Jump like a Maasai & give good blue steel
A few weeks ago I posted a story about the Maasai women from the village of the school I worked at in Tanzania. Here's the follow up - of the men, who were so kind to us & showed us what it's really like to witness a local Maasai celebration.
Before you scratch your head, yeah some of the guys have scars on their faces. I asked about this, and apparently it's a marking put onto elders, teachers & leaders. So if you look carefully you might see some of the younger guys with them on their cheeks & foreheads. This is because we had a dance teacher & a teacher of Maasai youth in the group.
The chief is the dude who has the cataract eyes & the leather vest under his robes. There's an up close pic of him further down. He was super friendly to me, but I have to tell you he is very intimidating in person. And super charismatic. Like a BOSS. Fitting I guess! I actually was afraid to ask for a picture; normally I'm totally fine with this kind of thing, but there's something about his stance which says 'don't mess with me'. But he willingly posed...I even got a smile out of him! Usually, he's all about the Blue Steel (seems they're all pretty good at it though- they must be taught to master it)
It's incredible to see these guys in full flight. And flying it is. They jump so high it seems to defy gravity. They've even engineered some whizz bang rubber footwear as shock absorbers, made from old car tyres.
I ended up taking some video footage too, so maybe one day I'll get the patience to shift through it all & edit it into something sharable.
