09 Track 9

Review unit 1

fluency practice

review reading 2

A Kenyan Safari

Page 62

A Kenyan Safari

by Richard Mantle

In September of last year, I joined a tour group and visited several Kenyan national parks on a tour that lasted about two weeks. It was an absolutely exhilarating experience.

The awe-inspiring wildlife, pristine natural settings and warm interactions with the local people seem to affect everyone, even the most jaded of tourists, we all emerged from the Safari radiant with joy and inspiration.

We saw an impressive array of wildlife at the Masai Mara National Reserve − lions, zebras, wildebeest, gazelles, giraffes, elephants and many more.

Most of us were initially rather nervous to be in such close proximity to the animals, but slowly grew to appreciate the intimate experience.

A woman screamed when a large lion came up to our minibus and started to lick the window. Our driver just laughed and said we had nothing to worry about. The lion was just offering his car-wash services

This calmed the woman down and she giggled along with the rest of us at his jokes.

At Amboseli National Park, we had our first encounter with the Maasai people. This famous warrior tribe still lives in a semi-nomadic lifestyle, meaning they move around from time to time in search of food, water and grazing land for their cattle. We were invited to one of their villages to learn more about their traditional culture and practices and to browse and buy handmade jewelry made from small colorful glass beads. The villagers were exceptionally friendly and gregarious and we were made to feel very welcome on our last day in Elmo’s LED. Our tour guide had a special surprise. A group of Masai were to perform traditional dances and songs for us. They sang without the accompaniment of any musical instruments and created wonderfully intricate music just by harmonizing their voices the Maasai dances were very energetic with the men leaping high in the air. These dances are considered a ritual among the men to display their strength, the higher the jump. The stronger the warrior. Some people in our group joined in, dancing and leaping with the Masai, but of course none of us could jump as high as them. The memory of the wonderful performance stayed with us long after the trip the next morning we left very early long before streaks of sunlight appeared on the horizon. Our next destination was Lakeville Gloria famous for its thousands of pink flamingos. The lake lay in a valley between two very high cliffs. We were in awe of the sheer scale of the place. We spent an hour watching the flamingos take off from, and land on the shimmering surface of the lake. Soon the sun was directly overhead and it was time for lunch. Our guide led us over to one area of the lakeshore that had hot springs and geysers. We cooked boiled eggs for lunch in the natural boiling water. No, not flamingo, eggs, chicken eggs, of course. After lunch the guide surprised us by saying we were going to go looking for hippopotamuses. I was a little nervous about this as I had heard that hippos were actually more dangerous than liens. As we were all getting into several large canoes on the shore of the lake. I asked the guide if this was indeed true. He said that hippos can indeed be very dangerous, especially if the mother hippos feel that their infants are being threatened. After about 15 minutes of paddling across the lake we saw a large male hippopotamus. He didn’t seem to mind being looked at until people in the group started taking photos of him. I guess he didn’t like the sound of the cameras and he started to make some aggressive sounds with that. Our guide turned our canoes around and we headed away from the hippo and back to the safety of the shore. That evening we ate dinner together at a little restaurant called mama Lena. It was an interesting mixture of modern and traditional Kenyan cuisine. Our guide helped us to decipher our menus, which, while written in English contained lots of dishes we had never heard of many of the dishes featured fish caught in Lake Gloria and there were various chicken and goat dishes as well. They were prepared with a variety of interesting local vegetables. When the food was brought it smelled wonderful and everyone ate heartily while we were eating we were amazed to see three men from the sum Guru tribe enter the restaurant they were wearing the traditional close of their people which included beautiful bird feathers and hair dyed bright red. It was a surprise for us. When these mighty African warriors all sat down at the bar and ordered a soda to drink. It was an amazing final scene from what was for me an unforgettable trip and CD number one