Endangered Hadzabe

I enjoyed William Reed’s story on his trip to Tanzania (Sept.’08, pg. 24), especially about his contact with the Hadzabe (Hadza) people. He described their hunting and cooking birds as “the single most significant thing we saw on the entire trip.”

I took a 7-week, self-guided tour of East Africa, July 7-Aug. 26, 2008, during which I spent time with two Hadzabe clans — a primary goal of the trip. I had researched them as thoroughly as I could. For me, it was a bittersweet experience.

I wrestled with the notion that my visit would, in a small way, further contaminate their unique culture and contribute to their demise. I tried to make my visit as sensitive as possible, rationalizing that the inevitable would occur whether I visited or not.

A 5-day safari cost me $750, all-inclusive. An additional two days with two Hadzabe clans cost about $650 for the exclusive use of a Range Rover, a Maasai guide and a local guide. That price was all-inclusive, also.

The Hadzabe are dispersed in small, remote clans near Lake Eyasi (north-central Tanzania) and move frequently to follow game. These people are a living connection to our hunter-gatherer past, but their unique culture is fading into history. Their numbers are diminishing due to habitat encroachment, intermarriage with other tribes, and cultural contamination by the many tourists introduced to them by tour operators who tout a meeting with “Stone Age bushmen.”

During two days, Aug. 10 and 11, I spent about 10 hours with two different clans, hunting, gathering and just sitting around with them. I had advised my guides that I wanted no special attention from the people, just for them to do what they normally would do.

During one of my visits, a Range Rover pulled up with about six wazungu (tourists). My guides moved me away, telling me I wasn’t going to enjoy what came next.

After an exchange of money, the tourists got out and gawked at the men, then at the women and children. The clan’s leader came back into the forest where we were sitting, strapped some bells on his ankles, went back to where the tourists were standing by their car and was joined by most of the other adults in the clan. They sang and danced for the tourists, who appeared bored and left a few minutes later. On my way out of the area, I saw many tour vehicles on their way in.

These people have no written language and no knowledge of city life, agriculture, farm animals or the business of tourism. They are totally vulnerable. They are going to need some help to facilitate the imminent transition that lies ahead for them.

I wrote to the government of Tanzania, the Tanzania Tourist Board and the Tanzania Association of Tour Operators, requesting that they develop a plan to insure that tourist visits are conducted in a manner sensitive to Hadzabe culture and that such visits require visitation fees (as in, for example, Tanzania’s Gombe National Park). I suggested that a portion of the money be set aside to aid and educate the Hadzabe as they enter mainstream Tanzanian society.

JIM SILL

Silverado, CA