Day 16. Sun 6th October
Iringa to Ruaha
It is a relatively short drive from Iringa to Tunga Malinga lodge in the
Ruaha National Park, and we are there in time for lunch of beef and rice
(just for a change!). This is another typical park lodge, thatched huts
(banda) with squat loos and basic showers, but clean. There is no electricity,
and this time not even any electric light, although each hut is provided
with a hurricane lamp.
The staff are very friendly, and don't mind being photographed preparing
our evening meal!
In the afternoon Jonas, the manager of the lodge, takes Kate, Sue and me
for a walk around the nearby village, and to see the local school. It is
Sunday and so the school is closed and the villagers are mostly relaxing
and brewing up the local beer, which looks like porridge. We are welcomed
into the village with a great deal of enthusiasm and no little curiosity.
The camera trick works as well as ever, and, on seeing the image, one woman
asks Jonas if I am a magician. We are offered a taste of the latest brew,
but politely turn it down, not only because we have been warned that it
opens the bowels with great speed and efficiency, but also because there
only seems to be one plastic cup, and most of the villagers have already
drunk from it. Jonas explains that although the inhabitants of this village,
which is on the main road into the park, will have seen white people before,
there may be many vistors for outlying villages who have not. Indeed, when
I try to make contact with a Masai girl with magnificent earings and headgear,
she shrinks back into a building, and I don't push the point.
One woman is very proud of her son, who is working at his sewing machine,
and begs to have a photograph taken. I shal send a copy of this, and some
of the others, to Ken in the hope that he may be able to distibute them
on his next circuit.
We meet several Masai on the road, including a striking young woman who
must be well over six feet tall, and with the gaping holes in her earlobes
that most Masai have from wearing huge earings. They are all friendly but
very aloof, and do not engage easily in conversation, partly because of
the language difficulty, and partly, I suspect, because they simply tend
not to mix with other peoples. Nathan and Amanda have been to the Masai
Mara in Kenya where they have had more contact with this strange and facinating
tribe, and they have many engrossing tales to tell. I think this area would
be top of my list for a subsequent visit to Africa.
Both the local Hehe tribe and the local Masai will come to the lodge
and perform their tribal dances for us if we want. There is a good deal
of discussion about this, as it is obviously a bit of a tourist trap, and
Ken points out that the price goes up every time he comes back. Each group
now demands $50 to come and dance. In the end we decide that as we're here
we might as well take whatever is offered, and we go for both. We are here
for three nights, so dancing will be arranged for two nights, and Jonas
is sent off to make the arrangements, with the proviso that we are not
prepared to leave the game park early to watch dancing, so if possible
one should be arranged for tonight, and one for one of the other nights
but no earlier than 19:00 (we must be off the game park by 18:00 anyway,
it's the rules).
We return to the lodge to discover that of all the lodges in all the
national parks in all of Africa Herman the German has turned up at ours.
We can scarcely believe it. He seems to have joined up with another group
who we think are French, and appears to be working his way through their
womenfolk.
The Hehe tribe have agreed to dance for us tonight. They perform a
series of songs and dances accompanied by a drum, at least one of which,
we are told, is a welcome to the foreign visitors, which is nice. The authenticity
of the whole routine is rather spoilt by the fact that several of them
are wearing baseball caps. I cannot get any photos of the dance, as it
is to dark to see through the viewfinder, but I manage to capture a sound
bite.
Herman and his entourage are also sitting around listening to the concert,
so we ask them for a contribution towards the fee, but they decline!