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Himbaland
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The Himbas are farmer. They are the last nomads of Namibia. Many squabbling they must suffered, your farmland was a
military area in the conflict between South African army and the SWAPO ten
and more years before. Many Himbas left this terrain. But now is peace in
this area and the Himba live in your old tradition again. Easy loam- or bushwoodhuts. And when the go over
the land they build huts of brushwood and
excrement of your cattle. This huts stay also there, when the Himbas go
on a other places and in some time they come back and use the huts again.
The holy cows you can see every time in your life. The possession of cows is a sign of wealth and not food for the family. In the cook pot come the goats and the sheeps. Who have many cows is a rich and respected man. Striking is the dresses and the jewellery of the Himbas. It's the same as we know it from books and film. You can know your social position. Your dresses are of leather and fur. A calf fur is the loincloth. The body is decorate with rings of brass. Leather stripe decorate the body of the back and the breast. For the ideal of beauty will be beat out the tooth of edge in a age of 9 years (brrr). But, how long will be this. The tourism already left his first prints. Many Himbas came in this area, because it's a easy life with the money of tourists and isn't so difficult to get some food or flour as on other places in Namibia. Money is poison, because after the meeting the Himbas will go to the corrugated-iron- huts-supermarket and buy beer and other alcoholic drinks.
left up: Boy or girl? A girl with 2 plaits, plaited from back to in front, a symbol of the horn of the holy cows. right up: The fattest Himba, said Uwe from Halle at the Saaleriver in East Germany, the manager of the Omarunga Campsite. More about the Himbas? Click here!
And this is the story about malaria.
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The food box
A married Himbawoman. The married himbawomen carry a such fur hoods on the head, also a symbol of the cow horns and they have over shoulder long, rotated plaits and with paste from ocker earth and redwood powder rubbed in the plaints. |
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