As is the miracle of this part of the world, within minutes of stopping locals starting appearing.
The Himba are a fascinating culture like few others. Despite being in relatively constant contact and co-existing with western society, they largely shun the ways and trappings of it. They proudly go about their ways and gracefully pick the few things they need from it and skirt the rest. Intriguingly, this way of being is not just a social behaviour, but genetically they have little to do with the rest of the Bantu lines either.
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0099117
To retain their culture they have even made representations to the world to be left as such. Recently, the proposed damming of the Kunene, besides being an ecological disaster, was going to destroy ancient tribal burial sites but also effectively obliterate a way of life. There’s a wonderful YouTube video of a Headman and his two lieutenants making an appeal to the UN and the world about their plight. It’s a documentary that fascinatingly follows both their appeal and their journey of navigating the first world in order to retain their culture.
Also, when one spends even some cursory time here, there is a quality to the behaviour of all the women that they are not subservient to anyone. Respectful yes but not less than. In most of our cultures, worldwide, it’s a patriarchal system. I am presuming that this might stem from their social system that adheres to “bilateral descent”.
From Wiki;
“Because of the harsh desert climate in the region where they live and their seclusion from outside influences, the OvaHimba have managed to maintain and preserve much of their traditional lifestyle. Members live under a tribal structure based on bilateral descent that helps them live in one of the most extreme environments on earth.
Under bilateral descent, every tribe member belongs to two clans: one through the father (a patriclan, called oruzo) and another through the mother (a matriclan, called eanda).[8] Himba clans are led by the eldest male in the clan. Sons live with their father's clan, and when daughters marry, they go to live with the clan of their husband. However, inheritance of wealth does not follow the patriclan but is determined by the matriclan, that is, a son does not inherit his father's cattle but his maternal uncle's instead.
Bilateral descent is found among only a few groups in West Africa, India, Australia, Melanesia and Polynesia, and anthropologists consider the system advantageous for groups that live in extreme environments because it allows individuals to rely on two sets of families dispersed over a wide area.”
Once I had the opportunity to sit and watch these ankle bracelets being made.
They’re made by a traveling blacksmith whose business was in traveling from one area to the next to repair or make the various items that they wear for either decoration or to represent a status of sort. Those nut like looking bits are thick gauge wire that was beaten around a thin mandrel and then threaded together. Sort of like they do with chainmail. It was a labourious process. Each of these anklets that you see here represent many many hours of work.
Anyay, we had places to go, things to do
Ah yes, another puncture
Grants small tip where we worked out the neutral thing
Another puncture, I have the difficult and important job of ballast
Honda might need to look at where the balance point is on the centre stand. If they moved it slightly backwards, this wouldn’t be necessary.
Johannes was having a bit of trouble with the sand, that first fall had shaken him a bit. Now with more and more sand coming, he couldn’t understand why he was struggling. He lives in Namibia and loves sand and yet if not tipping over from time to time he was all legs and heartrate. It was doing his head in. He was stressing and seriously not having much fun. At the break I had a chat. I’ve worked with people and sand quite a bit and had a few ideas that we then worked through. He then got a bit of a mental tool box together for when the sand started again and off he went. It was deeply satisfying to see his day improve dramatically after that. He never fell again.
Another one
It was frek hot now and and with the regular punctures, Hardy and the bunch were not far behind
There was more and more of this
With lots of this in between
Rinse and repeat
Then came this steep downhill, a few got stuck and had tips. In getting to them and helping out, my internal temperature gauge was starting to complain.
Also, we had a tailwind so that didn’t help much either. At the bottom of one of the hills, I had to strip off as far as I could. Water my buff and get it round my neck again. Gerrit had a few choice words to say about the scare I gave him.
At that next turn up ahead was a mother of a climb. It looked ominous, more like a riverbed at 30 degrees up the mountain. All we could hear was straining engines and rocks flying. I was a little worried. I wasn’t sure I could push my bike up there if I came unstuck!
After a time it was just the sweaty 3 of us left, Glenn, Gerrit and I. Glenn, optimistic and not called Throttlejockey for nothing roared off then proceeded to beat throse rocks into submission by bouncing and ricocheting up that madness. He was the first one to have a clear run and not dab or need the helping hands of the group.
Gerrit and I looked at each other with a grin, “Dammit! Well, I suppose that means we don’t have a choice now, we have to clear that too!”. We played Ching-chong-cha to see who goes first as it’s kak being last, I lost, so he went. He nearly cleaned it. Just a dab and one push from the gang.
Shit! It’s not that much fun owning a competitive spirit sometimes. Well, there was nothing for it but to go.
There really are only three things to concentrate on at times like this, Momentum, Aim and hang on. Thankfully, I cleaned it. The Youtube video at the top has the top half of my run filmed by Jacko.
The rest of the day was more sandier with long stretches of it. The mood had become lighter, it seemed the worst was behind us, but it was still hard work, especially those who had little experience in the sandier bits. I hadn’t been able to say much to Phill through the day but he seemed to be coping and having fun. We were less than 5k’s from the camp.
Then as if Murphy was a little pissed that he’d not been invited along, Grant had a crash just in front of us. It was a nothing riverbed compared to what we’d been through and it would have remained an innocuous crash if only his ribs hadn’t insisted on picking out the only rock to be seen. He looked super sore and was practically white from the pain. Ockie was there in less than a minute checking him out.
It was decided that Hardy would ride his bike the last bit and Grant would catch his breath in the 4x4.
Once at the camp, I could feel my battery was flat. It was probably the culmination of all the previous days and todays heat and exercise. But I know from experience that previously on longer trips, there’s always a part where I just run out steam. I think I have Lithium as opposed to Deep Cycle batteries; my drop off in performance is cliff like rather than gradual. But I also know that it is temporary and one good meal and evening sleep is all that’s needed for full charge.
That’s Grant waiting for a cocktail of industrial grade painkillers to kick in whilst avoiding the miggies
I warned Phill that tonight I was going to be useless and even though I was trying to go through my notes for my presentation was that evening, I promptly fell asleep.
What a place to give it!
Barbara gave hers, she was, as were all of us, a bit distracted by the drone capturing the epic footage and scenery as she spoke.
I had decided to speak about the African Rift Valley and its impact on human evolution. I had been fascinated to learn that without its involvement and affecting so many things at just the right time over the last 35 million years, that without it specifically, we most certainly wouldn’t be here. I had tied it to Honda Quest, asking all as to how would they would evolve as a result of this experience, “What would irrevocably be different as a result?”
It wasn’t bad, but I expected better. I felt I was flat and had left out some important bits. Oh well. It’s a long competition.
I have no photo’s after that, I just couldn’t stay awake. I had to ask Phil to wake me for supper. It seemed seconds later he woke me from a deep sleep, I shovelled it in, brushed my teeth and went directly back to sleep.
eepwall
