On the Topic of Food Part 1

In Alaska, there is an Eskimo tribe called the Yupiks.  The Yupik people live in a village named Kasigluk, on the banks of the Johnson River, close to the Bering Sea.  About  540 people live in Kasigluk.  Until about 50 years ago, they weren't in touch with the rest of the world, making them one of the last tribes to know anything about the rest of the world and the "progress" it had made.  The closest highway to the village is 400 miles away.

 The Yupik were hunter/gatherers, that is until the 20th century rolled around.  From an early age they were taught to set traps for small game such as rabbits and gather fruits from the right plants.  Their was no school because it was more important to learn about gathering food.  When it got to dark to gather food in the winter, they spend a lot of time having festivals, with lots of music and dancing.  This time was called Cauyarvik, or "the time for drumming".  People made ceremonial masks and wrote poetry.  They believed that all peoples' souls were connected, even to those of the animals and plants they got their food from. 

In 1959, when Alaska became the 49th of the United States, people were building roads like crazy.  One of these roads stumbled upon Kasigluk.  People started coming into the village and development took over.  A school was built in all of this development, and people started using U.S. dollars.  They bought televisions, and moved out of their traditional homes.

At this point, the hunter/gatherer lifestyle was still rather strong.  But when McDonald's representatives started rolling in, they asked if the school would serve their food in the cafeteria.  The school was hesitant, but the decision came down to the fact that the school was rather poor, and they could use the extra money. 

This was a huge threat to this culture, who's religion is based around resourcefulness, and gathering your own food.

Were Neolithics Stupid? Heck, No!

I found this picture of a guy I'm sure you are all familiar with.  He and his news friend have a little question.

 The answer is yes.  Pre-neolithic society was one of the most innovative ways of life to ever be on the Earth.  With what very little tools they had, they were able to create the first weapons, clothes, and homes (Not to mention cultures).  To say that something is 'so easy, a caveman could do it' must make something pretty difficult.  It also seems to be bagging on your own race, for what led to things like firearms, fancy clothing, and buildings.

Imagine if someone who's culture hasn't changed since the stone age were to watch this.  How do you think that would make them feel about their way of life.  Primitive?  Unintelligent?  Stupid?

I found an article in the June issue of National Geographic (I don't know why, but they never sent a May issue, and just decided it was June) that talks about an ancient temple in Turkey, called Gobekli Tepe.  It is a circular complex with perfectly carved stone pillars around the edge with carved reliefs of animals on them.  I the center are two even larger pillars, with arms and a loincloth carved into the surface (Possibly built to resemble deities).

The catch: the temple was built 7,000 years before the neolithic revolution.  This tells us that religion was present in hunter/gatherer civilizations, meaning that they had the capability to carve, move, and erect these giant stone pillars without using domesticated animals.  If that's what a caveman could do, then I would bet you anything that getting insured by Geico must be very difficult.

Bang Bang V.S. Blowguns

Where I live, people like guns. Guns and hunting. That's considered very normal. Some people are quite obsessive about hunting, however. The other day, infact, I saw a bumper sticker on the rear window of a truck reading: Ditch the @$&#%, Let's go Hunting.

Am I mistaken, or is that disgusting? I mean, that makes a person look like a total A-hole. What's even worse, I think the guy was married. The fact that anyone would be ok with that shocks me.

Ok, getting off track. I think guns make us look lazy. Compared to the extent to which some indigenous peoples go to, anyway. You could take an accurate gun out onto a game preserve for a week or less, and come home with enough food to feed your family for a year and a half. If you lived in a remote jungle, you could take a hunting party of 10 men, each with a bow or a blowgun, for one day to bring back enough food to feed a village of around 90 members a single meal.

Now, back to the story about the bumper sticker. Things like this make me feel like the original weapon designs of our ancestors are unappreciated.

Understanding Difference

If you take two cultures, and set them up next to each other, there are always some differences.  Sometimes people will believe these differences to be a bad thing.  They are incapable of looking past the differences, to see that it is an important part of cultural diversity.  There are also a lot of cross-cultural misconceptions.  A perfect example of this is saying things like all Spanish speakers are Mexican.  Someone might see a man get off a plane from Spain, and believe him to be of Mexican descent.

Also, I have found this great show that aired on the Discovery Channel that has a lot of information on the cultures of an early tribe in West Papua, New Guinea.  Google: World's Lost Tribes: Living with the Mek.  This show has more information than I can provide in a single post.

Now, the Mek haven't changed their ways of living since the stone age, and that means they do not where much clothing.  Just a traditional hollowed gourd for the men, a grass skirt for the women, and nothing for the children.  I was watching an episode online using my phone, when a girl walks up to me, and asks what I'm watching.  I tell her it is a show about a primitive tribe living in the tropics, and show her.  At the sight, she was repulsed to see a group of naked men carrying out a religious ceremony.  Ever since, she has asked me if I still watch naked people.

This is the ignorance I strive to end.

Right Out in Front of Us

I set up this blog to try and remind my fellow Westerners that we are not alone.  I'm not talking about U.F.O.'s or extra terrestrials or anything like that, but something much closer.  Geographically, that is.  Mentally, however, it is much farther away than any alien.  You are far more likely to hear someone walking down the street or riding a bus talking about their favorite sci-fi movie than about Earth's early cultures.  People have been so misled by a veil of ignorance that they have lost value in these cultures.  Some are so misled that they are shocked, even appalled by some of these cultures' traditions.

And so, I have built this blog to inform others on these cultures and of their traditions, and that they are not taboo.  I want people to feel some value in these cultures and their histories, before they disappear from right out in front of us.