Cultural showcase or cultural zoo?

At the Hornbill Festival, I took this photo of some performers waiting to enter the stage area. Aware that their butts were hanging out of their costumes, I was a little hesitant to take the photo without asking their permission, perhaps being a little too culturally sensitive.

But as at the Ahuna festival, it was a local friend who suggested I take the shot, and I reasoned that this was a performance, these people were in costume and there were going to be cameras all over them in a second anyway.



A few minutes later, while the same performers were getting ready to go onstage, this is what I saw. I think the guy on the left was American, and I heard the guy on the right speaking in French.



Now surely there's a limit to what you can and cannot do with your camera in such situations. I still don't know what to think of these guys. They probably wanted a better angle of the performers for their photo collections, but come on, these are still people here! I suppose it would have been a completely different thing if the performers were actually posing for the photos as well.

Anyway, on the final day of the festival, I saw a tall blond woman walking around the stage perimeter shoving her camera lens in front of people in the audience (while performances were going on). She wasn't alone, there was an Indian guy doing the same thing. It was with a little satisfaction that, as she was photographing the Dimasa performers, one guy asked her stood up and asked for a photo with him using his phone camera. He then dressed her in one of the scarves that the women were wearing, which he took back after the photo had been taken.

I suppose as an obvious foreigner here, she must get quite a lot of stares (I'm sure my friend Lauren can empathise when she's in Nepal), no matter how she's dressed. The man who took a photo of her will probably be showing it off to all his friends for some time to come, the way she'll be showing off her pictures of 'ethnic people' to her friends.

Maybe such events are just meant to be a bit of a zoo for everyone.

Hornbill Festival 2010

Here're a few photos from this year's Hornbill Festival (1 Dec - 7 Dec). It's held every year at this time here in Kohima - though the festival ground itself is in the village of Kisama, which is a bit of a drive to get to and the traffic coming back into Kohima was atrocious both times I went. There were other activities in and around Kohima too, like a night bazaar, the Miss Nagaland 2010 beauty pageant and the Hornbill Rock Contest.

I only made the trip out to Kisama twice given that I was in Zunheboto till the third day of the festival, and had spent most of the fourth day travelling. Anyway, I managed to catch a number of performances on the main stage, see replicas of the morungs (the traditional boys dormitories) of all the major tribes in Nagaland, check out the WWII museum, and even bought Mum that asükhu (wood plate on a stand) that she asked for (the guy at India Post assured me they could deliver it, but I'm having my doubts).

I don't have a lot of commentary on the festival itself. Given the diversity of the performers and performances, I'm finding it a little hard to remember what I saw and the significance of each performance. I don't really mind that many of the performances wouldn't be considered 'authentic' by even a lay anthropologist, since the festival gives the numerous cultural associations around the state a chance to showcase some of the traditional songs, dances and games that they're trying to maintain. (I'm saving other criticisms I have for another post.)

One of the entrances to the festival grounds


Participants waiting to perform


Pochury women, having just played a traditional game of catch


A nice touch on the last day of the festival

Eating chillies

Yesterday at the Hornbill Festival, they held a Naga Chilli eating competition for the first time. The winner popped 8 of the fiery peppers, known as raja mircha, ('king chilli'), Naga jolokia, bhut jolokia.

This may not seem like a lot to people used to popping  which may not sound like a lot, unless you know that these chillies have been found to rate up to 1,041,427 units on the Scoville scale which is a measure of spicy heat. Wikipedia gives the rating for Tabasco sauce as between 2,500 to 5,000 units, while bird's eye chillies rate between 50,000 to 100,000 units. The only chilli hotter than raja mircha is a hybrid called the Naga Viper made by cross-breeding the raja mircha and two other chillies and was developed in the UK.

Prize-winning chillies at the horticultural centre next to the Hornbill Festival grounds at Kisama.


In any case, these are still the hottest chillies in the world that are being cultivated and consumed en masse. There are even reports that the Indian army plan to put them in hand grenades. Dangerous stuff.

Cucumber baby

So I'm spending a few days in Kohima, the state capital of Nagaland. I'm in town mainly for the Hornbill Festival, but also to meet with one of the linguistics professors at Nagaland University, as well as to sort out some other 'administrative' things like an extenstion to my current permit *fingers crossed* and Tata mobile internet for when I'm in Dimapur and Assam (I'm not sure if the Tata Photon Plus will work in Zunheboto, *fingers crossed*).

I'm staying with B., who's organised both my permits to enter Nagaland, and her husband. They live next to the original Kohima village site known as Tsütuonuomia Khel or more commonly, T-Khel. The term khel refers to a village sub-division - nowadays it almost corresponds to the local term 'colony' (or 'suburb' to most Anglophones).



In Angami tradition, villages (and khels) were generally named after their founders. Hence the name Tsütuonuomia, the founder of this khel, whose name translates as 'cucumber baby'.

Now the story goes that there was once a cowherd who would take her cattle down to where the road between Kohima and Dimapur now runs. She got pregnant out of wedlock, which I assume was the guy's fault, but women always get the blame. Ashamed, she covered up the pregnancy until the time came to give birth. She then ran away to the fields to have the child in secret (most certainly without a midwife). On her way back and still ashamed, she covered the child in a blanket. When people asked what she was carrying, she told them it was cucumber.

And so the child was named 'cucumber baby' and grew up to found this khel.

Visit to Satoi (II)

When we arrived in Satoi, it became clear that our little 'sightseeing' trip would involve a little more than sightseeing. It was the 50th anniversary of the local pastor's appointment in the village and the occasion was in away a retirement party for him. I think it was also meant to commemorate his 75th birthday. Arriving with the reverend meant more VIP treatment - this time we got chappatis and avi kighinoli (mithun innards) and more cups of milk and black tea.

We were then led into the church, where the service was held.




I was a little embarrassed because they first ushered me right to the front to sit on the couches in the front row, when even the pastor was sitting on a plastic chair. At least we managed to give our seats to the pastor and his wife, but I ended up sitting in front of other guests of honour. During the service, I also had to stand and give a little wave while Ab. introduced me to the whole congregation - being a foreigner, having an MA and having worked on Sumi is apparently enough to attract this kind of attention. At the end of the service, I was presented, along with the other VIPs, with a bag containing a book about the pastor's life.

Then there was the feast following the service. To be fair, I could've taken a little less food without offending anyone, but I counted no less than four kinds of meat: pork, chicken, beef and mithun, cooked in a whole host of ways. And a lot more fat... but at least there were fresh vegetables. I only had one serving, which was more than enough...


On our way back from Satoi, we managed to stop a few times to take photos of the valley. You can see Zunheboto town on the ridge just off to the right.


We also stopped again in Ghokhüvi to look at some of the Baptist conference preparations. I really liked the traditional wind chimes that adorned the entrance to the main venue.



A view of Ghokhüvi from the bottom of the village


Leaving the village, we had to drive again down to the base of the valley and up again. This time we had a bit more time, so we stopped for photos at the bridge right near the confluence of the Tizü and Tsütha Rivers. It's a very pretty valley.



The Tsütha River just before it joins the Tizü




I had a great day, despite the initial embarrassment and over-eating. Looking forward to visiting other villages and having more feasts!

Visit to Satoi (I)

Two days ago, I went with Ab. and her father, the Rev. Yev., to the village of Satoi in the southern part of the Zunheboto district. Given that he's the head of all the district churches he often travels out of Zunheboto town. I've read that Satoi was really beautiful, and when we heard he was going, Ab. asked if we could tag along to do some sightseeing (we wouldn't get in the way).

So on Saturday, we got up bright and early to head south towards Satoi. The road wasn't great, and I've heard they're doing reparation work on it, mainly because one of the ministers in the State Government is from Satoi (although now that he flies there by helicopter, who knows how the road will turn out).

The worst bit was a little landslide where we all got out to walk, except for poor Subu our driver who had to get the car across.





Our first stop was for breakfast in the village of Ghokhüvi (pronounced quite close to 'Rock-a-vee', and if you pronounce your 'r's like in French). The 'ü' is a high central vowel that is often produced as a schwa in this position.

The church in Ghoküvi.


Arriving with the reverend, we were ushered to the outside area of the house of who I'm assuming is the local pastor and given delicious Sumi sho or 'Sumi bread' made with rice flour and lightly fried - a lighter version of the shel roti I was fed in Nepal during Tihar. Then there was dried innards (mostly liver and some intestines) which I was told are made by boiling them, then drying them, then frying them. Very nice.



The village was busy preparing for this big conference of all the Sumi Baptist churches starting on the 9th of this month. In the outside area of most houses, people were setting up large wooden structures to house all the people set to visit later in the week.



And after breakfast, we were off to Satoi, a little bit further up the hill.

G20 sherpas

This was something I'd seen about a month back on TV. It was a news report about the G20 summit in Seoul and the 'G20 Sherpas'. The BBC describes them as "the faceless diplomats who lay the groundwork for high-profile international meetings such as the G8 and the G20."

While the BBC website writes 'G20 sherpas', what annoyed me a little with this news report, was that the word 'sherpa' was written with a capital 'S', so the label given to the interviewees was 'G20 Sherpa'. A quick search on Google shows that a number of other websites have also spelt it as 'Sherpa'. Some, like the BBC have written 'G20 sherpa' and some have written 'G20 'sherpa'' in inverted commas. (Note: the spell check on this blog site is also telling me that 'sherpa' without a capital 'S' is incorrect.)

Now I don't want to be one of those people who gets indignant for other people, but what annoys me about the use of 'G20 Sherpa' is that in this context, the use of the word 'sherpa' is reduced simply to an occupation. The same BBC article writes, "Sherpas are the tough and resilient Nepalese guides who help mountaineers scale Himalayan peaks."

It's fair enough that this is the common English definition for the word 'sherpa' - prior to to my visit to Solukhumbu or hearing about my friend Sara's research, I would have just used the word in a similar way. And if it's been borrowed into English as a kind of an occupation, then 'sherpa' should be fine. But then, the word 'Sherpa' means so much more than the job of 'person from Nepal to assists mountain climbers', since it actually refers to the ethnic, cultural and linguistic group.

So unless one of those G20 sherpas is actually Sherpa, it really should be written 'G20 sherpa'.