Yea, mangosteen trees are great to climb. I use three limbs plus my butt to spread my weight too as one hand reaches out to get the fruit.
I guess tree climbing provides the kind of physical, mental, and emotional stimulation we have been evolved for. The physical movements are so varied and I enjoy the stretches (eg legs spread wide between two trunks). Mentally it is like navigating a puzzle, finding routes through the trees, testing the strength of branches with all four limbs, etc. Emotionally, there is always some fear because one could get hurt badly. The stimulation we didnt evolve for are city noises, car rides, urban fumes, etc. Meditation asks for no stimulation but maybe we just need the stimulation that makes us more human!
A few years ago I went for an arborist tree climbing course with all those ropes. It is very much against my instinct to trust all my weight to a rope, even though i know it is very strong. I kept trying to grab the tree with my limbs! But if you get past that, you can scale trees and reach the ends that without the ropes would be impossible. I saw a tree climbing competition here too and they have to ring the bells at different parts of the tree and get down as fast as possible. But like you said, I think it makes people take more risk and the pure joy of climbing is reduced by extrinsic motivation.
The orang aslis here drive 6 inch nails into the petai trees to climb them. Sometimes they hammer bamboo pieces in to make a ladder. Or tie a bamboo to the petai as a ladder. So many methods! It is a big part of their income because no one else does it.
The tualang trees that they harvest honey from are crazy big and tall. Feels like climbing a wall really.
Yeah, I think anyone who's ever harvested mangosteen can empathize... It's such a fun exercise, and a very wholesome movement therapy. I'm always looking forward to mangosteen season, because climbing is the main job during that time.
I can completely understand your initial aversion towards climbing with ropes - it's the same for me, it very much goes "against my instinct" as well. It just feels weird, and somehow I've always felt much safer just using my various body parts. One can easily secure oneself just locking ones legs around the trunks & branches in certain places. For some irrational reason I just trust my hands & feet more than any rope, knot or carabiner.
But maybe, as I get older, I'll start using a harness & basic securing for very risky climbs, let's see... In recent years, I've noticed that some villagers here start to worry a bit about liability in case I have an accident while climbing in their orchards, so maybe some basic sort of safety rigging would take away those concerns.
But most immediate climbing work in this area is during the durian harvest (the main cultivars are harvested *two weeks* before they ripen naturally!), and they have specialized teams for that. As a foreigner, I don't want to appear like I'm competing for jobs that locals do. As a result, I only do off-season climbs that nobody else wants to do. (Also, it's a bit of a sin in my eyes to harvest durian before it turns ripe, hahaha)
I've seen various ways to scale truly massive trees as well, and tried the bamboo method once with a few friends from the village. Get a 3m section of bamboo (optimally with branch ends) and tie it around the trunk in two places (bottom and top). Then climb up as far as you can, get the next piece of bamboo, and tie it around the trunk again, first at the bottom and then, standing on the bottom rope, at the top. Quite simple, straightforward and surprisingly safe - but incredibly time-consuming! The largest petai tree I've ever harvested fruit from (MASSIVE pods as long as my arm!) was too large to climb straight away. I worked alone so doing the bamboo ladder thing would have taken an extra day of work (or two), so I ended up just climbing the wild durian trees surrounding it with a *very long* bamboo pole, and I harvested the pods I could reach from the durian canopy. Still extremely exhausting, since the long pole was quite heavy.
I think my dream job would be to go harvest petai with a group of Orang Asli (or any other forest dwellers). I'm sure I could learn so much from them!!
Harvesting honey is a totally different ball game, though. Highest respect for those that can do it - but that's perhaps the kind of climbing work that I'm glad I *don't* have to do!
I do get stung occasionally while climbing (mostly by paper wasps of various kinds & sizes), and it takes *a lot* of self-control to climb away as fast as possible while just letting them sting you, instead of trying to chase them away with your hands (which could prove disastrous).
A few years ago I watched a documentary about Nepalese honey hunters, and that was seriously some of the most impressive climbing footage I've ever seen - they used vines instead of ropes! Easily some of the most gifted climbers in the world.
Gorgeous piece. It reminded me of how I spontaneously wove baskets as a kid without ever seeing it done, a strange urge that has followed me all my life.
That's seriously impressive, though - weaving is a skill that doesn't come naturally to most! Do you still weave regularly today? And, if yes, what materials do you use?
I wish I could say I wove more regularly. I learnt how to make bamboo baskets from grainy YouTube videos and trial and error years ago, but they piled up around the house without much use. I still use them as laundry holders. Need to make a vegetable harvesting basket soon but want to try a different technique using papyrus twine to hold it together. I made a lovely fine bamboo clothe peg basket too which hung outside for years before disintegrating. I'm hoping to build a twine making jig soon so I can produce hundreds of meters of papyrus and vetiver twine for other end uses.
To be fair, what the core of a spiritual tradition is and what modern adherents and urban dwellers understand is another thing.
What is it for? If we take the experiences of ancient and recent spiritualists, each of our souls journeys through several forms, animals and then humans, until we shed our material body and go to the next journeys, always towards infinity.
It's not for politics therefore, since human nature will not change, and these experiences of mundane life will need to be made, in order to progress.
On a much more practical side: Qi Gong meditation techniques improve focus for tasks like hunting, for archery, for anything that needs quick and decisive reaction.
Focus on parts of your body, within and around the body can be used for a lot of physical healing purposes.
Focus, in general, is important to any serious task.
Discursive meditation is where you meditate about a topic, about emotions, about experiences and memories, can give inner clarity, self awareness, help to unravel your own subconscious to you.
(example case is the octagon society spiritual alchemy)
Self knowledge is powerful and helps to act consciously, with a clarity of your own motives.
That kind of thing certainly is powerful against marketing and advertisement, as these will not take you easily by your unconscious instincts then.
The modern day "mindfulness" idea got a lot of criticism, yes, and pretty much for what you describe.
The part about monks buying cigarettes and soda was… sobering? Kind of like when I read the various quotes from Zen masters championing imperial Japan in WW2. You are dead-on about us idealizing and fetishizing these cultures in the spiritually voided western world.
I think I sent you some an email about shamanic trance ‘meditation’ a while back, curious if you ever get to take a look? There’s a few others (ecstatic dance, various rituals, psychedelics, and entering flow states or practicing mindfulness during various ‘mundane’ tasks like knapping flint or scraping hides etc) but trance is the main spiritual practice our ancestors would have used, or at least the shamans would have. I figured it might appeal to you.
I view a lot of this stuff you are talking about as doing the work on ‘this side’ while trance and psychedelics (and potentially deep meditation) works away on the ‘other side’ (which will make more sense if you ever had a nondual experience).
Yea, mangosteen trees are great to climb. I use three limbs plus my butt to spread my weight too as one hand reaches out to get the fruit.
I guess tree climbing provides the kind of physical, mental, and emotional stimulation we have been evolved for. The physical movements are so varied and I enjoy the stretches (eg legs spread wide between two trunks). Mentally it is like navigating a puzzle, finding routes through the trees, testing the strength of branches with all four limbs, etc. Emotionally, there is always some fear because one could get hurt badly. The stimulation we didnt evolve for are city noises, car rides, urban fumes, etc. Meditation asks for no stimulation but maybe we just need the stimulation that makes us more human!
A few years ago I went for an arborist tree climbing course with all those ropes. It is very much against my instinct to trust all my weight to a rope, even though i know it is very strong. I kept trying to grab the tree with my limbs! But if you get past that, you can scale trees and reach the ends that without the ropes would be impossible. I saw a tree climbing competition here too and they have to ring the bells at different parts of the tree and get down as fast as possible. But like you said, I think it makes people take more risk and the pure joy of climbing is reduced by extrinsic motivation.
The orang aslis here drive 6 inch nails into the petai trees to climb them. Sometimes they hammer bamboo pieces in to make a ladder. Or tie a bamboo to the petai as a ladder. So many methods! It is a big part of their income because no one else does it.
The tualang trees that they harvest honey from are crazy big and tall. Feels like climbing a wall really.
Thanks for your beautiful comment!
Yeah, I think anyone who's ever harvested mangosteen can empathize... It's such a fun exercise, and a very wholesome movement therapy. I'm always looking forward to mangosteen season, because climbing is the main job during that time.
I can completely understand your initial aversion towards climbing with ropes - it's the same for me, it very much goes "against my instinct" as well. It just feels weird, and somehow I've always felt much safer just using my various body parts. One can easily secure oneself just locking ones legs around the trunks & branches in certain places. For some irrational reason I just trust my hands & feet more than any rope, knot or carabiner.
But maybe, as I get older, I'll start using a harness & basic securing for very risky climbs, let's see... In recent years, I've noticed that some villagers here start to worry a bit about liability in case I have an accident while climbing in their orchards, so maybe some basic sort of safety rigging would take away those concerns.
But most immediate climbing work in this area is during the durian harvest (the main cultivars are harvested *two weeks* before they ripen naturally!), and they have specialized teams for that. As a foreigner, I don't want to appear like I'm competing for jobs that locals do. As a result, I only do off-season climbs that nobody else wants to do. (Also, it's a bit of a sin in my eyes to harvest durian before it turns ripe, hahaha)
I've seen various ways to scale truly massive trees as well, and tried the bamboo method once with a few friends from the village. Get a 3m section of bamboo (optimally with branch ends) and tie it around the trunk in two places (bottom and top). Then climb up as far as you can, get the next piece of bamboo, and tie it around the trunk again, first at the bottom and then, standing on the bottom rope, at the top. Quite simple, straightforward and surprisingly safe - but incredibly time-consuming! The largest petai tree I've ever harvested fruit from (MASSIVE pods as long as my arm!) was too large to climb straight away. I worked alone so doing the bamboo ladder thing would have taken an extra day of work (or two), so I ended up just climbing the wild durian trees surrounding it with a *very long* bamboo pole, and I harvested the pods I could reach from the durian canopy. Still extremely exhausting, since the long pole was quite heavy.
I think my dream job would be to go harvest petai with a group of Orang Asli (or any other forest dwellers). I'm sure I could learn so much from them!!
Harvesting honey is a totally different ball game, though. Highest respect for those that can do it - but that's perhaps the kind of climbing work that I'm glad I *don't* have to do!
I do get stung occasionally while climbing (mostly by paper wasps of various kinds & sizes), and it takes *a lot* of self-control to climb away as fast as possible while just letting them sting you, instead of trying to chase them away with your hands (which could prove disastrous).
A few years ago I watched a documentary about Nepalese honey hunters, and that was seriously some of the most impressive climbing footage I've ever seen - they used vines instead of ropes! Easily some of the most gifted climbers in the world.
As a fellow tree climber, I loved this essay.
Gorgeous piece. It reminded me of how I spontaneously wove baskets as a kid without ever seeing it done, a strange urge that has followed me all my life.
Thanks!
That's seriously impressive, though - weaving is a skill that doesn't come naturally to most! Do you still weave regularly today? And, if yes, what materials do you use?
I wish I could say I wove more regularly. I learnt how to make bamboo baskets from grainy YouTube videos and trial and error years ago, but they piled up around the house without much use. I still use them as laundry holders. Need to make a vegetable harvesting basket soon but want to try a different technique using papyrus twine to hold it together. I made a lovely fine bamboo clothe peg basket too which hung outside for years before disintegrating. I'm hoping to build a twine making jig soon so I can produce hundreds of meters of papyrus and vetiver twine for other end uses.
To be fair, what the core of a spiritual tradition is and what modern adherents and urban dwellers understand is another thing.
What is it for? If we take the experiences of ancient and recent spiritualists, each of our souls journeys through several forms, animals and then humans, until we shed our material body and go to the next journeys, always towards infinity.
It's not for politics therefore, since human nature will not change, and these experiences of mundane life will need to be made, in order to progress.
On a much more practical side: Qi Gong meditation techniques improve focus for tasks like hunting, for archery, for anything that needs quick and decisive reaction.
Focus on parts of your body, within and around the body can be used for a lot of physical healing purposes.
Focus, in general, is important to any serious task.
Discursive meditation is where you meditate about a topic, about emotions, about experiences and memories, can give inner clarity, self awareness, help to unravel your own subconscious to you.
(example case is the octagon society spiritual alchemy)
Self knowledge is powerful and helps to act consciously, with a clarity of your own motives.
That kind of thing certainly is powerful against marketing and advertisement, as these will not take you easily by your unconscious instincts then.
The modern day "mindfulness" idea got a lot of criticism, yes, and pretty much for what you describe.
The part about monks buying cigarettes and soda was… sobering? Kind of like when I read the various quotes from Zen masters championing imperial Japan in WW2. You are dead-on about us idealizing and fetishizing these cultures in the spiritually voided western world.
I think I sent you some an email about shamanic trance ‘meditation’ a while back, curious if you ever get to take a look? There’s a few others (ecstatic dance, various rituals, psychedelics, and entering flow states or practicing mindfulness during various ‘mundane’ tasks like knapping flint or scraping hides etc) but trance is the main spiritual practice our ancestors would have used, or at least the shamans would have. I figured it might appeal to you.
I view a lot of this stuff you are talking about as doing the work on ‘this side’ while trance and psychedelics (and potentially deep meditation) works away on the ‘other side’ (which will make more sense if you ever had a nondual experience).