“Why are they burning the crops?” I asked our guide as we were driving through the Serengeti National Park. “They burn the crops to breathe new life into the earth. The ash creates minerals that provide the soil with rich nutrients to produce new crops in the next season.”

In the summer of 2016, I went the trip of a lifetime with my two travel buddies on a safari in the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania. We came during the dry season which was the perfect time to see wildlife from afar and up close. This was also the season in which they burned the crops to create new life.

Fires blaze to burn off the old to create new, sustainable life.