Maasai

Through the countryside, desert and tiny Massai villages sprinkling the otherwise barren area with the bright red of their clothing. Along the way, we stopped at one of the most amazing natural occurrences I have ever seen. It is a sand dune peaking up from an otherwise flat area, and the sand dune magically moves 17 meters each year. The Maasai keep track and mark how far it moves, amazingly staying completely together, partly due to the fact that the sand is in fact magnetic. The sand dune is a sacred place to them. They make animal sacrifices and pray there, and they are honored that people come from around the world to see their holy place.

However, driving through the Maasai area was also morally conflicting. Small Maasai children would come up to our car, even mothers with small children, and they would ask for us to take pictures and would ask for money. On one side, they were all so beautiful, and we wanted to capture the beauty of their clothing and culture, and I felt it was more fair than taking pictures without them knowing, but yet it felt somehow artificial and wrong to be taking pictures of people, just like the elephants and giraffes we passed.

We also visited Olduvai, where LUCY was discovered along with some of the oldest human remains known to man. (I am standing in front of the excavation sight in the picture).

Tanzania is BEAUTIFUL!