How many cows do your parents want???


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Africa » Kenya » Rift Valley Province » Lake Naivasha
April 30th 2014
Published: April 30th 2014
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Traveling always helps you to see the world with different eyes. Since you're born you live in a certain culture, certain rules are followed by the society and that appears as the only valid reality, you expect that the whole world is like this.

But when going abroad, you soon discover that the obvious truth for you is something that doesn't exist in other cultures. People think differently, they have others morals, their habits are completely opposite to the yours. These differences range from simple everyday things that we do, up to life patterns and society standards.

Once I remember I ordered coffee with milk and a coke in Colombia and the waiter asked for whom the coke would be, since I was alone. I said, well, it's for me. He then looked at me completely confused and asked if I want the coffee first or the coke. Hm...well, both at the same time I guess?? And that was probably the most shocking thing for him...how could I possibly drink a HOT and a COLD drink together?? They never do that. It's either hot or it's cold. Hahahaha, he then looked over to me several times while I was mixing the "toxic" drinks between each other and was obviously waiting for me to pass out or something 😊

In Kenya and Tanzania I've experienced other big gaps between societies. Since I'm really interested in the Maasai culture, I've spent a lot of time talking to people from this tribe and was soaking up every little detail they would tell me. One of the guys I met was really nice, chatting with me and being super polite...but then eventually the conversation started around getting married and stuff and he directly asked me, if I would like to be his mzungu wife (mzungu just means "white person"). I laughed because I thought it was a joke, but he said that he really wants a domestic wife and one mzungu....:O :O hahaha...I then offered to look for him and find someone, but he insisted that he wants only me. Somehow I convinced him that I'm really not the right "material for marriage" and he seemed a bit sad, but nevertheless he just wanted to check anyway, how many cows would my parents expect for me....hm...I would need to check on that I said, 'cause my parents are living in a flat, so maybe goats would be a better idea??!! :D

The whole conversation seemed like a unrealistic play or a chat that you have when you've had too much of booze....I started thinking about how different we take life. How things that for us are unacceptable, for other people are just a normal conversation that needs to be done in order to know how many animals they should prepare. 😊

I've visited a market in central Nairobi with a friend, and after a while we started to act like husband and wife, just so they wouldn't be hitting on me all the time, and when a man asked my friend how much he had paid for me (cows of course) and he replied with "40", the man just started starring and said:" Wow, that was a bargain!!!".....so....I guess now at least I know approximately how much I could ask for hahahahhahahaha....

Amazing 😊

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