They live on the seas of Southeast Asia, drifting in boats at sea and do not even have a homeland of their own. They have little sense of time and age – almost no clocks, calendars, birthdays and the like. They evolved to live at sea, with internal organs and innate abilities unlike ours. That is the Bajau – the last “mermaid” race in the world.
History of the Bajau
An ethnic group of Malay descent, the Bajau have lived almost exclusively on water for centuries. While other “sea nomad” groups have existed for a long time in history, the Bajau may be the last sea-dwelling tribe to survive to this day.
The Bajau inhabit Southeast Asia, specifically the waters southwest of the Philippines. As migrants, they live drifting from place to place and are not tied literally or figuratively to any country.
The life of the Bajau is associated with the sea
With no official state records or even much recorded history, the story of this “mermaid” race is rooted in their own unique folk and cultural traditions, with a history of tribes are passed down orally from generation to generation.
One of the interesting stories they told was about a man named Bajau – a man with a large body. People in the tribe often follow him into the water because his body mass will take up enough space for the river water to overflow, making it easier for people to catch fish.
Over time, the other tribes became jealous of the advantage he gave his people, and plotted to kill him by throwing poison arrows at Bajau. However, he miraculously survived, causing the other tribes to gradually give up. Thanks to that, the Bajau people continue to live to this day.
Master of the ocean
Making a living mainly by fishing, the Bajau live in houses on boats called lepas, they often come ashore to trade or seek shelter during storms. In addition, when they do not live on boats, they often live in small stilt houses built on the water.
Because they were exposed to seawater so often and so early, they developed an incomparable mastery of the ocean. Children of the tribe learn to swim from a young age and start fishing and hunting from the age of 8. As a result, most of the Bajau are professional divers. They can dive to a depth of more than 60m under the sea and hold their breath for many minutes.
From adults to children belonging to the tribe can all scuba dive and catch fish with just a few simple tools
And yet, their bodies also evolved to adapt to the sea. Research published in the journal Cell in 2018 found that the Bajau have a spleen that is 50% larger than the average person living in neighboring areas.
When a person dives into the water, the spleen contracts and an amount of red blood cells containing oxygen are released into the bloodstream. A larger spleen means a larger reserve of red blood cells in the body, thus providing more oxygen when underwater.
Houses built by the Bajau on the sea
In addition, the Bajau also developed remarkable underwater vision. These skills give the tribesmen an advantage when hunting for pearls, sea cucumbers, and other obscure species.
Every day, the Bajau will spend many hours in the water hunting, and the only thing that makes their diving job easier is a wooden goggles, they don’t even have diving suits or propellers. Because of spending so much time in the water, their eardrums are affected, many believe they intentionally punctured the eardrum to make diving easier.
Today’s Bajau
Along with the development of society, more and more Bajau people are moving to live on land (some groups have lived on land for a long time because there is no single criterion to completely define Bajau people). .
For various reasons, the current generation of Bajau may be the last to live entirely at sea. High competition for fishing forced the Bajau to use more commercial tactics, including the use of cyanide and dynamite. In addition, they also switched to using heavier wood to make boats because the traditional wood is threatened with extinction. These new boats require an engine to operate, which means they will have to spend more money on fuel.
Over time, the Bajau spent more time on land than in the past
The stigma associated with nomadic living also forces many “mermaids” to give up their way of life. They are gradually accepted by the surrounding countries and allow access to aid programs from the government that they have never received before.
For the Bajau, though, fishing is more than just a livelihood, and water is not just a resource. At the heart of their cultural identity is the relationship between the ocean and people. So when it comes to preserving the Bajau people, we are not only preserving the people, but also preserving the culture and the sea they have called home for centuries.