Masai Girls

I cannot speak as to any of the other tribes in Kenya, but the masai still practice female genital mutilation ("circumcision"). Though illegal the practice is very common in the bush, with the mutilation taking various degrees depending upon the family or local custom. Driving out of Entasopia we saw a very young girl (maybe 14 at the oldest) walking with beads hanging down her forehead. Pehninah and senaw informed me that she had been circumcised and was now looking for a husband. often the girls in the interior do not finish primary school and are sold after circumcision to a man, generally at least 30 years her elder. the men pay dowries here, and in some parts will still take many wives. the men are the only income earners for many families (when there is any income to be earned) and when they die they leave the young girls with nothing. remarriage is generally unacceptable. Pehninah runs a local women's group that helps young girls to stay in school and will pull girls from their families and send them to boarding school if they are in danger of mutilation and being sold. as a young girl she was about to be married off when a european nurse took her and sent her away to school , paying her school fees and seeing to it that she got an education. today she is a nurse and through her involvements now tries to do the same for young girls to see that they have opportunities and are not harmed.