After crossing Skeleton Coast, a long desert that ends at the foot of a sea that has left behind the bodies of ships along the coast, we arrived at Camp ongong.
The landscape was slowly mutating. We left the Namibian desert eternal, that dwarfs the horizon, and began to run into green, in a tree, especially mapaná. The environment was not the only thing that was changed before our eyes. The Himba and Herero tribes inhabiting the northern lands, almost bordering Angola. We saw the first Himba, women painted clay to the hair and bare-breasted, practically night. We also saw some herero, dressed, as taught by the early missionaries, dressed in a unique hats and long skirts. That night, the ongong we expected a night swim, under a small waterfall that focused warm in an idyllic pond.
The next morning we went to the Epupa Falls. A spectacular waterfall Kunene River, whose other side is already Angola, in the middle region of the unique Himba. Unique is an understatement for the rush, I have no battery, but they are a nomadic tribe that has essentially anchored to the life of their ancestors standards (ancestors in Africa are the basis of many cultures; well at least I have explained in various ethnic groups).
The next morning we went to the Epupa Falls. A spectacular waterfall Kunene River, whose other side is already Angola, in the middle region of the unique Himba
Before coming to Epupa stopped for lunch in the middle of nowhere and we had the first direct contact with himbas. Behind havens usually always have an initial disappointment. A satellite dish hanging from the trees off rap music, sacred sounds of the shadows. Here were hundreds of bottles of beer spilled outside the fence that protects all Himba villages. We speak several of the group with five young people who came in our way. Quiceañeras Spanish as dumb as they wanted to charge us for us a picture and ended up chest out, in the form of indirect threat.
The first night was really unique Epupa. Three of the group went to a bar there Himba a mile from the campsite, a place not intended for tourists. Upon entering we see two elderly Himba, man and woman, dressed as, sitting under the bar, in soil. Were sucked, wandering lost, among seven or eight guys playing pool. (Certainly, is the first time I walk into a bar and there's a topless chick in a party without the wet T-shirt. Here the morbid is that they wear). The right bar has a shop selling everything to pieces and an old jukebox with eight disks. The old Himba, drunk, comes to us and speaks in dialect typical Himba I control to perfection. His eyes are green, strange, almost evil. Women, while, who smoke cigarettes has given Dion, decides that it is up to them the old and saw a scene that must have been something like "sleeping in the open today". They went separate. I ended the night drinking with Dion until the wee hours listening as raging water of the falls.
We visited the city of Heingda, the old chief who has three wives and overlooking a square kilometer of desert dust and. We took food to let us enter
But when star arrived hours after, when entering a poblado himba. We visited the city of Heingda, the old chief who has three wives and overlooking a square kilometer of desert dust and. We took food to let us enter (and you make a pass 4000 photos). The approximately 15 children living in that shed out to meet us at the door. Inside the Head, sitting, expected present. Everything would have an almost epic if it was not seen at the south gate to go to another group of tourists. Ie, is not it a place invented, that makes a meal show photos; but it is a place where they have decided to show his impressive clay bodies and food in exchange for dollars. I gave her a blue blanket I bought for spending the cold desert nights you crazy (All sacks are ready for the cold and I with the equivalent of a blanket that folds).
The head, an old man crushed, also decide to stay with pencils and notebooks that give children. Paint your name, smiles. Nearby is his granddaughter, a beautiful girl, young, with a body stretched in the sun, children playing with their children should be. Polygamy here, in principle, only to the prime. They tell us we can not cross the imaginary line between the sacred fire, around which gather every night, and the sacred stone, which is situated next to the house of the first woman (The boss has three houses, with whom they live with each of his wives for two consecutive days). We also explain how young people, to become adults, they break their four teeth of a blow that makes them bleed great gouts. "We cauterized the wound with a sacred fire burning stone", Himba says. We also detailed the Himba coomo not washed with water, but with some herbs that burn and the smoke passed through his body. There are dozens of stories to tell, but that place is more visual. Africa is the people lost in time.
To conclude the day, three of the group participated in a football match against Namibia. Against local Italian and Spanish. The crossbar of each goal is a row of rusty cans; a rocky field in the skin to lose to shreds. Among the locals are bare, in flip flops. Trucks crossing, horse types, bike ... The game just four to four. Will also turn the land of the nomadic Himba and their ancestral days. We're going to Etosha.
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