A collection of mostly very short stories compiled after two weeks on safari in Kenya and Tanzania.

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The painting conveys so much; at first glance it’s mostly the radiant beauty, for a portrait to render a young woman so beautiful she must surely have been even more-so in life beyond the canvas. However there are layers here, and the layers have context, to really appreciate the beauty that lies within it’s the context that must be understood.

In Kenya, a suburb of Nairobi called, simply, Karen, on an historic coffee plantation with a single story ranch home, built by colonialists from Europe, here to exploit the natural resources and the local people, a failed marriage, a dream of a business that died, but in the loss came rebirth in the form of a novel, Out of Africa, written by Karen Blixen, and later an eponymous movie, and with it recognition and fame and money and a place on the map, all for both the author and the subject.

And it was in this life that Karen began painting portraits of young Kenyans who had became a part of her life, or maybe she had become a part of their lives.

Recognized as the most beautiful young girl in the entire area, tribal custom followed that she would be presented for marriage to various tribes near what would much later become the suburb Karen, and as if to validate the consensus of her beauty, the most affluent tribe won her hand with the unheard of offer: 250 goats and a pot of honey.

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Culture is a fascinating concept, for it can never be Right and it can never be Wrong, it is simply different, and the difference is better to be understood than to be judged. In the Maasai culture, a man can have more than one wife but only if he has the financial wherewithal to support her, for that support comes in the form of her having her own home. The Maasai woman owns All the property inside the home. For the Maasai man, his wealth is measured not by a bank account but by the number of cows and goats he owns.

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Walking across the runway, we boarded the Air Kenya de Havilland Dash 15 bound for the Masai Mara.

Directed to the front of the plane as boarding passes have not yet made the trip to remote Kenyan border towns, we found ourselves occupying the emergency exit row. The flight attendant’s extensive, earnest and detailed instructions on our responsibilities hinted at her expectation that a reasonable likelihood existed where we would actually have to do what she said. (There was a flash of a good future consultant – someone with the knowledge that giving advice is much easier than actual implementation.) She explained in great detail exactly how to remove the emergency exit door, but stopped mid sentence and said “Before opening the door, first look through the door window and check for fire, propellers and lions!”

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It is said that the wildebeest was the last animal made by God. He was essentially finished with his work, but had leftover body parts so made the wildebeest, whose horns come from the Cape Buffalo, face from the locust, short rear legs from the hyena, and mane from the lion.

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Having colonized a good part of the world, the British were very experienced, so when the British Road Engineering Office was called to the Ngornogoro Crater to do site selection and road construction from the crater rim to the crater floor, they surveyed numerous locations and chose the optimal path. Building the road was made easier by the fact it was already an existing path – the smartest animals living on the crater floor, the elephants, had already figured out the optimal path and had been using it for millennia. The British simply had to widen the path to create a safe and navigable single lane road.

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Migration in central Africa is a fact of life, and a matter of life and death, for many species especially the herbivores as they require vast amounts of land for grazing on the wild savanna grasses. The rut happens in one designated locale, babies are born where water and food are plentiful, but as grasses are depleted and weather turns hotter, the clockwise migration begins – another form of the cycle of life, this one repeating annually. Zebras in the hundreds of thousands lead the migration as they eat the tops of the tall grasses, followed by the wildebeests who eat the middle grasses as they are a source of water, and finally the gazelles who enjoy the short grasses. Lions, leopards and cheetah trail the annual migration as they enjoy all three of these road warriors.

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These Toyota Land Cruisers work as hard as the men who drive them. 80 km/hour on dusty, hardened washboard roads, absolutely pounding tires, rims, shocks, springs, bearings and bushings. Dust everywhere. 6-8 passengers plus luggage and supplies. Two spare tires on the back as every safari has at least one flat tire. These things are bulletproof, there is no alternative. Service life in this harsh, unrelenting environment is 20 years!

Recently the Four Seasons Serengeti bought a fleet of Range Rovers because, well, because they’re the Four Seasons. But what happens when you get dust on a vacuum sensor and it shuts down the engine? Six months later the Range Rovers were auctioned and replaced with, well you already know.

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Elephants are either left handed or right handed, and you can tell by the tusks, the dominant side is shorter because that’s where all the work is done.

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In the early days of colonizing Africa, the missionaries ventured into the bush to meet and convert the locals. Camping under a specific type of shade tree that they favored, malaria became problematic so they named this genus of tree the Fever Tree. Much later they learned the malaria came from mosquitoes.

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Visiting the Nairobi National Museum, our guide Winnie led us to the Cradle of Mankind wing, stopping abruptly at the entrance, asking if anyone was a devout Christian and if so, are we okay proceeding as this permanent exhibit is centered around Evolution and some Creationism visitors refuse to enter.

A similar conversation ensued at the entrance to the Modern History of Kenya wing – turns out some British visitors also refuse to enter, something to do with oppressing an entire population, slave trade, stealing land rights, separate and unequal….

With Knowledge comes Power.

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In Maasai culture it is widely believed that if a Dik Dik runs across your path then something bad will happen. Possibly because a running Dik Dik is often closely followed by a very hungry leopard.

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When walking, giraffes are unusual in that both legs on the same side move together. They gallop with front and rear legs moving as pairs, enabling them to reach speeds up to 37 mph.

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Hippopotamus are the most dangerous animal in this part of Africa, responsible for over 500 human deaths each year, far in excess of other predators such as lions or crocodiles. The threat comes from their territorial nature – we were told more than once that if you enter their space, they will simply kill you. Herbivores, they won’t eat you, they’ll just use their jaws, which open to 180 degrees, to bite you in half and leave you for the hyenas.

With Knowledge comes Survival.

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Giraffes feed on the stately and shapely Acacia tree, but in an example of survival of the fittest, the Acacia tree had to develop protective mechanisms. It holds ants within the tree bark and structure, not causing structural problems, but rather warding off the giraffes for if they eat too much of the tree the ants go up their nose and they immediately stop.

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Kenya encompasses 44 distinct tribes, each with their own unique identity, customs and language. To unify the country around a common language, Swahili was selected. To enable the country to be a part of the global community, English was adopted. And so nearly all Kenyans speak at least three languages: Swahili, English and their native tribal language.

Learning and using just a little Swahili, derived from Bantu and Arabic, makes for a completely different experience.

Hello – jambo

Please – tafadhali

Thank you – Asante

You’re welcome – Karibu

What’s happening – mambo

Cool – poa

Everything is good – acuna matata

Goodbye see you soon – kwaheri ya kuonana

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Felix and Oscar. Giraffes and Warthogs. They both get along because they each bring something to the table. Given giraffe’s height and better vision, they can identify predators early. Similarly, warthogs have extraordinarily good hearing, so they hear what the giraffe doesn’t see. They keep each other safe and do not pose a threat to each other.

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A group of tourists

A tower of giraffes

A pride of lions

A herd of Cape buffalo

A dazzle of zebras

A bloat of hippopotamus

A harem of impala

A sounder of warthog

A collision of cheetahs

A journey of giraffes when on the move

A herd of elephants

A troop of monkeys

A nothing of leopards, for they are solitary creatures

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Just for the fun of it…..

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Those who wander are not lost.

As this marks the end of the Great African Safari blog, it is dedicated to the most wonderful people of Kenya and Tanzania, whose smiles and warmth and beauty and kindness will forever be remembered.

Kwaheri ya kuonana!

Doudi (David)