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, Town Centre, Market Harborough, England, United Kingdom, UK
Construction work is underway at the Town Centre in Market Harborough, England. The site features a large, historic brick building undergoing renovation or redevelopment. Piles of earth and construction materials are visible in the foreground.
Construction work is underway at the Town Centre in Market Harborough, England. The site features a large, historic brick building undergoing renovation. The purpose of the work is currently unknown.
In June 2024, I travelled into the Xingu Indigenous Park, Brazil’s first demarcated indigenous territory. To get there, I flew from Sao Paolo to Goiania and then took a bus overnight to Querência, in Brazil’s Mato Grosso state, where we were picked up by men from the Xingu village of Afukuri.
The Indigenous Park is host to a large number of villages in the Upper Xingu area, the inhabitants speaking fourteen different language (of five different language families). In Afukuri, where I stayed, Kuikoro / Kuikuru is the indigenous language (identified as part of the Cariban group). Villagers also communicate in Brazilian Portuguese with varying levels of fluency. While I speak and read French and Spanish, and can make therefore headway with written Portuguese, my spoken Portuguese is limited, so my ability to converse with the villagers relied on translation.
The Park was the world’s first ever dedicated indigenous national park (established in 1961 through the hard work of the Villas-Boas brothers). When the various ethic groups settled along the Xingu is not fully determined – generally believed to be predominantly between the 12th and 16th centuries but one ethnic group, the Trumai, for example, only settled there in the 19th century, perhaps seeking refuge from settler incursions. The Xingu area, not having great rubber or mineral assets, had a lower priority during Brazil’s expansion, which helped protect the park, but various areas directly outside have now been deforested.
Culturally, one thing I found interesting was the philosophy of adapting to the modern world while retaining their identity. Xingu leaders will often be seen in traditional costume e.g. when outside on political mission. The option apparently is either to work hard to maintain their unique culture or to ‘become just another Brazilian in poverty’.
The village structure is typically a circular plaza with houses – ocas – on the perimeter and a central meeting house / men’s house (where traditionally the long sacred flutes that only the men can play are kept). In Afukuri we saw the meeting of the old and the new – the ocas, their roofs traditionally made from thatched layers of sapé grasses, becoming ever more challenging in the era of deforestation, were not being repaired with grass, but with plastic tarpaulins. One reason for this, we were told, was that following the death of the chief, the village would normally move to another location once the funerary festival (Kuarup / Kwarup – the most famous of the Xingu festivals) had taken place, but that would require financial resources that the village did not yet have. Therefore, all the current ocas (which can stretch to 30m in length and 10m in height) will in due course be abandoned, with entirely new structures erected in their place in the future village, leading to a decision not to undertake cost- and labour-intensive thatch repairs. In Afukuri, the men’s house was not an oca (which historic photos from other villages led me to expect) but a columned shelter without walls, which provided us with shade as we watched life in the village.
The modern world was evidenced not just by the blue plastic roof-sheeting, but by the existence of small modern buildings outside the oca perimeter – one structure to host visiting medical/dental professionals. A second, a shower/toilet block (I think built because of these visitors, but available also to us). A generator powers a water pump / electricity for several hours a day. Solar panels were being delivered during my time there – and I did wonder what would happen to the water pipes and solar installations when the village moved, a very modern problem.
Our visit was chosen to coincide with three village festivals – the Javari / Yawari (a war/peace ritual with men mock-fighting), the Taquara / Takuaga inauguration of new urua long flutes (often connected with a girls’ coming of age ritual) and the Yamurikuma women’s festival, where women take on make roles, such as being permitted to wrestle against each other in the traditionally male huka-huka.
The more famous (and larger) Kuarup festivals draw visitors from Brazil and around the world, but in Afukuri, it was just our small group of travellers, allocated a section of on oca for our tents. I enjoyed watching the preparations as much as the festivals: body painting, feathers, and colourful textiles around ankles and knees (especially for the huka-huka). Important among the body paints was the red urucum pigment (similar in colour perhaps to Venetian red or Indian red oil paints) from the achiote plant (known in some places as the ‘lipstick tree’).
Villages have their specialities and Afukuri is known for fishing. The staple meal in dry season is mashed fish with a manioc/cassava flat bread (the flour toasted in large circular breads that are then shared). The pequi nut, important to the Xingu, is usually harvested in Jan/Feb and I therefore didn’t see any and don’t know how much is used for diet and how much for ceremonies.
One thing I will never forget is an unexpected aspect of the Yamurikuma festival: in it the Xingu women fight off males. I (and the other men in our group) looked forward to watching this, but had not been warned that the only men to be attacked would be our little band of travellers. On the evening when the Yamurikuma took place we were bemused at the unhappy look on the women’s faces and what seemed to be a premature end of the festivities. The next morning we learned that the village chief had discovered that we had been unaware of our role as victims – and he had wisely, seeing us fully dressed, with camera gear, glasses and mobile phones, decided that a surprise attack might not be appropriate. The women were disappointed at losing their opportunity. Fortunately, we were willing to accommodate them, and two days later, we awaited our fates by the mens’ house in the middle of the plaza. We had mostly reduced our clothing to underwear and disposable tee-shirts (to protect myself from the sun, I used an old cotton sleeping bag liner as a toga). When the women arrived, they poked and pinched us, and covered our faces and bodies in a resinous orange-yellow that later took great effort (scrubbing with river sand) to remove. The Afukuri women’s Yamurikuma honour restored, they completed their festival by paying visits en groupe to the village's ocas.
Title inspired by a photo of graffiti taken almost 10 years ago: "Look for the Beauty Within the Most Frightening..." seen in the first comment.
This was in one of the churches in Belorado. I didn’t get the chance to hear the organ but I can imagine it would be inspiring
In June 2024, I travelled into the Xingu Indigenous Park, Brazil’s first demarcated indigenous territory. To get there, I flew from Sao Paolo to Goiania and then took a bus overnight to Querência, in Brazil’s Mato Grosso state, where we were picked up by men from the Xingu village of Afukuri.
The Indigenous Park is host to a large number of villages in the Upper Xingu area, the inhabitants speaking fourteen different language (of five different language families). In Afukuri, where I stayed, Kuikoro / Kuikuru is the indigenous language (identified as part of the Cariban group). Villagers also communicate in Brazilian Portuguese with varying levels of fluency. While I speak and read French and Spanish, and can make therefore headway with written Portuguese, my spoken Portuguese is limited, so my ability to converse with the villagers relied on translation.
The Park was the world’s first ever dedicated indigenous national park (established in 1961 through the hard work of the Villas-Boas brothers). When the various ethic groups settled along the Xingu is not fully determined – generally believed to be predominantly between the 12th and 16th centuries but one ethnic group, the Trumai, for example, only settled there in the 19th century, perhaps seeking refuge from settler incursions. The Xingu area, not having great rubber or mineral assets, had a lower priority during Brazil’s expansion, which helped protect the park, but various areas directly outside have now been deforested.
Culturally, one thing I found interesting was the philosophy of adapting to the modern world while retaining their identity. Xingu leaders will often be seen in traditional costume e.g. when outside on political mission. The option apparently is either to work hard to maintain their unique culture or to ‘become just another Brazilian in poverty’.
The village structure is typically a circular plaza with houses – ocas – on the perimeter and a central meeting house / men’s house (where traditionally the long sacred flutes that only the men can play are kept). In Afukuri we saw the meeting of the old and the new – the ocas, their roofs traditionally made from thatched layers of sapé grasses, becoming ever more challenging in the era of deforestation, were not being repaired with grass, but with plastic tarpaulins. One reason for this, we were told, was that following the death of the chief, the village would normally move to another location once the funerary festival (Kuarup / Kwarup – the most famous of the Xingu festivals) had taken place, but that would require financial resources that the village did not yet have. Therefore, all the current ocas (which can stretch to 30m in length and 10m in height) will in due course be abandoned, with entirely new structures erected in their place in the future village, leading to a decision not to undertake cost- and labour-intensive thatch repairs. In Afukuri, the men’s house was not an oca (which historic photos from other villages led me to expect) but a columned shelter without walls, which provided us with shade as we watched life in the village.
The modern world was evidenced not just by the blue plastic roof-sheeting, but by the existence of small modern buildings outside the oca perimeter – one structure to host visiting medical/dental professionals. A second, a shower/toilet block (I think built because of these visitors, but available also to us). A generator powers a water pump / electricity for several hours a day. Solar panels were being delivered during my time there – and I did wonder what would happen to the water pipes and solar installations when the village moved, a very modern problem.
Our visit was chosen to coincide with three village festivals – the Javari / Yawari (a war/peace ritual with men mock-fighting), the Taquara / Takuaga inauguration of new urua long flutes (often connected with a girls’ coming of age ritual) and the Yamurikuma women’s festival, where women take on make roles, such as being permitted to wrestle against each other in the traditionally male huka-huka.
The more famous (and larger) Kuarup festivals draw visitors from Brazil and around the world, but in Afukuri, it was just our small group of travellers, allocated a section of on oca for our tents. I enjoyed watching the preparations as much as the festivals: body painting, feathers, and colourful textiles around ankles and knees (especially for the huka-huka). Important among the body paints was the red urucum pigment (similar in colour perhaps to Venetian red or Indian red oil paints) from the achiote plant (known in some places as the ‘lipstick tree’).
Villages have their specialities and Afukuri is known for fishing. The staple meal in dry season is mashed fish with a manioc/cassava flat bread (the flour toasted in large circular breads that are then shared). The pequi nut, important to the Xingu, is usually harvested in Jan/Feb and I therefore didn’t see any and don’t know how much is used for diet and how much for ceremonies.
One thing I will never forget is an unexpected aspect of the Yamurikuma festival: in it the Xingu women fight off males. I (and the other men in our group) looked forward to watching this, but had not been warned that the only men to be attacked would be our little band of travellers. On the evening when the Yamurikuma took place we were bemused at the unhappy look on the women’s faces and what seemed to be a premature end of the festivities. The next morning we learned that the village chief had discovered that we had been unaware of our role as victims – and he had wisely, seeing us fully dressed, with camera gear, glasses and mobile phones, decided that a surprise attack might not be appropriate. The women were disappointed at losing their opportunity. Fortunately, we were willing to accommodate them, and two days later, we awaited our fates by the mens’ house in the middle of the plaza. We had mostly reduced our clothing to underwear and disposable tee-shirts (to protect myself from the sun, I used an old cotton sleeping bag liner as a toga). When the women arrived, they poked and pinched us, and covered our faces and bodies in a resinous orange-yellow that later took great effort (scrubbing with river sand) to remove. The Afukuri women’s Yamurikuma honour restored, they completed their festival by paying visits en groupe to the village's ocas.
Even though this pipe is a pipe smoker’s dream, I have a love/hate relationship with it. Years ago when I first grew a bigger mustache (probably twenty-five years ago) I was lighting this pipe, and the tobacco flared up, and singed my mustache badly. I had to cut off months of growth, and I’ve been afraid of this pipe ever since.
It’s part of the pipes I recently found in the attic, and the first sight of it brought back all of the horror of my burned off mustache.
Even though this Oom Paul pipe is a pipe smoker’s dream, I have a love/hate relationship with it. Years ago when I first grew a bigger mustache (probably twenty-five years ago) I was lighting this pipe, and the tobacco flared up, and singed my mustache badly. I had to cut off months of growth, and I’ve been afraid of this pipe ever since.
It’s part of the pipes I recently found in the attic, and the first sight of it brought back all of the horror of my burned off mustache.
