After our morning drive, we left the park to visit a Maasai village.

Here is our village guide, whose name, I must admit, escaped me. What I do recall quite clearly is the skill with which he coaxed a steady stream of shillings from our wallets.

The village was surrounded by a circular fence of acacia.

The Maasai are pastoralists, and the fence helps them manage their cattle. During the day, they allow their herds - mainly cows and goats - to graze the surrounding pastures. At night, they bring the animals inside the fence to protect them from predators.

The Maasai are also polygamous. A man may take several wives, but he may not take a bride if he cannot pay her bride-price. (Our guide noted that the village chief has seven wives, and paid ten head of cattle for one of them.)

Before we passed through the fence, our guide informed us that the tour would cost five thousand shillings. (One U.S. dollar buys about a hundred Kenyan shillings. In other words, admittance was about fifty bucks.) We handed it over.

Once inside the village, we were treated to a performance of the adumu, a kind of combination military parade and dance.

The parade portion of the adumu involves a call-and-response song in which the song leader (the olaranyani) sings the verses while the rest of the group responds with rhythmic throat singing. Here is a brief excerpt:

The dance portion of the adumu is essentially a jumping contest.

Next, our guide showed us how the Maasai make fire. The process requires dry straw, dry elephant dung and two different types of wood.

After the demonstration, we were given the opportunity to purchase the two pieces of wood as souvenirs, for six thousand shillings. (The elephant dung was not on offer.) The Woman accepted this offer, and so, these two pieces of wood are now in our home. Lacking straw and dung, we have not attempted to use them to start a fire.

Next, our guide showed us the inside of a typical Maasai dwelling.

Once inside - and, conveniently, out of sight of the other tribesmen - our guide asked if we would like to make a "special contribution" of four thousand shillings to the village. This contribution, he assured us, would help to build a new school for the children of the tribe. The Woman obliged.

Finally, as our visit wound down, our guide told us about the Maasai diet. Their traditional diet consists of raw foods, and I don't mean crudités: I mean raw milk, raw meat, and raw blood. Our guide asked us: for six thousand shillings, would we like to see a tribesman drink a cup of blood drawn from a calf's jugular vein?

Of course we would!

(While we waited for the calf to be produced, we saw a heartbreaking sight. I really feel for this poor bastard. Is it not enough that you have to scratch out a living in a semi-arid region? Do you have to be a Leafs fan too?)

Finally, the calf was produced and the ritual began. It comprises five steps.

Step one: subdue the calf.

Step two: puncture the calf's jugular vein.

Step three: collect the calf's blood in a cup.

Step four: drink!

Step five (not shown): cover the calf's wound with a mud compress to stanch the bleeding.

What's that, you say? You'd like to see a video of the ritual? Thanks to The Woman and her iPhone, your wish is granted:

And with that, our visit was over. Except... You know how you can't seem to get out of a museum or an art gallery without passing through the gift shop? Our hosts had learned that trick as well.

Here, The Woman bought two small wooden bowls for five hundred shillings each.

At this point, I may have remarked on the day's expenses (which stood at twenty-two thousand Kenyan shillings). This dialogue ensued:

THE WOMAN: Don't worry about it. The exchange rate is a thousand to one.

ME: No, it's a hundred to one.

THE WOMAN: Oh.

[long silence]

ME: [gently] You know, one of us is a midwife, and the other one used to trade foreign exchange options for a living.

THE WOMAN: I feel like the wrong one is holding the purse.

But we both knew The Woman was not wrong to do as she did. We were affluent tourists on holiday; our Maasai hosts are eking out a subsistence lifestyle. In giving, we gave up nothing more than the cost of a good night out; in receiving, they gained something much more lasting. What does it matter whether the gain takes the form of textbooks to equip a new school or livestock to make a new marriage? A stream of tourists' shillings will nourish this village better than the blood of any calf.