'On our own territory'

"Silently, he raised a blow gun to his lips and exhaled in a swift, sudden puff. Seconds later, a large monkey fell through the foliage, landing on the forest floor where Njibe's son and nephew rushed to retrieve it. Later that night, they would sit together around a glowing fire and share a meal reminiscent of the ones Njibe had eaten as a child."

"For centuries, the Nukak had lived in isolation in the Amazon rainforest that blankets Colombia's south, sustained by hunting and gathering. They were once considered Colombia's last remaining nomadic tribe. But as outsiders press further into the Colombian Amazon, they have encroached on Indigenous lands, destroying the forest and threatening the Nukak's traditional lifestyle. In the 1980s, settlers and armed rebels started to invade Nukak lands in large numbers, bringing violence and diseases that decimated the tribe."

Jedeku Njibe hunts with a blow gun and shares ancestral meals, embodying a return to traditional Nukak subsistence. For centuries the Nukak lived in isolation in Colombia's southern Amazon, sustaining themselves through hunting and gathering and practicing a nomadic lifestyle. Encroachment by outsiders has destroyed forest habitat and undermined those traditions. In the 1980s settlers and armed rebels invaded Nukak territory, bringing violence and disease that decimated the population and forced survivors to flee. Njibe was a teenager during those displacements. More than four decades later Nukak leaders are reclaiming ancestral lands and attempting to reestablish traditional ways of life.

Read at www.aljazeera.com