The Masai are an extraordinarily successful people. They occupy a land that straddles Tanzania and Kenya. They are pastoralists; that is, they follow their herds of cattle from pasture to pasture. They have done this since time immemorial and they have survived well. They generally ignore our world and, though they know they live in modern states, the map of the country they truly occupy is the one that exists inside their heads and on the maps of the tourists who come to stare at these exotics in their beautiful territory.
The Masai only participate in our world inasmuch as they want to. They pay taxes if they have to and obey state law when they move outside their lands; they adhere strictly to their own codes while within them. They participate in the modern on their terms only, without any reference to those of us in the Western world. They are not disconnected; they simply prefer the way they live to anything we have to offer. Globalisation, Iraq, whatever; it is academic to them.
And yet the Masai are an entirely 21st-century people. They just happen to prefer wearing red plaid togas, unfortunately not made by them but in China or India, carry spears and knives and live in houses made of cow shit. It provides good insulation, decent fire fuel and is readily available when you up sticks and hit the road again.
At the weekends the young warriors slope off to town. That can often be very far away but they don’t care; they can walk for days without tiring. At night they curl up in their capes and togas and sleep. When they hit the bars and discos resplendent in their curiously shaved heads and extraordinary hairdos, jewellery and weapons these lean, tall and beautiful men hand their knives, spears and rifles over to the hat-check girl who politely provides them with their cloakroom tickets for collection on the way out. Then the lads hit the floor. Barefoot. They don’t do any of that leaping-straight-up-in-the-air-from-a-standing-start stuff that they do back on the ranch. These dudes get down to the latest grooves and dance like toga’d Travoltas.
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Many anaemic-looking German women can be seen strolling hand in hand with these guys; no doubt the Fräuleins’ fevered imaginations have them wandering this “untouched” land with their pet “primitive”. They look awful on the beaches of Mozambique, these unlikely pairings of the elegantly thin plaid-draped warriors and the floridly sunburnt, sweating Mädchen, dumpy in their hideous purple and yellow diagonally patterned Spandex pants and disgraceful sandals complete with “tribal” necklace. The Masai know exactly what’s going on and don’t care about being beach gigolos for a few days. They think it’s great. And then, rifle and spear slung, they hotfoot it back home to the cattle.
It is a fact that for the Masai cattle are everything. They represent wealth, status, food; they have spiritual value and they give meaning to the Masai existence. When the terrible events of 9/11 took place in New York in 2001, the Masai heard about it. Like everyone else in the sane world they were appalled. They presented to the people of New York something that was most precious to them, which had most value and yet was beyond price. Because the scale of the tragedy was so enormous, the Masai gave to the city of New York not one but 15 cows to honour the dead and as an expression of shared sympathy and universal shock. Serious people.
© Bob Geldof. Extracted from Geldof in Africa by Bob Geldof, published by Century on Tuesday,
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