Siberut has one of the densest and steamiest jungles in the world; mud swamps and deep riverbed crossings are everywhere. A network of logs and bamboo sections set in the mud links houses and villages. Athletic and graceful, even the eldest Mentawai don?t look down at the fly along these slippery logs, which inevitably send outsiders plowing into the thigh-deep mud that surrounds them..The Mentawai people live in the densest remote rainforest of Siberut Island, off the coast of Padang, West...
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Siberut has one of the densest and steamiest jungles in the world; mud swamps and deep riverbed crossings are everywhere. A network of logs and bamboo sections set in the mud links houses and villages. Athletic and graceful, even the eldest Mentawai don?t look down at the fly along these slippery logs, which inevitably send outsiders plowing into the thigh-deep mud that surrounds them..The Mentawai people live in the densest remote rainforest of Siberut Island, off the coast of Padang, West Sumatra, Indonesia. Traditional clans on this remote tropical island have long resisted cultural assimilation; their lifestyle has been unchanged for generations. The tattoo-covered sikeireis, or traditional shamans, are knowledgeable herbalists and lead the tribe in the practice of Jarayak, a form of animism: medicine men, rituals, ceremonies and taboos still define the Mentawai lifestyle...The endangered indigenous lifestyle of these Mentawai is one of the best preserved and most fascinating, yet one of the least known and protected. ..For more information on the Mentawai, visit Native Planet (www.nativeplanet.org), an NGO that we support..
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