Arusha's Sunday Maasai Cattle Market

Patience and Jordan Lister is an adventurous young couple for whom I arranged a safari in October. They opted for the expense of their own vehicle but kept costs manageable by camping throughout (which is easier to do when you are in your late twenties) and only splurging at the end on a comfortable tented camp. They asked for lots of hiking which I thought I had included—Olmoti and Empakai craters; Mts Lengai (if it hadn’t erupted) and Makarot. I laughed to hear from them when they returned home that they still thought they did too much car time.

They had a few days off in Arusha which fell over the weekend, and decided to take in the Sunday Maasai cattle market at Ngaramtoni. This is good activity for independent travelers with a similar free Sunday in town. Here is Patience’s market report. They hired a taxi in town to take them there.

“Fifteen to twenty minutes out of town, we came to a huge field in a farming area. For the next two to three hours Maasai arrived with herds of cattle, sheep and goats to sell. By the time we left there must have been 200 people there. The auction was more like a big networking event. The Maasai wandered through the crowd, chatted with each other, and occasionally exchanged money for animals. We took photos and then sat in the shade to watch everyone. Many curious Maasai joined us who asked a lot of questions, such as “What kind of cows do you have in Canada ?” How many cows do you own?” And for Jordan who is very tall, “you are tall and yet you look so young?”

We enjoyed this because we were the only foreigners at the market and it gave us a chance to observe, meet and learn about the Maasai people outside of the tourist setting.”

The Maasai of Longido town, which lies an hour’s drive north of Arusha in the direction of the Kenyan border, holds its cattle market on Wednesdays. Longido makes for a worthwhile day’s outing too. A word of advice on cattle markets. Your travels elsewhere might encourage the idea that the best time to visit is early morning. Not so with Maasai cattle markets. The Maasai drive their animals to market from long distances away beginning only when it is day light. They may not arrive until midday.

06-01-2008