Have you ever tried to imagine what life is like for a tribe in the Amazon rainforest? The Yanomami is one of the tribes that lives in the rainforests of Brazil and Venezuela in South America.
The tribe builds an enormous, oval hut in a clearing in the forest for everyone to live in. The houses are called yanos or shabonos. The huts are made from leaves, vines and tree trunks from the surrounding forest. Between 50 and 400 people live all together in the hut. Each family has its own fire. During the day, the women use the fire to cook the food, and the fire is kept tended at night to keep everyone warm in their hammocks. The central area of the hut is open to the sky and it is here that tribe members join together for feasts, games and fiestas.
Each Yanomami village has a headman who is the leader; but all the men gather together to discuss and make any decisions for the tribe.
The main job of the men is hunting in the forest. They hunt wild animals for food, such as peccary (an animal similar to a pig), tapir, deer and monkeys. They sometimes use a poison called curare on the tip of their arrows or blow darts – they make the poison from forest plants. A hunter will never eat the meat he has hunted; instead, he shares it with family and friends and waits for another hunter to give him meat in return. Meat makes up only about 10% of the food of the tribe.
The women take care of the children and work growing plants in the garden. The soil in the Amazon is not rich, so they have to create a new garden every two to three years. They grow banana, plantain, cassava and cotton. The women also gather food in the forest and the river – they collect nuts, shellfish and insect larvae. A special treat for the tribe is wild honey. Another favourite food is the fruit of the peach palm tree.
Both men and women fish in the river. To catch the fish, they use a fish poison known as timbó. The poison is obtained by beating plant vines into a mat which is placed on the surface of the water in the river. This makes the fish float to the top and the tribe then collects them in baskets.
Children work with their parents from an early age, helping with the garden and gathering food. Girls learn to make baskets and boys learn to use a bow and arrow.
It is important to protect the way of life of tribes like the Yanomami as more and more of the forest is taken over by farmers, ranchers and miners. The government of Brazil has given land especially for the tribe.
One of the dangers of connecting with the modern world for the tribe are the risks of diseases that do not exist in the forest. Governments have worked to train tribe members as health care workers to help when people are sick and as teachers so that children can learn to read, write and do math.
