Rite of passage 

• A rite of passage is a ritual event that marks a person's transition from one status to another. Rites of passage explores and describes various notable milestones in an individual's life, for any marked transitional stage, when one's social status is altered     
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• Wikipedia,Rite of passage,Wikipedia Foundation, October 24, 2014, October 26, 2014

                               THE FOOT PEOPLE 

   This book is about the Yanomano or Yonomani village in the amazon forest on the borders between Venezuela and Brazil. They fall into the category of “Tropical Forest Indians”, called foot people. This ethnography focuses on the day-to-day routines that all members of the Yanomamo follow. The village is very small so there is no privacy. They have no writings but have rich and complex language. They have a very simple life. Everybody in the village owns a garden where they grow crops. They go hunting, collecting wild food, fetching water, and visiting others. Rituals are a very important part of the Yanomano culture.

    Napolean Chagnon is an anthropologist who goes to Yanomano village to study about the people living here. When he first arrived he didn’t know their language and had a hard time. Now he has already spent about 60 months and has learnt their language. The Yanomano were difficult people to live with, as they were different and strange form the anthropologist as he is form the United States. The first time he saw them he got a culture shock and wanted to return home instead of doing the research. Napolean revels many aspects of the Yonomani tribe. There are two seasons here the dry season and the wet season. The dry season is the one that is liked by the people and they even celebrate by having feast and visiting other villages. The clothes worn by they people consist of only some woolen strings. They wear clothes for decoration rather than protection. Food sharing is the method of displaying friendship if we don’t share our food they get very angry. They were very interested and begged the food that the anthropologist had as it was the first time they had seen these. Banana is the most famous dish there, which is either roasted in coals or smoked. The people of Yanomano show ferocity among the men. The young boys are taught to be fierce and are rewarded when they strike out at others, even adults. Young girls are considered an asset only in that they are able to take on many duties and do so at an early age. Girls have little said in their lives, are handed off in marriages that are beneficial to their fathers, brothers or male relatives, and are largely at the mercy of husbands. When their husbands are cruel, male relatives may sometimes rescue the woman, usually giving her in marriage to some other man. Because of this potential for rescue from a bad situation, women hate the thought of being taken captive or traded to some other village. Trading of women is fairly common as is being captured. Men are allowed to marry as many times as he wants and is allowed to hit his wife. Men are not allowed to kill women.

  Men are more competitive for status than women here.  It was said that all Yonomani men should marry a cross cousin. The only close friend the anthropologist made is Rerebawa. He found Rerebawa the bravest and the smartest among the entire village. The people in the village were quite ill mannered they entered and left the anthropologist hut whenever they felt like.

  They Yonomani people would give the anthropologist plantain seeds but in exchange they would steel tools form his room. The fact that the Yanomano had lived in a chronic state of warfare is reflected in their mythology, ceremonies, settlements pattern, political behavior and marriage practice. The anthropologist main purpose was to collect kinds of information on genealogy, reproduction, marriage practices, kingship, settlement patterns, migrations and politics.

     

      In my opinion: I found the Yonomani people are one of the most primitive people living in the world.

I found this very interesting and was easy to understand. I had never heard about the yanomano people before, their culture and rituals are also so different form ours. I really enjoyed reading it and most importantly learning about a culture. Reading articles and books like this are making me love the job of an anthropologist going to different places living with them and learning experiencing so many new things.

                                                      One-hour observation

    

    Observation is an act or instance of noticing and perceiving. On the 19^th of September I woke up early in the morning to visit the Swayambhunath which is also know as the monkey temple form my anthropology observation assignment. I chose this place, as me being Buddhist I have so much love for it. It is one of the most religious and holy places in Nepal. It is considered as world heritage sight under unesco. It is close by my house but I have to climb 365 steps to reach the temple.

        
     As I climbed all those steps I was so tired and decided to sit down. I took out my notebook and a pen and started jotting down all the things I observed. What I have noticed at first is any one who enters the temple is happy and overjoyed to reach at the top of the temple. The temple is situated on top of the hill it has a peaceful and holy environment. There were so many people taking rounds of the stupa chanting Buddhist prayers, many of them are exercising and mediating. I could see the entire Kathmandu form here it was looking so beautiful. Monkeys were everywhere either jumping up and down, playing and some were in search of food. There was even a monkey who was getting chased by a black dog. People were staring at me and making a confused expression.  A man came and sat beside me stared at me for a while and asked me If I was Chinese when I replied no I am Nepali he was surprised, he then started asking lots of questions I was quite annoyed but replied to all his questions. At the end he handshake with me and asked my number which I obviously dint give. A Nepali soldier came followed by a group of people who were wearing complete white clothes. The group consisted of male and female, they had come here to exercise. As I started moving around to observe more things. There was a long line of people carrying offerings, waiting for turn to enter the temple and get blessed, there was this puja going in front of the temple I always imagine or saw pandits (Hindu priest) wearing orange clothes, different types of tika on their forehead but this pandits was so different he had worn ray ban shades and normal clothes I was quite surprised looking at him.
     
       The antique shops were just opening, while shops where we get butter lamps and offerings open early in the morning. Butter lamps are the product, which is the most sold and bought. There was this group of singers they even play instruments and sing every morning in swayambhu I don’t understand what they sing but I think most probably its in newari language. I saw a lot of tourist but most of them were Chinese. They had come along with a tourist guide. The guide was explaining the history and aspect of this place.  The famous drink of this place is divya ras, which a lot of people drink. It is good for our health. Even though it is such religious place teenagers come on dates or bunk school I could see lots of pairs dating and school students just chilling around. The most beautiful moment in this observation is when this young girl came and started feeding pigeons the pigeons came flying to the ground, there were people coming with bags full of bananas and fruits as they were walking around the stupa they were feeding the monkeys. The monkeys here in swayambhu are considered holy. There were lots of people gathered around an artificial pond, they had coins in their hands, which there were which they were trying to put inside a pot. There is a saying that if the coins go inside our wishes are fulfilled. 

                                                                                                                                           

As this was my second observation I think I have done it better. I have enjoyed doing it. Even though I had been to Swayambhunath several times I had never really observed it properly. Most importantly what I have learnt form both the observation is that we never observe things properly but when we do we can learn things quicker and get a better   understanding.

 

SURAT AL- MURSALAT (The Emissaries, Winds Sent Forth) 

   

As this is the first time reading the Quran it was a good experience. I have chose to read Al- mursalat, which is the 77th chapter, and there are 50 verses. I liked this chapter, as it was easy to understand and was so meaningful. It talks about a day when Allah will send his messenger to let us know that there will be a day of judgment and that no one can run away form it. The good ones who obey Allah's teaching will be rewarded and blessed but the ones who disobey will be punished for all the sins they have committed. It has been also mentioned that if the ones who commit the sin will ask for forgiveness Allah will surely forgive them and tell them follow the right path and not commit sins.

    What I like most about this chapter is that its common to all the other culture which also teaches us no to disobey god. It also shows us that god loves us so much that even if we commit sins he forgives us and gives us a second chance.

SMALL PLACES, LARGE ISSUES

                                        COMPARISON AND CONTEXT ANSWERS 

-The common concern that the entire anthropology share is that anthropology tries to study or find out that all cultures have something in common and that all should be treated equally. 

As an ethical principle, however, it is probably impossible in practice, since it seems to indicate that everything is as good as everything else, provided it makes sense in a particular society. It may ultimately lead to nihilism (pg.7)

- In this line Eriksen says that even though culture relativism is one of the most important thing in anthropology and all the anthropologist says us to follow it. It is quite hard to follow and to always have a positive mind towards other cultures.

Warn against the application of a shared, universal scale to be used in the evaluation of every society(pg.6)

 -As each culture has something important to them which other cultures might not find important.Everyones choices are different and they must be understood in their own terms.As being an anthropology student I do agree with this line as I feel that no one should be judged because of their culture.Even thought some thing is not important to us that does not give us the right to judge others in any way.