Opuwo 6th July 2012

This is my 5th attempt at posting this. Having major technical difficulties... And I don't think the networks can cope with loading photos so it's text only at the moment. Opuwo was a hugely cultural experience with at least 4 tribes all very distinctive wandering the streets. They varied from Himba (barely clothed), Zembas (semi clothed) and herero (overly clothed) to others who have adopted western style clothing. The boys were quite shocked meeting nearly naked women in the aisles of the supermarket. Mandy was accosted by them all outside the supermarket and after some not very successful negotiating ended up with jewellery from them all. In the afternoon we went to visit a Himba village with a local guide called Martie. We were fortunate that the headman of the village was there, as at this time of year, the himba become nomadic moving to the mountains where there is more food and water for their stocks. As they are heavily dependent on their stock for their daily activities they do not like to be far from them. Their village at the moment being the dry season is literally a dust bowl. After gaining the headmans permission to enter we spent some time talking to him,well Martie translated for us. He didn't know how old he was as the himba have no sense of calendars, only seasons, but he seemed in his 50s or 60s. He has 3 wives, but doesn't seem to know how many children... Many he said. Ech wife generally has 8 to 10 children, as contraception does not exist. A number of his sons wives were there with their children. They all looked to be under 20 and had up to 4 children each. The women live with their husbands village, only going home to have their children, returning when their babies are 2 months old. Each marriage is arranged by the headman. The women take great pride in their appearance. Twice a day they cover their bodies in ochre and butter fat giving them an orange color. Their hair is matted with ochre mud and lots of decorations including wool, beads and metal. Although they only have a skirt made out of calf skin as clothing they wear a lot of jewellery on their neck, legs and arms. This denotes their status in terms of whether they have reached womanhood, are married and how many children they have. Each item is painstakingly made. The village consists of sleeping huts with mud floors, cow dung walls and a thatched roof with a hole in the middle to let out the smoke of the fire inside to keep it warm. Similar huts are smaller in size for storing food such as pumpkin and maize. Wooden corals are used for locking up stock to keep the predators away and other wooden huts with big stone slabs are used for preparing food. Their diet mainly consists of maize porridge, milk and pumpkin. Meat is saved for special occasions like naming ceremonies and weddings. Although they live a very primitive lifestyle they appear very switched on, especially the women and are very enthusiastic and interested in us. They cannot understand why we only have 2 children and think I would look most beautiful if I was dressed more appropriately like them. The women are heading back to the mountain a couple of hours walk away. They prefer to be near milk which they are unable to store. After a couple of hours we give them our gifts for allowing us to visit them of maize, sugar, salt, meat and bread. They rarely come into town 30kms away. We return back to our luxurious campsite on top of the mountain and have rump steak for dinner. I had amused the butcher by asking to cut off the fat of the rump and mince it. After a misunderstanding I ended up with 6 rump steaks and 2 kilos of mince.... Oh well. The nights are a lot colder now, more like we expected.