The Bedouins of Egypt, live in the desert and are nomads who move around and never settling in one place for long.
One of the reasons how they can have this existence in the harsh desert land is that they live with camels.
They have been living with camels for a millennia and they know the behaviours and characteristics of these magnificent animals.
Camels have long memories and can go without water for weeks.
When a mother camel has a baby the Bedouins know best to leave the mother alone with it’s baby. The mother takes its baby into the desert and may be away for weeks. The baby follows the mother around and the mother takes the baby to all the watering holes in the desert. Knowing that its baby will grow up to remember where the watering holes are, according to the stars.
Sometimes tragedy occurrs and the mother dies without showing it’s baby where all the watering holes are.
The baby grows up thinking it knows where all the watering holes are. In time it has children of its own and then shows its children where it knows where the watering holes are. In turn its children grow up and have children of there own, showing them the watering holes that they know.
This information is passed down for generations. The camels are fine, apart from the fact that they cannot go into various parts of the vast dessert, because they know no watering holes exist there.
Until maybe some where down the generations, one of the camels is in a part of the desert and it’s run of its water reserves and knows that the nearest watering hole is fifty miles away. It is facing impending doom.
Suddenly it comes across a watering that should not exist.
The camel is absolutely astonished, apart from being able to survive, where did this watering hole come from? It’s mother, grandmother, great-grand mother and so on had all said that this watering hole did not exist…..
And if this one exists then there must be more out there….??
Who can this camel ask where the others are, where can it go, what book can it read.
A new mission beyond the everyday begins for this one….. One that will allow it to go beyond the boundaries of its ancestors.
Flickr Creative Commons image by lovelpetal
