The Maasai people are a tribe who live partly in southern Kenya but mainly in northern Tanzania. They range from Lake Turkana down through Ngorongoro. Currently there are 377,089 Maasai but the population is declining fast. Thisdisappearance is mostly due to a clash both economically (farming) and culturally with the advancing Kenyan and Tanzanian peoples. One quarter of the Maasai people have already been converted to Christianity. The rest still follow the traditional religion. The traditional Maasai religion worships cattle and revolves around the God of the sky, Engai, or more commonly Enkai. To the Maasai any pursuit other than a pastoral one is considered demeaning to Enkai. The Maasai feel that each new day is a significant change in their lives.   The Maasai got their name after their language; Maa. It is an African language that has no written form. The Maasai have four age grades: junior warrior, senior warrior, junior elder, and senior elder. The Maasai men can marry once they reach the senior warrior age group. This age lasts for about fifteen years. Once a person has been a senior elder for around fifteen years, they are eligible to become the Oloiboni, tribal leader, soothsayer, priest, and prophet.   One way the Masai that is unique is their application of red ochre all through their bodies and hair. The women of the tribes wear many coils around their necks as well as some on their arms. The Maasai, both warrior and elder alike, wear earrings through the large loops in their ears. The Maasai are nomadic most of the year; following the herds and rains across the Serengeti/Maasai Mara area. The Maasai live in kraals, small huts made out of clay and cow dung clusters. The women are treated as equals of the men in the Maasai culture. They are the ones who make the kraals. The village children are content to simply play games with pebbles, dung, and berries. One of the traditional rites of passage for the Maasai boys and girls becoming a junior warriors is a customary circumcision ritual.   For food, the Maasai eat mostly meat. Their drink mainly includes the milk and blood of the animals. The Maasai are very much like the Native Americans in that they have a great respect for their food and feel that they need to use all of the animals that they have slain. The following parts are used these ways: its urine is used for medicinal purposes, the dung to plaster and seal their houses, the morn is used to make containers, the hooves for ornaments, and the hide for everything from clothing an d shoes to bedding. Often times, a Maasai warrior will go out armed with nothing but a spear to kill a lion.   A few Maasai have turned to cultivation and grow maize and barley for Kenya Breweries. Although some of the Maasai's traditions are being washed away by "western" customs, many of their traditional practices still are being utilized. Unfortunately, these customs may not be continued if their population continues to be diminished.