Human Planet

We started watching Human Planet last week. We watched  "Episode 2: Deserts: Life in the Furnace" and "Episode 3: Arctic: Life in the Deep Freeze". Actually my husband also watched "Episode 1: Oceans: In to the Blue" so I have to watch that on my own.

IMDB categorizes Human Planet as a documentary and yet its rating is 9.2/10. I think the rating truly reflects how well the series is. The show takes us to places where Mother Nature's hostility shapes the way humans live.I was never bored while watching the episodes, everything was fascinating! I got to learn many things.

For example, in Episode 2 the men of Niger’s Woodabe tribe put themselves on display. These men actually enter a beauty contest and dance for the judges. The judges are women and if they choose a man, the chosen man gets the honor of spending the night with the judge who picked him. Even if the men are married their wives do not protest because if a judge chooses their husband this means that he is very beautiful and it is an honor to be married to such a man. I've put a picture of the men that are competing in the beauty contest. As you can see they also paint their faces for the judges.

From Episode 2: Deserts: Life in the Furnace

In Episode 3, we learned that you can eat fermented sea birds. In the Arctic, more specifically several families in the far north of Greenland catch sea birds during the summer and wait until the summer is over to eat them. The winters are very harsh in this part of the world so they prepare food for the coming winter by fermenting sea birds. During the summer the sea birds are placed inside seal skin that contains fat. A single seal skin can hold up to 200 sea birds. After the seal skin is full of sea birds it is sewn up so that it is airtight. To avoid flies the sewn part of the seal skin is rubbed with seal fat. Finally, the seal skin full of sea birds is placed under a pile of rocks until the sea birds are fermented and ready to eat. This dish is called kiviaq and loved by the Inuit families.

Main ingredient of kiviaq: Auk birds

 

 

 

 

There are so many other interesting things I haven't mentioned here. You have to watch at least 1 episode and see the fascinating lives of people that stand up to very harsh living conditions!