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The world's only undersea people

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The world's only undersea people

A peculiar people who live in the water all year round, located in the southeast of the Asian continent, the Bajao people, they are the only underwater people in the world, with "sea gypsies" called, let's learn more about it. Apr 14, 2024

The only undersea people in the world


The Bajao, located on the sea between Filipino and Malasia, live in an area called Borneo. In their mythology, they were originally members of the Sultan's royal guard, and due to the loss of their escorted bride and their shameless return, they eventually became the Bajao tribe living in the water. The most special thing about this people is that they all live on the sea, their house is a wooden stake built up a simple hut on the sea, travel is by a boat, rely on the sea fish and seafood for a living.

Because they live in the sea, they do not have a fixed residence, will drift with the waves, such a social structure, there is naturally no system of education, their civilization relies on the oral transmission of the word. The children here do not need to carry their school bags to school every day, but have to learn various survival skills. First they learn how to swim in the wind and waves, and then they learn various fishing skills. Any adult Bajao is a master at unarmed diving, able to go deep underwater and walk as if they were on land. But strangely enough, once a Bajao gets above land, he gets vertigo, just like an ordinary person riding a boat for the first time.

In order to be able to adapt to the air pressure under the water, the Bajao people will poke their ear drums to reduce the pain under the water. So when outsiders communicate with them, they need to match the sign language for them to understand the exact meaning. The long time of living at sea has made the Bajao people thoroughly adapt to it, and in their opinion, living at sea is far more comfortable than on land. Due to the constant grinding in the sea, the Bajao's body has also changed. Their eyes are able to see the underwater images more clearly, even more clearly than on land, and there is no need to wear goggles at all.

In fact, the reason why they are drifting in the sea, the Bayao people also have hardships, they are a group of people without nationality and have not been recognized by any country. After being at sea for a long time, many of them get sick, but there is no way to get treatment on land, so they have to fight their luck to carry through. They are born ocean hunters. Very young children are good at building boats and making up fishing nets, and even when they are a little older, they can drive their canoes and go out to sea alone to catch octopus, lobsters and crabs. After the age of eight, Bajao people are able to catch fish by themselves.

The only reason for the Bayao to go ashore is to trade at the market, where they will sell the seafood they catch to people on land in exchange for some essential living materials. The long hours of living at sea have made the Bajao people's understanding of time and age gradually blurred, and they would only judge the date by the time of the tide. With the development of society, this way of life of the Bayao people is constantly facing difficulties. Professional government fishing teams are gradually encroaching on their living area, but they still have no way to return to the land.

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