Daily communal life at a traditional Iban longhouse or Rumah Panjang tends to converge around an elongated wooden veranda that serves as an open social area and shared meeting space. This longhouse is naturally positioned along a remote rainforest stream about a half day's jungle trek from Kapit, a small riverine supply town that caters to the many Iban and Orang Ulu longhouse communities in the upper Rajang River region of Sarawak, East Malaysia (Borneo). Digital film scan, Asahi Pentax Spotmatic, circa 1973.
The wooden longhouse structure and veranda are raised on tall stilts with a row of separate family apartments sectioned off on the other side of the main housing structure. Notched logs are used as ladders that lead up to the longhouse. Traditional hand-tapped tattoos on the headman's back are seen as having magical protective powers.
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Postscript - Few traditional wooden longhouses of this kind remain today. Most longhouses are now made from concrete and milled timber with access to electricity, satellite TV, and the perennial corrugated tin roof. Nowadays, the Rejang riverine region can be reached overland by taxi or bus, and by air on cheap Expedia flights. Express boats with air-conditioning and cushioned first-class passenger seating ply the Batang Rejang daily, cutting longboat travel time from Kapit to Belaga by a day or more. Organized package tours to the longhouses flourish. Digital smartphones and credit cards dictate the travel experience. The modern era of fast travel and organized tourism has arrived.
Accelerated contact with the outside world has contributed to sweeping social changes and a gradual erosion of the region's original charm. While the legendary warmth and hospitality of the Iban longhouse communities persist, much of the mystery and serendipity of independent travel to this remote region deep in the heart of Borneo is sadly on the wane.
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Context - Around the time this photo was taken, a robust ethnic Chinese-dominated communist insurgency was fully underway in the region. Malaysia's postcolonial government was about to launch an ambitious counter-insurgency operation. Government agents would travel upriver on longboats or by foot through dense tropical rainforests to remote riverine settlements and indigenous longhouses “to explain” why it was in their interest to support the government in the renewed anti-communist insurgency campaign.
The campaign appeared to have been effective at the time because the Malaysian government soon scored a major victory with the surrender of a key insurgent leader, Bong Kee Chok, along with about 500 of his supporters. With the subsequent capture or surrender of other members in the movement, communist activities in the Rajang river basin began to subside. The communist movement of Sarawak finally ended in 1990 with a signed peace accord that coincided with the final collapse of outside communist support and the end to the global cold war.
© All rights to these photos and descriptions are reserved. Any use of this work requires my prior written permission.
National Geographic | Social Documentary | Lonely Planet
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Swahili racing teams come together several times a year to compete in traditional hand-crafted arabic-styled Mashua dhows in the Lamu Archipelago just off Kenya's northern Swahili Coast.
Intense village rivalries build over the years, often reaching pitch fever on race day. This magnificent racing dhow and crew are in the lead as they move into the final leg of the race. They are the ultimate winners and will return to their village on the island of Pate with team bragging rights and a certain village swagger that will likely last several months until the next race.
Six crewmen in the lead dhow are perched on an adjustable plank that hangs out over the choppy waters for added balance, speed, and stability. About sixteen young crewmen all together are crowed into each dhow to give the necessary weight and stability against a stiff coastal trade wind.
The art of Swahili dhow racing requires considerable team skill as the dhows tack and manoeuvre back and forth through the Manda channel and ultimately out to the edge of the open sea. The finest dhows are selected from each village to race under sail through a complicated series of buoys, combining speed and balance with elaborate tacking and maneuvering competence.
The races are usually organized in conjunction with a cultural festival or an Islamic religious holiday. This particular Shela-based race on the island of Lamu is organized yearly by Peponi's on New Year's Day.
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Dhow Culture | Social Documentary
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A graceful gait, an elegant long-limbed stance, or this spontaneous pose under the photographer's gaze - all exude poise and dignity amid the weekly market bustle in Ethiopia's lower Omo Valley.
Omalle, a young married Hamar woman, vogued this pose against a painted wall at the marketplace in Turmi, a small multi-ethnic frontier town in the remote Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples Region of southwestern Ethiopia. Shot directly under the midday sun near the end of a long dry season regularly exceeding 40°C in the shade.
Elegantly adorned with a traditional cowrie-shell collar, seeded necklaces, copper bracelets, glass-beaded goatskin clothing and iron marital torques. The upper torque with phallic protrusion is wrapped in leather, signifying first-wife status. The torques are worn for life.
The hairstyle consists of long, tightly twisted strands rubbed in a mixture of fresh cow butterfat, ground red ochre and tree resin gathered from the lower Omo River Basin. The ubiquitous chewing stick favoured by peoples of the lower Omo Valley serves as a natural toothbrush and dental floss all in one.
Other editions of this photograph include the Lonely Planet cover for Ethiopia & Djibouti , 6th edition, 2017; and an article on the chewing stick in AfroStyleMag, Issue 7, 2012.
David Schweitzer/Getty Images © expl#308
Lonely Planet | Rethinking Portraiture | National Geographic
Peoples of the Omo Valley
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Dani women with carrying nets prepare a traditional Melanesian cooking pit lined with grass and heated stones of fine grain limestone. The occasion is a traditional pig feast inside the oval courtyard of a Dani compound, set high in a remote corner of West Papua's central highlands at 1600m/5200ft above sea level. Irian Jaya, Indonesia. Digital film scan, semi-automatic Pentax point-and-shoot pocket camera, circa 1996.
The main steam bundle was built up with alternate layers of wet long grass, pork, a whole pig skin with its heavy layer of fat, vegetables, ferns and more heated rocks. Water was poured on the rocks from a gourd to make more steam. Banana leaves were added to several of these layers to help capture the steam.
Smaller grass-wrapped steam bundles containing sweet potatoes, vegetables and other greens from the elaborate gardens nearby were also placed in the pit. One of the small steam bundles can be seen at the centre of activity around the smoldering pit.
This preparatory process took about an hour, then another hour or more for the cooking, and several more hours for food distribution and feasting. The entire process took close to a full day that included a ritualized killing of the piglet with a bow and arrow, a gathering of materials for the earth oven (wood, grass, stones, food), making the fire, and heating the stones.
It is the men's role to kill the pig, make the fire, prepare the heated stones, undo the steam bundles, cut the pig skin into strips with a sharpened bamboo knife, and distribute the food according to a predetermined pattern of exchange and reciprocity among members from this and several other neighbouring compounds.
© All rights to these photos and descriptions are reserved. Any use of this work requires my prior written permission. expl#201
Rethinking Portraiture | Social Documentary | BodyArt
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Saitoti, a proud Maasai elder and herder, comes from a small pastoral settlement nestled in the Kenyan foothills of Mount Kilimanjaro (near Amboseli National Park, Rift Valley Province). He travels each year to Kenya’s Swahili Coast to work as a security guard. The money he earns goes towards the upkeep of his family and cattle back in the homeland. Adorned with a glass-beaded collar and stretched earlobes with glass-beaded sleeves, copper pendants, and circular facial scars.
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Street Portraiture | Social Documentary | BodyArt
Flickr Gallery: The Power of Documentary Portraiture
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