Kenya Cultural Safari: What a Village Visit Taught Me About Community
I try to live in the present. The now. The moment and this very instant.
But my brain goes back to this moment in Kenya. An epic trip with women that I love and a visit to a local village.
How could something so simple have such an impact on my life and way of being?
I have thought about this, and I do believe that our values have been corrupted in the age of dishwashers, washing machines and phone communication.
Do you remember just chatting?
Shock... horror... scream... yes I really said "just chatting."
Washing and drying up the dishes together as a family. Being together and helping each other out?
These are the values and experiences I remember from my childhood. Fighting with my sister about who would wash and who would dry the dishes. Doing things as a family.
No disrespect to children nowadays, but they are a lot more lazy than I was and I realise that is probably my fault. It's too easy as a mother to be tied to the kitchen.
Then to realise you spoiled your kids and they don't want to help you and would rather be on their phones.
It is what it is...
But this moment in this picture took me back to the simplicity of communication of being in a group and of a community spirit I haven't felt since the early 1980s.
Yes. Nostalgia it is and I am sure living in the early 1980s was tough...but 40-odd years later...
There was something charming about living without all the technology we have now.
Anyway, I am waffling. This image shows Tanja and I in a community with a tribal culture in Tsavo West near Lion's Bluff. We are all women, dressed in the same clothes.
Who knew dressing the same would make me feel part of it? Suddenly, I understand school uniforms!
Working together to make dinner.
Pounding the dough, cleaning the plates, making tea, and figuring it all out.
Learning from the elders. This is one moment in time that I hang on to, because it was so real.
I felt part of that community, and the impact of helping, learning, and understanding this culture leaves its mark on me today.
If you would like to find out more about a cultural safari please email me at bena@bestsafaris.com
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