Mitey mite

Saturday, December 09, 2006

Saturday Photo Hunt: Red

I saw a lot of red when I was in Africa. It is a very powerful color for most tribes.

The Masai warriors wear red because they believe that lions are afraid of the color. A man must never wear pants, because pants reveal to lions that you have two legs. The lion knows you cannot outrun him with only two legs, so he will kill you. But if you do not wear pants, you can walk right by a lion and he will never realize that you are a human. All this was told to me by the young men in this picture.

The Masai men jump to attract women. The higher they can jump, the more attractive they are. Women never jump; apparently men are attracted by other things. (Probably how strong they are and how much they can carry, since women do all the work.) I suggested that these young men should come to America to play basketball. They gave me blank stares, but when I pantomimed dribbling and shooting a basket, they broke into grins and let me know that they recognized the game, if not the name.

posted at 7:23 AM
Comments (7)

7 Comments:

At 9:14 AM, Anonymous said...: Wow! That's great that you went to Africa. It's amazing that different people have some strange beliefs. It's just like the hawaiian culture. They belive in menehune's(little people), kind of like the irish.

Thanks for stopping by.
At 11:35 AM, Caylynn said...: Great photo! That must have been an amazing experience in Africa. Thanks for sharing the information about the Masai with us - I always enjoying learning about other cultures. Very interesting.

Have a good weekend. :)
At 11:44 AM, Anonymous said...: OK... so if I ever plan on walking through the lions... I need to wear a dress....
At 3:43 PM, Unknown said...: Very interesting. I've been going through the entire Saturday Photo Hunt because of a 'bet' hubby and I had today, and just now realized you're not on the blogroll. LOL....duh!!

But I wanted to drop by and say 'howdy'.

I loved reading what you had for us in your explanation. Just how long were you in Africa? Inquiring minds wanna know.
At 11:03 PM, Anonymous said...: cool picture. I think it is so cool that they interact with Americans so much. You always come back with such cool stories :)
At 7:31 AM, gal artist said...: You have had quite a varied and well traveled life. I think that is awesome.
At 8:20 AM, Ramona said...: LOL...I like this story! And, how similar their way of life is to ours...men playing games to see who can jump the highest...and women getting the job done!