Cultural tourism in Tanzania started as a program to help rural communities enjoy the benefit of tourism sector in which they are a part of. The main goal is that rural communities should directly benefit from tourists who visit their areas.
Cultural tourism allows local people such as Maasai, Hadzabe, Datoga, Pare, Sambaa, Wa-arusha, Gogo, Nyakyusa and Wazaramo to offer tours that show their culture, their sacred places of worship, economic activities, for example, farming, pastoralism and fishing. The income generated is used by local people for specific development programmes, such as, the building of dispensaries, schools and cattle dip sites.
DIFFERENT CULTURAL TOURISM IN TANZANIA
MAASAI CULTURAL TOURISM
The Maasai are an indigenous ethnic group in Africa of semi-nomadic people settled northern Tanzania. Due to their distinct traditions, customs and dress and their residence near the many national game parks of East Africa, the Maasai are among the foremost African ethnic groups and are known internationally because of their links to the national parks and reserves.
Language – Maa, a language derived from Nilo-Saharan, related to Dinka and Nuer. They also speak the official languages of Tanzania Swahili and English.
Maasai Music and Dance
Traditionally, the Maasai music comprises of rhythms rendered by a chorus of vocalists singing harmonies, all the while the olaranyani (song leader) sings the melody. The olaranyani is usually the person who can best sing that song. The olaranyani starts singing the namba of a song and the group responds with one unanimous call in acknowledgment. Women recite lullabies, hum songs and sing music that praises their sons.
HADZABE CULTURAL TOURISM
Hadzabe Tribe Day tour offers you a unique opportunity to visit the traditional homeland of the Hadzabe (or Hadza) peoples, one of the last surviving hunter-gatherer tribes in the world, and to meet their neighbors, the Datoga peoples. They grow no food, raise no livestock, and live without rules or calendars. They are living a hunter-gatherer existence that is little changed from 10,000 years ago. What do they know that we’ve forgotten?
A Cultural Experience
The Hadzabe tribe of Tanzania is the last true nomadic tribe of Africa. Topi Adventure Tours and Safaris can take you on an amazing adventure with the Hadzas. You will join the men as they hunt for their daily subsidence using traditional bow and arrows, or join the women as they forage for fruits and berries. This is not a show or a “tourist put on”. This is the real deal. A true African cultural experience, not for the faint of heart.
DATOGA CULTURAL TOURISM
The Datoga consider themselves the oldest tribe in Tanzania. They are first and foremost warrior’s, known for their stealth ability to eliminate their enemy. They migrated some 3000 years ago from the Highlands of Ethiopia. Datoga’s are farmers specializing in onion plantations, but share similarities to Maasai in some traditions.
The Datoga tribe – Cultural experience Visiting the Datoga tribe will complete your cultural experience at Lake Eyasi. The Datoga are skilled farmers and craftsman. You will visit their habitat, and experience thier culture first hand.
Datoga Culture
The Hadzabe’s are semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers that are culturally and linguistically members of the Khoi (Person) and San (Foragers) group. They have close affinities with the Sandiwe people who possess cultural connections with the Khoekhoe hunter-gatherers communities of Southern Africa.
Women are adorned with “Hangweda“ made of local pieces of skin, while the Hadzabe men are polygamists with a patriarchal social system.