What's My Dowry Worth Anyways?

I find that seeing how the other half lives brings perspective to my life. This time I got to meet a family of the Datoga tribe.

They are polygamous pastoralists, tending to their cows and goats. The kids do go to school, in between farm and house work.

The matriarch, an elegant woman of maybe 60, had a son who wanted another wife, sight unseen. I didn't ask how many wives he already had. Evidently the starting offer for my dowry is 20 cows and a couple donkeys.

Mutual curiosity about our very different worlds, here's some snippets of the conversation (via translator):

"Do you have a husband?"

"No, I don't want one of those."

She looks at me funny. But women pull more weight in their culture too, so maybe that's not so strange.

"But how will you have babies?"

"Oh I don't want those either."

Now I grew two more heads in her eyes. Red flag. I think the dowry dropped by 10 cows.

"Do you mill corn like this?"

"No, we have factories that do that and we buy it at the store."

I gave milling the corn a try. I’m not any good at it. Red flag. Dowry drops by another 5 cows. Maybe a donkey too.

"Do you build your houses like this?"

The women build the houses of bricks, mud, and wood. They look a lot stronger than the straw houses back home.

"No, we have people who build houses for us."

Red flag. Dowry must be in the negatives by now. My parents don't own any cows, so I think the deal is off.

Then she asks me a funny question, one that really highlights the differences of our worlds.

"Could I walk to where you live?"

I think about making joke of: "well its technically feasible if the Bering Strait freezes over...", but I don't think she knows what or where that is. So sadly, I just shake my head no.

Its not all bad though. There is a girl in the family - 19, studious, with good English. She wants to be a lawyer in the big city, Dar es Salaam.

I'm actively rooting for her.