On Thu, May 7, 2009 at 12:26 AM, Venkatesh Hariharan <[email protected]> wrote:
> I am ripe for a lifestyle change. Two hours a day of work sounds > exactly right. Where exactly does this tribe live? S 7° 21.642' W 62° 16.313' according to the book. Of course I left out the part where they have no electricity, no plumbing, no modern medicine, and an expected lifetime of somewhere around forty years. In addition, they have to deal with things like this: None of us, not even Keren [his more experienced wife], had anticipated all that this new life would entail. One of our first nights as a family in the village, we were having dinner by gas lamp. In the living room I saw Glasses, Shannon's [his daughter's] puppy, chasing something that was hopping in the dark, though I couldn't make it out. Whatever it was, it was hopping toward me. I stopped eating and watched. Suddenly, the dark thing hopped on my lap. I focused the beam of my flashlight at it. It was a gray-and-black tarantula, at least eight inches in diameter. But I was prepared. I worried about snakes and bugs, so I kept a hardwood club with me at all times. Without moving my hands toward the tarantula , I stood quickly and thrust my pelvis to throw the spider to the floor. My family had just seen what was on my lap and they stared wide-eyed at me and the hairy hopper. I grabbed my club and smashed it. The Pirahãs in the front room were watching. When I killed the spider they asked what it was. "Xóooí" (Tarantula), I replied. "We don't kill those," they said. "They eat cockroaches and do no harm." -- Charles
