Why do mursi women wear clay lip plates

Mursi woman with clay lip plate

Do you know women of the Mursi tribe cut their lips and small clay plate is inserted in to the lips? When a girl reaches her puberty her lower lip is cut and held open by a wooden plug until heals. But the dimension of the stretch depends on the wearer.  Mursi owns good plant based ointment to recover the wound quickly. If a girl prevent from wearing this plate she is considered as lazy and she is hard to find a husband. Mursi are a surmic pastoralist ethnic group that inhabits Southwestern Ethiopia. According to history they came to recent territory 200 years ago from Sudan-Ethiopia border lands. Mursi tribe is one of the most dangerous and aggressive tribe in the world. The motto of the Mursi tribe is “It is better to die than live without killing.” Their main crop is sorghum. They also grow maize, beans chickpeas. Women main work is to fetch firewood, water and cook the food provided by men.

The unmarried women are more worth when the size of the clay plate increases. The size of the plates represents the amount of cattle they give to the husband as a price for her hand in marriage. Nowadays this becomes a source of income as tourist pay money to take their pictures. If there’s no major health issue of stretching one’s lips out, the major side effect is lips never shrink as it is. Women didn’t wear these plates all the time. They remove the plate to eat, sleep and when they are only in the company of women and children. They wear this in the company of men, during ceremonies and special occasions.

Mursi girls practicing to wear lip plates

 It is said that one of the main reason for wearing this type of clay plate is to rescue from slave traders. But researchers reject the explanation after revealing that the plates are being wearing as a symbol or expression of their social & economic status. According to article issued in September 1938(Thaw & Thaw 1938:357) said that girl babies wear large plates in both their upper & lower lips. Small wooden plugs are inserted into the holes pierced in both upper & lower lips. These holes are gradually increased in size when they grow up until it reaches size of large soup plate. Some resources express the idea that if this is true why the activity of disfiguring body didn’t discourage the young men within the tribe. And also they mention that this tradition is not unique to Mursi tribe women. Like Mursi tribe Suri, Chai and Tirma tribes in Africa wear lip plates. In those tribes not only women men also wear these special plates. According to me this is somewhat painful and uncomfortable but according to reporters some women like to wear this special plates and think that it increase their beauty.

Reference-GhanaWeb.com

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Most perfectly formed volcano in the world

Mount Mayon is called as the most perfectly formed volcano due to its symmetry. It is the most active volcano among the 22 volcanoes in Philippines which was erupted over 47 times within past 400 years. Mount Mayon is situated in province of Albay in Bicol Region, on the large island of Luzon in the Philippines which rises above the Albay gulf to a height of 2462 m. It is recorded that since 1616 Mount Mayon exploded with pyroclastic flows, mud flow sand lava flows. That perfect shape was formed through layers of lava and pyroclastic flows. So it is called as a stratovolcano which means a volcano built up of alternate layers of lava and ash. It consists of small crater and its upper slopes are steep with an average of 35-40 degrees. The volcanic crater is about 250 m in diameter. About 85 lava flows have been identified and it includes mainly augite-hypersthene-andesite. In the fact that Mount Mayon is also belongs to Pacific Ring Of Fire, movement of oceanic plates can trigger an eruption anytime.

Mount Mayon from distant

Mount Mayon Eruption

The first eruption happened in 1616. Most lethal event happened in 1^st of February 1814. 1,200 people were died; town of Cagsawa got buried beneath 30 feet of ash. It destroyed Cagsawa church which was 10 Km away from volcano. This eruption lasted only for one day but Mayon emitted large amount of material during short period of time. In 23^rd June 1897 Mayon eruption took place which was lasted for 7 days. This was the longest eruption and it destroyed trees, rivers and streams. In December 2006, more than 1000 people were died due to rains from powerful typhoon Durian caused mudslides and flood at the foot of the volcano. 

Mayon’s last eruption happened in  18^th September 2014 but it recorded  higher levels of volcanic activity in January 2018.In 1^st of April 2020 Mayon Volcano’s seismic monitoring network recorded one volcanic earthquake during 24 hour observation period.

It is reported that P185 million in crops have been destroyed in Albay due to Mayon volcano’s eruption and it affected about 9,791 farmers and around 7,131 hectares of land. But it still attract many tourists because of its perfectly formed cone shape.

Dolphin- The Most Human Friendly Marine Mammal

There are many species of dolphins like killer whale, Common bottlenose, Amazon river dolphin, stripped dolphin, spinner dolphin and Baiji that belong to phylum chordata. Dolphins are very intelligent and friendly mammals. They communicate with each other by clicking, whistling and other sounds. They usually live in schools or pods up to 12 members. It is found that like humans they engage in playful activities such as jumping out of the water, riding waves, play fighting. They are carnivores mammals. Female dolphins are called cows, male are called bulls and young dolphins are called calves.

There are number of occasions where dolphins helped humans. It’s been reported that dolphins rescue distressed human from the depth of oceans. Otherwise they reach to humans when they need help. Once an isolated dolphin approached to group of divers in Hawaii, was discovered to be trapped in fishing line. There are some instances where dolphins detect cancer in human body. Sometimes dolphins help fisherman to catch fish by showing where to use nets. As they are intelligent mammals they can be trained to be super helpful to humans. Navy has been training dolphins for guarding military bases .They also rescue humans from shark attacks. Humans and dolphins are much similar in physically and mentally as both are mammals. But there are some differences. Dolphins cannot show facial expressions and communication through body languages and sounds.

Nowadays there is a trend of dolphin assisted births.  Few years ago there was news of American couple Adam and Heather Barrington travelling to Hawaii to plan such a birth. These births are done with the assistance of dolphins within their natural habitats. Heather said, “It is about reconnecting as humans with the dolphins so we can coexist in this world together and learn from one another”, when she was questioned why they choose this type of child birth. Dolphins swim around while relaxing the mother. Then mother give birth to the child effortlessly, painlessly and without fear. Though dolphins are so friendly to human, they were hunted by humans for meat and used in dolphinariums.

Do Kangaroos Flex Their Muscles To Impress Opposite Sex?

The kangaroo that belong to family Macropodidae which give the meaning of “large foot” are the only large animals to use hopping as a means of locomotion.

Kangaroos also flex their biceps to impress the opposite sex just like the human male. 

Researchers found that forearm size of male kangaroo could be a sexually selected trait. It will help to find a suitable mate for them.  Male kangaroos strike poses that show off their arms according to researches published in Biological Journal of the Linnean Society. According to Ellen Adamcewicz, a kangaroo expert, “additional advantage from either females finding big forelimbs sexy or alternatively the males which win the right to access the females are then strong enough to overpower any unwilling female".

According to Dr Natalie Warburton and collaborators Dr Trish Fleming and Dr Bill Bateman “Forelimb measurements showed that whereas female musculature growth was proportional to body gsize, male musculature was exaggerated,” also she said “This could be linked to the fact that male kangaroos establish their dominance hierarchy through sparring contests. Males at the top of the hierarchy have higher mating success.”

What Would Happen if All the Bees Went Extinct?

Bees are flying insects belong to phylum Arthropoda, class Insecta, known for their role in pollination and producing honey and beeswax. Pollination is very important both ecologically and commercially. Pollination is the act of transferring pollen grains from male anther of a flower to the female stigma. It is estimated that 1/3 of human food supply depends on pollination by insects, birds and bats, most of which accomplished by bees, whether wild or domesticated.

What is Colony Collapse Disorder?(CCD)

Phenomenon which occurs when the majority of worker bees in a colony disappear and leave behind a queen, plenty of food and a few nurse bees to care for remaining immature bees. It cause significant economic losses. Most of agricultural crops worldwide are pollinated by Western honey bees and it is estimated approximately 200 billion dollar in 2005.

Causes for Colony Collapse Disorder?

Parasitic attacks

Varroa parasites carry harmful viruses like acute bee paralysis virus and deformed wing virus which are deadly to bees. These viruses weaken the immunity of host bees making them susceptible to numerous ailments. Varroa parasites fed on the bee larvae.

Use of pesticides

Pesticides consist of thiamethoxam and clothianidin directly influence the change in development in bees, though some pesticides rarely lead to deaths in bees. The pesticides like neonicotinoids which affects the central nervous system of bees lose their memory of path to their home.

Climatic changes

Changing weather patterns, washing  away pollen due to rain and dry season lead to the lack of nutrition and strained buildup of honey.

Fungal infections and Invasions of hive beetles.

Effect of Bee Extinction on Human Life

Extinction of bees vastly affects the life on earth as insects are the primary pollinators on earth. The process of photosynthesis stored the energy of sun and the process of pollination helps to give that energy in consumable way. If bees went extinct, it leads to massive loss of production of crops. This low production of harvest leads to worldwide famine. Though rice and wheat do not need insect pollination, we cannot depend entirely on those kinds of crops. The crops like Blueberries, cherries are insect pollinated crops and cannot grow in large-scale without bees. Biodiversity is very important for survival of living beings, if one species get extinct it leads to imbalance and vastly cause for food webs.

Without bees, it is very difficult to maintain the diversity fresh production and good human nutrition level. That is why Einstein said “If the bee disappeared off the face of the Earth, man would only have four years left to live”. Japan invented tiny robotic pollinators but it is not affordable for small scale plantations and traditional farmers.

Bhutan-The Only Carbon Negative Country in the World.

Carbon dioxide is a naturally existing element which is very important in the process of photosynthesis. But when it pass the adequate level it cause for global warming, Acid rains etc. The most immediate reasons for increasing carbon dioxide is man-made reasons like burning fossil fuel, deforestation, automobile industry. So increasing the level of carbon dioxide is vast problem arising today.

The kingdom of Bhutan is a small, land-locked nation in Asia which has a multiethnic population of 760,000 inhabitants (2015).It occupies an area of 38,394 Km² .Bhutan is a country with a strong ancient Buddhist culture. The word Bhutan gave the meaning of “land of the Dragon”.

“Gross Happiness is more than important than Gross National Product”

-His Majesty, the fourth king of Bhutan

Bhutan is the only carbon negative country in the world. Even though they generates 2.2 million tons of carbon dioxide, their forest coverage sequester 3 times the amount. So they acquire net carbon sink for more than 4 million tons of carbon dioxide each year.

They effort to safeguard the environment is to provide only controlled, low impact tourism. Bhutan government is working to make its country free of greenhouse gases and waste by 2030.They use resources like wind, bio gases and solar power to generate electricity and mostly use flowing water. The electricity produced even exported to India. By 2020 they expect to export electricity to offset 17 million tons of carbon dioxide and recently they export clean energy to offsets about 6 million tons of carbon dioxide. Bhutan is the only country where selling tobacco is banned. Bhutan has a GDP value less than two billion dollars but they provide free education, medical and health facilities. They also provide free electricity to farmers in order to reduce use of firewood and in return reduce carbon emission. According to Bhutan’s constitution demands ,minimum of 60% of land must be under forest cover. Currently 72% of the country is under forest cover. If we can implement the policies and procedures followed by Bhutan towards a carbon negative country, we can have better world to live.