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Planted safely back in the wilderness, I’ve been briefly introduced to bush politics. We went to Paul’s yearly research meeting with the leaders of the community; the chief – appointed by the government, the chairman - elected by the people of the group ranch, and the various researchers and research assistants in the area. The meeting was conducted in Maasai and English, though word for word translation didn’t match up to me. The leaders would talk amongst themselves for several minutes and the version we got sounded more like Tyson verses Spinks 1988. There are two group ranches that Paul does research in and he has a research assistant from both communities. Each group ranch also has a conservation area with no bomas – houses – and that is only used for grazing during times of drought. Our camp is in Okiramatian’s group ranch (the north) and Shompole’s group ranch is to the south. Shompole also has a lodge, for those that can afford its fees, in their conservation area and it is marketed as a place where your encounters will only be of the local variety. So its proprietor doesn’t like the researchers much and thinks they are getting in the way of this egotistical dream. While the community may not agree with this sentiment, the money the lodge brings in is hard to ignore and this man has earned himself the title, a complicated friend. I think the meeting lasted about three hours and I was introduced at the end along with an ACC – African Conservation Centre - intern, Rebecca, who will be staying with us for the next five months. It was clearly annunciated that neither she nor I had our own research agenda so there would be no talk of us sneaking into this system without paying for the privilege of being here. After my introduction one of the community leaders joked, “so I heard she is studying giraffes.” We’ve actually been seeing a lot of giraffes lately, but I try not to look at them too closely.
The hyenas are another story. We’ve been seeing them, but they tend to stay just out of reach. We followed a group for five hours the other night and just when we inched up close enough to dart, she stood up, yawned, and walked further away. Our last two attempts have ended at five in the morning and I got us stuck in the dirt twice. It’s sort of like driving in snow; since it hasn’t rained in awhile (circa April 2008), some stretches of the road are just inches of dry and dusty soil. As if to give us a consolation gift, we found one of the den’s last night and saw a mother pick up a pretty new cub. This saved her from our further advances.
Paul had two blackboards locally made with some money that was raised for the schools. We delivered them to one of the nursery schools nearby - a one-room school -house of 26 students, 8 of them boys. The teacher said that the boys pushed for this school so they could hang out with all of the ladies. When we arrived, the children danced and sang us a welcome song. If I ever find a fast internet connection, I’ll post the video of the dance because it was the cutest thing I’ve ever seen. Some of the parents came too and I received a pair of Maasai earrings as a thank you gift. The mama first tried to give them to Rebecca, but she doesn’t have pierced ears. Paul whispered to me that I should just say my ears are pierced and accept the gift. Luckily, while my ears are irritated by metal and I don’t wear earrings anymore, they are indeed pierced because when I made this confirmation she didn’t just hand me the ear rings, but proceeded to stick them in my ears herself. What a terrible mess that little white lie would have gotten me into. After Rebecca and I had received our jeweled gifts another one of the mamas looked down at the necklaces she was wearing and must have thought, what the hell, this one looks masculine enough, and with that, Paul received a gift too. At the end, the school chairman got up and thanked us in Maasai; the translation I found most amusing. In the true spirit of human discontentment he said, “ just like we say to God when he has brought us rain, Thank you God for your gift, but now, what else can you do for us.”