If you’re following along on Instagram, you may know that I recently visited Kenya – such a beautiful country!

I travel at least twice a year to visit a new country especially seeing the countries we’ve seen on Nat Geo or History TV channels.

Kenya is on our bucket list ever since – it’s the perfect place for lovers of nature, animals, and indigenous people.

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I would say that of all the countries I’ve visited so far, Kenya is on top ticking off the following list:

🍴 Food — 90%. It’s totally fresh, clean, and tasty! I really liked their curry; it has coconut milk in it.

🌳 Nature —100%. It’s divine and untouched. Indigenous and non-indigenous people protect it.

🦬 Animals — 100%. I mean, it’s real savannah and pure nature after all. We’ve seen the Big 5. I even walked among the giraffes.

🫂 People — 90%. Especially in Masai Mara – before you could even get out of the car, the kids and adults wave their hands at you and smile.

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It is on this trip that I got reconnected with my ✨roots as a HUMAN✨ – not someone attached to any race, religion, nationality, or any other orientation.

Let me share with you the lessons I’ve learned from the wildlife:

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1. Smile and a warm spirit are the ultimate universal language.

They didn’t need to know me, my name or where I am from, before they smile and greet me.

In the city, especially in fast-paced places like the UAE, nobody even cares to smile or greet you even when they see you eye to eye.

We need to know each other personally before we give a basic warmth and decency. We mask this in being shy or being civil.

When I went to Kenya and saw how different the approach is, I realised just how far we’ve strayed away from our humanity.

They’ve kept this basic human connection alive so naturally – if they see you passing by or your eyes crossed, they’d smile and greet you or give you a nod.

We’ve lost this – our ability to deeply connect with humans. We’ve lost our trust with humanity.

I even forgot it existed – that it’s safe to smile and greet strangers.

To Kenyan people, especially Masai Marans, there are no strangers. They themselves said it: “There is no race, religion, nationality here, we are all one at heart.💖”

Mark and I really teared up when the Marans in our camp hugged us after we danced with them on our last night.

It feels good to find deep connection with people you barely know mentally, but you know by heart – as a human.

This is how we are supposed to live.

2. It’s ok to see a lion kill and eat a baby giraffe away from his mother.

Hold on before you raise your eyebrows on this.

Before going to Kenya, I told Mark that I want to see a live kill and chase in action during the safari game drives.

I don’t know, I just feel like I want to complete the entire Nat Geo TV-like experience being in a game drive that’s why I really want to experience this.

Until we saw one.

I cannot believe in my eyes what I just saw. Yes, I saw this many times on TV, but witnessing it in action and with me on the freaking roof (Kids, don’t follow this example) is a mixture of feeling in awe, grief, wonder, joy, fear, and anxiety.

I wanted to see it so clear that I didn’t even notice I already climbed up the roof (which I was not supposed to do) until I saw the lion, dragging his poor giraffe kill, eye-to-eye.

When this happened, I quickly came down the roof and our driver drove fast away from action.

As we were driving away, I saw in a not-so-far distance a bigger giraffe looking at these two lions, specifically the one dragging the smaller giraffe.

This is when we realised that that was her kid, she was the mother.

Grief covered me as I look into the faint eyes of this Masai giraffe.

I was so happy seeing my dream come true to the expense of another creature’s demise.

I was dumbstruck.

On the way to find the next animal of the Big 5, I thought long and hard as to why the predator and prey game in nature was even allowed by God.

At one point, I also connected this experience too on how I experience it in the city – there are predators in our modern societies, and many are preys too.

But then I thought, if nature or God won’t allow the lions, cheetahs, tigers, leopards – all these predators – to kill and hunt prey, then how will they survive?

So, was it that preys were only created for the sole purpose of being killed and hunted by those at the top of the chain?

Isn’t that unfair is what I thought.

And then I zoomed way out to see the bigger picture and I understood that none of this is new or terrifying or cruel – it is just what it is.

For the entire planet to survive, a balance in ecosystem and food chain needs to be maintained.

The same is true for modern society of humans.

Predators aren’t bigger just because they are stronger, it’s just what they are created for. Preys aren’t smaller just because they are weaker, it’s just what they are created for.

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What matters is how we live our lives whether we are a predator or prey.

A human life is much more complex – we can be both the predator and prey in many areas.

✳️ How do we lead when we’re at the top? How do we submit when we’re at the middle or bottom?

✳️When we see someone’s demise or misfortune, do we feel empathy or grief for them, or do we just laugh with the ones on the top?

✳️Do we judge the ones on top and discourage those who wants to be on top out of our frustration being part of the middle or below?

✳️Or are you able to see beyond any level at all and just see people as they are – human?

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How we be with ourselves, and others is what matters.

3. Even nature works hard too.

As I gaze in the serenity and quietness of the savannah at our camp, I thought to myself why can I not just live here?

Closer to nature. Closer to animals. Closer to peace and love.

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I look at the trees, animals, plants, and flowers, they don’t labour or spin like we do as humans in the city and yet they are always provided.

As I observe longer and look even closer, I realise just how wrong I was.

To me, this experience looks like heaven as it’s my days of respite, but to them – both the living and inanimate – it’s not.

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They do work hard. They do labour. If we look hard enough to see it.

🌲Trees had to stand the extreme weather of rain and heat. Kenya’s a mix of sunshine and a cold breeze and rain.

🦒 Animals always need to watch their back to not get killed. They need to run, chase, kill and work with other animals to survive.

🥀Flowers need to produce pollens by keeping themselves nourished from the earth and withstand the busy visitations of bees and butterflies.

🌱Some plants have accepted their fate to be eaten, while others accepted their role of shooing away the insects from their other kind.

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It’s all hard work, but it’s one done in elegance and grace.✨

They simply work and live out their calling without doing extra work and taking on unnecessary stress.

Unlike humans, we work, we labour, we answer the call, but few of us do it with elegance and grace.

We make life look harder than it really is because we always look at others to compare than to cooperate – a trait I observed from most wild animals.

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The next time I come back to the wildlife, I have learned my first lessons.

🙏🏻 I will try to be more human.

🤍 I will show up as a better leader and a better team member.

✨ I will do hard work with elegance and grace.

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I hope by sharing this, made you feel like you travelled with me too.

I hope these impartations from the wildlife has touched you in many levels and inspired you to make better changes.

(Comment below or reshare and tag me if you do!)

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Thank you, Kenya and Masai Mara people, animals, and nature. 🙇🏻

I am also grateful for YOU for being here and for reaching this part of the email.

May we share a smile and a warm spirit when we see each other face to face. 😊

Hakuna Matata, my friend.

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With love,

Denielle