Lithuanians saw the amazing traditions of the tribe: male pride covered in gourds and the ancestor’s mummy, which the locals carry with them.

I kindly greeted the commander, who held my hand for a long time and repeated “wa wa wa wa …”; I gave him a cigarette. Later, at the invitation of the women, I ran through their huts. Some produce to eat, others rotate tobacco rolls. Without the permission of men, it is forbidden to enter their homes, by the way, members of the stronger sex and women live separately. The tribe is multifaceted, so men enter women’s houses only when they “think.” It does not help to raise or raise children, everything is done by mothers. When a child is born, sexual relations in the family only begin after 2 or 5 years.

I eat everyone with cigarettes and that makes the locals very happy. The humor is good, everyone is happy. On the occasion of the reception, the men of the village go to the nearby field and show how the villages used to fight each other. Later, the winners danced and returned to the village. Women also joined in the tribal dance.

The pork will be fried for lunch, it still needs to be prepared. The Dani tribe has a complete ceremony to prepare the piglet; pigs are very important to them. Its meat is used for food, blood for ritual ceremonies, bones and tails for jewelry, and ribs for sweet potatoes. Pigs are also used for barter or donated to reconcile. Sweet potatoes, sugar cane and tobacco are also grown here. The tribes sell stones to make axes, wood, animal skins, and bird feathers.

Returning to the recipe for the piglets. The men of the tribe cut wood and piled stones on them. He lit a fire with his hands and let the stones warm. At that moment, the other men, armed with bows and arrows, shot the piglet and attracted the sows. The village commander gutted the sucker with a very sharp bamboo stick. The women covered the hole with leaves, then placed hot stones in it, placed more leaves, then put sweet potatoes, other vegetables and, on top, a gutted piglet. Then everything was covered with leaves again, wrapped and simmered for over an hour. A wonderful feast of mild pork and sweet potatoes awaited him.

After the piglet ceremony, I had a good dose of excitement while walking through another village. The village chief went to bring the 350-year-old mummy. It turns out that the village mummified a highly respected commander who ordered before death exactly what to do to protect the village even after his death. Of course, he needed to grab it. The skin is like a hardened film, but vulnerable. It was an impressive sight, although looking at this mummy, not all stomachs would have suppressed the pig inside.

Today is the day when representatives of the Dani tribe from different clans with different traditions meet and participate in the Baliema Valley Festival. The inhabitants of different villages adorn themselves with different feathers and headdresses, painting their legs and bodies in different colors. But we are all united by the same clothes. Women weave skirts from the grass and men wear flattened penises. Some take the largest, others the smallest. It probably depends on the “assets” you have. I bought that souvenir to take home. It is true that I bought a small one, but only to fit in a backpack. Of course, in the end it didn’t even fit, so I had to fly to the airports with my pants buttoned up. Those who knew what was here laughed. Who did not know, X-rays. When I still did not understand and was at risk of being taken away, I showed the photos and was very surprised. So no airport employee wanted to touch the pumpkin with their hands.

I spend the day at the festival and am tempted to chew on his favorite call betelių walnuts (areca catechu fruit). Few people know a tenth of the enslaved drugs on the planet. Bethelium palm nuts. The dyes in the seeds turn the mouths of those who chew them red bricks. In the past, as a result, catechetical areca was used to dye fabrics. The extract of this plant has an antidepressant effect but is addictive. Well, maybe two-nut doesn’t work out for me. As soon as you start chewing, your heart begins to beat faster, sweat, the hair on your hands and euphoria fill you. Saliva also begins to accumulate in the mouth, causing people who chew nuts to spit where they fall.

In Papua New Guinea, police are blocking roads and checking that drivers have not eaten the nuts, and in Myanmar chewing these palm fruits during work has been banned. A nut to help overcome depression but cause great addiction and cancer is a favorite in Asia. According to the World Health Organization, betelių Nuts are the fourth most consumed psychotropic substance on the planet after tobacco, alcohol and caffeine. From what I’ve noticed, Papua chews these nuts with everyone, both men and women, even children.

It is forbidden to marry relatives of the Dani tribe. Members of this tribe often live in groups and help each other a lot. Whether in farm work or building a cabin, the whole town is involved. The commander will determine the location of the new cabin. Also, he talks to the gods and can summon or stop the rain.

There is also a terrible tradition in the tribe, which is called palek. When a loved one dies, women cut off one finger at a time. Fingers cross when a man, a boy or a brother dies. The grief they experience symbolizes the anguish over the loss of a loved one. All the fingers form a palm that symbolizes a cohesive, complete and strong family, and when one member is lost, harmony collapses. The same goes for your fingers: when you lose, your palm is no longer as strong as it used to be.

The healing finger encourages a woman to cope with heart pain. It is said that the finger will heal only when the pain inside the woman disappears and she stops crying. The thumb is never crossed because it symbolizes the owner of the hand. Cut with an ax, knife or mosque. The tradition of cutting off the fingers is popular only among the fairer sex, but men also have their own way of crying: they cut off part of the ear. Fingers are not crossed as this would interfere with physical labor and affect surviving family members. Also, a group of men regretted bathing in mud baths (mud). It symbolizes that man originated on earth and returns to it.

Dani traditionally believed in animism. Animists emphasize respect for the diversity of the community of living organisms and spirits with which humans share the world (space). Many animists believe that there are spirits in nature and in certain places that can sometimes have the same power as earthly deities. She paid close attention to the spirits of her recently deceased ancestors. Efforts were made to reassure them so as not to cause disease, problems, or imbalances beyond the control of the tribal shamans. Until 1930. the Dani tribe was not known to the world at large. When it was discovered, the members of this tribe had no metal tools, only stone and wood.

In the next part, I will talk about the tribal festival, to which the government transports people of different clans in trucks from the villages.

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