Masai Problems

Masai houses are made of wood branches, cow dung, and polythene papers.  The landowners consider a latrine/toilet to be a permanent structure so the inhabitants must relieve themselves in nearby thickets.  Cases of cholera and dysentery are prevalent; cholera has taken the lives of four adults and two children.

Nutrition and food hygiene are also of great concern.  The Marimbeti Masai continue to rely on the traditional staples: milk, blood, and meat for their nutrition.  The meat is usually eaten raw or undercooked, and the blood and milk are rarely boiled before consumption.  Many women and children suckle directly from a cow while milking it and the men lance the cows and drink the blood directly from the open wound.  These practices account for the presence of animal-related diseases like Brucella.  Drinking water, obtained from a polluted Athi River nearby, is consumed without being boiled or treated.  Water-born diseases like typhoid and schistosomiasis (bilharzia) are common.  Nearly every child below the age of 14 suffers from intestinal worms.  The net result is widespread disease, especially among the children, who appear lethargic, with bloated faces and stomachs, and brown hair.

Childbirth – Children are delivered by birth attendants, who operate well below hygienic standards.  Traditional herbs are often toxic to the fetus and cause a miscarriage.  Prolonged labors or breech births typically end in the death of mother, child, or both.  Those children who do survive are often weak, unhealthy, and not vaccinated against diseases like tuberculosis, measles, or polio.  The village has lost many expectant mothers, their deaths arising from complications during pregnancy.

HIV/AIDS – As in many poor Kenyan communities, HIV/AIDS is a constant threat.  The Nairobi-Mombasa highway, along which the Marimbeti Manyatta is located, has long been known to be a primary transport mechanism for HIV/AIDS.  Long-distance truck drivers shuttling goods between the coast and the capital often pay for sex from women or girls picked up along the way.  The Marimbeti women, left alone with no way to generate income save prostitution, are particularly vulnerable.  So, too, are the young girls who must often beg for food in nearby Athi River Town.     Unhygienic practices during childbirth and lack of modern pharmaceuticals ensure that diseases like HIV carried by the mother are usually passed on to her child.  These risks are compounded by the community’s reticence to discuss HIV/AIDS, and by the infrequency of medical attention, due both to fear of stigma and lack of resources.  

Education – Education is often the best and most expedient path toward improvement but this is an equally complex and difficult problem.  First, simply getting to school is a problem, as the nearest is an 8km walk away and involves crossing the busy highway.  To date seven children have been killed by vehicles while crossing Mombasa Road.  This contributes to many Marimbeti Masai children not going to school until the age of ten or eleven.  These students are far behind their peers and are placed in classes with much younger students.  In addition, many are sent home from school for lack of books or uniforms

The poverty that necessitates begging occurs as a result of a lack of personal income for the women of Marimbeti.  Though skilled in beadwork, they lack the start-up money to purchase materials and the ability to transport their product to market.  Left to shoulder the full responsibility of child rearing without financial stability, many women depend on begging, prostitution, or outside support from groups like MWEP.  Such dependence greatly undermines self-esteem and impedes empowerment.

Goals and Objectives of the Masai Women Empowerment Project – To improve the general health status of the community within culturally permissible parameters through education concerning hygiene, disease prevention, HIV/AIDS awareness, and pre/post natal care.
To provide emergency food, when necessary, in order to ensure that women and children do not have to prostitute themselves or beg to eat.
To provide the opportunity for education to those children and adults who desire it.
To make available means for the women of the community to feel agency in their own lives and futures.