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Extraordinary footage of an uncontacted tribe

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  • Extraordinary footage of an uncontacted tribe

    This was filmed at a distance, as explained in the short clip. When I see these people looking back at the plane it's like our own distant past looking at us. I guess protecting people like this is protecting the last vestige of a past all our ancestors knew at one time.
    Sign @Survival's pledge to stand with #UncontactedTribes for their survival!

    Rhode Island

  • #2
    Yeah that is an awesome clip thanks for the share
    TN formerly CT Visit our store http://stores.arrowheads.com/store.p...m-Trading-Post

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    • #3
      That is amazing footage.  My heart says, let me be one of them.  Then there's reality.  Somehow reminds me of what we know as, "The Serenity Prayer."

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      • #4
        I read up on this story when it first came out.  It turns out, they weren't "uncontacted", the crew had actually been chased out by the same tribe a short time before this was filmed.  They don't feel that there are any uncontacted tribes left, although some have embellished their accounts to sell stories.  The deforestation of the Amazon has made it impossible to remain in the jungle without any outside contact.  I think it's a propaganda move by the lumber industry, trying to lead us to believe that they aren't destroying the ways of life for so many native there.  It is amazing however that they have kept so many traditions alive.  Here is a link to a good story on the "uncontacted" tribe.
        Indigenous people all over the world are already embedded in global modernity, whether anyone likes it or not. There is no turning back, no way to disengage from the modern world, nowhere for indigenous peoples to retreat. And I think it is fair to say that indigenous people are, generally, worse off in many ways since this change than they were before. Still, there are aspects of modernity — modern dentistry, for example — which could be of benefit to indigenous people if they had access to them.

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        • #5
          Yeah, the guy from Brazil who flew the BBC team in indicated he had monitored the tribe for 20 years, so I don't believe they had never seen outsiders before.  Plus this particular band was driven from Peru.  But real close contact would have wiped them out, I believe. Even the common cold can wipe out entire bands. Can't be easy trying to keep steps ahead of loggers, etc.  Last I knew a section of rain forest equal to the size of Pennsylvania is burned in Brazil every year. I still find the footage special, to see these people living and trying to hold on to that way of life.  Don't think they're ready to shop at Walmart quite yet.
          Tyson, good info here on just the degree of contact and degree of non-contact:

          Short article describing the attitude of 2 Christian missionaries.  They make me sick to my stomach:
          Diary entries illustrate the historic attempt of two missionaries to contact isolated Indians in the Brazilian Amazon

          Rhode Island

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          • #6
            All most illuminating. As a species, we sure do have an almight capacity for interference in other people's lives, don't we?
            I’m always astonished by these kinds of discoveries - even if the story is a little manipulated - and also extremely interested by any place that you can still see ancient survival skills and tool use in action without the feeling that you're interfering. The closest I’ve been on a couple of occasions is Borneo, where it is possible to visit the villages of the Iban/Dayak people. Traditionally, they were head-hunters (not to be confused with head-shrinkers) with a fearsome warrior culture. Head-hunting arose from over-population of their lands and also as a way of proving manhood and gaining a wife.

            [Yep, them's human skulls alright]
            In some cases these villages now have tarmac roads, electricity, gas and water supplies but the people still largely maintain a traditional way of life in long huts. These are normally on stilts, sometimes in the water for security. I visited one of the more remote villages, requiring a long trip in a 4x4 to a nature reserve at a place called Batang Ai. This huge artificial lake is part of Borneo’s Hydro-electricity programme, although the Iban didn’t take to kindly to the loss of their lands when the dam was built.

            [There's a longhouse]

            [And there's the drawbridge than they haul up at night]
            This all sounds rather primitive doesn’t it? Amazingly, there is a luxurious Hilton Hotel built on a small island in the middle of the lake. In fairness to the Hilton chain, it has been sympathetically built in traditional style with largely traditional materials and brings much-needed employment into the area. From the island you can take an hour’s trip up an ever-narrowing river by canoe to reach the Iban village.

            [Not sure you'd get me in that. Ours was a little more robust and had a small outboard]

            [The village has one telephone (for emergencies) but no-one could recall it ever having been used]
            I overheard one lady from Sweden taking a very politically correct stance that such a visit would be intrusive. The truth is that these people love to have visitors and are very welcoming (providing they know you’re coming!) They take great pride in demonstrating their independence and the traditions that they practice. Fortunately, that no longer includes the taking of heads, although it wasn’t officially out-lawed until 1953. The people are heavily tattooed but it’s not allowed to have tattoos beyond the end of your wrist unless you have taken a head. Something to watch out for, I felt.
            Our guide told us that we should take gifts, so we did. We filled two black bin-liners, following his advice to go for bulk and quantity of useful but inexpensive items. Candy was discouraged but cigarettes were not. We took a lot of writing paper and pencils plus some funky stuff for kids that we’d brought from England specifically for the purpose. Packs of disposable lighters. Rice and other cereals. Also toilet paper (sure beats leaves as far as the Iban are concerned). There was great amusement at the packs of coloured Post-It notes, which they had never seen before. What’s wrong with a nail if you want to stick something to a wall? They will have discovered afterwards that the small plastic balls we brought for the children actually glow in the dark.
            The Chief of the village gratefully received the gifts and proceeded to divide them up in an interesting way. He created the same number of piles as there were people in the village and then placed one item on each pile, continuing round the piles until the bags were empty. There was no discrimination about what the items were or their suitability for the recipient. It was simply about the numbers. A child of about 7 walked away with pile that included a couple of cigarettes and a bag of rice.

            [Choose a pile]
            I had a blow-pipe competition with one of the tribe. I was pretty good, if I say so myself, but he was better. They make the blow-pipes by strapping a long branch of something they call “ironwood” to a tree and laying underneath with a bladed borer on a long spindle with a T-handle so they can check the hole is going straight.  For hunting, they tip the darts with poison from a small berry found in the forest. When prey is hit, they run as fast as they can to get to it before the poison spreads through the animal and – even then – they hack a large piece out around the dart and throw that away. Sometimes a whole limb. The rest of the meat has to be minced, steeped in salt for an hour, washed and boiled for a long time to be on the safe side. We ate fish that our guide had brought along.

            [Close, but no cigar]
            I do NOT recommend the coconut “whiskey”. I think it was Oscar Wilde who said you should try everything once apart from incest and country dancing. I would add coconut whiskey to that list.
            There were modern tools in use (especially steel knives and machetes) but also lots of traditional stuff which was still regarded as functionally satisfactory. Hollowed out gourds for water carrying; bone and wooden weaving tools for example. I saw one of the tribe with a Bic biro that had probably come to the end of its life and he was wearing it as a nose piercing instead of the traditional bone. Like some kind of status symbol. I wonder what a future archaeologist might make of that if he ultimately gets buried with it still in place?


            [No artefacts on this trip, apart from these cool earrings traded for with the universal currency known as Marlboro]

            [And this, which I think is a Feng-Shui “compass” of unknown antiquity, left behind during the Japanese occupation. The disc in the middle rotates, but it's all carved from one piece of jadeite. Some amazing fossils elsewhere, too]
            Sorry about the travelogue, but if it encourages one person to go to Borneo and see this beautiful and interesting island, it will have been worth it.
            Roger
            I keep six honest serving-men (they taught me all I knew); Their names are What and Why and When and How and Where and Who.

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            • #7
              Thank you for the travelogue, Roger.  I think you described the trip of a lifetime. And I think you could beat me good in a blow pipe competition :lol:
              The Brazilian tribe in the clip I posted have chosen to have no contact, which seems to be the operative principal in Survival International's definition of uncontacted.  They are tribes who are aware of the outside world and have basically said to the civilized world: "Please, don't call us, we'll call you!!". Certainly understandable.
              Charlie
              Rhode Island

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              • #8
                Tyson
                I used to be in the timber business, did it for 40 years and the forest industry is only responsible for 5% of the Timber cut each year in Brazils Amazon, the rest is ranchers doing slash and burn to increase ranch land or subsistent farmers cutting -and- burning small acreage to be able to grow food for themselves and families, a lot of this is illegal, but the government has not stepped in to stop it, to many of them.
                Brazilian deforestation is strongly correlated to the economic health of the country: the decline in deforestation from 1988-1991 nicely matched the economic slowdown during the same period, while the rocketing rate of deforestation from 1993-1998 paralleled Brazil's period of rapid economic growth. During lean times, ranchers and developers do not have the cash to rapidly expand their pasturelands and operations, while the government lack funds to sponsor highways and colonization programs and grant tax breaks and subsidies to forest exploiters.
                A relatively small percentage of large landowners clear vast sections of the Amazon for cattle pastureland. Large tracts of forest are cleared and sometimes planted with African savanna grasses for cattle feeding. In many cases, especially during periods of high inflation, land is simply cleared for investment purposes. When pastureland prices exceed forest land prices (a condition made possible by tax incentives that favor pastureland over natural forest), forest clearing is a good hedge against inflation.
                Such favorable taxation policies, combined with government subsidized agriculture and colonization programs, encourage the destruction of the Amazon. The practice of low taxes on income derived from agriculture and tax rates that favor pasture over forest overvalues agriculture and pastureland and makes it profitable to convert natural forest for these purposes when it normally would not be so.
                Jack

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                • #9
                  Roger
                  I have been to Sarawak many times, stayed in the town of Miri, in a hotel across from the local Mosque; that conveniently woke me each morning at 4:00 with their call to God. I was in the Timber industry for 40 years and bought lumber products from Sam Ling Industries who had 15 mills there. We used to fly from Miri to Lawas and drive to different mills in the area. The Timber industry has been declining in the area for the last 10 years because of over cutting of trees legally and illegally and the government has put their foot down to stop it, mostly because the International Monetary System told them they had to, or they would not continue asset  them. We were stopped several times on roads leading out of Lawas by Federal troops wanting to know what we were doing in a controlled area, glad we had our papers in shape or might not be writing this.
                  Very nice people and for Muslims they like their Johnny Walker Black Label.
                  Jack

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                  • #10
                    Charlie
                    Saw this on TV a few days back. They are part of thier enviromen.
                    Jack

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                    • #11
                      This is a still shot from the above video overflight. If you go to the link below and scroll down a bit you can move your mouse over the photo and info will appear describing what you're seeing:
                      Sign @Survival's pledge to stand with #UncontactedTribes for their survival!

                      And here's the photo.  I've posted this to a few other forums, my feeling being if ever a picture was worth a thousand words, this is surely it.  Notice the metal trade goods.
                      The adult male looks like he's getting ready to use his bow if he has to.
                      Rhode Island

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                      • #12
                        Interesting.  Wanted to point out a kinda' peculiar observation.  Notice the physique of the peoples photographed? The whole proportion of their bodies in general is almost identical to the other. Short legs, large wide feet, wide torso, and appear to be large boned. Silly observation, huh?

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                        • #13
                          A most unfortunate update.  The tribe in question is missing and drug traffickers are likely to blame:

                          Rhode Island

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