I love travelling outside civilisation and I’m open to whatever comes. On that journey it was similar.
Turkish Airlines plane was tearing the thick night sky over Addis Ababa. When the plane wheels hit the runway – the pain made me realise I was in Ethiopia again. In Ethiopia I had loved years ago, walked it up and down several times and I was still enchanted with.
I’m going to the Omo valley that is resided by the proud and brave Mursi people. There are only 5 thousand people. It is one of the last African tribes whose lifestyle and the way they dress have not changed for thousands of years. The Mursi people settled within the limits of Mago park, among the hills covered with savannah.
Little girls, girls and women of the Mursi tribe still practice piercing lower lip in which they insert a ceramic or wooden plate. This custom used to be common among many African tribes, but now it is present only here. Why do they do this? One of the hypotheses says that it was done to deform women in order to protect them from Arab slave traders. Some other says that evil spirits enter the body through the mouth, so they have to be protected this way. There is yet another theory that says that plates of various sizes make women more attractive.
We, the modern people, do not tend to think what spirits are chased away by safety pins inserted into lips, noses, cheeks and navels. Scarification is a common method of decorating body that leads to formation of deep scars. Bellies of the greatest women of fashion are covered with braids of raised patterns. Razor blades are the best trading product in this part of the world.
African elegant women use natural white clay to care for their bodies – they apply it with their index fingers to the face and body. This natural make-up nourished the skin and protects it against sunlight as well as it decorates. For Mursi people, the buttons, clips, pieces of watch bracelets are perfect products to manufacture jewellery. Old tyres are used to produce flip-flops, skilful hands of Ethiopian craftsmen manufacture kitchenware, like bowls, ladles, mugs and colanders and even headgear, out of used oil tins.
An expedition to this region of Africa is a unique experience. It’s worth to see this piece of Earth that is untouched by civilisation. Who knows how long they will survive.
Zofia Suska – a traveller and journalist
an author of TV reports “Podróże z Zofią Suską
