Is this real life???

This post is named as such in order to express how surreal our experience in the Maasai Mara was. As we drove around the park, that is the Kenyan extension of the famed Serengeti National Park in Tanzania,  in our safari trucks we were frequently taken aback by the park’s breathtaking beauty and amazing wildlife. As the sun set over the savannah we would frequently ask each other, “Is this real life???” I suppose this also speaks to our status as the YouTube generation. 

While in the Mara we went on two game drives per day- one in the morning (truck leaves at 6:15 AM!!- my uncle Pat won’t believe me but I’ve turned into a veritable morning person during my time here in Africa), and one at night. We saw lions- three massive males lazing in the sun beside the remains of a buffalo (reminded me of an enlarged version of Percy!) and two momma lionesses with five lion cubs. The cubs were so adorable and playful, jumping on top of their mothers. We also saw a few families of elephants, hippos (we made a special trip to a known hippo pool to see them), many birds, goofy giraffes, gazelles, hyenas (which are actual fuzzy, adorable, and sweet looking- I know agree with the hyena enthusiasts who were in an uproar after the Lion King’s portrayal of them as stupid, mangy, and vicious), and an adorable family of cheetahs. The crowning glory to our stay in the Maasai Mara was a gorgeous leopard lounging in a tree that we saw on our last day in the Mara. This sighting rounded out the “Big Five” for us. The big five are the most sought after and dangerous animals in East Africa: elephant, buffalo, lion, leopard, and rhinoceros.   

The misunderstood hyena. Photo courtesy of the amazing Bluth

In the Mara we camped at a research field station where elephant herds walked by only 100m from where we slept and ate.  Adorable vervet monkeys are always running around our site, using the tents as trampolines and driving the cooking staff crazy. The second session has officially started and this session I am taking an anthropology class called Environment and Development in Africa. My professor here is the inimitable John Galaty who has been coming here to do his research for nearly 40 years. We did our extremely stimulating lectures under acacia trees. The highlight of my time in the Mara was when our class went on a field trip to a nearby Maasai village where we talked to some of the villagers and interviewed them. Our translator was a young Maasai man with a very quirky personality. The Maasai seem to be a very proud and dignified people. They do not inspire pity in the least despite what we’ve learned about the land tenure issues that they’re facing that we’ve been learning all about. The Maasai are one of the tribes that stretch out their earlobes. They typically wear very bright reds, blue, and purples, in all different prints. They wear lots of multi-coloured bead work too. It may sound awful and garish but the Maasai are incredibly beautiful and their style is very esthetically pleasing. They have an incredible natural grace and style.

Lala Salama (“good night” in Swahili and also my favourite Swahili expression)!