Notwithstanding that this tearful and frightening ordeal has been outlawed in Kenya about three years ago, teenage Kenyan girls in Pokot Tribe, in Baringo County-Kenya still have to as it is considered a rite of passage that marks the transition into womanhood and a sign of strength.
A tradition which is said to be sacred, also a certification for these girls to be able to marry. Young girls are lined up before villagers to undergo tribal circumcision ceremony draped in animal skin and covered in white paint, the girls squat over large stones after being circumcised; wrapped in bright coloured shawls, and are also made to spend the night huddled around a fire in a thatched-roof house as local women gather to sing and dance in support.
Female genital mutilation (FGM), also referred to as female genital cutting/female circumcision, is the ritual removal of some or all of the external female genitalia, carried out by a "traditional ircumciser" with a blade or razor, broken glass and scissors; with or without anaesthesia, to reduce a woman's sexual desire.
According to U.N.'s Children's Fund, UNICEF, more than 125 million women have been cut in the 29 countries in Africa and the Middle East where genital mutilation is carried out. FGM is concentrated in 27 countries in Africa, as well as in Yemen and Iraqi Kurdistan, and practised to a lesser extent elsewhere in Asia and among diaspora communities around the world. The age at which it is conducted varies from days after birth to puberty.
See more pix below...
A tradition which is said to be sacred, also a certification for these girls to be able to marry. Young girls are lined up before villagers to undergo tribal circumcision ceremony draped in animal skin and covered in white paint, the girls squat over large stones after being circumcised; wrapped in bright coloured shawls, and are also made to spend the night huddled around a fire in a thatched-roof house as local women gather to sing and dance in support.
Female genital mutilation (FGM), also referred to as female genital cutting/female circumcision, is the ritual removal of some or all of the external female genitalia, carried out by a "traditional ircumciser" with a blade or razor, broken glass and scissors; with or without anaesthesia, to reduce a woman's sexual desire.
According to U.N.'s Children's Fund, UNICEF, more than 125 million women have been cut in the 29 countries in Africa and the Middle East where genital mutilation is carried out. FGM is concentrated in 27 countries in Africa, as well as in Yemen and Iraqi Kurdistan, and practised to a lesser extent elsewhere in Asia and among diaspora communities around the world. The age at which it is conducted varies from days after birth to puberty.
See more pix below...
Credit: Reuters-Siegfried Modola/Dailymail
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