I spent a wonderful night in a boma (enclosed homestead with a corral for cattle, one for goats and sheep, and a small hut for each wife and her children). Two students and I arrived after work, just before sundown. We drank chai (in Kenya, that's strong black tea with milk and lots of sugar) and chatted with our host and our interpreter (though our host did speak some English) about Maasai tradition and life in New York. The children sang and danced for us, and we ate a tasty dinner of rice, beans and potatoes. Sleeping was interesting: the Maasai sleep on a raised bed of sticks covered with a brittle cowhide. I was a little tall for space and didn't sleep well. Or at all. I will never take a bed for granted again, that's for sure.
Our host is the fellow in purple just in front of me. Shani, our coordinator, is on the far right. The gentleman right next to me, in the cap, is an elder who happened by just as we were beginning to take pictures.
With our interpreter, Marasua.
Taking the sheep out at dawn
