Going Tribal - pack your backpack and lets go into the jungle!

[Aura]

Yepp!
Pack your backpack and lets go into the jungle! (once there we can get rid of it )

After a short (though seemed so looong time) time in EU, I decided to try go back to Nature, again.
I think I needed some time in civilization to give away of some useless and dangerous dogmas.

So I am already on my journey to visit indigenous tribes in South America (I am mostly interested into Amazonian tribes, especially the most remote ones where they do not wear clothes nor cook their food..
I speak spanish and portuguese.

I invite whoever of you wants to join me in this life changing trip.

Please give me a PM if interested.

Looking forward to meet you!

Ps. Contrary to similar posts on this topic, I would t like to say that I am actually in the continent so no time for joking around, online meeting and chit chat.. I am pretty serious about it ! ) 

Pps: Dont worry if you have got no skills on hunting, we will learn as we live with the tribe. 

[Iguana]

So I am already on my journey to visit indigenous tribes in South America (I am mostly interested into Amazonian tribes, especially the most remote ones where they do not wear clothes nor cook their food..

You are extremely courageous, congrats! Are there still some tribes who never cook their food? According to the info I had there’s no-one anymore: they all master the fire and cook food. 

[Projectile Vomit]

Good luck on your journey. If you are of European descent you will find that there are many diseases and parasites in tropical areas that you have no innate resistance to, and there are many microscopic (and some not-so-microscopic) critters that would love to feast on various parts of your body.

And Iguana's right. I've done some research on this and as far as I can tell there are no tribes that subsist on a totally raw food diet. The idea that tribal peoples ate raw food diets is something of a myth, at least those peoples that lived within the last several thousand years. Even Inuit, who are often held high by many raw paleo proponents, ate a good portion of their animal foods cooked. A return to a 100% raw diet is a very modern experiment.

[TylerDurden]

Most tribes, however, did eat a lot of their food raw. They just didn't eat 100% raw and what cooking they did was, mostly, far less harmful than some more modern cooking processes.

[CitrusHigh]

I don't know, every amazonian tribe I've ever studied seem to cook most of their foods.  That is, they cook the vast majority of their foods, and eat very little raw, probably mostly fruit, veggies, nuts/seeds and some insects.

Have you read 'The Lost City of Z' ?
http://thosewhodared.blogspot.com/2010/01/amazon-explorers-find-lost-city-of-z.html

or 'The Darkest Jungle' ?
http://www.amazon.com/The-Darkest-Jungle-Expedition-Ill-Fated/dp/0609609890

Make sure you know what you're in for. The Amazon is not a joke, she will eat you alive if you're not showing respect!

I wish you the best on your adventure, I'm on my own in western US, mostly taking a break from technology. I'd so join you if I weren't already here, I've often wondered how my ideas of microbes as being completely benign would stack up in a place like the Amazon where everything is trying to decompose everything else.

I do remember reading, in the darkest jungle, that one of the whiteys who had gone for a long time without decent food, ate a dove of some sort raw and it gave him his strength back, but he was starving, so anything edible would have been better than nothing! But seems like the natives otherwise cook they tubers, cook their fish, cook their money, etc Please let us know what you find out in the raw dept.

Best wishes!!!

PS: Obviously the examples I'm giving are of people with a conquerer mentality, not living in harmony with nature, so that will make a big difference in your experience, but still, you'll have to adjust to their microbes, their biting insects and everything else that is trying to kill you!

Also recommend Tom Brown Jr.'s 'Grandfather' for an idea of what someone living close to the earth might have as an experience in an unfamiliar jungle.

Lot's of love!

[Aura]

Hi, thank you for all the advices and books!
I did not read them yet and I am trying to find a pdf of each.

Well, right now I am not in the Amazon, I am not with tribes but I am in a natural reserve with 400 years old indigenous trees and younger ones as well..
I do not have a camera but I ll try to post some pics.

There is a guy here who knows pretty much of wild edibles around and today I tried one that tastes like a mushroom, amazing.  I ll have to ask for the name again.

When I first got in the Atlantic Forest area, although I was staying on a pretty manicured farm, I got heavily bitten by mosquitoes and bugs alike but now they stopped to be so violent  because they know me.

I ll try to make my skin acidic as to increase outer protection so that I could go naked for short walk and see how it goes re insect bites.

Do not know how long I will stay here but I am planning to learn as much as I can before I move to the next place, somewhere north.

[Aura]

Well, to be honest, I do not care if they still eat raw or cooked. I am going have it raw, whatever edible.
I do not know about you guys but for me, if I want to eat natural foods, the only option is to go in Nature.
I just cannot think of dedicating my life breeding fowls... 

[Aura]

Hi guys, sorry for the absence but I have been pretty busy lately.
I am about to leave this nice reserve where I am now to move north, closer to the Amazon region.

I made some good connections with a man living there who knows locals and can introduce me to them, helping me with the tribe joining process also by offering a free, unpolluted, natural accomodation into his jungle property with many fruit trees on it slurp!

I ve learnt a lot while here. I went hunting with expert people and got some wild meat from a mammal and fishing as well.
Also got some raw milk, butter and ricotta cheese and eggs from free range chikens.

Mosquitoes and other bugs are  not biting me anymore since I started to daily rub red mud on my skin and hair.

I go naked walking in the forest everyday and sit near big trees and feels SO wonderfully FREEDOM!

I have also been to very very beautiful waterfalls and had absolutely relaxing hidro massage, swimming and sunbathing naked into waterpools surrounded by all elements of nature.

Suddenly that day, a storm came and started to heavily rain and I was already on my way  to the main camp but I lost track of my friends so I just found myself alone in the middle of this stony place with water level raising so I opted to enter the jungle woods but I was not sure where it would lead... So I just took the risk and walked while heavy rain was blurring my vision..

There was a time I REALLY freaked out guys.  Then after 1 hour walking uphill alone,  into mud, thorns, barefoot, fallen branches, completely wet I saw first signs of civilization and met my friends playing billiard hah

They told me they got worried for me and they were waiting for the storm to pass and then going back to the waterfalls to find me because quiet often explorers die there by slipping on the stones and then being carried all the way down to the falls..

A friend of mine joined right after I wrote  what my projects were. Come on guys, it is so tremendously important to go back to our real selves...!

Some pics

[Iguana]

That's awesome, Aura! Wow! Thanks a lot to keep us informed and also for the beautiful photos. So, you're are in Brazil, aren't you ?

[Iguana]

Hi Aura! What news?

[jessica]

Aura do you have a job while you are there?  I am just curious how you sustain your life? do you live with others?

[Aura]

Yes. I work in a vegan  restaurant and I am also specializing as a forest guide.
I live with a core group of 3 people (2 westeners and 1 brazilian) plus the local workers but they live 1 km away from here, within the same property.

[hadzabal]

I would rather try the savanna in afrika sometimes naxt jear with a strong group of people, just with stiks in hand, waching woltures flight and finding bones, and trying to get meat eventuely as well. I dont know if leons,hienas etz. would dear to attack. There are still quite wild hadzas in Tanzania, we could learn from them. They eat raw meat as well. I wonder if some coked food doesnt appoort esencial inorganik minerals, in earias where there is no salt for instance.
But cooked food is unfortunatly addicktiv, and that made the unfortunat human history in tha last 10-15 tausand years. The amasonian indians dont know that. Someone should tell them. :*)

[Aura]

Hi Guys, after few months in remote places of my soul and Nature, I finally came to a conclusion in my Life.
I woke up from a what I think it was a deep sleep and found my self alone and incredibly hungry for Love and Community with like minded people.

I live with other people on a beautiful farm at the moment but I just feel the need to have other paleo people into rewilding..

I could go hunting, fishing etc but I just feel I d love to have somebody to share all these things with.

Just cannot go on like this anymore.

Im starving of Love.

...

 

[Inger]

Are there no one wanting to do these things with you there Aura? Can you not get any friends there? I am sure someone loves to do these things too where you live ...
or do you mean a partner, like a boyfriend or such?

[Aura]

Hi dear,
unfortunately not!
The péople here are nice but not into rewilding at all.
It is such a pity because there is so much potential of the land over here.
Lots of wild foods..

 

An]d, yes, also meaning a partner, sure..

[jessica]

It happens to us all Aura.  Stay strong, your tribe is assembling.

[Projectile Vomit]

Indeed, it does. And not just to women, I might add!

[Inger]

Are there any children? I take the children with me out in the wild. They love it.. I love it too. Children are magic.

I am lucky as I have brothers and sisters (many siblings) that loves nature too so I go into the woods with them... or swimming or fishing. My mom loves picking berries too so she always comes with me in summer/fall if she can. Maybe people are different up here in Scandinavia. Many people love to be out in the wild.

IDK.. I like to be alone in the wild too. I do not feel alone there. I think it is weird but it might be because my heart is still broken.

[jessica]

Family can fill a huge void for sure, I wish they were closer all of the time, and while we do enjoy and partake in a lot of the same activities, where they live(the city or mountain towns) is in no way conducive to the life I want to build that also generates my livelihood(farming/ranching something somewhere).  So its not really an option.  Basically the same with what friends I have that I hold close as family, we are all far and wide, some want the same life or something similar but we are all so spread out.  I still look forward to the day when we combine resources and agree on a place and actually make real family and community happen, lol, *le sigh*, anyway...

This is probably a very lonely time on the planet for many because we have so many opportunities to explore and travel far and wide, and we are so connected on a informational level via technology.  Sometimes we try to think that we are also able to connect on a social level through those same technologies but there is no substitute for knowing a place well and for many years and growing familiar with a community who supports you, even if they don't agree with you, but even better if they do.  I think many suffer for the ways we choose to communicate and create lives and move about the earth through technology.  Growing roots is where its at.

Aura, I have totally been in the same predicament.  I feel like I have given up or run out of momentum for the same reason, its just not right for people to be or feel alone.  I am seriously one of the most independent people I know, I can sustain myself on extremely minimal human interaction, but not always and not for long anymore.  Its just not part of human nature.  Its gotten harder as I have gotten older and my ambitions have grown more concise and I know there are things I cant do or will never be successful at alone.  Just trust there are people out there who are waiting to meet you, and all that you have gone through and are going through will just strengthen those bonds   You are on the path!

[goodsamaritan]

How about the Indian cultural way?  Put up an advertisement, advertise what you need.  Something like... looking for partner / husband who is into "rewilding" (define that)... and that you are into "rewilding"... will have children and family in the wild... define more... link to your web page / FB page for more info.

[hadzabal]

I would like to do something similar, but i think rainforest is too inhospitabel. 5 traumatised screeming children are here. No mother trast give them raw animal produckts, even the leeding spanish antropologist Arsuaga wrote in his book about nutrition that cooking meat doesnt improoves it any way. He finished that book with the words- yes our ansestors was sitting in circel but was no fire in the midle. " En Atapuerca they didnt used fire in 800000 year. Nevertheless I cook ones a week similar how Benando Lapallo (112?) recommends it. The Nenet at polar cirkel eat cooked and raw animal produckts.......  There is a guy with me 3 years i think he would take the risk to walk in savanna too. But we needed more people.