The Great Lion hunt: Untold stories of the Maasai

(Courtesy)

When Ole Bernt Frøshaug came to Kenya in 1995, after resigning from his position at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, he produced and directed a wide range of documentary films on topics ranging from culture, conflict and ecology to Africa’s oral heritage. Away from the luxury of his former life, he now lives with his family in a small stone house in Maasailand, to the southwest of the capital, Nairobi.

His films have been broadcast on Norwegian and other international television channels, and several have won prestigious awards.

In 1997, together with some friends, he set up a safari camp in the Masai Mara.

“None of us had any experience with tourism, and we knew nothing about running a hotel. The truth is that we would have been lost without our close collaboration with the Maasai. They were the storytellers, familiar with the wildlife, the sounds, and the open grassland; they became guides, camp leaders, and cooks; they owned the land and provided the necessary advice. Our task was mainly to attract the tourists,” he begins.

Ole Bernt says the safari camp is the reason he ended up spending so much time on the savannah, but it is the stories told by the Maasai that form the core of his book. These stories, he says, are part of a larger narrative that has become important for him to tell.

“The challenge to write and share this tale was given to me by Ole Taek, an elderly Maasai leader who experienced the British invasion, the loss of land to European settlers, and the subsequent influx of tourists on the savannah,” he says.

The Great Lion Hunt is a vivid encounter with the Maasai of Kenya - their ancient stories and their new reality. For generations, the cattle nomads have lived in harmony with antelopes and predators. The lions and the Maasai both belong to the savannah, but do they have a future together? The stories artfully interweave the ancient lore of the lion, Kenya’s colonial past, its struggle for independence and the challenges of tourism and neo-colonialism.

“I am using the lions as a metaphor for all the fighting for the ecosystem, the people. What I realized is that half of the big mammals on the planet graze within the Mara. People have been fighting lions for hundreds of years. Again, local communities need to be empowered to be in charge of their territories and stories,” he states.

One of the themes tackled in the book includes not just the colonial past, which many people don’t know about, but also neo-colonialism.

“In the book, there is a narrative about how the Maasai were affected by colonialism, including land dispossession and concentration camps, which some of the elders I spoke to could relate to, but also neocolonialism issues like what is currently happening in Ngorongoro in Tanzania,” he states.

While many would ask why he chose to translate it to Maa, Ole Bernt reckons that it is important for the voice of the locals to be heard, and for him, translating it to Maa is important.

“People have asked me who will read, and I ask them if people are reading the Bible in their languages; why not this? If you make an e-book or an audiobook and you get it to libraries, one will create awareness, and while translating it to English is good for the wider audience,” he notes.

Looking at the book industry in Africa, Ole Bernt says the number of books published in foreign languages exceeds those published in local languages.

“It’s easier to find Shakespeare in Africa than a Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Kenya’s most famous author. When a language dies, the local history and ancestral knowledge also disappear. The Norwegian says his endeavour is also part of supporting the government’s agenda on its curriculum advancement and encouraging people to take vernacular languages seriously,” he states.

Language and culture are inseparable; they form a living entity that must be preserved because they teach us to live in harmony with the environment. Multilingualism opens doors to a diverse planet, rich in solutions to the problems we face today or will encounter soon.

“You can learn other languages quicker if you start with your language. We know that from Norway. Then we also have a significant number of older Maasai people who did not go to school and can’t read or write. Those I have engaged have said they can have reading clubs at schools and local libraries, and the young can read for the old; they can listen to the audiobooks and create something to bridge the gaps between generations,” he points out.