No Pain (Muria 19)
Near the town of Bijapur in the neighbouring district of the Dantewada Maria tribe we witnessed this gathering of trance dancers. I can't tell you much about the background of such rituals but only report what we saw.
When we arrived at the place a crowd of people, men and women, had already gathered at a dusty open space where they were dancing in a kind of circular procession to the deafening sound of drums, Indian types of shalms and other instruments. The sun was murderously burning. Goats were decapitated and the pile of their heads offered along with coconuts in front of images of Hindu-like Gods.
Some people were flogged but most prominently a lot of the dancers had their cheeks or tongues pierced by flower decorated daggers as seen in this photo. There was no sign of pain or blood to be noticed.
As part of the ritual some dancers were hugging everyone who came close (including the photographer ;). This is what the guy in the picture is doing: he leans far back in preparation for a very ceremonial embrace.
(...continues below)
See and read this series from the beginning
Texture with courtesy Jaiel (who left Flickr)
These photos may be used with proper attribution and unaltered but not in any case for commercial purposes according to the attached Creative Commons License. Higher resolutions can be obtained on request.
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License.
No Pain (Muria 19)
Near the town of Bijapur in the neighbouring district of the Dantewada Maria tribe we witnessed this gathering of trance dancers. I can't tell you much about the background of such rituals but only report what we saw.
When we arrived at the place a crowd of people, men and women, had already gathered at a dusty open space where they were dancing in a kind of circular procession to the deafening sound of drums, Indian types of shalms and other instruments. The sun was murderously burning. Goats were decapitated and the pile of their heads offered along with coconuts in front of images of Hindu-like Gods.
Some people were flogged but most prominently a lot of the dancers had their cheeks or tongues pierced by flower decorated daggers as seen in this photo. There was no sign of pain or blood to be noticed.
As part of the ritual some dancers were hugging everyone who came close (including the photographer ;). This is what the guy in the picture is doing: he leans far back in preparation for a very ceremonial embrace.
(...continues below)
See and read this series from the beginning
Texture with courtesy Jaiel (who left Flickr)
These photos may be used with proper attribution and unaltered but not in any case for commercial purposes according to the attached Creative Commons License. Higher resolutions can be obtained on request.
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License.