Wildlife Expert and Safari Guide Jean du Plessis explores the
Serengeti's link to humans' distant past.
; This area is often referred to as the Cradle of Mankind.
From there, he visits our closest living relatives.
; It's always incredible to see chimpanzees.
They're so close to ourselves.
They just view us as another primate species that lives
side-by-side.
And he visits Serengeti's Nomadic people,
the Maasai.
Do you think we can maybe go visit your village?
You definitely need to be born in this culture
to appreciate that.
♪
This is the Greater Serengeti in Tanzania.
It's one of the most biologically diverse places on
the Planet.
It's home to over 70 species of mammals and it's the site of the
wildebeest migration - the largest mass movement of animals
on earth.
But there's more to the Serengeti than it's wildlife.
It's also one of the most important paleo-anthropological
sites in the world.
On the Southern Serengeti plains in Olduvai Gorge,
famed Paleontologists Louis and Mary Leakey made some of their
most important fossil discoveries.
Discoveries that have been central to our understanding of
early human origins and evolution.
; I'm standing on the edge of Olduvai Gorge,
which is a really prominent site within the Great Rift Valley.
This area is often referred to as the Cradle of Mankind because
the Leakey's discovered two very prominent skulls here.
Those skulls of zinjanthropus and Homo habilis date back to
about 2 million years.
♪
; The reason Olduvai Gorge is so unique is the fact that this
used to be a massive lake a couple of million years ago
where these hunter-gatherers or early hominids formed
homesteads.
It was the perfect environment to live close to a food source.
What's really interesting is the fact that Homo habilis or the
handyman was discovered not more than 20 meters from
Australopithecus, living side-by-side during the same
time era.
It might sound strange to have two ape-like species living
close together like that, but today is no different.
Further South in the Great Rift Valley
are apes still living, and in other areas in Africa,
there are species such as bonobos and gorillas
all living same as us humans in the Great Rift Valley.
. Tanzania has several populations of chimpanzees.
The most well-known is in Gombe National Park where Jane Goodall
did her famous studies.
But the most significant population is actually further
South in Tanzania's Mahale Mountains.
♪
; I've just arrived onto Mahale airstrip and we are getting to
an old dhow that's going to take us into the national parks.
This is one of those unique parks where there's no roads.
(Child greets Jean)
Jean wants to see Mahale's wild chimpanzees close up,
where he can observe their behavior, and to do that he's
headed to Greystoke, a lodge on the shores of Lake Tanganyika
that is only reachable by boat.
; I'm on Lake Tanganyika which is just one of the most spectacular
lakes I've ever seen. The largest body of unpolluted fresh
water on the planet.
Behind me is Mahale Mountain National Park,
and this is one of the few parks where one can find viable
populations of chimpanzees.
On this side of the lake are very much two chimp populations
referred to as the M-group and the K-group, where in the 80s
the M-group pretty much over threw and almost completely
demolished the K-group.
In modern day K-group is starting to come back,
but it's a new population of chimpanzees that's very skittish
and hard to see.
.It's estimated that the entire park has between 700 and 1,000
chimpanzees.
Mahale Mountain's National Park is open to tourists.
But the lodges are all small occupancy.
That, along with the fact that the area is remote and hard to
get to keeps it from being too overrun by tourists.
And in a fragile ecosystem, that's a good thing.
; Here we are arriving at camp.
It's always a very impressive site.
(Boat Docking and Water Sounds)
(Water Sounds)
&gt;&g ; Hi.
Jeff and Kerrie, the managers at Greystoke along with the staff
and resident pelican come out to greet Jean.
Jean settles down in camp for the night.
They will begin trekking in the morning.
; Another really hard day in the office.
. The chimpanzees live in the mountains around Greystoke.
Researchers had been studying them for decades,
so they're habituated to humans.
This means Jean should be able to sit and observe them.
But first, he has to find them!
The home range of M-group spans a very large area.
This is mountainous terrain.
For Jean, it will mean a tough steep hike through dense bush.
Jean's guide is Mwiga Mambo, head guide and a primate expert
at Greystoke.
Mwiga is the second generation in his family to work with the
chimps.
His father worked on a research project in Mahale.
; This is our first morning and we are about to head off into the
forest to see if we can find these chimps.
What can we expect this time of year?
Is it going to be easy, hard?
What do you think?
; Yeah.
; It's hard walking.
Really.
; Honestly, very hard walking.
Okay.
. With limited time, Jean is keen to get started.
The chimps are wild animals and aren't on his schedule.
; There is still no up taking from the trekkers in terms of
locating the chimpanzees this morning,
but instead of sitting here on the beach,
we are heading off into the forest to go and explore the
lower regions of the forest.
The chimps are often easily found in the low lying areas
around the camp.
; Just keep on walking.
But a recent shift in weather has sent the chimps higher up
into the mountains in search of food.
This means some serious climbing ahead for Jean with no
guarantees.
The chimps can get to areas that are inaccessible to humans.
So the trio begins to head into the forest,
and up the mountain.
; What's this?
; Stracnus Nakuwa.
They must clearly eat the inside part that is soft and smelling
very citrus-like.
; Chimpanzee, they have canine and then they have strong jaw.
Okay.
So they can break it.
; Yeah.
; They can break it.
♪
What can we expect?
Is it going to be easy, hard?
; Yeah, it's hard walking.
Really?
; Honestly.
. Jean du Plessis is in the Mahale mountains where he and head
Greystoke guide Mwiga Mambo are on a quest to observe the
social life of the chimpanzee.
We're biologically cousins to chimps and gorillas,
and share 98% of the same genetic makeup.
What separates us from our hairy relatives is our large brains,
our capacity for language and the ability to create and use
complex tools.
; Is this a termite mound?
Yes.
I know in Gombe with Jane Goodall's project,
they discovered that they fish for termites with sticks.
Do they do the same here?
&gt;&g ; No.
; Here they didn't fish from termite mound,
; but they fish from the trees.
; There is ant called carpenter ants.
; They use tools too.
So here they don't use those sticks to fish for termites.
What's quite fascinating is that it's all learned behavior.
Obviously some chimp in Gombe did that by accident and there
was a termite on, and that's how they learned it,
and here in Mahale maybe one of them was playing around with a
stick in a tree and caught the carpenter ant.
So it's more matter of a learned behavior that's brought
over from generation to generation and by chance,
it haven't happened here that they are fishing for termite.
. Science has learned lot from studying chimp behavior.
Researchers and scientists have discovered medical treatments
for diseases like Malaria, diarrhea and even anti-tumor
medication that can be used by humans.
; We have been hiking now for most of the morning.
The trekkers came out at 7 o'clock this morning to try and
find the chimpanzees, but this time looking at the high up in
the mountains and in the valleys because that's where the only
viable food source will be.
. Finally, after several hours of hiking,
Jean makes his first sighting.
; It's 1 o'clock now, and we just came across a group of females
and infants.
I'm wearing this face mask because a few years ago,
there was a flu virus that was introduced to this group of
chimpanzees, and there was a dramatic decrease in chimpanzee
numbers here in Mahale.
So as a precaution, all guests coming into contact of chimps
must wear these face masks at all times.
Just down from me is two females sitting with an infant
that's younger than a year.
One can see they're younger than a year because they -- they've
got this little fluff of white on their backsides.
♪
It's always incredible to see chimpanzees.
They're so close to ourselves.
♪
They're having a proper game here,
the young ones chasing each other.
(Chimpanzees Scream)
So what was all that about?
; What happened is two mothers fighting because of
; their children.
It's very much just like humans would.
Yes.
Two kids fighting and then the mothers end up fighting.
; Exactly.
Although not overly disturbed by the presence of humans,
the mothers are understandably protective.
(Chimpanzee Squeals)
; And it seems like they are still having a little bit of squabbles
as they move up the hills, so we're just gonna try and stay
behind them.
; Yeah.
And this is hard to keep up with them. It's very
easy for them obviously moving through this under growth is
extremely hard for us.
It's the time of day I spent there.
We'll go pass out a bit and take it easy.
. Although this group of females is off on their own,
chimps' society has both a patriarchy and a hierarchy.
To get a fuller picture of their social structure,
Jean will need to find the males.
; Who is now number one?
Alofu?
; Number one is Primus, and then he was challenged alpha
; male on that time calling Pim, and then Orion went up to
; be number three.
; So he needed to support Alofu to took all that,
; to resume his position, Pim gets scared him.
; So Pim, he was needed support from Primus number three.
; Primus challenged Alofu, and then Alofu gets scared of him,
; he disappeared with a one female calling Inebe.
It's very complicated.
There's (laughs) there's a big power struggle going on.
; It's amazing.
Seems like you are part of this politics.
Yes.
; Because...
Like a soap opera for you.
; Yeah.
These females we've been tracking the whole day are part
of a much larger group of between 16,
17 individuals, and hopefully these call these little domestic
and conflicts within this small group will draw the main group
this way, and yeah, hopefully, there is dominant males who are
coming to see what the trouble is here.
. The M-group of chimps is broken down into several smaller
groups.
While there are still some males to be seen through the brush,
Jean is still looking for the main group and the dominant
males.
; These kinds of calls are partly contact calls because
the group is all over this valley,
they are communicating with each other,
and hopefully, some of the ranking males will come and see
where these females are, and we might run into them tomorrow.
Yeah, it'd also be nice for you to go there and see what's going
on 'cause it seems like it's changing in a daily basis.
; Yeah.
. It's getting late, so they call it a day.
Mwiga leads Jean back down to Greystoke Lodge.
Back at the lodge, the resident Pelican is more forthcoming than
the male chimpanzees.
This Pelican is incredible.
This pelican has become a fixture here,
and Manager Jeff from Greystoke fills in Jean on his
back story.
So what's the deal with this bird?
; Yeah, the bird he swam in off the lake about 8 months ago.
;There had been a big storm and the next thing we knew the
; bird was swimming ashore and started chatting to our guests.
I mean, you know, there's a bit of a daily routine to the guy.
; Yeah.
; It's quite a relaxed daily routine.
(laughs)
; He landed on the right beach.
; That's for sure.
(Ocean Sounds)
It's nice to seeing him out in the kayak with you.
; He loves it.
; He loves kayaking. He really wants to fish.
; But as a solo bird, it's a real challenge.
; and they normally fish as a flock,
; so they corral the fish and then they all scoop with their
; huge pouches and then they filter the water out and that's
; how they feed.
; As a solo bird, he doesn't stand a chance.
. An isolated pelican in the wild is vulnerable.
This one is lucky.
Jean hopes some of that luck will rub off on him as he heads
into day two of his quest.
♪
. Wildlife Expert and Safari Guide Jean du Plessis is in the remote
Mahale Mountains National Park.
The park has the largest number of wild chimpanzees in Tanzania.
And Jean is hoping he can get close enough to watch the
chimp's social structure in action.
From his base at the Greystoke Lodge,
Jean has put himself in the hands of it's Chief Guide and
primate expert, Mwiga Mambo.
It's day two, and they've just come across a male and a
female.
Mwiga ID's him as Darwin, the third ranked male chimpanzee.
; He, and this female climbed up this big tree,
and they are feeding on Ficus.
It's really hard this time of the year for them to find a
viable food source.
They really need to eat when they see food.
What they will do is they will pick with their hands and stuff
their mouth full of figs.
And one by one, they would run these figs through their teeth.
And that way they don't need their hands for the actual
feeding anymore.
Darwin is the number three ranked male in this group of
chimpanzees and that gives him the authority to take a female
away for a couple of days while in his case he has been away
with female for 3 weeks.
She is in estrous that gives him the opportunity to completely
monopolize her and be with her all the time.
If they are in a big group he is going to have to share a female
in estrous with some of the other ranked males,
especially the males that's ranked higher than him.
It's a time of the day where they kind of lie down and take
a bit of a siesta this, but it's also a time for grooming.
♪
So he is never joining up with the main group in the last
couple of weeks.
; No, that's why you can see big group down the mountains;
; Darwin is here mean that he don't like to share.
So what do you think what's up to Darwin now?
Where is he-- what's his plans?
Does he just kind of go up and down and try to avoid the main
group the whole time?
Yes.
There's no real plan that you think he's after today.
; Also, their plan, if you see male doing like that,
; it mean that's he needed to be on higher end.
To be able to steal a female?
Yes.
; Because he won't do that if he is in low rank like number
; seven and like that, he won't do that.
So we are going to leave Darwin.
With Darwin fully occupied by his fig tree and the female,
it's time to move on.
We just news from the truckers that they found the
main group.
It's quite far from here high up in the mountains.
So we need to take a boat to go around to an easier place to
launch from.
(Water Sounds)
We are on the boat now just to go around to the next beach,
but I expect this is going to be a very hard hike.
; We go there, right here.
We will start from here to find the trail behind this camp to
head up into the hills.
The main group of chimps has been spotted even further up the
mountain.
Jean and the crew have to start again at beach level and they
have a long, tough climb ahead of them.
; So M-group is by far the most dominant group in Mahale and it
seemed like there is a lot of politics at play inside this
M-group.
Yeah.
That might make this a little bit unstable for the rest of the
group as well.
; The alpha male lose his power, mean that if he gets
; sick, and then others number two, he can take that
; opportunity to hit him badly.
; Now in-charge is Primus and then I hope Darwin or Orion,
; he would take over.
Is this kind of behavior everyday type of things?
Are we likely to see?
; Any time it can happen.
So we can expect some excitement.
; Exactly!
. The hike is a tough one - steep, rocky and they have to go
through a lot of brush.
But after two hours, the hard work pays off.
♪
We just found the main group after a grueling hike up this
mountain, and this is primus, the alpha male that's lying in
front of me here.
♪
Primus, the alfa male, is clutching an enviable prize,
the carcass of a colobus monkey. It's more than the little ones
can resist.
; Look, look, look.
Oh, dropped it.
♪
He had a piece of meat, what looks like a Colobus monkey,
a red colobus and a young infant basically took it from him.
That created a bit of a commotion between the infants.
(Squealing)
(Inarticulate) red colobus monkeys.
(Squealing)
And it was interesting to see the two infants fight down up in
the trees and there was a mother sitting down here almost
shouting instructions up to them to stop it,
stop it, stop it, but eventually she went up and then it got all
out of hand and then suddenly Alofu appeared who is the second
ranking male to come and sort out all this trouble.
♪
It's quite common for chimpanzees to eat meat and it's
kind of a delicacy for them.
They really like it, but very hard to obtain because it's
generally red colobus monkeys that they would catch and these
monkeys are very nimble up in the high canopy where obviously
chimpanzees struggle to move around so fast,
so it's a massive team effort and a hunting party that will
go out and chase all these colobus high up into the canopy,
and yes, with a lot of aggression, and
movement and shaking of bushes, maybe one of them will fall
and they will catch them on the ground.
♪
. For now, the excitement seems to be over.
Jean du Plessis is on his second day of his quest to find
the M-group of chimpanzees
in the Mahale Mountains National Park.
After a difficult hike, Jean and head Greystoke guide Mwiga
Mambo have found the core group that includes the ranking males
high up in the mountains.
And they've located Primus, the Alpha male who Mwiga says is
also the most unstable.
Who's the most aggressive in the group?
; Primus and Orion.
Right.
; These guys are crazy.
; Primus is alpha male now, and he like fighting a lot.
; Because he has a bad behavior, most of the chimps,
; they don't like him.
; That's why you can see he will use like a force.
; Yeah.
; Maybe one years to come he will lose his power.
And who is the -- who do you think will be coming up next?
; It could be Darwin because he did such good things,
; and Orion.
Who is the oldest chimpanzee in the group?
; It's Kalunde.
Right.
; He is 55 years old.
; Kalunde, he is kingmaker.
Right.
; If he decided to support you, most of majority of chimps,
; they are going to listen to him, and then they are going to
; support.
So who is he supporting now?
Who, who is he...?
; Now, he is working with Alofu many time,
; so seems like he needed to support Alofu to resume his
; position.
And he has been alfa?
; Yeah he was alfa male in 1991 for 1 year only.
Okay.
Why do you hope that Darwin would become alpha?
; Because he has a lot of support also,
; even Alofu, he supports him and then a lot of females also,
; they like him.
; He is peaceful, but Orion is angry.
; He wants to take over from number one.
; So when he do that, he convinced the female, the female
; agree and then he is going to those number three,
; four, and five.
; When they agree, they are going to try to challenge the
; alpha male.
♪
Oh, man!
Sitting in between a group of ranking males and females and it
is quiet a time for the time being where they are grooming
each other.
It shows respect and strengthen bonds between individuals.
It's quite amazing that I can just sit here... and I kind of
wonder if they just view us as another primate species that
live side by side to them and don't have any negative effect
on them.
♪
After spending time with the chimps, it's time for Jean to
move on.
But all the difficult hiking has paid off.
Jean's had a chance to observe the chimp's dynamic social
structure up close.
It's always in constant change as lower ranking males vie to
move up in the hierarchy.
Perhaps, not so different from the way human societies work.
Now Jean heads back to the Greater Serengeti.
He's heading to Lake Natron in the Great Rift Valley.
Here, in the shadow of the sacred Ol Doinyo Lengai volcano
is the centre of the Maasai Culture.
The Serengeti plains is known for it's relatively undisturbed
ecosystem, it's rich wildlife, and the wildebeest migration.
But it is also one of the key places where our species, homo
sapiens evolved.
We know that hominids have lived in the Serengeti for a long
time, but a recent discovery on the shores of Lake Natron is
helping rewrite the story of modern humans.
Now this looks like an adult, maybe
a bit smaller.
; Yeah, it's a baby.
Yeah, I've got a few sets of footprints here,
seems like these people were walking from over there,
going down this way, and they were all walking barefoot.
In Southern Serengeti or more in the Ngorongoro Conservation
Area, there is another set of footprints,
those are called the footprints of Laetoli, that's the -
the oldest proof of walking on two legs and that humanoid was
called homo-erectus.
These footprints provide a link to humanity's distant past,
but the area around Lake Natron and the Eastern side of the
Serengeti is currently home to the Maasai.
This series of footprints are referred to as the Ngare Sero
Footprints, and it's very interesting because it's the
oldest footprints of the homo sapiens in East Africa dating
back to a 120,000 years.
The significance of these footprints are that it's a clear
indication that modern day homo sapiens lived in this area for
a very long time, even a little bit longer then what was
originally thought.
. The Maasai settled in the Serengeti around the15th century
and developed a very distinct culture that they have held onto
in spite of pressures from the modern world.
Little has changed in their lifestyle or culture in that
time.
They are still a tribe of semi-nomadic pastoralists.
There are two things that define life for the Maasai- their
cattle and their spiritual beliefs.
The Maasai believe in a single God who influences their daily
life.
And there are a number of places around the Greater Serengeti
that they consider sacred.
The most sacred is Ol Doinyo Lengai an active volcano that
the Maasai believe is their God.
; Ol Doinyo Lengai is very famous.
; Two years ago, we've had really trouble with dry season.
; Many, many cattle died around here,
; also Kenya.
; So I saw Maasai from Kenya, they are joining with the Maasai
; an old man or an old woman in this place and they joined
; together and they make a safari in about two days,
; they went to the top.
And then it started raining.
; Yeah, I mean it was about after that few months coming,
; it's raining and we have a big rain right now.
Yes.
According to the Peter, some of these families actually packed
up and they left the area altogether in fear of bigger
eruptions.
So do you think people were doing something wrong to make
the god angry?
; Yeah, it's a big, big eruption until people,
; they moved from the same place to another place.
Where did the ash go?
; It goes to Ngorongoro direction.
The ash from Lengai gets picked up by the wind.
It's this nutrient rich ash from these volcanoes that constantly
replenishes the Serengeti.
In one area, the ash has collected into a sand dune.
It is one of the Massai's sacred sites.
I'm heading to the shifting sands which is one of very few
sacred places to the Massai tribe and it's out here on
extremely barren terrain.
The area I am in is inside the Ngorongoro Conservation Area.
The Massai live here for a couple of hundred years.
It's a great example of the way people and wildlife can live
side-by-side.
The Massai traditionally are not hunters,
so they are a prime example of a tribe that can live in harmony
with wildlife.
There's quite a few Massai sheep herds around.
. Jean arrives at the Massai sacred site and finds
a welcoming committee.
There's different kind of greetings for men and women
in Massai.
The language is called Maa and they say different things when
you greet a woman or younger woman,
older woman, or different age set of male as well.
(Jean speaks Maa with the Masais)
Massai culture is patriarchal and sharply divided along gender
lines.
♪
The Massai take Jean to see the sacred sand dune.
The sand dune was created by a volcanic eruption out of Ol
Doinyo Lengai that's off in that direction and has now been
moving downwind in approximately 25 meters every year.
There's definitely some magnetic qualities to the sand
that keeps it sticking together.
Here you can see the sand falling over on itself and this
is essentially just a normal sand dune,
made up out of volcanic ash that have some magnetic qualities
that kind of keep it together a little bit and it just keeps on
falling over on itself like this.
It's pretty cool.
These shifting sands have some religious value to the Massai
tribe and it's believed that if a woman cannot conceive that
they need to come and sleep in this vortex and that will help
them to become pregnant.
♪
The women are raised to become wives and mothers and the men
are Massai warriors.
These roles have been in place since the Massai settled here
in the 15th century.
Wildlife Expert and Safari Guide Jean du Plessis is at Lake
Natron in the Great Rift Valley.
It's the cultural centre of the Massai People.
I'm at the Warden Safari's Lake Natron camp and this is Mwengi
who is going to be my Massai guide.
♪
These cows have now been taken out into the field by the young
boys who are called Layoni where they will go to pastures and
just be out there for the whole day and be led back around six
o'clock in the evening.
. The Massai men are warriors called Morani.
I always wonder what is the responsibility of the Morani
because 50 years ago, there was a lot more trouble with maybe
lions and other tribes and things like that and then the
Morani were like the warriors and they were protecting the
tribe.
But today there is not so much trouble with warfare and you
don't need to go and catch and steal cows.
So what does the Morani do these days?
; The function of Morani now to do it is only to look for their
; peace and love for their community and also to make their
; cows to be somewhere which has enough grass or enough food
; and enough water.
I find that very interesting what you say is like now the new
function of them is to make sure that there is peace and love in
the community.
; Yeah.
Yeah, but of course, in the same way it's also protecting the
culture.
; Yeah.
So yeah, I think that's great.
This enclosure here seems to be where they are
keeping the goats.
; Yeah -
The baby goats.
What's interesting is that it's a mini representation of how the
main Massai houses are being constructed where they take the
branches from a Cordia tree and then packing it with dung all
the way up the walls and even on the inside and then they will
smoothen it out with mud on the inside to give the nice,
red ochre type of look.
Besides all the modern technology that surround the
Massai tribe, they still choose to live in these very
traditional houses in a very traditional lifestyle and I mean
you might have a watch and a cell phone but you still-
(laughs)
That's one of those things that I always admire about Massai is
they clung on to their culture.
Yeah.
It's really nice.
. In spite of their reputation as warriors,
the Massai are not hunters.
Their traditional diet includes meat from the animals they
raise.
They also drink raw cow blood and milk.
The Morani are going to draw some blood from a cow's neck and
these are special tools that they use to kind of get the
blood out.
It's like an arrow that they shoot in.
Okay. Is that still really a big part of the Massai diet?
; Yeah.
Okay.
; Sure.
The major part you think?
; Yeah.
You cut it.
Yeah, that's very sharp.
It looks like a young one.
(Cattle Bell Rings)
(Inarticulate)
There's a little kid with the calabash.
That's what they carry the blood in.
; Yeah.
(Inarticulate)
So how much blood you take from them?
; We don't take much.
Okay.
(Inarticulate)
They now are going to take this calabash and get some fresh milk
in there.
(Inarticulate)
So what if you don't stir it, it goes hard,
it goes solid?
Oh, boy!
You definitely need to be born in this culture to appreciate
that.
(Inarticulate)
Lactose and protein intolerant.
; How is it?
Just like coffee.
; (Laughs) It's like coffee.
; Sure.
(Laughs)
I don't see my name on here.
(Laughs)
Try getting this at Starbucks.
(Laughing)
♪
. Jean is heading to the Ngorongoro crater highlands where Myzgio
Tented camp works with the local Massai to give tourists some
insight into their traditions.
The Massai's semi-nomadic lifestyle allows their
livestock to thrive despite the relatively dry climate.
But the landscape provides other economic opportunities as well.
The traditional role of the warriors used to be to enrich
the tribe and that used to take on the form of going at war with
your neighboring clans and stealing their cows and in these
modern days, that's obviously frowned upon a little bit.
So the more modern way to do that is to get cash from
tourists and it's basically just the evolution of the tribe.
Tourism is now a major source of revenue for the Massai.
But the Massai don't often open their homesteads.
Instead they use elements of their traditions to create
attractions for the tourists.
Jean is at a recreation of an Opul.
It's a ceremony involving a feast of meat that is only for
the men.
A traditional Opul will take place away from the village and
last two or three days.
; Today we got a message that you are coming so we prepare our
; traditional food.
; Normally our traditional food is meat and milk and blood.
; We took the blood without killing from the neck of the
cow.
(Inarticulate Discussion)
In a lot of ways the saving grace for wildlife in Tanzania
is the fact that Massai can live side by side with wild animals
and the reason is because it's just not in their tradition to
kill wild animals for food where most other tribes in Tanzania
will do that but all of these areas,
that's boundary in Massai village land is safe where one
can still go quality game viewing as well, 'cause Massai
are not killing the wild animals.
So why is that the Massai's never went like other tribes
where they would hunt wildlife?
; That's a good question.
; You know the Massai people, we believe in God,
; one God for everyone in the world,
; white people, black people.
; So our beliefs tell us that we have a very special gift
; coming from God as animals.
; We are herd people. We keep livestock;
; cows, goat, sheep.
So Massai never eat wild animals?
; We never eat any game meat.
(Inarticulate)
You can taste the barbeque here.
(Inarticulate)
(Laughs)
It'd be nice with a bit of chili sauce,
but the chief here say, not allowed;
only meat, no salt, no chili, just like that,
and it's actually pretty good.
Okay, it's very goaty.
(Inarticulate Discussion)
These Massai warriors who are called Morani are now starting
to prepare a soup that's made from boiled up goat intestines.
; Nobody, the Massai people we never use the soup without the
; herbs and the herbs coming from the different plants.
Enjoying an early evening snack.
; Do you guys really eat this?
No?
(Laughs)
Containing a lot of stomach lining and heart and lung.
. Wildlife Expert and Safari Guide Jean du Plessis has been getting
up close to both chimpanzees and humans in his exploration of the
changing face of hominid life on the Serengeti.
Humans lived here from
as far back as 30,000 to 40,000 years.
Now he's up early to survey the landscape from above and to look
back even further.
Hominids have been living on the Serengeti plains for millions of
years.
In fact, not too far from where I am standing now are the famous
footsteps of Laetoli which date back three million years and
those are the earliest form or signs of humans walking on two
legs.
Since then up until now, humans have utilized this great
wildlife expanse.
From Australopithecus to Homo Sapiens, they all share the
common trait of walking on two legs.
But it is the privilege of humans alone to
survey this land from above, to understand its past,
and, hopefully to protect its future.
This morning we are taking to the sky in this hot air balloon
to get a little bit of a new perspective of this beautiful
countryside.
♪
; Okay, we are flying along the Seronera Valley and this valley
; collects water from open area and takes that water to Grumeti
; River.
Interesting seeing this area from the air,
wondering how much has changed over the last three million
years since homo-erectus actually took his first steps.
I actually expect that it looked a lot different here before the
eruption of Ngorongoro where this massive ash cloud fell over
here and that's what gives this area this great characteristic
of these open plains.
It's debatably hundreds of meters of thick ash that covered
all these valleys.
; I'm trying to follow the river.
♪
Yeah, it's amazing up here.
Don't think we'll be doing canoeing in this river.
Just flew over two male lions, beautiful,
clearly the dominant pair of this area.
Very undeterred by the balloons.
♪
These open plains are not really that conducive to the way humans
want to live.
Even though there's a huge amount of game in the wet season
and in the dry season, it's extremely barren and there's
very little to eat for anything, from hominid all the way through
to predators.
So I would think that the area was much more ideal for humans
to live and evolve prior to the eruption of Ngorongoro crater.
♪
These river systems are like lifelines.
. The Serengeti is a remarkable feat of nature.
It was born in a catastrophic eruption of the Ngorongoro
volcano millions of years ago, creating lush plains that
sustain an incredible range of wildlife.
It's where our distant ancestors walked and evolved as part of a
self sustaining ecosystem where every creature from the smallest
insect to the massive bull elephant plays their unique
part.
It's the site of the world's greatest mass migration of land
animals.
It's a window into what the world looks like when it's in
balance.
How nature, humans and wildlife can coexist and live in harmony,
as it was meant to be.
This is the Serengeti.
♪