Introduction
Tourism and the Makonde. Tourism is an economic sector that involves people from different parts of the world. Tourism is a wider sector mainly involving attraction of some natural and general wonders. Some natural attraction touristic attractions include wild animals in Serengeti, Ngorongoro, Manyara, and on and on and some artificial touristic wonders may include historical structures such as buildings, bridges; built with a unique technology that may be no longer exists today or the advancement that we have today cannot explain it sufficiently. The Egypt Pyramids are among such structures that it is so difficult to explain the technology that was used to build them.
The Makonde people like other people in the world are gifted with different talents as argued by Plato in an argument about the Ideal state. I concur with Plato when he says that all human beings are talented differently and with various types of gifts. The Makonde people are found in three different countries of Eastern Southern Africa. They exercise their right of movement that belongs to human beings; the freedom of movement, and so they can be in any country of the world so long as they do it legally.
States/Countries exist to fulfill the needs of their citizens, human beings, and so they should have resources that are needed to satisfy the needs of people. Countries exist for the purpose of serving people’s needs, and individuals should use their talents to produce for the purpose of meeting their needs and those of fellow men and women.
The Makonde people are best known for their carvings talents. They can carve different types of sculptures of different types of themes ranging from marriage, faith, to as many subjects as possible. This carving talent is recognized and has been a source of important realities in the society where they find themselves in and even beyond; their carvings touch a number of sectors such as:
1. Economic
2. Tradition
3. way of expressing people’s faith
4. Touristic attraction
5. Source of government revenues
Economy – Tourism
The carving art is a source of income to a number of talented individuals who are good at playing with trees and wood in extra ordinary ways embedded in their brains. Indeed, beauty is in the eyes of the beholder; the beauty of beings, including carvings, attract people and so pay the artists turning it into a source of income. This can be witnessed through various market places where artistic articles are sold.
Tradition
The carving activity demonstrates the embedded tradition of a people being demonstrated this one artist through his/her ability in carving the different sculptures. The carvings speak volumes, they speak so many unspoken words that are indeed so much valuable to both the Makonde people and all people of the world.
Way of expressing peoples faith
Some artists carve crosses that are used by Christians as an expression of their faith and other Makonde knowledgeable fellows prepare artistic features that have some faith meaning to various groups of people in their society and beyond. The world has so much advance in telecommunication that the Makonde carvings could signify something else in other people’s culture
Touristic attraction – Tourism
These carvings demonstrate the great use of human intelligence at work. This is indeed amazing because some of those sculptors do not or have very limited formal education but they produce sculptures portraying great intelligence. The wood is chopped and prepared in such a way that people across the world are attracted to visit these beautiful artistic works and admire them.
Source of government revenues
Tourism; The carving talent is a source of income to the sculptors. Being a source of income to them they do contribute, through tax, to the government revenue which in turn is used to address citizens needs in the community such as hospital facilities, school, water accessibility and on and on.
These five mentioned contributions are only part of the many possible contributions; these are mentioned so as to keep you aware of the importance of the local people in developing their community through their local economic activities.
