Posted on 12/28/2004 6:34:30 PM PST by blam
What happened to the rare tribes?
SANJAY DUTTA & CHANDRIKA MAGO
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 28, 2004 11:19:06 PM
NEW DELHI: An enormous anthropological disaster is in the making. The killer tsunami is feared to have wiped out entire tribes — already threatened by their precariously small numbers — perhaps rendering them extinct and snapping the slender tie with a lost generation.
Officials involved in rescue operations are pessimistic, but still keeping their fingers crossed for the Sentinelese and Nicobarese, the two tribes seen as bearing the brunt of the killer wave.
The bigger fear is for the Sentinelese, anthropologically the most important tribe, living on the flat North Sentinel Island. Putting their population at about 100, officials say no body count is possible as the tribe had remained isolated. The Nicobarese, numbering about 25,000, are also feared to have suffered major losses, if not near -extinction. Clustered in 12 villages along the coast of Car Nicobar, the worst affected, it is feared nearly half of them could have been engulfed by the giant wave.
Then there are the Chowra and Teresa islands, mostly inhabited by the Nicobarese. Chowra has reported 38 deaths from a total population of 1,500. Here, too, the picture is hazy. The Onges, living on the Little Andaman island, are expected to fare a little better. So far, 14 deaths have been reported from the island. Some of these would be Onges. To begin with, they just number a 100.
The Shompens, Great Andamanese and Jarawas are expected to have fared better as they live on comparatively higher grounds. But their small number could be working against them.
This post is compliments of Shermy.
Well, I guess anthropologist have records of these tribes. Now it is time to find the survivors and see if they want to join the rest of the world.
Fascinating. And sad. Thanks for the information.
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Amazing. I've learned more about the countries in Asia this week than my mind can absorb. I've had a rather provincial view of the southern hemisphere til now. A little while ago I was surfing and caught some of Anderson Cooper on CNN- it was a good show. He interviewed the father of a young man who was visiting a tiny obscure island off Thailand...can't even remember the name of it. He hasn't heard from his son, so he's flying over there and taking a boat (God knows how he'll find one) out to the island to search for his son. I'd no idea so many westerners visited that part of the world...
Prayers to the suffering..
I had no idea, either. When I think about a tropical vacation, I think about the Carribbean. I had no idea so many people vacationed in Southeast Asia.
We know the cities in Iraq and Afghanistan from recent events, and now some of the islands in the Indian Ocean. That is how Westerners learn geography, war and disasters.
I do a lot of wargaming and a couple years ago I was a player in a game involving a good 20 people that was played by e-mail simulating the naval war between the French and British around India during the American Revolution; when we had a battle we'd fight it out in person using miniature ships.
We spent a great deal of time capturing and recapturing Galle, Batticaloa in Sri Lanka, Madras India, etc. from each other. Sort of weird seeing those names pop up in the news.
I'd read some articles regarding the tribes of the Andaman Islands a couple years ago. Really fascinating. They seem quite close to the San Bushmen of Southern Africa in appearance.
Tourists, locals or rare tribes....... just plain sad and painful.
next winter, the carribbean and south florida will be loaded with euros on vacation.
very interesting, maybe this will convince them that there is definate advantages to joining the modern world (like Tsunami detection grids).
I agree.
The San Bushmen have Mongoloid Spots. I wonder if the Andaman tribes do?
Could I be put on your "Gods..." ping list? Thank you.
I doubt it; there's no sex trade in small boys there...
What, and ruin the private playground of these Anthropologists? /sarcasm
Most of these tribes have more contact than the naive anthropologist think, and have learned to avoid strangers because they end up being victims one way or another. And some tribes in the Amazon have been playing the antropologists for years.
No one ever seems to question the ethics of these anthropologists for working with governments to keep these "pet" humans for their private study, watching them die of easily preventable diseases, while refusing to offer help for fear of "contaminating" the population.
I'm not gonna weep for the inhabitants of the Nicobar islands - there have been some sad stories about Western tourists going there and not coming back. Some areas have always been sealed off.
Why?
Because they are cannibals. Real ones.
The eurotrash's great secret.
I vacationed there too but I always preferred the company of charming friendly easygoing Aussies on Bali to unsmiling German eurotrash package tourists on Phuket. Just my taste, I guess.
It's a big world. I know far more than the average American about world geography/history - as, I suspect, do most Freepers. I still don't know a tenth of it.
They're cannibals. The pot-boiling kind. Good riddance.
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