As soon as they can walk, young girls follow their mothers around and begin helping with their chores. Today is fishing for shrimp and small fish in the flooded taro fields, a great opportunity to exchange the latest village news ? a pastime the women, young and old, love..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...
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As soon as they can walk, young girls follow their mothers around and begin helping with their chores. Today is fishing for shrimp and small fish in the flooded taro fields, a great opportunity to exchange the latest village news ? a pastime the women, young and old, love..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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