Breastfeeding animals with their children: how people from the wild Ava tribe live

In the impenetrable jungle of South America, dozens of wild tribes still live. They live the same way as their ancestors a thousand years ago: they walk in loincloths, hunt, collect fruits from trees. One such tribe is the Ava people, who live deep in the Amazon. This is one of the most vulnerable tribes of the planet: once their number exceeded tens of thousands, now there are barely 400 people in the tribe.

Avas roam the forests of eastern Brazil and carry with them everything they have: their weapons, their children and their pets. The photographer Domenico Pugliese spent several days with them, he managed to see and capture their unusual world.

About five centuries ago, Avas lived in the modern state of Brazil, Maranhão, near the border with the Atlantic Ocean. Their people were numerous, but they could not resist the colonists who came to conquer new lands. They brought with them diseases: measles, flu, smallpox. Those who did not die as a result of epidemics were turned into slaves and sent to rubber and reed plantations. As a result, Ava had to go into the jungle, so as not to be completely exterminated. Since then, they live in the tropics.

Surprisingly, the Ava completely turned into a nomadic people. For several centuries, they have lost knowledge of agriculture, and even make a fire for them is very difficult. But they learned to survive in the harsh Amazonian forests, where danger lies everywhere: Ava became skilled hunters and learned how to build shelters in just a few hours. In one place they do not live long, only a few days - and again on the road. This was the only way to avoid genocide: in 1835, after several centuries of oppression, the local peoples of Maranyan rebelled against European rulers. However, it ended with the mass extermination of the indigenous people: in five years, about one hundred thousand people across the state were killed.

Today Ava consider the jungle their home, and they live in complete harmony with nature. Family for Av is the main thing, they do not understand how a person can live without a family. They were surprised that Pugliese is lonely, it does not fit in their head: how can a man be lonely.

Ava live in harmony not only with the forest, but also with animals, which they also consider their family: they take monkeys, squirrels, wild pigs and rodents as pets. And their connection is so strong that women breastfeed not only their children, but also their pets. In particular, they love primates and agouti - these are large rodents. At the same time, they hunt monkeys, but they gently cherish their pets, fed with their own milk.

Those, in turn, become truly tame and help them collect fruits from tall trees. And even if the monkeys later go to the forest, then even after many years, the avs are able to recognize the “hanima” - as they call their pets, which become part of their family. This seems to be the best example of how far we have advanced in our development and what a gap between civilization and wild tribes. And if we are part of this civilization, then they are already part of nature.