Our Day at Lake Victoria

Our activity for today was to take a canoe ride to a fishing village and learn about the culture of that place. We visited a fish market, helped make polenta and met with a medicine man. The polenta was exceptional, very tasty. I think it’s a combination of sorghum and corn. I’m very impressed with the people here. They are exceptionally friendly. They know who they are. Family and culture are very important to them. Most of them can speak some English. The official language of Tanzania is Swahili while both English and Swahili are the official languages of Kenya. I’ve been thinking about how this culture was stolen from African-Americans. How some African-Americans are struggling to find their place in society. Here are the pictures.

These are the same boats that the men used to fish in the evening.

We were not allowed to take pictures directly of people. However my group leader let me take a quick shot of these youngsters.

The fish market. The big fish are taken to processing plants. Only smaller fish are available in the market.

Cassava root. A staple in the African diet.

Our village guide introducing us to two women.

There is electricity throughout the village. The village has a water purifying plant. Throughout the village, there are places where people can get this water. They do have to pay for it. The money goes towards maintaining the system.

The bay in the south east corner of Lake Victoria is called Speke Bay. This is where our Lodge is, and this is where the fishing village is located. In the north east corner of Lake Victoria, you can see the start of the river Nile.

Our village guide with some of the children. The children kept following us and wanted to touch us. They were very curious.

Chicken. They were running loose all over the place.

They use solar panels to charge the lights that they use for fishing.

Community room. The men in the back are working on repairing fishnets. People come here to dance and listen to music.

Woman making polenta for her extended family, which includes her daughters and grandchildren.

Packages of peanuts for sale. We fed some to the children.

All over Kenya and Tanzania I’ve seen the most beautiful fabric. We got to go into a fabric store in the village and I bought a scarf for my house sitter. Here are some pictures of some of the fabrics.

Making the African version of a tortilla

Almost all Africans that I saw both male and female had shaved heads. Couldn’t figure out what a hair salon would do.

The mill where they grind the sorghum and corn for the polenta

I really don’t know what to make of this whole experience. I know that these guys know a lot about local herbs and can cure things. No doubt about that. He was also very willing to send people on to regular doctors if he felt that he could not help them. He didn’t speak English. I was late told that he was exceptionally shy. We had a translator who really did most of the talking. The medicine man is a young guy about 36. He has two wives and a number of children. Where we were only one of his wives lived. The other wife lived in another area and took care of all the cows. He charges up to two cows for a cure. Sometimes a person has to stay at his conclave a number of days to be cured. Most medicine men get the calling so it’s a spiritual thing. This young man got the calling and went to be trained by his grandfather. He has signaled out one of his daughters as a future medicine woman.