1318: Guillaume Dulude | Tribal Truths for Modern Minds

25:11I worried for nothing. No. it's because everything was there at every millisecond. So yeah, you're waist deep in crock-infested water, two days from the nearest doctor, eating mystery seeds from strangers, and suddenly you remembered you needed a discount code for some flavored water. Let's fix that. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Aura Frames. Aura Frames is perfect for the family memories that are a little chaotic in the moment and a lot funnier later. We just got back from a family cruise where Jen and I got hit with food poisoning, like the first meal, which is not that's the worst way to start a cruise it was a very real parenting moment especially for moms because even when you feel awful you still have to somehow keep it together for the kids and Jen was dealing with stomach cramps making emergency bathroom runs feeling absolutely miserable still helping make sure the kids were having fun it's such a mom thing to do so now yeah I know people are like oh you didn't even know I also had it and I also did that so but anyway that's beside the point now we look back at the trip we remember both sides of a Total chaos for us in these awesome photos of the kids smiling, exploring, and having the time of our lives.

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26:45Terms and conditions apply. This episode is also sponsored by Paka. It's been freezing here lately. I've been living in one thing, which is my Paka hoodie. It's warm without being bulky. And what makes Paka different is the material. It's made from alpaca fiber, not something you see everywhere. Most people are wearing the same cotton or synthetic stuff. Paka is softer than cashmere, warmer than wool, still breathable. So it keeps you warm without overheating, kind of like an alpaca, I guess. I like my alpaca hoodie so much, I immediately ordered a second one. That's usually a test for me. If I buy another one, it's a keeper.

27:12Also, not a lot of people walking around in alpaca, so it stands out a bit. I've had people ask about it. It's one of those low-key conversation starters because it's different enough. And it's not just about comfort. It's durable. It's odor-resistant. It's made to last. I mean, have you ever smelled an alpaca? No, you haven't. Made to last, plus every piece is made in Peru and comes with an Inca ID hand woven by artisans, which is kind of a cool touch. And it's inside, so if you're like, I don't care about hippie stuff like me, then it's not like front and center. If you've been thinking about leveling up your hoodie game, this is your sign to do it now.

27:43To grab your Paka hoodie, go to www.pakaapparel.com. That's www.pakaapparel.com. This episode is sponsored in part by AT &T. You know why I love summer? All those plans we made, they finally make it out of the group chat. It seems like there's more time to fit everybody in. Whatever you've got in store this summer, capturing those memories is a must. That's why I love the iPhone 17 Pro I picked up from AT &T. It's center stage front camera auto-adjust the frame to fit everyone into group selfies. You don't even have to turn your phone. No awkward cropping or asking strangers to take it. Just the perfect group selfie every time.

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28:51I'm teaching you how to build the same thing. You've heard this spiel 100 ,000 times, haven't you? You've heard it a lot. Fine. 6minutenetworking.com. Many of the guests on the show subscribe and contribute to the course. Come join us. The course is free. No shenanigans. 6minutenetworking.com. Fine. Now, back to Guillaume DeLude. My wife, Jen, asked a good question at lunch, which thankfully we ate before because that story about your foot was pretty disgusting. thing. But she asked, what about you bringing diseases and stuff to these tribes? How do you make sure that you don't bring in, I don't know, COVID or something to a tribe that the equivalent of smallpox, right?

29:28That you don't want to give these people, I don't know, something that we have to go take antibiotics for that kills half their tribe or worse. Normally there are guidelines. The authorities of every government have some guidelines if you want to do this kind of tourism. And some governments do have very strict policies. Some countries do not. For me, I think it's always important. And you must make sure I don't have any symptoms of anything, that I have all my vaccines up to date. And I spend enough time in the country so I can confirm that I am in a stable state. Oh, so do you go in like a month before and hang out for a couple weeks or a couple weeks?

30:07If it's possible, yes. But sometimes because of the budget and the shooting and we need to make an episode count in a certain amount of days. So ideally, I'm trying to come earlier to spend more times, make sure I'm stable in terms of symptoms or anything. If it's good, I have the green light. Now we move forward. Okay. Yeah, I was just curious. What about predators and stuff? You said you're out there for a week looking for them. Aren't there things out there that are looking for you because they're hungry? And your chicken, I mean, that's attracting attention from whatever big cats or whatever are out there too, right?

30:40Yes, that's a good question. And to me, it's really exciting, to be honest. It's exciting. Why is that exciting? Because it's a game and it's a game that you're in a hierarchy. Yeah, you might not be at the top of the food chain. Exactly. And the only way you're going to find out is when you get the bad news that you're not at the top of the food chain. So you need to be good at tracking. You need to be able to spot what are the dangerous animals in a specific area to know the tracks, ideally speaking. and you need some kind of basic experience on how to do that. For example, you walk with the wind in your face, never the wind blowing your scent forward because it will attract things in front of you.

31:20That's not what you want. So you want that your smell go backwards. So you're always advancing, but your smell is going backwards. So you always have a priority on what you can spot before you're getting spot. I guess you also have to look behind you and make sure there's nothing following you. All the time. And that's why I have a bow and arrow. I never carry firearms or that stuff. It's dangerous. It's complicated. And it's not necessary. The laws are probably crazy. I mean, you try to import a firearm to Kenya. I don't even know how you do that. And it's not necessary. If you know how to act, you're supposed to be safe.

31:50But yes, there are predators. And you need to watch, especially during the night. You need to know where to sleep. Yeah. So where do you sleep? I don't know. You're hanging from a tree or something like that? Like, how are you staying safe with your chicken? Yeah, ideally, I like in the trees, but I remember for this show, I didn't bring any hammock, so I was just sleeping underground. So what you can do is find a way where you're sheltered, you're protected at the back, and you can put some trees, some bush in front of you to create kind of a wall, and always a fire. Normally, when you have a fire, it's going to keep the animals away.

32:26It would be so hard to keep a chicken safe in an environment like that. It's like having a baby with you, although of course you'd care more about a child than a chicken, but you're trying to get something to try to keep things away. It's like when you're camping, you know, you don't keep your food out because bears will get it. So you get a bear bag, but you have a live chicken and it's just like such a pain and it's making noise. What are you sleeping with this thing? It's just crazy. You need to defend your chicken. Yeah, you need to defend the chicken. You need to defend your chicken or anything you have.

32:54Normally, the fire does a good job, but during the night, you always kind of sleep on one ear and you're always waking up. There's a little noise, especially little cracks like this. You hear some cracks. Depending of the noise, you can know if it's a heavier animal or it's a predator. It will create a different noise. So you can get used to that and see like, oh, this is an elephant, but it's far. It's fine. Or it's a cave of buffalo, but it's far. And normally, cats, you don't hear them. Yeah, you find out when it's too late. They're right in your face. He is, man. Is there a cameraman or are you filming at all?

33:27There's one cameraman. So we shot the whole thing, two people. Okay. Because I was going to say, if you're filming it, that's a huge pain because you have to set it up and then climb the tree and then get down and then take the camera down. So at least you have that guy help. Yes. And the thing that was the most important thing for me is the first approach, the first contact with people. Lions and all that stuff, it was not the main priority. main priority is it has to connect. It cannot not go well. With all this trouble, the safety is the safety of the relationship with the people you meet. So this has to go well.

34:00So for example, when I meet people, there's always a rule with the cameraman. So he knows exactly what to do, when I'm going to give him special sign, where to look, when it's time to put camera forward, keep the camera backward. So there's certain steps that he needs to respect. So I'm going to give him the cues like, okay, you can follow me. Okay. Put a camera down, make eye contact. Okay. That's the right time. Put the camera up. Now it's good. It's all little details that goes really fast, but the goal is to never obstruct the relationship process. That's what you want to do. I had some questions about that somewhere later in my notes, because I'm thinking if you're meeting them and the chief comes out and is like eyeballing you and he's got a camera that's behind you and he puts it in that guy's face, that's going to just blow the whole thing.

34:47The guy's going to be like, who is this freaking guy? And what is this thing? I assume that things can go wrong really quickly and then they just don't want anything to do with you. Absolutely. And respect seems just a value. Actually, respect is a science. Respect is a sport. Respect is knowing exactly which line you're supposed to cross and when. And the only way you can know that is by observing the other person. The other person will give you the answer on what to do and the timing of certain things. So when I have certain signs, I know that it's safe to, for example, lift the camera a bit or move forward or bring the cameraman next to me.

35:24Otherwise, it's not safe. So I need to have the right authorization and I need to have the right authorization of the right hierarchy. So I don't need any authorization. I need to know where the order is coming from. And sometimes it's hard to tell because you come here, right away, I'm like, who's the boss? Who's leading here? And it's not always obvious. Most of the time, it has something to do with age. The older, the better. Because age means that you have overcame many challenges, and there's a lot of respect related to age and experience. So normally, you're going to look at the older person or the most decorated person.

36:02You'll see if this is the person in authority. So you want to create the relationship first with this person, and after it's going to go down the hierarchy. Yeah. Have you ever met up with a tribe and they're like hostile or anything? Has that ever happened? hostile no but very resistant yeah resistance probably a better word yeah otherwise you'd have a hole in you by now but yeah you need to be careful you need to see these signs of resistance really far if you don't see these signs you just keep walking and say hey i have good intentions but the world doesn't work with intentions did i read something in your face that i wanted to or not it's not yeah but trust me in inside myself i have a good intention it doesn't matter So safety-wise, you need to know when people have problems with you and you need to keep your distance and you need to show them that they will lead.

36:50If you're trying to do too much, even with good intention, you can get hit in the face. So you need to always show that you understand their rules and you play by their rules and you're always listening to them. If they feel that you're always listening and responding in a way that they want, the anxiety will lower, vulnerability in relationship will increase. But sometimes it's long because some society has been invaded, has been tortured and had bad relationship with tourism and other people. So you need to be sensitive to that. Sometimes you can't know, but what you can't see is to read the right mechanisms in terms of psychological mechanisms and behavioral mechanisms.

37:31And you can't see that. So an example was you gave plenty, but like how you approach slowly, there's one where you waited for the chief to smile before smiling back at him. My instinct, not that I've ever met a tribe in the middle of nowhere, but I'd be like, oh, just be really smiley and then they'll like me or find me vulnerable. But it's not quite how you want to handle that. now that you mention it, saying like that, it's true that it's weird because we feel that because we have positive intentions, it should work. Not really, because there are all kinds of reasons why you would be smiling, but it doesn't mean that the reasons are good for me as well.

38:10That's a good point. Yeah. So when you're interacting with someone, you can feel whatever, however you want, but you need to ask yourself, like, what is the state, the mental state of the other person and if you put yourself in his shoes or her shoes how this person will understand my smile what does it mean and if it's not clear it will increase doubt like where are you laughing at i don't see so you increase the doubt just because you just did a small facial expression at the wrong timings normally what i like to do is that i just listen to the other person and i just wait that this person is showing me the emotional direction where we're going so if the person, for example, is really not in a good mood, very serious, I'm going to keep it like this.

38:51I'm going to keep the distance. I'm going to keep the attention on the other person, but I will mimic normally, but not artificially mimic, not just like a robot, not like that. But I want to show the person that I get how he feels. I don't maybe understand everything because I don't know this person. I don't know the culture or the language, but I'm going to mimic that. And if, for example, the other person loosen up and smiles, I'm going to follow the vibe. And this way, you tell the other brain, like, I'm following your lead. No matter where you go in your head, in your heart, physically, I'm following you.

39:25So as soon as people say, okay, so you will obey, you're not a threat anymore. So that's the trick, but subtle. This is interesting. It reminds me of if you smile or you laugh and it's the wrong time, it'll increase doubt. You ever seen a video of Tom Cruise just having an interview? He laughs wildly very weird things and weird times and it's fake it's obviously just fake like he's doing something i don't know what but he's acting performance yes it is so bizarre and it doesn't make you feel like look at this relatable guy what you're thinking or at least what i'm thinking is something is wrong with this person like he's mentally not all there that's what i always think when i see him on oprah or like in a scientology video or something that i'm researching I'm just like, this guy's got screws loose.

40:12Yeah, you probably wouldn't want to communicate that to a tribe where you're like, hey, can you let me into your house? I want to live with you for a week. Yeah, but this is what I mean by respect. Respect is about knowing exactly what you must do at a certain timing according to the rules in place. You don't know the rules. The only thing you can know is how to read someone. What do you know about the tribes beforehand? Hit the Wikipedia. Okay, fine. But what else? What do you know? Do you know what they eat? Do you know their history? how much research are you doing before you meet them? I do as much research as possible because I've been in maybe 50, 70 tribes in my life.

40:48Oh, really? Okay. Because I saw five. I assumed that there was seasons prior, but I didn't know it was like dozens and dozens. That's my best sport to meet people, creating relationship, reading people, analyzing people. I love it. That's really cool. Yeah. I didn't realize you'd done so much of this. That's neat. Yes, I'm trying to read as much thing as I can because it's going to help with empathy. Empathy is accelerated if you have more information to understand the other person's reality. So you're going to do research where they live, what their history, long history, recent history. Is it a hard period for them right now?

41:24Is there a food crisis? Is there a social crisis? Sometimes in the bush, there's all kinds of tribal wars and nobody talks about that. And you cannot know. It's not making the newspaper. No, but sometimes you need to be very careful. I got some really weird surprises in Papua New Guinea, which is not on the TV show, but I saw someone getting his head cut off right in front of me because there was a war between two tribes. One tribe killed one person of the other tribe. And so instead of seeking revenge, they set a compensation, 30 pigs to repay the life. But the compensation didn't work. and so there was still a conflict and I saw someone just putting the axe on someone's head.

42:06So you need to be aware of that. That's why it's a real jungle. You need psychology. You need to read people. The answers are there. Trade you this white guy. If the pigs didn't work out, we got this white guy you guys might be interested in. We got this. You want that? Yeah. Oh man. So this tribe, I can't believe we're still in episode one. It's just so interesting. They offer you some seeds to eat initially. How do you know that's safe to eat? Did you know what that was or were you just like, cool, I guess I'll swallow an handful of these? That's a good question. The question is, what's going to help me survive there?

42:39Without a doubt is relationship. You have like timings or special opportunity. You can boost the relationship. And how to do that? You increase vulnerability. How do you get vulnerable? You take a risk. If you take a risk and you put your health in their hands, you show an extreme amount of vulnerability and it's going to score relationship like nothing. So especially in the first minutes, we have more energy, emotional energy is going well, anxiety is getting lower. There's a momentum when you meet someone and I want to keep this momentum. So if I refuse this present because, oh, wait, what is this?

43:18I'm not sure. You slow down the momentum. Is there gluten in here? Is there gluten? Is there gluten? I'm lactose intolerant. How many calories? So it's like there's an opportunity there. And so they're sacrificing food. They are vulnerable. They're sacrificing food for me and they don't know me. So they're getting vulnerable. It's like an offer, yeah. And so I must reciprocate the vulnerability. If they become vulnerable, it's like saying like, look, I want to be with you. And you say, not for me, thank you. Not right now. Rejection, instant anxiety go up and you feel rejected. The walls are closed off.

43:52you can't afford that. So whatever they will offer, you put that in your mouth and you eat that like Tic Tacs. When I was in Peru on one of my crazy trips, there was a shaman that was hanging out with us for a day and I was walking with him and asking him about stuff in Spanish because he spoke a little bit of Spanish. And he gave me this huge wad of coca leaf. And I was like, oh, what do I do with this? And he's like, you put it in your mouth. And I was like, oh man, I don't want to be like, no thanks. So I just put this huge wad of coca leaf in my mouth. And I thought it would do more than it did.

44:22Maybe I built a tolerance when I lived in LA. I don't know. Yeah. I was like, oh, it was supposed to make you buzz. It basically just sort of gently numbs part of your mouth. I don't know. I remember thinking this could lead down a bad road, man, if I have a reaction to this or there's a plant in here that I'm allergic to, but I didn't want to be like, I don't know. I didn't want to offend the guys hanging out with us, showing us all this stuff in the jungle and whatever. I got travel insurance. Lucky you. Yeah. Lucky me. Exactly. how do you show them that you want to film them how do you even explain what you're doing do they know what the camera is or are they like what the heck is this it depends where you go sometimes they have seen one before sometimes no if they know what it is that's fine you save some time but sometimes it's like there are no words or you cannot really explain what you're going to do with that and what's the point and it's just a machine the most important thing is that they agree they accept, they feel comfortable that we use it.

45:17And normally we show them like, look, we take images and we show them their images. Yes, exactly. To say like, look, this is souvenir. And if you don't want it, we don't use it. If you want it, if you accept, we use it. So we always give them the authority if we use it or not. Most of the time I never film until I have enough of relationship. If the relationship is not established yet, I'm not filming because the camera is stealing from them. It's like, I'm here to shoot a film. It's for me. So I'm using you for me. This is a lack of respect. So you cannot do that. That's why people hate influencers.

45:55I'm here working out and you're freaking filming me. I'm like, I'm shopping. Why are you filming me? So this is a hard stop for respect. You cannot do that until the relationship is good enough, no problem. And you have the green light from the person in authority. And after it's good. And after you can film whatever you want, but it has to be done in a certain order. You said never start giving things away other than the initial welcome gift, which is maybe the chicken or some other thing. Why is that? They'll pick you clean or what? Because the way the brain creates relationship is in direct competition with any source of reinforcement.

46:31Every dopamine source will be in competition with the relationship. Okay. So if you want to create relationship, you must play on psychological mechanisms only, if you put external rewards or external factors that are high in dopamine, which is something that tastes good, something that creates power, something that is rare, something that is shiny. If all these things are very high in dopamine, if you try to create a relationship and you put a reinforcement between the two, the reinforcement will crush the relationship and you become a distributor. You're a vending machine of dopamine. Exactly.

47:09You must never give anything valuable. Never. If you give something, it must be with low value that is always lower in dopamine than the relationship itself. So for example, let's say you and me, okay? We build a relationship. The relationship is high. You can give me a present. I can give you a present as long as it's not like a Lamborghini. You understand like this is too much for what our relationship can take. So there is a ratio between the dopamine aspect of a certain reward and the relationship. And even if you do things perfectly, you can corrupt relationships like this with objects. All right.

47:47I'll take an Aston Martin instead then. That's it. That's the right range. It's crazy to me that you don't know what they're saying because in the subtitles that I read that your wife made, thank you again, they're explaining all these things to you about arrows and poison, but in the moment, you don't know what they're talking about. You're just sitting there and they're like, hey, this one will kill you. This one you eat. And you're like, basically just being polite, sitting there in the corner. So you're inferring everything that you can, obviously. So what happens is that when I want to create the relationship first, the first 24 hours, first two days, I want only me and the cameraman, but I will arrange that The relationship will go through my eyes only.

48:30So they will create attachment with me. And the cameraman is like just an inoffensive thing hanging around. We want it like this. So he doesn't talk, the cameraman? No, no. That's interesting. Because - Do they think something's wrong with him because he's not talking? No, because the way we designed the process, he's just my friend who is not really talkative. I see. But he's not a threat. He's with me. And if they trust me and I'm telling them like, he's my friend, he's with me, it's not a problem because I'm supposed to be in hierarchy. Yeah, yeah. Okay. so I'm the boss of this thing. Not really.

48:59They must believe that I'm the boss and therefore he's my friend. He's not offensive. So when I start the first contact, I want them to focus on my eyes only. So the first few minutes, I will tell my cameraman like, drop the camera, make eye contact and as soon as possible, go back to your camera and go hide your eyes. That way you force the other people to focus their attention on my eyes only. It takes more energy to synthesize relationship with many people at the same time. So it's going to slow things down a bit. So what I want is that they focus only on the relationship with me. So I'm going to tell my cameraman to put his head back on the camera so we don't have much access, but he's fine.

49:43He's not a threat, but I will keep the eye contact for me. So once the relationship is strong enough, normally for the sake of the show, there's a translator that will come on day three or day four. Okay. Because I was thinking, how have you not eaten the poison or caused some sort of epic big misunderstanding if you don't have a clue what they're talking about? Yes. At a certain point, we need some verbal language because relationship does not rely on verbal language, but abstract thinking, coordination, naming stuff, objects, categories, it's all mental representation. It's all language. So at a certain point, we need that to be able to make a show.

50:22But the relationship does not depend on the words at all. He's out there risking death by snake, infection, or just being politely murdered by a tribe. And you, well, you're saving big on the fine products and services that support this show. Two peas in a pod, Just saying. We'll be right back.

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51:34sign up and get 10 % off at betterhelp.com slash Jordan. That's betterhelp.com slash Jordan. This episode is brought to you in part by Lufthansa. When people talk about travel, they usually focus on the destination, the hotel, the restaurants, all the stuff that happens after you land. But the flight is part of the experience too. Just like a great hotel can shape an entire trip, so can a great flight. That's exactly what Lufthansa Allegris is built around. On a long haul route, comfort matters more than people realize. If you're cramped, tired, and can't relax, you feel it the second you land.

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53:00We're happy to surface codes for you. It is that important. that you support those who support the show. Now, back to Guillaume Delude. When the translator shows up, they must be like, okay, we're all dying to know, why did this guy show up here? Like, there's gotta be some funny moments because the translator's, oh yeah, no, everybody's been asking me all day, like, where did you come from and why are you here? Surely, even if you're friendly and they got this relationship, you still fell out of the sky with a bow and arrow and a chicken. Absolutely, yes. When the translator comes day two or day three, there's a big meeting.

53:31on, oh, we're going to have more precise information. So now I get more the names. I'm better to understand how they pronounce certain things because sometimes there's the click that... Yeah. All these things, most names, these tribes have clicks and it's hard to do this kind of... They're all different. They're all different. So it's like... That's cool though. You go to another level and you love languages as me. It's always so interesting. And so you need some help for that. And when they start telling their story, where they're born, who's their family, they have sometimes many wives. And it's like, okay, you guys are related.

54:05Okay. So it's another layers. But for me, this will never have priority, but the relationship does have their priority. Yeah, that's super cool. I know you let them help you set up and teach you things, and it sort of increases hospitality. That's a vulnerability lever, I suppose. in the tribes, most of them anyway, that you mentioned, nobody's more wealthy than the others. The leadership is mostly based on age, like you mentioned, but people can even switch clans if they want to, but nobody owns a bunch of stuff and the other person's poor. It's pretty interesting how they set it up. Yeah. That's how, you know, we come from nomadic lifestyle.

54:44It's like belonging are not useful. It's only useful when you start agriculture and you can start gathering things and there's an economy system but when you just hunt and eat fruits like on the way where you're walking don't need any stuff it's just dead weight i remember i think in this tribe in the morning they just wake up and they just gather together they go for a walk they're gonna go to try find something to eat so we walk one behind another and they find like a bush with fruits and they all like bees go on it and they eat everything in the bush and it's like empty in two minutes and it's like this bush is finished.

55:24You keep walking, you find something else. So you have to be quick. Yeah, there's probably some competition who can shake the most berries in their face. Yes, yes, yes. If people switch clans, how does that work? You just wander over to the next one and you're like, hey, there's no girls here. I'm looking for a wife. Can I hang out here? It depends of the community. It depends of the culture. But what I can assure you is that there are rules. All they have is themselves, us humans, their family, their community. So everything is structured. families are structured alliances are structured the roles titles everybody has a title there's not random like they all have prestigious title like it's like they're all sitting around a fire and they're gonna say like i'm the president of this thing like it's like a silicon valley startup i'm the chief experience officer dude there's four people in your company calm down that's exactly how it is it's crazy how similar we behave all human beings it's crazy it's the same tradition the same concept, the same instincts, but just with new disguise, new costumes.

56:26It's the same. You go in a tribe, they all have like special responsibility. And every time I'm stunned, I'm like, now what? What's your title? And they're going to say like, I'm the chairman of cultural and you're, it's like, what the hell do you mean? And sometimes you feel like you want to judge. It's like, come on guys. But that's the culture. And everybody has a special title. They're all special and they're all proud of themselves. So when you switch from one clan to the other, one village to the other, you need some kind of agreement. You need some kind of authority saying like, yes, you're allowed to move in.

57:03What are you going to do? Who's your dad? And there's going to be a voting system. Dang. Oh yeah. Every move is decided collectively and there's a structure behind it. It's not, look, I'm in love. Everybody else has to deal with it. No. When like your love is your problem, we need to survive. We need to organize our resources. What are you good at? Are you good? Are you a good man? I am a good man. Why? Like, what's the proof? What have you done? Nothing. You're not good. So when you're going to be good, come back. So you need proof to earn stuff. You need to actually work. In our society, we have this thing called self-esteem.

57:42Yeah, I was going to say this is a totally different take. Yeah, and it doesn't work. Yeah, but I'm special. I'm worth a lot. I deserve a lot. Why do you say that? How are you special? You're not special. You're unique, but that's not the same thing as special. You're unique, but you're not special. So when you're surviving in a difficult environment, don't talk to me about how you're special you are. Don't talk about it. Show me how many cows you have. Show me what have you done. How many houses have you built? Show me things. and after you will be worth something and after you can get married and after, but you have to do something.

58:23You cannot sell yourself like this. This isn't on the pitch. So here in our modern world, we have this idea of personal value, but it's more potential than value. You actually need to do things. It's more of a meritocracy in many ways. Yes. There's a part where you go with the men and you're making poison for the arrows. You're out hunting with these guys with a bow. And I was just thinking, I literally said out loud, bro, good luck. Like you're just hanging out in Iraq and Africa. Just, I've got this. I know you've trained with the bow, but these guys live and die by this thing. They must've been so skilled.

59:00And this is with the monkeys, I think. They were shooting the monkeys at night. I'm just thinking this is next level difficult. This is not a target range. This is a moving monkey that hears you and is dark. These guys do stuff that I can't even imagine. They have these bows and arrows that they do themselves and just doing that sitting on the ground and they can shoot a bird flying in the air. A moving target far away. Easy, easy. All the time and they won't miss a lot. It's just like, how did you, like I have like a pulley, bows and arrows. You have a compound bow, yeah. Compound bow, exactly.

59:35And like super strong arrows and all that stuff. Like I cannot be that accurate. But right, the difference is you have to hit the target. It's like hitting a target with a stick arrow beats missing the target with a steel arrow. Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. They seem to genuinely be enjoying your company and vice versa. It seemed like these guys are having a pretty good time. It would be like, I guess if you were... At work one day in a place where you never see anybody new and a celebrity shows up to help you one day with a video camera and you're just stoked. They seem like really excited. They're showing you how they live and it must be an incredible feeling to just be in the company of these people who are like, they genuinely accept you.

1:00:17They're like, come hunt monkeys with us. And you're like, sure thing. And now you're there doing that. It's like, it never happens to them. It's never probably ever going to happen to them again in their life, maybe. And you get to do that. You're the one guy doing that. It's pretty cool. This is the ultimate reward to create a bond, to create relationship with people so different. It's just, it's the reward by itself. That's my draw, creating relationships, understanding people, and anybody can do it. You can train, you can learn how to do that. But it's still, when it happens, if you know how to do it, it's a privilege.

1:00:50It's an awesome honor to share these moments with this kind of community, with anyone, To be honest, with anyone, whether it's a tribe in South Africa or anywhere, meeting someone new to go in their home, it's an awesome privilege. I'm surprised they don't want your bow when you leave because this is their survival tool. Yes. It would be like if you hunted all your food with a musket and somebody showed up with a laser rifle from the future. I would be like, bro, maybe you leave that thing with me. That's pretty damn cool. Do they ask for that? that's a really good question because i am not creating a pattern where they feel that they can ask for objects i see yeah okay we value relationship and we don't ask for stuff yeah so they don't do that but they don't do that because the way we develop the relationship is that we keep our things and so no they value their relationship and they're not like oh i want this stuff i want this stuff they're just see me for me and so this is very important and that's a problem in tourism in general because tourists go there with a lot of money and they want to do good but the problem is that they're not as good to create the right type of relationship and it becomes a mess unfortunately this is how you corrupt villages with tourism this is bad tourism unfortunately because you arrive with your bling bling all your stuff and you say i'm gonna make poor people happy i'm gonna give my stuff away you must never give anything except something that is relevant to the culture.

1:02:19Only this. If you bypass that, you corrupt the whole culture and you corrupt the relationship with you. But for the future people that will come, now they will expect objects. This is how you ruin relationships. The only experience I have that's even remotely close to this is going to North Korea because they had never seen any of the things that we had. And so we went to the city and our guides were like, all right, you're in the middle of town. and there's all these kids roller skating around. We can just hang out here. We're going to get some coffee and stuff, which is rare. Usually you don't have downtime, especially not with locals around.

1:02:53And I had this camera that was like a Polaroid that would print also. Yes, yes. And also it saved them digitally. So I didn't need the prints. So what I was doing was taking photos of kids and stuff with their permission, obviously, and then giving them the print. And I'm like, oh, I'll save my digital copy for at home. And I remember like the word got around in this little square. And so all these fathers were in line with their kids and we would take a picture and give it to them. And one guy who spoke like the tiniest bit of English and other guys spoke a little bit of Chinese. He explained that they didn't have any photos of themselves with their kids at all.

1:03:30And maybe there were either zero or one school photo of just their kid, no family photos, nothing with them and their son ever. So we were giving them this really cool, really precious, probably they couldn't even buy it kind of gift. And no one asked for the camera. They just wanted the print. And even then they tried to pay us in like local money, which we can't even use any, buy anything with. So we didn't accept it. and kids were trying to give us their toys in exchange for the prints. Nobody wanted the actual device. I remember my friend was like, dude, no one's asked you to give that to them or even touch it or anything.

1:04:06Yes. We found that just shocking. It is probably the same principle. Absolutely. And what is interesting about pictures, it's not just any object. It's an object that reflects the relationship. Picture is a special object. Yeah. Because there are all kinds of objects that can go in competition with the relationship because it's high dopamine. But this is high dopamine, but it's merged with image of yourself. So it does not contaminate the relationship. The respect remains really high. But I'm really happy you bring that up because it's one of the rare objects that still fits in the realm of positive relationship.

1:04:42It's one of the only. I often think there's a bunch of North Korean dudes in the city of Wonson with a Polaroid from my camera stuck on the wall. and it's the only photo they have of them with their six-year-old kid at that age. And it's pretty cool that I was able to do that. I think it's touching. It's a souvenir. It's not just like any object. I'm for that. I'm for Polaroid. Yeah, we - That camera got a lot of mileage, dude. You would go to a school and take a picture of one kid and every kid wants a photo, right? Every kid. Once I brought 50 and I thought this will last the whole trip and then the next trip I brought 200 and I think I came home with three left.

1:05:21Oh, yeah, of course. It was awesome. it's powerful yeah it's powerful it's like everything we want souvenirs history relationship a special moment that you will remember i know it's i love it those little travel cams are like one of the coolest thing i should do that on one of my adventure trips because sometimes you meet bedouins or something on these trips or whatever and that's part of the trip it's not a random but they don't go to town and do this and now unfortunately a lot of these even the shaman have Android phone he was using occasionally. There was no phone service, but he just had it.

1:05:53I don't know, maybe it had a map on it. And I thought like, all right, the world is just almost too modern now for this to matter as much as it did. Look, I come from a place of privilege to be able to say that. Oh, it's too bad he has a phone and clothing. It would be more interesting for me if it was still - He was dressing with leaves. In the Stone Age, yeah, exactly. Man, the point at which you're all collecting honey out of this huge tree, with the beehive in it. They're all getting stung, right? They're sticking their arm in this hive and you tried it. Even little kids were doing it because they have smaller arms.

1:06:26What happened when you tried it? I always try to contribute in whatever activities I'm involved. I don't want to feel like I'm just like eating their stuff and being bored. I want to try to do something, even though like I act like a four-year-old and I know nothing and I don't really contribute, but they let me try. So it's the intention, right? And so I was looking at the guys and everybody trying to get honey inside the tree, the full arm inside and bees going everywhere. And it's like Star Wars was going to stick his hand in that thing and you don't know what's going to happen. Yes, yes, yes.

1:07:02It's like that. Or Dune. Dune. Or Dune, yeah. But here's the thing, you know what's going to happen. You're going to get stunned. So it's actually almost worse yeah so i saw like six-year-old kids do it i'm like i'm a grown-up man this should be no problem and i work out that's no problem i was almost an olympic swimmer i got this exactly i just put like half of my fingers in it and i got stung so hard like it was like an electric shock for my whole body i was like guys what are you doing and they're been bitten thousands of Like it's nothing. Face, yeah. In their face, and they're just like this, and they're eating honey and smiling.

1:07:42And after I got like my first huge allergic reaction, because I didn't even know I was allergic to bees, so. Could it be only a certain kind of bees, or did you just get stung so many times that you had a reaction? I got tested afterwards. Yeah. I became interested about that. I would too. And I realized that I'm allergic to all kinds of wasps, bees, and so I'm allergic. Good thing you brought an EpiPen, because you're what, like two days away from a doctor? At least. And it's the first time that I carried a nippy pen in my life. It's just because the production company said, look, you need to bring that.

1:08:13I'm like, okay, whatever. Fine. I'll never use this. I use both. Wait, so you needed both for the one reaction? Ooh, dang. Yeah, because it was not going away after four hours of the first one. I took another one. How do you get water? That's so funny. You're thirsty, so you're asking, like, where's the water? And they're going to say, like... They don't have a well or anything? You have to look for it. And they're going to say, oh, you need to go to the river. I'm like, okay, yeah, fine. Let's go to the river. So you walk for like a couple of hours. You go to the river and classic, there's no water.

1:08:49The water's gone. And they're like, there's a river. I'm like, yeah, but there's no water. He says, yeah, but it's a river. It's like, why do you think I need a river? I always get caught like this. I'm looking for a river. They're always proud. in many places around the world. Here's the waterfall. Go to a waterfall. Here's the waterfall. Where's the water? Yeah, but there's no water right now. You should see it in springtime. Why are we here? But you said we wanted to see a river waterfall. Yeah. But yeah, for the water. Right. But we didn't know that. And that's why you say like, okay, let's just different cultures.

1:09:25Yeah. We didn't know that. So in this special tribe, in this river, there's a way to find water. You need to dig a hole inside the waterbed, and there's going to be a little bit of water going up, and you drink right inside the hole. So you dig, and there's some water underneath. Is that dangerous? Because there's microbes in the ground and stuff. Of course. They're used to it. They're used to it, but what about you? Do you use a filtered straw or something? I boil it. Yeah, okay. Boil it. Yikes. So you're thirsty when you're done with these. Oh, yeah. Like, first thing is a beer. Oh, yeah. And I remember the beers coming out of this drive.

1:10:01My face was still half swollen and I was like so thirsty. And yeah, the beer was really good. And it's so hot. So anything cold is just, oh my God, how could I live without that? Like first gas station on the way back to civilization. It's like, all right, I want all of the ice. Oh yeah. Coca-Cola and the beer. Yeah. Oh man. How does baboon taste? Because you ate a baboon hand or whatever. That looked kind of like a bony mess. It's quite horrible. Yeah. It looked pretty gross, man. They were so happy because they were giving me like the hand and the whole hand, like with the fingernails and the hand is like this.

1:10:36And I'm like, where's the food on the hand? And they just cut, you know, the muscle, the thumb muscle there. So you eat that. You have some muscle there. Just eat the fingers like this. My wife eats like that. She would be fine. I'd starve. Oh, yeah. She can demolish a chicken wing. Yeah. And it was funny because we hunt this baboon during the night. and so there is absolutely no light at all. I couldn't see anything at all but they can't see in the night. They have night vision and I couldn't even see my hand in front of me, nothing. They were grabbing my hand, me and the cameraman. We were just like following them like this.

1:11:16Couldn't see nothing, nothing. And so they were trying to hunt the baboon but the baboon could hear us. And so they said like, look, you're too noisy, just stay there. We're gonna pick you up afterwards. So me and my cameraman were just like in the jungle like this, pitch black, just waiting forever like that they're going to come back. We cannot get out of there. They need to come back. So we're like this. And after half an hour, they come back with two big baboons. They're like, yeah, we got it. They shot it in the dark. It's unbelievable. That is impressive. Do you have a favorite person when you meet new tribes after a while?

1:11:50Like, is there one person you connect with the most and maybe you're bummed when you got to leave? Yes. It's always sad. For me, I always get attached. I bond quite well with the people I meet. And so everybody's crying. I cry. And yeah, it's hard. Have the people in these tribes ever seen a white person before? Like, I guess if you're old enough, you've been to town to pick up like, I don't know, fishing supplies or bricks or I don't know, clothes. But the kids probably have never seen anybody who's not in their tribe. Yeah, it depends of the tribes. And yes, as you say, the age. It happens a lot with younger kids or babies.

1:12:24when they see me, they start to cry because they think that I'm a ghost. That's what I'm talking about because I'm white. I'm coming from the other world, the dead. So I'm like a ghost. They see me like, wah. I remember in Papua New Guinea, like everywhere where I was going, like the kids were like, wah, running everywhere. There's a ghost, there's a ghost. And of course, adults, they have moved around and they don't think I'm a ghost. So yeah, this can happen. Some of the stuff on the show is pretty nerve-wracking. like there's one where you were waist deep in the water and there's kids canoeing on a log and you're like oh hey guys and then there's a 12 foot alligator carcass at what point are you like wait that thing was in here with me alive there's might be another one of those what killed the 12 foot alligator was it a 14 foot alligator i'm walking through this and they're on a boat like maybe i should get on a boat yes i remember that it was in ethiopia if i remember correctly yes they have big crocodiles there.

1:13:21I think it's Nile crocodile, which are the biggest. Some people went in the water like waist deep. They were doing crocodile traps, so they were inspecting traps. Oh, so they eat the crocodiles. They eat crocodiles and fish, of course. So they're fishing, mostly fishing, but of course there are crocodiles around. But I don't know, they're just walking, but I was really nervous following them around. And the cameraman was just behind me and we were looking at each other like, just keep walking. No, it's really scary. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if I can handle that. I wonder how you learn so much about nature because there's a point where you come across this termite mound and it's 30 feet high or whatever, 10 meters high.

1:14:00You're like, oh, they can be twice that and you got to be careful around them, not because there's termites, but there's snakes that eat them and sometimes they're inside these things. By the way, I thought this was fascinating. The snakes are there because birds come to eat the termites and snakes have learned that the birds come to the termite mound, so they hang out. So it's not the snakes eating the termites, it's the snakes eating the birds that eat the termites. But where do you learn stuff like that? Is it from the tribe or what? Yes. When you spend a lot of time in nature and you talk with people that live in nature, they're going to teach you so many things.

1:14:30And I love animals. I've always been interested by animals. And so I remember once I was sitting on one termite mount. And one of the tribe's men, I remember, said, you should get up. I'm like, why? He says, there's a hole inside this termite mount. I'm like, okay. So he says, probably there's a snake inside it. I'm like, wow. And also it's maybe 40 degrees. Oh, so it's nice and cool in there. Yeah. It's cool inside and they come out at night. So you can get bitten easily. Scary, man. Nature is like unforgiving. It's unbelievable that you're going to miss all that if you don't know what you're looking at.

1:15:09And for me, when I see an expert in nature and can describe everything he sees in nature, for me, it's the same thing when I look at someone in psychology. So many things you can't see. You know what to look. If you don't know, you're going to sit on a log or next to a crocodile. Or you can see all kinds of things. When you learn what to look for, what to see, the world becomes interesting and full of potential. You know, safety-wise, it's dangerous. When you're not in control of your things, it's dangerous. You need to keep control. You need to stay alert at all times. The Omo River, it's full of crocodiles.

1:15:46Full of crocodiles. So you're not going to go there to wash up? The protocol when they wash up is that they're going to have two guys with two rifles, two Kalashnikov, looking for you. And while you're going near the river and wash, and if they see a crocodile coming, they will shoot around you to make their crocodile jump. so you know where they are. So taking a shower, it's a big adventure. You need two rifles, you need bullets, and you need to be really fast because crocodiles, they eat people, they eat children, they grab people by the face, pull it underwater. So the shower time, it's a big expedition.

1:16:20Now we'll get back to how you avoid getting shot with a poisoned arrow by people you just met. Super relatable stuff. But first, let's talk about something equally life-threatening, forgetting to support this podcast. We'll be right back. This episode is sponsored in part by Dell. Dell PCs with Intel inside are built for the moments you plan. And the ones you don't. They're for those all-night study sessions, the moment you're working from a cafe and you realize every outlet's taken. The times you're deep in your flow and you can't be interrupted by an auto update. That's why Dell builds tech that adapts to you.

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1:18:41Don't you start to stink out there? Those guys are used to being out there. They probably have a body biome that sort of resists. I don't know. For me, I work out if I don't shower that day by nighttime. And I'm not a smelly guy, but by nighttime, I'm like, oh yeah. So if I was out somewhere for seven days, I would definitely smell worse than any local guy hanging out in the jungle or the desert. I remember once when I was in Papua New Guinea, I was in a community called the Hela tribe. It's the wig men. They're all painted. That's cool. And they have an artificial wig made out of plants. They all have plants and colors.

1:19:20And the chief of the village, I've never smelled something stronger in my life. I could know where it was like at 50 meters. Oh, so they also smell. Yes. Oh, okay. I just for some reason thought that they didn't. It's just they don't notice. It's normal. So it's like France. I don't know. But you get used to it. Yeah. And you don't smell it anymore. So I think anybody not used to it, it stinks like crazy. But after a couple of days, you don't smell yourself. You don't smell others and it becomes normal. Yeah. Oh, man. And I don't know why, I guess I just assumed if you grow up out there, your body bacteria doesn't smell anymore because it balances out.

1:19:59But I guess you just, you grow up with it and you don't care. Just like sleeping with the goats. Like they still stink. It's just normal. It just goes in one nostril and out the other. Yes, exactly. Got it. Wow. Man, the armed guards for bathing. Oh man, you stink. You know what? I don't want to go to the river and get bit in the face by a crocodile. So deal with it, pal. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. but they still need to go there every day to get water. So like women go there with their children wrapped and so they need to be careful. The technique is when you don't have a rifle, what you're going to do, you're going to throw rocks where you want to get the water and see if something jumps.

1:20:36If there's a crocodile there, it's going to jump or you're going to see it's going to go up to look. If there's nothing, you can take a chance and so grab the water. Crocs are so fast. I was in, this is a long time ago, I was in Costa Rica and we went surfing and there was like a river that goes out into the ocean and it's really muddy. So sometimes these crocodiles from the river will go into the ocean. And I think they turn around and go back in the river. They're like lost at that point, but they're like, oh, you don't want to surf past like this point because sometimes crocs go out there from the river and blah, blah, blah.

1:21:06And then, so we went and got coconuts because there's guys that sell coconuts on these bridges that go over the river. I was like, oh man, what's down there? Because it was just grass and I saw a crocodile on the riverbank. And I was like, oh, there's a crocodile down there. And my friend's like, there's a lot of crocodiles down there. And I said, well, I only see one. And then the guy was like, are you done with your coconut? And I said, yeah. And he goes, watch this. And he threw the shell into the water. The second, the millisecond, this shell hit the water, the whole river erupted with crocodiles.

1:21:35There was, I don't know, a hundred crocodiles in this river. And they all went to go grab it. One of them got the shell, realized it was just a coconut shell and like slowly relaxed its jaw and then just sank. And I thought to myself, there's a 0 % chance of surviving, even being near this river. There's no way. So I can't imagine having to go to a river like that for your water. And you're just like, all right, throw a rock in there and they'll jump. And then you look where they didn't jump and that's where you go get the, like, that's just another level of survival, unpredictability, and just like, it's nightmare fuel.

1:22:10It is. It is. They were so fast. dude. What are the rainstorms like out there, man? It's got to be crazy. I love a good rainstorm, a good thunderstorm. I feel like you must see some crazy stuff out there because on those plains, it's got to rain a ton and the storms are probably insane. Depends where you go. It depends the time of the year. When it's dry season, sometimes it's dry season for a while and sometimes for years. For example, in South Africa, they've been in the drought for the last 11, 12 years. so it's not raining much. Normally there are cycles so sometimes like it's dry for a couple of years and after it comes back so it's back and forth like this.

1:22:51Sometimes like when the rain falls you can fill up this glass just like this in a few seconds but you got to be in the right timing. So it depends where you are. In Africa it's a bit unpredictable. I think it'd be really badass to sit there and watch a lightning thunderstorm with just nothing else around. Have any of the tribes you visited, do they have any of those coming of age rituals that are like crazy intense? You know, you see on Nat Geo, which is where your show should be probably, that they make a glove and then they put bullet ants in there and then you like shove your hand in there for as long as you can to prove you're tough.

1:23:27Yes. Every traditional community has really important transition rituals to become adults most of the time. And most of the time, especially for men, it involves pain most of the time. And most of the time, they will have circumcision. Yikes. It's way worse than you can think. I've been invited to watch that. What age are they when they do this? When they feel that they want to be a man. So like 10, 13 years old? Yeah, something like that. Oh my God. I remember one tribe, the Dasanich tribe, the one walking with the crocodiles in the water, okay, this tribe. I remember one guy was explaining to me that if you want to become a man, you need to get circumcised, but you need to have a successful circumcision.

1:24:16And I'm like, what do you mean successful? It's like when you're going to be caught up, you must not cry, flinch. You must not have any emotion, any facial expression, otherwise you're weak and it's going to follow you the rest of your life. So you're getting caught with a piece of rock, a piece of a knife, and you must not move. Flinching is not the right word. I am cringing, but that's horrific. Oh yeah. First of all, it seems like the person doing it can either make it fast or make it slow or use a sharp knife or use a not so sharp. I mean, even if you went to a hospital with a scalpel and a skilled doctor, if you didn't have anesthetic, you're still going to flinch.

1:24:59Probably even if you did have anesthetic, you would still flinch. If you're watching somebody circumcise you. Just looking at someone, you're going to flinch. I'm flinching watching somebody else go through this probably. That's crazy to me, man. Like rituals and transitions are a big thing at the center of traditional cultures. And I have a good story for you. Yeah. Once I brought seven clients with me in a tribe. Seven clients because I do psychology workshops and all that stuff. And I said, look, guys, if you want to do something special, we could do something special. Get circumcised. No circumcised.

1:25:37But where it happens, I brought them in Ethiopia to the crocodile tribe. And what happened is that I explained to them all the rules, communication rules and all that stuff. But there was one girl that is a bit personality disorder, very tall, very beautiful, very charismatic, need for attention all the time. And the son of the chief of the village fell in love with her. She likes the attention. So the last day, the last evening, the next morning, we're supposed to go back. But we need to be escorted. We don't know how to go back by foot. We need help from the chief of the son. so we need him but the guy's in love with one of my girls you know i'm one of my clients and so the last night he was drunk he brought some alcohol like weird alcohol into the village so the whole village was drunk which is really bad sign it's not good because it can go wrong really fast they all have guns they all have kalashnikov they're all starting to drink they don't want us to leave the next morning.

1:26:47So my clients, they're not aware of it, but because I have experience, I know that there's maybe a big problem, dangerous situation coming up. So I'm just looking at that like, how will I get out of there? Just have to sell her to the tribe. Easy peasy. So it's eight o 'clock and everybody wants to sleep. And so at eight o 'clock, the chief, the prince, he's waking us up like, hey, wake up. Normally he never talks to us like that because it's very respectful. And now he's drunk, weird. Now all my clients are like, oh, this is weird. What's going on? And now I'm like, okay, guys, follow my lead.

1:27:28Follow exactly what I'm doing. So you just smile, just follow, Just say exactly what. Don't show that you're afraid. Just smile. Just smile. Just nod. Don't panic. Don't make him feel rejected. Because this guy is not accepting to let go this girl. So if we all reject him, he's going to rebel against us. He will try to control us by force. And it's very dangerous. You don't have no idea what they can do. There are no rules here. We're absolutely alone. There is nobody that knows exactly where we are. And so we go there. He wants us to sit right in the middle of the village and everybody's afraid.

1:28:05I'm like, don't show that you're afraid. Just say relax, smile, just follow my lead. I'm just trying to see what he's going to do. And he brings a live goat. And I'm like, oh Jesus, this is a sacrifice time. Everybody's like, what is he going to do with the goat? I'm like, just smile. So just get yourself ready. He's going to kill the goat. All right. And probably we're going to have to eat it. And they're like, no, I don't want to eat it. There's no choice. So just nod, smile. People are drunk. It's not good. so they kill the goat the blood goes everywhere and so one girl is not feeling bad so i just tell her like just close your eyes just pretend to sleep i'm like now we must make him accept that he's gonna lose the girl and we're gonna leave he's not ready to accept that so if he feels that we reject him right now we are dead we must feel close instead of going away from him we must stay close to him.

1:28:59Even though we're afraid, even though we don't want to eat anything, you're not hungry at all, stay close. And so he cooks the goat and nobody's hungry at all. And he drops some pieces of meat in front of us and nobody wants to eat. I'm like, you eat, you fake like eating. You're happy. You're happy. Good, good. Just keep eating. Everybody's happy. Make him happy. He's just grieving right now. Just let it, just relax. Don't drink alcohol. Don't accept alcohol. We need to make the party go down. And so after a couple of hours of fake eating and stuff like that, the mood goes down. Everybody gets tired and we go make a big group hug to the prince.

1:29:41Yeah. And now it was okay. It was one of the scariest moments because it's not for me, it's the security of everyone. Sure. Yeah. So the next morning he accepted to walk us back, but that's the moment I said I'm never going to bring anyone with me anymore in any tribe. I don't blame you. I'm surprised you did that but I guess it was an experiment. I knew this tribe for many years. It was the safest tribe that I know but the problem is that this girl, she broke the rules that I set. It's very specific psychological rule that I explained. There is a distance. There's a way to do it. You cannot give presents.

1:30:16She was giving presents while I was not looking. She corrupted the whole thing. only one girl. She put us all at risk. Very dangerous. So one mind can put a whole village at risk just with one person. So psychology to me, it's like you have to be extremely precise because the brain is very powerful. That's fascinating, man. Some of these tribes, life is viewed differently out there. I mean, what are these called? Like mingy babies? babies, basically if the top teeth come in first, they will kill the baby. This isn't all the tribes. Obviously, I'm just speaking about one, but I was looking at photos of my kids the other day.

1:30:55I was looking at a photo of my son and I was like, oh yeah, before he had any teeth. And then it was like, wait, he was probably like one and a half, maybe like two. I can't remember exactly how old he was, but he wasn't like a newborn baby. It's so sad thinking about raising somebody for a year and a half and then you go, oh, their top teeth came in. I got to kill them. That's just terrible. Yeah, humans. Humans believe in stuff. And once there's a belief inside a human mind, it's very resistant. So in their mind, if the top teeth are coming up like before the other ones, it's like the demon that is living inside the baby.

1:31:33And unfortunately, you need to kill the baby. Humans believe in stuff. today. It's funny because, oh my God, it's just because they're primitive. We also have beliefs here that don't make any sense. In 50 years, we will laugh about that. But right now, we believe in stuff that does not make sense at all. So humans, they always believe in stuff to create some kind of meaning. The problem is that sometimes it's not connected with reality at all, and you can create a lot of damage. Same as today. These Kazakh clans that you visited were fascinating, man. They kidnapped their wives. They also have love marriages, but I found it notable the kidnap marriages tend to outlast the love marriages.

1:32:19I thought, why can that be? Maybe more traditional people do the kidnapping so they're less likely to separate because they have more traditional values. It seems a little counterintuitive that a woman that you literally kidnap off the street is less likely to divorce you than somebody who fell in love with you in the first place. This is a really hot topic. If you would ask what it's all about to someone with certain ideologies today, they will say that it's because women are victim. Of course, I will never approve kidnapping people. It's just that cultures are complicated and it's very easy to judge.

1:32:56It's one of the biggest challenge to me when you meet someone is to avoid judgment. It's very hard because we come with values, we come with priorities, we come with a version of what's good and what's bad. And you're like inside a house with a couple and they're just explaining randomly, like very casually, yeah, I kidnapped her. And then she was like, yeah, she kidnapped me. Like a real kidnapping? Like not real, yeah, real kidnapping. But it's a crime. No, it's just how it is. I'm so happy. It's so cute. Yeah, but you said you were crying. Yeah, but it's a normal cry when you're getting kidnapped.

1:33:29it's like how do you want me to make sense of this yeah and for me when you meet people that are different from you you go in different cultures and you have this kind of things in your face it really forces you to think like what's really good and bad what is your conception of what good and bad how quick are you to judge and of course we all have our preferences we all have our values and it's fine there are cultures that i like better than others because they fit more with me. It's more natural for me. But it doesn't mean that it's wrong to do something different. And this is hard for us to conceive that.

1:34:04Very, very hard. Mariana Van Zeller was on this show. She runs that show, Trafficked on Nat Geo. I don't know if you've ever seen it. Yes. Yeah. She did an episode about, I think it was Laos. Their tradition is also they kidnap the women and they'll do it off the street. The problem is there are also now a ton of real kidnappings from like Chinese gangs kidnapping the women and selling them in China. And nobody does anything because here, if somebody is going to kidnap off the street, everybody's stopping. People are going to intervene because it's not normal. But there, since there'll be people who go, oh, it's probably a family thing or maybe he's going to propose.

1:34:39And it's like, no, this is actually just a real kidnapping. That's a bad one. Yes. Yeah. So they're trying to figure out how to deal with it. And there's these volunteer organizations that are like, stop kidnapping. If you're going to do a kidnap marriage, arrange this so it's done out of your home where there's people that know, don't do it on the street. And if you see a kidnapping on the street, you should intervene even if you think it's a marriage proposal just in case it's not. So it's like a crazy scenario in which this is blown up into something that was never meant to be at all. Isn't that fascinating?

1:35:13Humans make up these things. They just make that up. Yeah, you know what? We're going to do that. It's going to work. And everybody's like, yeah, I think it's good. and they just do it. I'm curious, actually. I should look this up, but it probably starts with a folktale where some ancient prince kidnapped the princess and blah, blah, blah. And then they're like, you know what? Let's just all do that. Let's just all do that because that's how you get a blessed marriage or something. And then it's like, for a thousand years, they're kidnapping the bride from another tribe. And then it's all good because everybody's happy afterwards and whatever, who cares?

1:35:46And then it's like, no, now we live in a civilization where you don't need to do that. Eh, but it's a tradition. There's a tribe, I think also in Laos called, in Vietnam, they're called Hmong. It's like a mountain tribe. And during the war, they were on the side of the United States against the communists. So a ton of them moved to Michigan, where I'm from. So a lot of the Asian people are not Chinese, they're Hmong. So they also do this kidnapping thing and not necessarily a bunch in Michigan, but I had a buddy who was also Hmong and he was like, hey, if I ever propose to my girlfriend, would you guys help me kidnap her?

1:36:19And I remember running this by our parents, me and the other guys, and they were like, hell no. You're going to get arrested and put in prison. We were like, no, it's how they do it. And we were in high school, so it was like never happened too young. But I just thought, man, that's like a bucket list thing. Like, I don't want to kidnap your wife for you. As long as we're not going to get in trouble for it, I'm in, you know, getaway driver. It's surreal. It's like a film. Look, if it's really traditional and it's part of thing and everybody's in on it, the mom's there clapping on the porch, fine.

1:36:51But as soon as somebody starts crying, I'm out. Crying is like there's maybe something wrong, you know? Maybe there's a line crossed. Yeah, exactly. No, it's hella scary. You went to Namibia. That dude at the village, that guy was at least a full head and a half taller than you, and you're pretty tall. How tall do you think that guy was? Probably 7 '5". How common is that? Because I would think if you live hunter-gatherer, you can't get 5 ,000 calories a day that easily or whatever somebody like that needs to be that big. That was crazy to me. It's the tallest guy I've ever met. I think he was so tall.

1:37:29I remember it's a Himba. It's a Himba village. And I went there and they live in, it's called a Kral. A Kral is a round circle made out of wood. And there's an inner circle and it's built like a cell. I arrive in front of this kral and I'm like, oy! And I'm trying to see if there's something moving. The kral is really high. The defense is really high. And I see the top of the head moving. I'm like, are they on top of something? And just see the top of his head. He opens up and this guy comes in and he's like a giant with a weird haircut. He was so funny. No, it's rare. It was not common. He was the chief of the village, but I don't know how he got this genetic, but it's unusual.

1:38:13They're not as tall as that. I was curious. Calories got to be hard to come by. Milk is their base of calorie. So that's most of their diet. It's milk. I know what I forgot to ask about the smoke baths so that people don't smell bad. That was like women in this tribe doing this, right? That's one of the funniest thing I've seen. Seriously. I couldn't get over that. I had to pause and rewind because I was like, wait, am I understanding what they're doing? They're basically, they're going to get married, right? The women. And they don't want to smell bad. So they just like light a fire and stand over it.

1:38:45Yeah. The tall guy, his name is Quayo. That was his wife. I wanted to talk with his wife. You know, I had a translator with me. I go inside a hut and she's starting the fire and do like little powders. And I'm like, what are you doing? And she says, I'm going to take a shower. So I'm like, where? Yeah, where's the water? This is a shower of smoke. A shower of smoke. Okay. And she says, like, it's between my legs. I'm like, okay, you want to shower between your legs? He says, yeah, to be clean. Okay, so you want to clean between your legs, sexual parts, with smoke? And she says, yeah. I'm like, why?

1:39:26She says, obviously, because I want to be clean for my man. Yeah. I'm like, yeah, but not to wash with water? And she's like, no, you're crazy. and it's really crazy to say that to wash with water doesn't make any sense like water no you drink water you don't wash with water so it doesn't make any sense there is no connection between a shower and water that's so it's like okay she sits right in front of this little fire with smoke it's only a little smoke with kind of a spice in it and she puts a cloth over it so she keeps the smoke and between her legs and she keeps talking to me like she's showering like this.

1:40:03I'm like, okay. And after Quoio, the tall guy comes in and suddenly I'm not sure if I'm allowed. Is that okay? Is she taking a shower with me? Is that bad? And I'm like, sorry, Quoio. Oh, fine. Oh, okay. And after he says, me too, I need to clean up. Oh, okay. You're going to take like a smoke shower? He says, no, I'm going to put fat on me. I'm like, what do you mean fat? He says, look at my necklace because they have big necklaces. I have no fat on my necklace anymore. Look. I'm trying to understand what he's talking about. I'm like, okay, you don't have fat on your necklace. And I said, what do you mean?

1:40:36He says, look, I need my fat. And he takes a little bowl of animal fat mixed with rotten milk and it's black and oily and it smells super bad. That was my next question. Yeah. And he puts like his oil like this. And I'm like, okay. He says, you see, it's much better. Now I'm ready for action. Exactly. And I was like, okay, but what happens if you don't do that? He says, everybody's going to laugh at me. I cannot just get out like this. What will I look like? I didn't notice you're always beautiful. Yeah, yeah. Wow. This is so fascinating for me. The reality that human beings conceptualize a reality and believe in it, and this is the standard.

1:41:17You have to see that to believe. It's like a smoke shower for lady parts, and I need to wear all my fat otherwise. It's like going out with no pants on. It's the same thing. The smell in that marital bedroom has got to be just next level. It's quite interesting. That tribe had some crazy rituals. There was a coming-of-age ritual. I meant to talk about this earlier. It included having cow intestines put on her head, but then they removed two of her lower teeth with a rock and a stick hammer, and then they rubbed cow dung in her hair. I felt bad for that girl. She had quite a day. Another really interesting story.

1:41:57these younger girls, they wanted to become real women. So in this transition, they need to do a couple of things and switch their hair around. So the hair configuration indicates where you are in the social structure. So when you're a young lady and you have the braids coming like horns at the front, it's because you're still a kid. When it flips and when you change the hair, for women, for men is different. Now you are a real woman. They were doing this ritual of just before changing their hair. First, you must kill a cow. You must take the skin of the stomach. One of the chief of the village must read the future inside the skin.

1:42:40Oh yeah, I forgot about that part. Yeah, you must read the future inside the cow's intestines and skin and blood. And after you take that, you put it on top of their head for one day. After that, they must remove two teeth. The bottom two teeth. Bottom two teeth. And the way they do that is they call the dentist. But the dentist is just a guy. With a rock and a stick. With a rock. And they go like this and they knock the two teeth. And I was like, okay, we're going to assist. That's a huge privilege. It's not stage or nothing. It's real. But my cameraman is very sensitive. He's very respectful.

1:43:16He might be in the wrong gig if he's sensitive. He was like, I cannot film Batman. man. I'm like, what do you mean? He says, I cannot put my camera in his face. Like she's getting her feet broken. We need to film that. It's a unique thing that we're here for that. And we asked and they say it was fine. And he was like, not filming that. And I had to stop everything. I was like, hang on. And his name is also Guillaume. Asmia's like, Guillaume, get yourself together, man. Come on. We need to film that. I convinced him, but he says, I cannot get too close because I cannot, It's too offensive. I'm like, okay, like Zoom.

1:43:51Use the Zoom. Just use the Zoom. Yeah, she was having quite a day. I mean, you feel bad for these people. Oh, yeah. Because that is extremely painful. And then they make her all dirty with the cow intestines and the dung. But the funny thing is that the day after, they're so happy. She's happy. They're like, I'm a real woman now. And they're so proud of themselves. And you're like, so everything was fine. Everything you've done yesterday, breaking your face and all that stuff. Yeah. You know, it gets you thinking. Do we have transitions here? How do we move on with our lives? What's the social structure or the rituals that push us from one phase of your life to another?

1:44:28We don't really have that. So it's be happy, have success, be successful in your life. But it's not really clear on how to do that in our culture. In other cultures, it's clear. And so, yes, it looks like it doesn't make sense for us and it's tough and it's suffering. But for them, they're proud. I've never heard someone of my entourage saying like, I wish I'm going to be circumcised with rock. But young men ask for that because they want to be in that club of real men. So it's quite fascinating. So what's the next project, man? What are you working on now that you could talk about? I'm working with my wife and I would like to show the origin of love, the origin of men-women relationships.

1:45:14And I would like to understand in the most remote places in the world how the selection happens, how a man select a woman, how a man select a man, and how they build a relationship together. So the origin of love, the origin of intimate relationship, and how the environment influence what kind of partner you choose. So depending on where you live, what are the challenges, depending on the environment, you're going to need certain skills and it influence who you're going to partner up with. Hunting skills, kidnapping skills. All kinds of skills. You know what we're talking about? There are all kinds of ways to be in love, to be intimate, to get married, and to have a long-term relationship.

1:45:57And I want to go back to figure out what's in common for all humans. That'll be super interesting, man. I feel like the smoke shower might make another appearance of you're doing a show like that. It's going to come back for sure. It's going to come back for sure. Man, thanks for coming. I really am so glad we finally got to do this. I would ask where people can see the show, and I know people are going to ask me, but I know it's also only in French. So I had to watch it with subtitles, which it's not publicly available. Basically, your wife made me that package to watch. So where can people who speak French watch the show?

1:46:29I would say I think it's fun to watch even though you don't speak. French. Forget about the language. Just feel the experience, feel the looks, especially if someone have listened to our interview to get the spirit of what we're going to look for. People will have fun. I think you don't need to understand all the language. So you just go on TV5 and it's all free. It's all online. And there are eight episodes in all different climates, hunting with eagles and minus 40 and all kinds of things. So TV5, it's called Tribal. It's all free, so it's accessible. We'll link to that in the show notes. We may need your help finding that link because I don't think that Bob speaks French.

1:47:12But yeah, that'll be fun because people are going to go like, man, I got to see this. And I agree. I think you could totally watch it without speaking French. Honestly, there were plenty of times where I had to go back and read the subtitles. But after this conversation, you have enough background, you could just play it and get it 90 % of what's going on. Now that you know about the smoke shower, you won't be left in the dark. Man, thank you very much. Thank you so much for inviting me. It's an honor. He's eating baboon hands in the wild. You're reading Uber Eats and still making bad decisions.

1:47:40So what do we take away from all this? Well, aside from the fact that most of us wouldn't last six hours out there without crying, bargaining and trying to Venmo someone for help, there's something kind of wild about it. No pun intended. There are communities with no shared language, no shared culture, no technology. And Trust gets built. Friendships form. People teach you how to survive. And in some cases, how to not die immediately from doing something incredibly stupid. Meanwhile, back home, we can't even make eye contact with our neighbors. So maybe the lesson here isn't go wander into the wilderness with a chicken and a dream.

1:48:13Maybe it's be a little more curious, be a little more humble, and maybe don't assume you understand how the world works just because you got Wi-Fi. Or, I don't know, stay home and listen to podcasts where other people almost die for your entertainment and education. That works too. All things Guillaume Delude will be in the show notes on the website. Advertisers, deals, discount codes, ways to support this show all on the website as well at jordanharbinger.com slash deals. Please consider supporting those who support the show. Don't forget about 6 Minute Networking as well over at 6minutenetworking.com.

1:48:43I'm at jordanharbinger on Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. And this show is created in association with Podcast One. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Tata Sidlowskis, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi. Remember, we rise by lifting others. The fee for the show is you share it with friends when you find something useful or interesting. In fact, the greatest compliment you can give us is to share the show with those you care about. If you know somebody who's interested in, I don't know, wildlife, Nat Geo stuff, uncontacted tribes, these aren't quite uncontacted, but you know what I mean, share this episode with them.

1:49:14In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn. And we'll see you next time.

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