Serengeti [antikvár]

SERENGETI Natural Order on the African Plain Serengeti National Park stretches for endless miles across the wilds of East Africa. A world of calm beauty and quick violence, it is home to over two million animals and witness to daily dramas of life and death played against a background of sublime grandeur. To capture that fascinating world in photos, I lived in the park for a year and a half, from August 1982 to March 1984. Before that time, I had traveled all over the globe to photograph wild animals in their natural habitats. Nevertheless, I had become frustrated because I felt there was a limit to how well I could understand the animals' lives when working in a hurried, detached manner. I finally asked myself if I could truly capture the essence of nature and animals without living among them. Consequently, I decided to stay in one region and tackle the problems of working in a single locale. I chose the Serengeti National Park because I had visited the area several times and was intrigued by it Serengeti means "endless plain" in the language of the Masai people, a seminomadic tribe Uving in the region. The park is possibly the finest area in the world for its selection and number of large animals. A year and a half did not seem long enough for my task because to know the park well one would undoubtedly need to live there five or ten years. However, I did my best in the limited time available. With my wife and four-year-old daughter, I rented a small house in a village called Seronera, located in the center of the park. Its population consists of six hundred Tanzanians who are rangers in the park or employees of the tourist lodges. In this small village, no gas or electricity was available, and water had to be pumped from a spring fifty-five miles away The water pipe was very old and often out of order. Because of the water shortage, it was often difficult to wash or find drinking water. On days when the water fiowed, my wife scrubbed our clothes on a washboard she had found, after many days of searching, in Tokyo. We were in constant need of meat and fresh vegetables. Books, newspapers, and music were also in short supply. My wife frequently listened to tapes of classical music. Mozart is her favorite, and she believed the sound of the violin suited the plain. Although I am a fan of rock music, I had to agree. We realized that we had a lot of the "dirt" that we call "civilization" from our city life in Japan. As the time passed, the "dirt" slowly disappeared, and we began to feel refreshed. By the time we decided to return to Japan, my wife expressed her appreciation and love for Serengeti, saying, "I could stay here by myself." During those eighteen months, the faces of the wild animals began to look familiar to me. Of course, they did not exhibit signs of intimacy, but I felt something like friendship for them. Whenever I saw a family of cheetahs or lions, I could not help hoping that the cubs would grow up safely. As I kept pushing the shutter release of my camera, I came eventually to a conclusion, a truth about nature. I began to call this truth "Okite." It is the Law that rules everything in Serengeti; in fact, it governs all life on earth. Human beings are no exception. This is my deep belief. Nature can be both severe and gentle. Through the photographs in this book, I hope you will understand the significance nature and Okite have for me. What image do you have of the wilds of eastern Africa or of the animals living there? It is diflicult for people who have never visited that region to form a realistic picture of it. Some might think that joining a safari is the best way to experience Africa. Perhaps they