Why Do Children Participate In The Ancient Cowblowing Tradition In The Mundari Tribe? A Story From The Front

Intro

Growing up in the West, I had always had a perceived notion of what was right versus what was wrong. As an example, if we believed someone was ill, that would not entail killing them to rid them of their spirits, much like what used to happen in Papua New Guinea. But the Mundari Tribe in South Sudan almost rewrites the script on what we believe is the way of living healthily in the West. We pump our bodies with toxins and $200 face cream, hoping that there might be a chance they cancel each other out. But what if I told you the answer lay deeper than the shortcuts we use in the West? What if I told you that the perfect skin came with applying cow dung to your body? Because that, that is the reality of the situation.

What Is The Mundari Tribe?

Let's start here. What is the Mundari Tribe? For those who have never heard of this Nilotic ethnic group, they are a tribe that mainly lives north of the capital of South Sudan, Juba. The Mundari are semi-nomadic pastoralists, meaning their entire lives revolve around herding, protecting, and caring for their cattle. They are constantly on the move, finding the most suitable places to care for their cattle, whether that be moving every few days or every few weeks. Their cows are their currency and how they survive. Every morning, they drink the raw unpasteurized milk as their meal, shower in the cow urine, and apply cow dung to their body as a natural insect repellent.

A young man poses with his first bull, which he was recently gifted

Their cattle are their lifeline. Not only is it how they feed themselves, but it's how they reproduce, how they live, and most of all, it's their currency. What do I mean by that? If one wants to marry a woman in the Mundari Tribe, one must purchase a woman through an "elder". A woman can cost anywhere from 50-120 cows, depending on the height of the woman and what cows are being offered. The taller the woman, the more cows one will pay. Additionally, the most valuable cows are the plain white ones, with the mixed cows being second, and the plain colored cows being the least valuable. It's a striking difference to the world we live in the West today, where women are being sold off for cattle, and children partaking in roles that would be considered "bestiality". But it's their culture, and who's to say what we do is right and what they do is wrong?

So, What Is This Cowblowing Practice?

There are plenty of practices that the Mundari Tribe partakes in that many would consider to be questionable. Well, that is putting it lightly... While some of these entail applying burnt cow dung to your face, and others entail enjoying a shower in cow urine. However, the one practice that seemingly made my followers question their sanity was the practice of cowblowing.

Cowblowing has long been a historic part of the Mundari Tribe. When a calf dies, children are instructed to blow into a cow's vulva to help stimulate milk production. Oftentimes, the cows suffer trauma from their calves passing away, and with the Mundari needing the milk in order to survive, this becomes a necessity to keep the cattle alive.

A young man performs the cowblowing ritual

But perhaps the biggest question I get asked is why the children perform this practice, and not the adults. Well, each individual plays a role in the tribe. The elders watch over the cows, the men (aged 20-45) tend to care for the cows throughout the day, as well as collect wood to keep the cattle warm at night, and the children perform tasks around the camp, such as cowblowing. To them, it's part of the way you become a man, by blowing into a cow's vulva. Every man who is now part of the Mundari Tribe once had to do this, and this has now transcended onto the younger generation.

The Mundari Cattle prepare for a long night ahead

Being Open In Today's World

The culture in today's world in the West usually stems from our views as being black or white. If something doesn't fit in our society, we tend not to be open to it. If something does fit, it must be an acceptable level of comfort in order to accept it. An example of this is the purity of the skin of the women of the Mundari Tribe. Women around the world spend thousands of Dollars per year on skincare, with results being varied. But what if I told you the cleanest skin in the world came from the Mundari Tribe? But in order to achieve that, you must only drink raw milk, only shower in cow urine, and most importantly, apply burnt cow dung to your face.

A Mundari man raises his hand as a show of unity

So, while we might look at these practices as "wrong", are they? Or are they wrong because they don't fit our traditional mold? A sad reality of today's world is that we remain uncomfortably comfortable. Meaning that we are so comfortable that we never push the realm of what it means to be uncomfortable, what it means to do something different. We spend hours per day on our electronics, intaking constant information and soft propaganda, promoting the latest skincare 😉 as an example. Is that we were designed to do as humans? I think not...

And with that, I leave you with one of my favorite photos I've ever taken