actually comes out a little rude for a younger person like me to say Takwenya to my mom/dad or uncle/aunt or an older neighbor.

An experience of the Maasai culture

        The Maasai are one of the Nilotic communities of Kenya. Historically, they are famous for their “traditional dance”, unique fabric & clothing usually comprising beaded items such bangles and necklaces. Most Maasai wear are very unique such that one would easily notice them from a crowd of varied African regalia. I once attended a conference that brought together at least 70 African cultures and I wasn’t surprised when our Maasai participant from Tanzania seemed to be noticed and admired by all. She had worn a dress and jewellery inspired by the Maasai culture; everyone wanted to have a photograph with her!

        It is not only the dressing and jewellery that identifies a community’s culture, we also need to learn the general lifestyles of a people; their likes and dislikes if at all we are going to survive in a new environment. For the month I was away on volunteer, I would come to interact with a famous culture, the Maasai culture. I choose to call them the “Maasai of Enoosaen”. There are 3 groups of Maasai (as I learnt) and all of them cover the larger Narok county of Kenya. From’s a Maasai’s tribal name, one can distinguish which of the 3 Maasai communities the speaker come from.

I believe the culture I met during my month stay in Enoosaen cuts across most (if not all) the Maasai:

• Dressing

Decency has always been a guiding principle when dressing. It is emphasized in most African traditions that women must wear something decent. By decent they mean “a long dress or skirt for the women”. As mentioned earlier, the Maasai have very unique wear. They have drawn attention globally by their amazingly beautiful “shukas, jewellery and Maasai sandles”. I like clothes made out of Maasai fabric. I do not own one yet, but I will soon. I have 5 different shukas made out of Maasai fabric though. 

While interacting with the community, I realized that women are expected to wear dresses or skirts, not trousers. Women need to look feminine. Depending on the family where somebody comes from, they may have the liberty to wear trousers or not. You will notice women wearing a cloak usually of Maasai fabric. Young girls too love to rock it in a cloak when it gets cold. I found this amazing. I think men too do wear a cloak, but I didn’t notice it much as I did for women. What most people use as a “Maasai blanket” is well thrown back over the back and knotted at the neck bone to form the cloak. 

• Livestock keeping

Usually, I have known the Maasai as pastoralists; they  own lots of cows, sheep, goats and any other livestock. And they own this in very large numbers. I never knew how large is large until I saw it. For a single family, there can be at least 50 cows, 100 sheep and goats! To me this is rather unique given in my community (Luo), unless somebody is a “serious” livestock farmer, you wouldn’t find these kind of figures on livestock keeping. For the Maasai, it is a common thing. And the animals are very healthy meaning the breeders know their work. This is expected for a community that has practiced the same activity for over 2 decades. The most surprising bit to me was the fact that “each of the cows has a name; and they are known by these names! For the goats and sheep, the count is right on the finger tips, any new member would easily be noticed from a far!” It was exciting to see young children (who role play as herders) know all their animals, herd size notwithstanding

• Gender roles in the community

Have you ever seen Maasai herders visit Nairobi in search of greener pastures for their livestock? It is always men doing this work. This is one of the men’s roles in the community; they are the herders.

I had never quite exactly known who milks the cows. In my community, usually men, or boys milk the cows. But there are cases where girls (or women milk too). This happens occasionally, not always especially if men are in the homestead. In the Maasai community, it is the women who milk the cows! Most of the time always. This is one of their roles, they know it is. Young girls would therefore learn how to milk and help their mothers. I found that something new.

Young boys take the flock to graze. They would typically do this all day long and bring the animals back home in the evening for the women to milk them. With education a key priority of the government today, the Maasai are not left out. Young boys will therefore go to school during the week and spend the weekend as “herds’ boys”.

I didn’t figure out the exact role of young girls in the community; the very young ones spent most of their time playing. Those that are of age help out with cooking, cleaning utensils and housekeeping. A young boy may help with cookery, but that only happens before he becomes a “Moran”. Once morans, you will never easily catch them entering the kitchen to cook! They don’t spend time in the kitchen at all. It is however men’s role to slaughter and cook animal meat. Usually, men do the slaughtering in most communities while women would do the cooking. But here was a new culture; that where men do both!

(part 1)