Living on the Sea | Real Life In The World's Last Nomad Society | 4k Travel Documentary

[00:00:00]If you want to travel to the most breathless, punishing, and spectacularly beautiful aquatic wilderness on planet Earth, you must travel deep into the absolute isolated heart of the Coral Triangle in Southeast Asia. You must leave the connected, paved, predictable modern world entirely behind and plunge your body directly into the active [music] biological flow of the Pacific Ocean.

[00:00:27]Close your eyes and imagine stepping [music] off a small shaking handcarved wooden boat onto a narrow creaking wooden platform [music] suspended over the open sea. You are not stepping onto a solid [music] gray concrete sidewalk.

[00:00:42]You are not stepping onto dry, warm, steady brown land. You are [music] stepping directly into a silent floating universe of weathered bamboo and dark wet [music] wooden stilt houses perched precariously over the endless deep blue ocean.

[00:01:01]You look around. There are absolutely no green mountains with forests here. There are no towering glass skyscrapers [music] reflecting a hot sun. There are no heavy metal power lines buzzing in the air. And there are absolutely no paved [music] black ashalt streets, modern grocery stores, or hospitals for hundreds of miles. There is only a massive, terrifying, [music] endless, completely suffocating ocean of bright glowing turquoise water and deep, [music] dark blue trenches stretching endlessly toward the polar horizon. The landscape is locked in a tropical wind blasted and violently wild environment under a punishing, blindingly bright yellow sun that beats down relentlessly upon the shifting water. The air itself [music] feels incredibly heavy, wet, and absolutely saturated with salt. You can physically feel the intense [music] burning heat of the tropical sun pressing heavily against your face, instantly covering your skin in thick, sticky, salty sweat, and dried white salt crystals.

[00:02:08]Every [music] single time you take a deep breath, your lungs are filled with the rich, overpowering scent of drying fish, rotting wet seaweed, hot engine gasoline, and the freezing salt spray of the open sea.

[00:02:22]The silence here does not exist. The floating village is a chaotic, deafening symphony of wild aquatic noise. It is dominated by the relentless, heavy, thundering sound of massive ocean swells crashing violently against the fragile wooden stilts beneath your feet. You hear the sharp, screaming cries of white seabirds circling high in the blinding blue sky. the loud [music] rhythmic mechanical chugging of small motorized wooden boats and the sudden splashing sounds [music] of children diving head first into the deep blue water. Welcome to the floating world of [music] the Baja Lout, the absolute undisputed nomads of the sea, the fish people of the Pacific and one of the most culturally isolated, [music] physiologically mutated and deeply misunderstood human societies on our planet.

[00:03:17]For centuries, [music] these extraordinary, resilient people have lived their entire lives out on the open water. They do not merely fish on the sea. They do not merely travel across the water. They belong to the ocean. They are born [music] in small, narrow wooden houseboats. They raise their children in houses built on stilts over deep coral reefs. And they die [music] in the same water.

[00:03:45]Many of them rarely if ever set foot on solid dry land. If they walk on the solid earth, they beautifully and strangely [music] complain of land sickness, feeling dizzy and nauseous because the stable ground does not rock and roll like the wooden deck of a boat.

[00:04:03]For adventurous [music] wealthy foreign ecoourrists, the extreme safe edges of this territory offer a quick guided ride in a clean fiberglass [music] speedboat to take digital photographs of beautiful colorful coral reefs and slowmoving giant sea [music] turtles.

[00:04:19]They sleep in aironditioned white cabins and drink cold bottled water. But for the isolated, ancient, [music] uncontacted Baja families who live deep in the empty, sweating, [music] terrifying center of this aquatic labyrinth. This deep ocean is not a beautiful vacation spot. It is not a place to visit. It is their entire universe.

[00:04:43]It is their grocery store, their nursery, their playground, and their graveyard.

[00:04:50]And it operates under a strict, terrifying, and absolutely unforgiving set of extreme survival rules. Out here, a single mistake does not mean a trip to the hospital. A single mistake means absolute certain death in the dark, sharkinfested depths. Rule number one of the floating world. You must master the deep, high pressure dark. The open ocean of the Coral [music] Triangle is not a place of gentle, peaceful, relaxing swims. It is a [music] deadly, merciless, terrifying trap. The water is swarming with venomous, [music] silent black and white sea snakes, giant stinging jellyfish with long, invisible blue tentacles, and massive [music] predatory tiger sharks waiting silently in the deep blue trenches.

[00:05:41]Because of [music] this terrifying, unavoidable daily reality, human survival required an absolute jaw-dropping physical mutation and incredible [music] biological bravery.

[00:05:53]In a modern, crowded city, when people want to explore the deep ocean, they wear incredibly thick, insulated black [music] rubber wets suits. They strap massive, heavy metal tanks of pressurized [music] oxygen to their backs, where giant plastic fins on their feet and use [music] complex digital dive computers to monitor their depth and time. The Baja [music] Loot do something entirely different, they plunge directly into the deep, crushing water, [music] wearing absolutely no modern gear. A rugged, heavily muscled indigenous hunter grabs a simple [music] handcarved spear gun made of scrap wood, a rusty metal trigger, and a thick oxidized iron spear tip. He wears [music] only a simple wrapped cloth around his waist. He does not wear advanced [music] plastic masks. He wears a pair of small handcarved wooden goggles with small circular [music] pieces of glass held in place by sticky black tree sap. He takes a [music] single deep quiet breath of the hot air.

[00:06:54]He does not [music] gasp. He does not struggle. He dives headfirst off the wooden deck of his canoe, plunging [music] silently into the deep blue water. He swims down, down, down into the crushing heavy gray blue dark. He descends to a staggering depth of 30, 40, or even 60 m below the surface. At this extreme depth, the immense physical pressure of the water column violently presses against his body, instantly flattening his lungs to a fraction of their normal size and pushing his blood into his vital organs.

[00:07:33]But his body does not panic. According to groundbreaking modern scientific studies, the barjo have undergone a true physical genetic [music] mutation over hundreds of years of natural selection.

[00:07:46]Their spleens, the vital internal organ that acts as an organic [music] oxygen reservoir, storing oxygen rich red blood cells, are physically, genetically 50% larger than those [music] of normal humans.

[00:08:00]When the Barjo hunter dives into the freezing deep water, his massive mutated spleen violently contracts, injecting [music] a massive concentrated surge of fresh oxygen-packed red blood cells directly into his bloodstream, allowing him to stay submerged under the heavy water for an [music] impossible 10 minutes on a single breath of air. His heart rate slows [music] down to a crawl. He walks on the seafloor exactly like a land animal walks on a grassy field. He moves slowly, silently through the giant green sea enemies and the sharp [music] gray volcanic stones, hunting the ultimate most valuable prize of the deep reef. The giant grouper, the silver [music] snapper, and the massive sea cucumbers. These massive, unpredictable ocean creatures can quickly get away, hiding beneath a shark, cutting coral reefs. But the wet, [music] darkeyed hunter moves with absolute, flawless precision.

[00:09:02]He spots a massive, heavy [music] silver fish hiding beneath a coral ledge. He raises the heavy wooden spear gun, [music] aims through the blurry glass goggles, and releases the rusty iron spear, bringing the heavy, struggling animal down onto the white sand of the ocean floor. But surviving [music] the extreme ocean requires more than just holding your breath. It requires a constant, backbreaking struggle to maintain their fragile wooden homes.

[00:09:30]In the floating villages of the Bajauo, you can never escape the decay of the salt. The bamboo and wood houses are built on tall, narrow wooden stilts driven directly into the sharp coral reefs, completely exposed to the open fury of the Pacific storms.

[00:09:47]The salty sea spray and the constant tropical humidity are a slow, silent, relentless monster. They eat the wood.

[00:09:57]They rot the bamboo. They rust every single iron nail. Because of this, the families [music] must spend their short, calm, dry season days using sharp steel axes to cut down heavy, salt-resistant mangrove [music] trees from the distant coastal swamps, dragging the heavy logs across the water to constantly rebuild and reinforce their wooden fortresses.

[00:10:21]During the [music] dark, terrifying monsoon season, when the sky turns a dark, violent gray and the tropical winds scream at hurricane speeds, the families are locked [music] in their creaking stoneweighted wooden homes. The ocean waves crash [music] violently beneath their wooden floorboards, sending salty water, spraying through the wide cracks in the bamboo walls. The houses [music] sway violently, threatening to be torn completely away from the reef and swallowed by the dark, churning water.

[00:10:51]But the Bajau do not run away in fear.

[00:10:54]They sit together around small flickering [music] yellow kerosene lamps, listening to the rhythmic, terrifying roar of the storm, surrendering [music] completely to the rhythm of the ocean. To survive in this watery world, they must also navigate an incredibly [music] complex spiritual landscape. The Baja La do not view the ocean as merely a physical body of water. To them, the sea is a living, breathing, [music] conscious entity filled with spirits, gods, and ancestors. They practice a unique ancient [music] mixture of Islam and animism known as medutu. They believe that every [music] coral reef, every deep underwater trench, and every school of fish has its own guardian spirit. When a [music] child is born, the father places the placenta inside a coconut shell and drops it carefully into the deep blue water, returning the child's life force directly to the ocean spirits. They believe this ritual establishes [music] an unbreakable lifelong physical and spiritual bond between the human being and the sea. If they anger the sea spirits by over fishing or showing disrespect to the water, the spirits will punish them with terrible violent storms, empty nets, and deadly diving accidents. Because of this deep spiritual fear, the Baja operate under a strict ancient moral code of conservation. They never take more fish than they can eat in a single day. They never destroy the live coral, and they always offer small gifts of dried tobacco and [music] sweet rice to the water before embarking on a dangerous deep sea hunt. If a diver becomes mysteriously sick with the [music] bends, the terrifying, painful decompression sickness caused by ascending too rapidly from the high-pressure depths. They do not seek [music] modern decompression chambers or doctors. They carry the shivering, [music] screaming victim to the village shaman known as the Boai.

[00:12:55]Inside [music] a dark, smoky wooden stilt house, the shaman lights a small clay bowl filled with burning sweet smelling incense. He beats a traditional [music] wooden drum, chanting ancient guttural mantras to communicate directly with the ocean spirits. He believes the sickness is a physical punishment from an angry sea ghost, and he must [music] negotiate a spiritual sacrifice, usually a white chicken or a bowl of yellow rice, [music] to buy the divers's life back from the cold, dark depths.

[00:13:29]It is a beautiful, haunting, and [music] completely unscientific system of survival. It is a world where physical mutation, ancient engineering, and deep [music] spiritual devotion are woven tightly together into a single unbreakable fabric of human resilience to fuel their human bodies through this exhausting, shivering physical labor.

[00:13:52]The people cannot rely on fresh [music] green vegetables, sweet yellow corn, or fresh animal milk. Agriculture [music] out here in the middle of the deep blue ocean is completely, utterly impossible.

[00:14:04]You cannot [music] dig a metal shovel into the earth because there is no earth. The true absolute foundation of the barow survival diet.

[00:14:14]It comes from an extreme [music] high protein, high-fat consumption of raw fish and a unique sticky starch. If you walk into a floating Bajau stilt house, you will see the family preparing the ultimate most essential dish of the sea, pangi.

[00:14:31]This is not a hot cooked vegetable soup.

[00:14:34]This is a thick, heavy, dense white paste made from grated cassava roots. To prepare pangi, the cook takes the long, heavy cassava roots, which they traditionally trade for with land dwelling farmers on the distant islands.

[00:14:50]They grate the hard root with sharp pieces of metal, squeeze out the toxic, bitter juice with their bare hands, and steam the dry [music] white starch in large metal pots over a small, hot orange wood fire. They serve this [music] heavy, sticky white paste alongside a giant overflowing pile of raw, freshly caught [music] sea fish, giant gray sea urchins filled with rich yellow [music] fat, and dried salty sea cucumbers. You take a small ball of the sticky white [music] starch with your bare fingers, dip it into the rich, yellow, highly concentrated [music] fat of the sea urchin, and place it directly onto your warm tongue. It tastes incredibly strong, intensely fishy, and extremely rich. Along with the warm, salty soup made from boiled fish heads, this extreme, [music] high protein, high-fat diet provides the massive, intense calories and thermal energy [music] the human body desperately needs to endure the cold, high pressure depths of the ocean.

[00:15:55]But today, this ancient, [music] perfect, delicate, isolated way of life is facing a massive, silent, and deeply challenging modern threat.

[00:16:08]The younger generation of the Bajou [music] is quietly, relentlessly looking toward the outside world. Through the glowing bright screens [music] of their digital smartphones connected to weak cellular signals beaming from distant land masts, the teenagers [music] watch videos of massive warm concrete cities like Manila, Koala Lumpur, and Jakarta.

[00:16:30]They see fast, shiny sports cars, bright neon shopping malls, warm sand beaches where people only relax, and endless choices.

[00:16:40]They realize that the world outside does not require you to hold your [music] breath for 10 minutes just to catch your lunch. It does not require you to constantly repair rotting wooden stilts in the freezing rain. It does not require you to face the terrifying dark storms of the open ocean in a fragile bamboo hut.

[00:17:01]At the same time, the massive modern industrialized fishing fleets of global corporations are brutally invading the sacred, quiet coral reefs of the coral triangle. These massive heavy metal ships use giant loud diesel engines and massive destructive bottom trolling nets, completely scraping the ocean floor, destroying the colorful [music] coral gardens and stealing millions of fish, leaving the traditional hunting grounds of the Bajau completely empty [music] and dead. Because of this, thousands of young Baj boys and girls are packing their small woven grass bags. They are boarding loud smoking metal fairies, [music] leaving their parents, their traditional stilt houses and the small [music] wooden canoes entirely behind, allowing their ancient resilient heritage to slowly fade [music] away into the howling ocean wind.

[00:17:58]Will the small creaking wooden stilt [music] houses of the Bajau eventually go completely cold, their wooden stilts collapsing into the deep blue water?

[00:18:08]Will the [music] ancient mutated fish people of the Pacific become nothing more than a forgotten fading myth?

[00:18:16]It is a terrifying, deeply painful question. But if you look into the [music] bright, fierce, incredibly proud eyes of a seasoned Bajau elder standing his ground on the wet, slippery deck of [music] his wooden canoe, holding his heavy, oxidized steel spear tight [music] against his heavily muscled chest, you will see a human spirit that absolutely, stubbornly, and violently refuses [music] to be broken.

[00:18:43]These are the descendants of the tough ancient people who looked at a [music] vast, suffocating, terrifying, and absolutely hostile ocean labyrinth and did not run away in fear. They decided [music] to stay and build an unbreakable, beautiful, and deeply connected community at the very edge of the world.

[00:19:03]Living in the Coral Triangle is not a vacation. It is a daily exhausting [music] exercise in profound absolute wet human resilience. It is the intense overpowering smell of drying fish, hot diesel oil, and cold fresh salt spray.

[00:19:22]It is the deafening beautiful sound of a roaring ocean wave keeping the dry land away. The metallic crackle of your own high pressure breath and the majestic dancing blue lights of the tropical sea.

[00:19:36]In our modern, comfortable, lowaltitude western cities, we build massive, thick concrete walls. We pave over the soft earth with hard, dead, gray asphalt. And we turn on humming electric heaters because we are [music] desperately, deeply terrified of raw nature. We want [music] to hide from the wind, the water, and the dark. But the incredible, [music] fierce people of deep ocean do not hide. They plunge headfirst into the crushing dark. They walk on the seafloor. They hunt the giant [music] beasts. They eat the raw fish. They ride the massive waves. They survive the darkest, wetest nights on [music] the face of our planet. Nature here is a massive, suffocating, [music] wet, unrelenting dictator. But the people who choose to stay, the the true ancient saltcovered guardians of the deep will fiercely, violently, and [music] proudly defend every single wooden stilt, every drop of turquoise ocean water, [music] and every giant silver fish until their very last, [music] defiant, wet, and frozen. If you want to travel to the most breathtaking, bizarre, and spectacularly isolated extreme wilderness on planet Earth, you must travel deep into the absolute, forgotten heart of the Indian Ocean. You must leave the comfortable, paved, predictable modern world entirely behind and sail into the violent, churning turquoise waters off the southeastern coast of Africa. Close your eyes and imagine stepping off a small rusted heavy wooden boat onto a pristine beach of blindingly white sand. You look around and you realize you are not standing on a normal tropical island.

[00:21:31]You are not standing in a standard green jungle. You are stepping directly into a vast, terrifying ancient biological fortress of striking bright, dusty red soil and bizarre, impossible plants that look like they were violently ripped from another planet. You look around, there are absolutely no towering glass skyscrapers reflecting the sun. There are no massive multi-lane highways choked with running metal cars. There are no modern concrete hospitals or massive global grocery stores for hundreds of miles. There is only a massive, terrifying, endless, completely suffocating ocean of towering, jagged gray limestone mountains, dry spiny forests, and deep red canyons piercing directly into a blindingly bright, impossibly deep dark blue sky.

[00:22:24]This massive red island stretches endlessly toward the horizon. Locked in a dry, isolated, and violently harsh wilderness under a punishing, blindingly bright yellow sun. The air itself feels incredibly heavy, hot, and absolutely relentless.

[00:22:42]You can physically feel the intense, terrifying power of the tropical sun pressing heavily against your shoulders, instantly soaking your skin in thick, heavy, salty sweat. Every single time you take a deep breath, your lungs are filled with the intense, rich, overpowering scent of burning wood, hot red earth, drying fish, and the sweet, intoxicating smell of wild vanilla blooming in the dark green valleys. The silence here does not exist. The wilderness is a chaotic, echoing symphony of wild noise. The deep, terrifying isolation is broken by the sharp, piercing, screaming cries of giant black and white lemurs jumping rapidly through the high branches of the trees. Beneath the canopy, you hear the dry, shifting sound of a colorful, bright green chameleon rolling its large, bulging eye ease as it stalks a giant insect. You hear the deafening, thundering, rhythmic pounding of massive, violent turquoise waves crashing relentlessly against the jagged volcanic cliffs. Welcome to Madagascar, the absolute undisputed eighth continent of our planet, an alien world where evolution took a completely different path and one of the most biologically unique, dangerous, and deeply isolated human territories on Earth. Millions of years ago, this massive island physically broke away from the giant continent of Africa. It floated completely alone in the deep blue ocean, isolated from the rest of the world.

[00:24:17]Because of this absolute geographical isolation, nature here went completely wild. More than 90% of every single wild animal, crawling insect, and green plant living on this massive red rock exists nowhere else in the entire universe. It is a biological time capsule of impossible life. For adventurous wealthy foreign ecoourists, the extreme safe edges of this territory off for a quick, comfortable ride in a clean, quiet white suvi to take quick digital photographs of beautiful bizarre trees and cute jumping animals. They sleep in heated wooden lodges and drink sweet tropical cocktails.

[00:25:00]but for the isolated ancient resilient indigenous tribes and farmers who actually live deep in the impenetrable, dry, terrifying center of this harsh island.

[00:25:11]This red wasteland is not a beautiful vacation spot. It is not a place to visit. It is their entire universe. It is their grocery store, their pharmacy, their fortress, and their religion. and it operates under a strict, terrifying, and absolutely unforgiving set of extreme survival rules. Out here, a single mistake does not mean a trip to the hospital. A single mistake means absolute certain death in the dry, thorny forests or the shark-filled turquoise waters. Rule number one of the alien island. You must survive the deadly, suffocating dryness and the lawless empty plains. The dry, spiny forests and the vast red plateaus of southern Madagascar are not places of gentle, peaceful, relaxing walks. They are a deadly, merciless, terrifying trap. The rocky ground is covered in sharp towering gray limestone structures called singi. massive razor-sharp rock forests where a single for will physically slice human flesh like a metal blade. During the brutal dry season, the temperature violently skyrockets and the water wells dry up into hard, cracked gray clay. Because of this terrifying, unavoidable daily reality, human survival required an absolute jaw-dropping, magnificent mastery of natural resources and incredible physical endurance.

[00:26:41]You do not conquer this land. You blend into it. The people here do not build massive modern brick houses. They survive by anchoring their entire lives to the earth. If you travel to the spectacular bright turquoise blue coastline of the southwest, you will find the VO people. They are the legendary semiynomatic sea tribe of the Mosambique channel. The Vaso do not live in concrete houses on the solid dirt.

[00:27:10]They live in small temporary wooden huts built directly on the white sand covered in dry palm leaves. To understand how human beings survive in this waterless, salty environment, you must watch a Vaso fisherman walk onto the beach at dawn.

[00:27:27]He does not use a massive heavy metal commercial fishing boat with a loud diesel engine. He uses an ancient, brilliant piece of naval engineering, the Pyrogue.

[00:27:39]It is a narrow, fragile, wooden outrigger canoe carved by hand from a single trunk of a soft forest tree and balanced by long wooden poles floating on the water. He raises a massive square white canvas sail. The strong ocean wind catches the white canvas, pushing the tiny, unstable wooden boat incredibly fast across the deep, dark blue water.

[00:28:04]He sails far out to the dangerous sharp coral reefs where the massive ocean swells crash violently.

[00:28:12]He does not fish with a modern, expensive carbon fiber rods. He holds a long, sharp metal spear in his rough, calloused hand. He wears simple scratched plastic goggles over his dark eyes. He takes a deep breath of salty air and he dives deep into the crystal clearar turquoise water. He is hunting the most intelligent and camouflagemastered creature of the reef, the giant octopus. He swims silently, kicking his bare feet through the sharp coral. Suddenly, his sharp eyes spot a slight movement in the rock. He strikes with explosive speed, driving the sharp metal spear into a dark crevice, pulling a giant, wet, wriggling purple octopus out of its cave. But hunting in these warm, clear tropical waters is incredibly dangerous. The moment the bright red blood of the octopus hits the salty blue water, the true kings of the deep arrive, massive, fast, dark, gray reef sharks. These terrifying predators can smell a single drop of blood from a mile away. They swim rapidly in aggressive circles around the human diver. Their cold black eyes staring.

[00:29:26]The Vazo fisherman must quickly swim to the surface, pulling his heavy catch onto his wooden canoe before the gi the giant gray sharks can attack. He rows the heavy wooden boat back to the white sand beach. When he arrives, the local women, wearing incredibly vibrant, brightly colored yellow, green, and red wrapped cotton skirts, take the fresh seafood. They use sharp metal knives to quickly cut the giant wet octopuses, hanging them on long wooden poles to dry directly under the burning hot yellow sun. They build small, hot orange wood fires directly on the white sand, cooking fresh silver ocean fish and massive mud crabs. The ocean provides an endless, bountiful supply of vital protein. But if you turn your back on the blue ocean and walk deep into the dry, burning red center of the island, the survival story completely changes.

[00:30:24]In the vast, dry southern plains, the landscape is incredibly harsh. It is a desert filled with sharp, thorny green bushes, swollen bottle trees, and sharp gray rocks. Water here is more valuable than shiny gold. And surviving this dry red desert requires the ultimate absolute symbol of Malagasi wealth and power. The Zebu. If you stand on a dusty, bright red dirt road, you will see a massive herd of giant muscular cows. But these are not normal cows. The zebu has a massive, strange hump of fat on its back and incredibly long, sharp, curved bone horns. A strong young local herder walks behind the massive brown and white animals. He carries a simple wooden walking stick guiding the heavy cows across the cracked red earth. For the people of the interior, the zebu is absolutely everything. They use the heavy brown cows to pull large wooden carts filled with heavy goods. They use them to plow the deep, sticky brown mud in the flooded green rice fields of the highlands. And most importantly, the zebu is a walking bank account. A family's entire social status, their pride, and their wealth is measured by how many massive longhorned cows they own. When a special village ceremony occurs, a zebu is sacrificed. The rich, heavy, sizzling red meat is cooked over a roaring orange wood fire, providing the massive essential calories the hardworking people need to survive. But owning massive herds of expensive cows creates a very dangerous, violent problem. The red dirt roads of the interior are wild, completely unpoliced, and highly dangerous. Armed groups of ruthless, highly organized cattle thieves known as the Dahl hide in the deep green forests.

[00:32:24]They carry heavy illegal automatic rifles. In the middle of the pitch black night, they launch violent, bloody raids on the quiet villages, stealing hundreds of valuable Zebu cows and burning the wooden houses. The local herders must constantly guard their animals. They sleep outside in the freezing dark night on the cold ground, holding sharp metal spears and old hunting guns to protect their living wealth from the ruthless bandits. To fuel this intense physical labor, the Malagasi diet relies heavily on one single massive crop, white rice.

[00:33:03]Very. If you travel to the central highlands, where the mountains rise into the clouds, you will see a spectacular masterpiece of agricultural engineering.

[00:33:12]The local Betsilio and Marina farmers have turned the vertical mountain slopes into a breathtaking landscape of massive curving flat green steps.

[00:33:22]These are the terrace rice fields. The Malagasi people eat more white rice per person than almost any other country on the globe. They eat massive steaming bowls of fluffy white rice for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

[00:33:37]It is the absolute life-saving foundation of their survival, giving them the heavy carbohydrates needed to walk for miles under the boiling yellow sun. But this profound, deep connection to the land and their animals is not just physical. It is intensely, deeply spiritual.

[00:33:55]To the indigenous people of Madagascar, the boundary between the living and the dead is incredibly thin. They believe that the spirits of their ancestors are still alive, watching over the families, protecting the crops and demanding absolute respect. To honor these spirits, they practice one of the most unique, shocking, and deeply emotional rituals on earth. The famadihana, the turning of the bones. Every seven years, a local family will gather at the sacred ste tomb of their ancestors.

[00:34:29]It is not a moment of quiet, dark sadness. It is a massive, wild, and joyful celebration.

[00:34:37]The family members wear their finest, brightest clothing. They hire a loud brass band to play fast, energetic music. They open the heavy stone doors of the tomb. They carefully, lovingly bring out the skeletal bodies of their dead ancestors.

[00:34:54]With tears of pure joy and love streaming down their faces, they lay the bodies on flat straw mats, they use their bare hands to gently clean the bones, and they wrap the ancestral bodies in fresh, incredibly expensive, bright white, and colorful silk shrouds.

[00:35:12]They write the names of the ancestors on the silk cloth with black ink. Then the magic happens.

[00:35:20]The family members lift the wrapped lightweight bodies of their dead grandfathers, grandmothers, and parents directly onto their shoulders, and they dance. They spin in wide, wild circles around the tomb, laughing, singing, and drinking hot rum from small glass cups.

[00:35:40]They introduce the dead ancestors to the new young babies born into the family.

[00:35:46]They show them the new clothes and they tell them stories of the village. It is a beautiful, deeply touching and incredibly powerful family reunion between the living and the dead. They believe that as long as they remember and dance with the ancestors, the family will remain strong, the zebu herds will multiply, and the green rice will grow.

[00:36:09]Once the dancing is done, they carefully return the wrapped bodies to the cool stone shelves of the tomb, sealing the door until the next cycle. It is an unbroken ancient harmony between humanity, spirituality, and the red earth of the island. But today, this ancient, perfect, beautiful balance is facing a massive, unnatural, entirely modern, and deeply terrifying global threat. The beautiful unique green forests of Madagascar are actually being violently rapidly destroyed.

[00:36:45]To clear flat land to grow the vital white rice and to create open fields for the heavy brown zebu cows to eat grass, the local farmers practice an ancient destructive technique called taravi or slash and burn agriculture. In the dry season, they take burning orange torches and set the ancient thick green jungle completely on fire. If you fly a small airplane over the island, you will see a heartbreaking apocalyptic sight.

[00:37:15]Massive, terrifying pillars of thick gray and black smoke rise high into the blue sky, completely blocking out the sun. The intense orange flames roar through the spiny forests, turning the giant ancient trees into dead black charcoal. The jumping lemurs, the colorful chameleons, and the rare birds lose their homes burning to death in the flames.

[00:37:40]And when the heavy violent tropical monsoon rains arrive, there are no green tree roots left to hold the red dirt together. Millions of tons of rich top soil wash away. If you look down at the massive rushing rivers flowing toward the Mosambique channel, the water is not blue. The water is a dark, violent, bloody red. It literally looks like the entire island is bleeding its very soul into the Indian Ocean. The red mud washes into the sea, burying the delicate, colorful coral reefs and destroying the shallow hunting grounds of the Vaso fishermen. At the same time, the modern industrialized world is violently impacting the isolated island.

[00:38:25]Massive wealthy foreign industrial corporations are driving loud, heavy yellow excavators and giant bulldozers deep into the quiet forests.

[00:38:35]They are digging massive open gray mines to extract valuable pink sapphires and shiny silver minerals for modern electronics.

[00:38:44]The modern world is consuming the alien island at a terrifying catastrophic speed. And the young generation is caught right in the middle of this massive change. Young Malagaci teenagers wearing modern blue jeans and holding glowing digital smartphones are now deeply connected to the global internet.

[00:39:03]They sit in their small wooden villages, but they watch bright, fast, incredibly loud digital videos of the capital city, Antanarivo.

[00:39:13]They see a massive, crowded, modern concrete metropolis.

[00:39:17]They see thousands of loud, small yellow taxi cars stuck in heavy traffic. They see tall concrete buildings, modern universities, and clean grocery stores filled with plastic wrapped food. the psychological emotional temptation to leave the harsh, hot, dangerous red dirt villages for the bright electric lights, the modern jobs, and the convenience of the gray, wealthy concrete city is incredibly powerful. Thousands of young boys and girls are packing their small woven bags. They are walking out of the dusty valleys, boarding loud, crowded, brightly painted metal buses called taxi bruises, and driving away from their ancestral homes.

[00:40:01]They are leaving the giant biobab trees, the white sailed wooden canoes, and the dangerous zebu hering traditions entirely behind, allowing them to slowly fade away. As the young youth permanently abandon the rural villages and the ancient green forests continue to burn, a profound, heavy, deeply painful anxiety hangs over the island.

[00:40:27]Would the massive upside down biobab trees eventually stand completely alone in a barren, dead red desert? Would the beautiful white- sailed wooden canoes of the Vaso completely disappear from the turquoise bays, replaced by loud smoking fiberglass motorboats?

[00:40:44]It is a terrifying, deeply painful and incredibly complex reality. But if you stop and look directly into the bright, fierce, incredibly resilient eyes of a local Malagasi farmer planting small green rice stalks deep in the wet brown mud. You will see a human spirit that absolutely, stubbornly, and violently refuses to be broken. These are the descendants of the people who looked at an isolated, wild, unpredictable alien landscape and did not run away in fear. They decided to stay and build a vibrant, beautiful, spiritually rich and incredibly powerful enduring culture.

[00:41:28]Living in Madagascar is not a soft vacation. It is a daily, exhausting exercise in profound, absolute hot human resilience.

[00:41:38]It is the intense, overpowering smell of a burning wood fire and sweet, sticky white rice.

[00:41:45]It is the feeling of the hot red dirt beneath your bare feet. and the cooling salty breeze of the turquoise ocean. In the modern comfortable western world, we build massive thick concrete walls. We pave over the soft grass with hard, dead gray asphalt. And we turn on humming electric air conditioners because we are desperately, deeply terrified of raw nature. We want to hide from the wind, the heat, and the isolation. But the incredible fierce people of the Indian Ocean do not hide. They sail the wooden boats. They herd the giant cattle. They dance with the bones of their ancestors.

[00:42:26]They survive the most isolated extreme months on the planet. Nature here is a massive, suffocating, hot, unrelenting dictator. But the people who choose to stay, the true ancient sunburned guardians of the eighth continent, will fiercely, violently, and proudly defend every single ancient greystone, every drop of sweet, deep mountain water, and every massive ancient baobab tree until their very last defiant, fiercely proud breath. If you want to travel to the most breathtaking, high altitude and spiritually fierce wilderness on planet Earth, you must travel to the absolute roof of the world. You must leave the oxygenrich, warm, paved modern world entirely behind and pull yourself up into the towering ancient fenceless mountains of Tibet.

[00:43:20]Imagine stepping off a small diesel train onto a dry, cracking, violently bright yellow dirt plane.

[00:43:27]You are not stepping onto a soft green lawn. You are not stepping onto a busy city sidewalk. You are stepping directly into a vast, terrifying, fenceless ocean of dry yellow grass and sharp gray rocks sitting at an impossible 4,000 m above sea level. You look around. There are absolutely no towering green trees here.

[00:43:49]There are no massive glass skyscrapers reflecting the sun. There are no thick, breathable forests. And there are absolutely no modern concrete hospitals or massive grocery stores for hundreds of miles. There is only a massive, terrifying, endless, completely suffocating ocean of towering, jagged, snowcapped mountains piercing directly into a blindingly bright, impossibly deep dark blue sky. These massive granite peaks stretch endlessly toward the horizon. Locked in a dry, thin-eared, and violently harsh wilderness under a punishing, blindingly bright golden sun. The air itself feels incredibly thin, sharp, and absolutely lethal.

[00:44:35]You can physically feel the intense, terrifying power of the low oxygen pressing heavily against your lungs, instantly making your head spin and your heart beat wildly inside your chest.

[00:44:47]Every single time you take a deep breath, your lungs are filled with the intense, rich, overpowering scent of burning ak dung, fresh white barley flour, and the thick, intoxicating, heavy smoke of burning ancient juniper incense.

[00:45:03]The silence here is absolute, crushing and immense.

[00:45:07]The concept of quiet is almost completely swallowed by the sheer scale of the mountains. The deep, terrifying silence is only broken by the sharp, piercing, screaming howl of the freezing, razor sharp wind sweeping rapidly across the high fenceless plateaus.

[00:45:27]Beneath the wind, you hear the deep, heavy, rhythmic, terrifying thumping of giant prehistoricl looking black yaks.

[00:45:34]Massive, heavily, horned beasts stepping heavily upon the sharp gray rocks. You hear the sharp, high-pitched winnie of wild horses echoing across the empty valley.

[00:45:47]Welcome to the Tibetan Plateau, the absolute undisputed king of the high wilderness. The land of snows and one of the most culturally isolated, dangerous, and deeply misunderstood human territories on our planet. For adventurous, wealthy foreign tourists, the extreme safe edges of this territory offer a quick, comfortable ride in a loud smoking heavy diesel SUV to take quick digital photographs of a beautiful blue lake or to point a camera at a slow, heavy brown yak chewing grass in a green valley. They sleep in heated white canvas tents and drink hot, sweet Tibetan milk tea.

[00:46:29]But for the isolated ancient, resilient indigenous nomads who actually live deep in the empty, freezing, terrifying center of this high altitude desert, the proud custodians of the high plateaus, these mountains are not a beautiful vacation spot. It is not a place to visit. It is their entire universe. It is their grocery store, their pharmacy, their armory, their fortress, and their religion. And it operates under a strict, terrifying, and absolutely unforgiving set of extreme survival rules. Out here, a single mistake does not mean a trip to the hospital. A single mistake means absolute certain death in the freezing dark mountains.

[00:47:12]Rule number one of the high plateau. You must survive the deadly, suffocating thin air and the bone crushing cold. The high altitude valleys of the Chungthang region are not places of gentle, peaceful, relaxing walks. They are a deadly, merciless, terrifying trap. The rocky ground sits staggering at 4,000 to 5,000 m above sea level, where the oxygen levels are terrifyingly, dangerously low. It is blasted by violent, rapidly moving, freezing winds and sits under a blazing golden sun.

[00:47:47]Because of this terrifying, unavoidable daily reality, human survival required an absolute jaw-dropping, magnificent mastery of mobility and community. You do not conquer this land by building towering concrete walls. You flow with it. The nomadic tribes here do not build massive stationary stone mansions with fragile glass windows. In the deep step, staying in one place means your animals will starve to death. They survive by packing up their entire lives and moving. If you walk into a traditional Tibetan nomadic camp, you will see a breathtaking piece of ancient organic mobile architecture. They build massive circular black canvas tents called bar or gear. It is a giant wounded lowprofile structure made from a woven grid of thin flexible willow branches covered entirely by thick heavy dark black handspun yak wool felt. The center of the massive black tent is a small packed dirt floor. In the exact middle sits a heavy dark iron metal stove. A thick metal chimney pipe runs straight up through a small circular hole in the wooden roof, blowing thick gray smoke from burning yakdung into the blue sky.

[00:49:08]Inside the warm round tent, families live closely together. They sleep under thick, colorful, heavywoven wool blankets and massive white sheepkin rugs. Underneath their woven cotton mattresses, they light a bright roaring orange fire in the heavy iron stove. But they do not burn green trees because there are no trees here. They burn dry brown animal dung. The thick heat from the burning dung acts as a massive radiator, keeping their sleeping bodies safe from the lethal freezing black knight outside.

[00:49:43]To survive and feed their families inside this round fortress, the indigenous men had to become the ultimate, fearless masters of the massive, hairy beasts and the incredibly thick freezing ice. A rugged, incredibly tough indigenous herdsman steps out of the black tent and walks into the freezing wind. He is wearing a heavy massive traditional coat called a deal or chuba made of thick raw brown sheep fur and lined with rich brown lamb skinin. He wears tall heavy brown leather boots. He does not drive a loud heavy metal diesel tractor. A heavy metal machine with black rubber tires would instantly freeze, its engine oil turning into solid black blocks the moment the violent heavy Himalayan winter blizzards begin to fall. Instead, he guides a massive, silent, perfectly adapted herd of giant, heavy black and brown yaks down the dark, twisting, dangerous, rocky valleys.

[00:50:43]He walks silently, making absolutely no sudden, startling sounds in the thin air. He does not with loud explosive metal hunting rifles. He relies on silent, ancient, deadly animal husbandry.

[00:50:59]He carries massive, heavy, deeply spun wool ropes and long, sharp, handcarved wooden staffs. He steps out of his mud brick home and moves flawlessly, silently through the freezing, slippery white snow and the sharp, jagged gray rocks, managing the ultimate, most dangerous, and most valuable prize of the high plateau. Heards the massive, heavily muscled, terrifying, badl looking black yak. These massive, aggressive, unpredictable yaks have incredibly thick, tough black fur razor sharp, curving white horns, and can violently, brutally charge a human being in seconds, crushing human bones with their massive weight. But the yak is the absolute lifeblood of the high altitude.

[00:51:49]It provides thick, dark red meat, heavy, rich white milk, and the incredibly thick warm black wool used to weave heavy nomadic tents that withstand the screaming winter wind. But managing dangerous wild animals on the frozen plateau is only half of the extreme survival equation.

[00:52:09]To truly understand life in Tibet, you must look into the dark, frozen, terrifying waters of the massive winding rivers and the giant blue lakes. The Tibetan plateau is one of the most significant, mysterious water systems on the planet, the birthplace of massive rivers like the Mikong, the Yangzi, and the Indis.

[00:52:31]During the summer, its waters are a thick, roaring, impenetrable, muddy turquoise blue.

[00:52:38]But during the brutal dark winter, the temperature drops so low that the massive, violently rushing rivers and giant lakes freeze completely solid.

[00:52:47]They become a massive, transparent, blindingly white blanket of solid blue ice. For the isolated ancient nomadic camps deep in the high valleys, the mountain passes are completely blocked by 30 ft of solid white snow for six entire months. They are completely, totally cut off from the entire world.

[00:53:08]These tough, windburned indigenous nomads do not hide from the ice. They absolutely conquer it. They wrap themselves in thick animal furs, use ancient handcarved wooden sleds loaded with supplies, and walk for dozens of miles across the blindingly bright, incredibly slippery, transparent blue ice. Beneath their thin leather boots, they listen intensely to the deep, echoing, terrifying cracking sounds of the shifting ice.

[00:53:37]A single mistake, a single thin patch of white ice means falling into the freezing black water and an absolute certain death. They physically completely push their own human bodies to the absolute limit of endurance to match the terrifying frozen environment.

[00:53:55]They become the high alitude ice masters. But walking on solid blue ice and hering massive black beasts is only part of their daily life. The human body requires massive amounts of calories to survive the exhausting, shivering physical labor of the freezing mountains. Agriculture out here in the deep, frozen rocky valleys is infinitely impossible in the traditional modern sense. You cannot drive a heavy green combine harvester. You cannot plant neat, perfectly straight rows of yellow corn or tall green sugar cane in freezing, dry, rocky, high alitude dust.

[00:54:34]The true absolute life-saving foundation of the Tibetan diet and survival comes from a miraculous exhausting harvest of a single tough plant. Barley. Imagine working for weeks across a freezing high alitude, intensely dry, dusty wasteland.

[00:54:52]Your hands are covered in thick gray dirt. Your face is dripping with thick, heavy, salty sweat under the blinding ultraviolet sun. You are exhausted, hungry, and struggling to breathe the thin air. And then suddenly you find a massive thick bright neon green patch of towering waving barley fields growing directly out of the barren dry mountain slope fed by freezing crystalclear glacial meltwater.

[00:55:24]When the farmers use their sharp sickles to chop down the massive golden barley stalks, it is a moment of pure desperate life-saving relief for the entire village. The men and women use heavy sharp metal sickles attached to thick handcarved wooden handles to violently slice the massive heavy golden stalks.

[00:55:46]They thresh the grain using massive heavy wooden poles and the weight of their giant black yaks walking in circles.

[00:55:54]The local women wearing colorful bright turquoise and red coral jewelry walk into the stone mills carrying large heavywoven bags of grain.

[00:56:04]They use the freezing rushing blue river water to power massive heavy grinding stream wheels. They pound and smash the hard grain for hours, turning it into a thick, dry, heavy roasted white flour.

[00:56:18]This roasted barley flour is called sampa. It is the absolute foundation of their survival. They collect this bright white and golden flour and mix it directly with heavy, thick, salty, bright pink yak butter tea. It transforms into a thick, heavy, dense, chewy brown dough. This Tampa dough is completely packed with massive amounts of heavy, slow burning carbohydrates and massive, thick and animal fat. They eat it raw, they boil it, and they roll it in their bare hands. Along with the warm, rich, dark red meat from the yak and sheep and the incredibly thick, heavy pink butter tea called gura chai.

[00:57:02]This extreme high-fat, highcarb diet provides the massive, intense internal energy and body heat the tribes desperately need to endure the brutal, exhausting physical labor of navigating the endless, freezing, oxygen-deprived mountains. But Tibet is a land of extreme, violent, and terrifying contrasts.

[00:57:25]While the daytime brings blinding continuous bright yellow sunlight filtering intensely through the incredibly thin transparent air violently burning the human skin. The nighttime is a freezing pitch black terrifying void filled with unseen hidden cold because of the complete lack of moisture and clouds. The absolute moment the bright sun sets behind the massive jagged gray granite mountains. The valley plunges into terrifying, painfully dark, absolute freezing blackness.

[00:58:00]You cannot feel your own hands in front of your face due to the biting cold. The air instantly drops to sub-zero temperatures, freezing any standing water into solid, cracking white ice within minutes. To survive the dark, dangerous, terrifying freezing nights, the tribal families must gather closely together. They do not wander alone into the howling wind. Inside the thick mudbrick houses, high alitude black tents, and towering ancient fortress-like monasteries built on the edges of massive cliffs. They seek safety, warmth, and intense, profound spiritual connection.

[00:58:41]They build a bright roaring crackling orange fire using dry brown animal dung placed directly on a heavy iron stove in the center of the round tent or mudroom.

[00:58:52]They sit closely together on thick, incredibly soft, intricately handwoven red and blue woolen rugs placed directly on the hard packed dirt floor. and they practice the most important sacred beautiful and mind-blowing spiritual ritual of the high Himalayas.

[00:59:11]Tibetan Buddhism. Dozens of proud, spiritually dedicated, deeply wrinkled elderly monks and young noviceses stand close together in a massive ancient dark smoky prayer hall completely covered in brilliant glowing blindingly vibrant dark red and golden yellow woolen robes.

[00:59:31]They begin a deep rhythmic incredibly heavy synchronized guttural throat chanting. These massive ancient thickwalled monasteries smell intensely of burning butter lamps. The monks strike massive, heavy hanging brass gongs and blow into incredibly long, massive, heavy copper horns that rest directly on the wooden floor. They produce mesmerizing, echoing, heavy, thundering, vibrating sounds. The incredibly deep, vibrating horn blasts, and the throat singing perfectly imitate the heavy, violent howling of the winter blizzards, the crashing roar of the avalanches, and the sharp echoing calls of the high alitude eagles.

[01:00:18]It is a slow, hypnotic, overwhelming, and breathtakingly emotional spectacle of human devotion.

[01:00:26]Listening to this deep, echoing, thumped chant physically vibrates inside their chests.

[01:00:33]It connects their human bodies from the inside out. It brings the entire isolated, freezing community together in an unbreakable, invisible, spiritual bond.

[01:00:47]They sit around the warm glowing flickering yellow light of thousands of tiny burning yak butter lamps preparing elaborate towering impossibly complex brightly colored mandelas made entirely of crushed colored sand. They used the brilliant glowing neon red, bright blue, and vibrant yellow sand, meticulously pouring it for weeks, only to violently sweep it all away to symbolize the impermanence of life. They spin massive, heavy, glowing golden prayer wheels, sending ancient echoing, whispered mantras into the pitch black, freezing, howling night air. If you step outside the heavy wooden doors of the monastery and look closely at the massive white snowcapped peaks glowing in the moonlight, you will see a breathtaking, terrifying sight that modern city dwellers can absolutely never experience.

[01:01:45]You are closer to the stars than almost anywhere else on Earth. The dark black sky is completely overwhelmingly suffocated by billions of bright glowing brilliant white and purple stars.

[01:01:59]You can clearly see the glowing bright thick dust of the Milky Way galaxy stretching violently across the entire universe completely unobstructed by any city lights or pollution. It is a beautiful ancient unbroken magnificent celebration of human existence, thriving and surviving in the most extreme, isolated, difficult, frozen, high alitude corner of the world.

[01:02:25]But today, this ancient, perfect, beautiful, delicate balance is facing a massive, unnatural, entirely mechanical and deeply terrifying global threat. If you travel across the vast twisting rocky valleys, far far away from the quiet mudbrick villages and the chanting monks, you will suddenly hear a deafening, terrifying, massive feat of modern industrial destruction slowly creeping across the fragile high alitude step. The massive ancient frozen glaciers that provide absolutely every single drop of drinking and farming water for over a billion people downstream are actually being violently, rapidly destroyed due to the insatiable, endless, hungry global demand for fossil fuels and severe global climate change.

[01:03:18]The massive towering white glaciers are melting at a terrifying, catastrophic speed. The vital lifesaving freezing blue melt water that has watered the green barley fields for a thousand years is slowly drying up, completely destroying the traditional ancient farming cycles and leaving entire villages entirely without water. At the same time, the modern industrialized world is sending massive, incredibly loud, heavy metal diesel trains, loud, smoking, screaming motorcycles, and giant rumbling military supply trucks crashing directly through the ancient sacred towering mountain passes.

[01:04:00]Global tourism and military border tensions now use massive, loud, smoking, heavy metal excavators with giant steel claws to violently tear open the fragile, dusty mountains to build wide black asphalt highways.

[01:04:15]They pump thousands of gallons of highly toxic, heavy black diesel exhaust directly into the incredibly thin, fragile, pristine mountain air. This deadly heavy gray exhaust slowly sinks into the valleys. It violently pollutes the crystal clearar, bright blue, high altitude lakes. It destroys the fragile, delicate, quiet hunting habitat of the massive wild horses and snow leopards, slowly pushing the ancient, majestic cats higher and higher into starvation.

[01:04:48]Most tragically of all, this modern influx of plastic waste and pollution poisons the vital life-giving purity of the isolated region, turning the vibrant, beautiful, quiet valleys into loud, toxic, chaotic tourist traps. And the modern, hyperconnected digital world is quietly, relentlessly leaking into the ancient redroed, isolated communities. Today, if you walk into a remote high alitude nomadic camp, you might see a strange, jarring, totally bizarre visual contrast.

[01:05:22]Sitting by the warm, glowing orange yakdong fire, surrounded by thick black wool felt walls, a young indigenous teenager wearing a traditional heavy brown goncha robe and bright turquoise stones is also wearing modern torn blue denim jeans and dark black sunglasses.

[01:05:41]And in their hand, they are holding a bright, glowing, shiny digital smartphone connected to a new fast 5G cellular signal beaming from a towering metal mast. They sit in the freezing high alitude desert. But they watch bright, fast, incredibly loud digital videos of crowded, massive concrete cities like Beijing, Shanghai, London, and New York.

[01:06:07]They see fast, shiny metal sports cars, bright flashing neon street lights, massive clean modern shopping malls, and towering reflective glass buildings reaching into the warm oxygenrich clouds. The psychological, emotional temptation to leave the harsh, freezing, oxygen-deprived, incredibly dangerous, backbreaking mountain desert for the bright electric lights, the modern central heating, the easy food, and the convenience of the gray, warm, concrete city is incredibly powerful and seductive.

[01:06:43]Thousands of young indigenous boys and girls are packing their small woven wool bags. They are walking out of the rocky valleys, boarding loud, smoking metal trains and heavy buses and driving away from their ancestral homes. They are leaving their ancient complex Tibetan languages, their towering black tents and their dangerous freezing nomadic traditions entirely behind, allowing them to slowly fade away into the blowing freezing mountain dust of history. As the young youth permanently abandon the high plateau and the loud screaming diesel trucks push closer and closer and closer to their sacred melting glass every single day. The heavy, profound, deeply painful anxiety hangs over the ancient rocky peaks.

[01:07:33]Would the massive, beautiful, gravitydefying mudbrick houses built 4,000 meters in the air eventually be completely abandoned, rotting away and collapsing back into the dry brown dust?

[01:07:45]Would the ancient echoing, thumping, chanting of the red robed monks and the spectacular massive copper horns completely disappear into the pages of history books, becoming nothing more than a forgotten, fading myth. It is a terrifying, deeply painful and incredibly complex reality. But if you stop and look directly into the bright, fierce, incredibly proud, dark brown eyes of a seasoned Tibetan nomad, standing their ground in the deep, shifting, freezing white snow, holding their heavy, handspun wool rope tight against their heavily windburned chest.

[01:08:26]You will see a human spirit that absolutely, stubbornly, and violently refuses to be broken. These are the descendants of the people who looked at an impenetrable, suffocating, terrifying, deadly, oxygen starved, freezing rock labyrinth and did not run away in fear. They decided to stay and build a vibrant, beautiful, spiritually rich and incredibly powerful peaceful empire.

[01:08:53]Living on the Tibetan plateau is not a vacation. [clears throat] It is a daily exhausting exercise in profound absolute freezing human resilience. It is the intense, overpowering smell of dry, freezing dust, burning yak dung, and sweet, intoxicating juniper incense. It is the deafening, beautiful, completely chaotic sound of howling, screaming mountain winds and the deep, rhythmic, chestpounding beating of heavy brass gongs. In the modern, comfortable, lowaltitude western world, we build massive, thick concrete walls. We pave over the soft earth with hard, dead gray asphalt. And we turn on humming electric central heating systems because we are desperately, deeply terrified of raw nature.

[01:09:42]We want to hide from the cold, the ice, and the thin air. But the incredible, fierce indigenous people of the high Himalayas do not hide. They climb the giant frozen peaks. They heard the massive, hairy beasts. They drink the salty, fatty tea. They walk on the cracking, freezing blue river ice. They survive the darkest, coldest nights on the planet. Nature here is a massive, suffocating, freezing, unrelenting dictator. But the people who choose to stay, the true ancient windburned guardians of the roof of the world, will fiercely, violently, and proudly defend every single ancient black tent, every drop of freezing blue glacial water, and every massive wild yak until their very last defiant frozen and