I stood inside the mud hut home of a young Maasai woman, amazed by what was before me. My eyes adjusted to the dark, a stark contrast from the natural light outside. In the center of the small floor space, a pot of food was fired by a kerosene burner, which created a somewhat stifling smell.
I don’t remember her name, perhaps our guide did not say. She showed us two slightly elevated, adjacent spaces – both furnished only with cow hide that served as beds where her family slept.
Two tiny 4”x 1” slits in the mud walls – ‘windows’ to the world outside – I wondered silently about how they were able to breathe and watched the fired pot provide illumination that the windows could not …
Against the hut’s wall was a built-in shelf – also made of mud – it held cooking supplies. Next to that, a small enclosure, reserved for their baby goats.
We spoke. She smiled. Through our Maasai guide I asked how old she was. She replied: “I don’t know my age but I have three children”. My question felt shallow – her answer revealed the depth of what really mattered.
We know so little of each other – our personal differences, and similarities, span across thousands of miles and traditions – actually, we know so little about so much!
Connection and travel are external tools that open vast avenues of inner awareness. … So much to experience – about self, about others, about seeing our world through unfamiliar lenses … having our understanding, or lack thereof, cracked wide open revealing ‘the more of life’.
How little we know…
