If we want to be even more accurate, the Kayan tribe is actually part of the Kayan Lahwi tribe. Our website houses close to five decades of content and publishing. It remains to be seen though, whether the Padaung will eventually come are small and containable but this may change. [2], In the late 1980s and early 1990s due to conflict with the military regime in Myanmar, many Kayan tribes fled to the Thai border area. A Bad Last Impression: Looking Into The 5 Worst Series Finales Of All Time, Giant Clocks And Pickled Sharks (And Charity, Too): Heres What Billionaires Spend Their Money On. Padaung women bind their necks with heavy brass rings that alter the shape of the neck and shoulders. See Separate Article KALAW, TAUNGGYI AND SOUTHWESTERN SHAN STATE AND KAYAH STATE factsanddetails.com, National Geographic reported: Some women are rejecting the rings because the tradition has trapped them in what critics call human zoos mock villages where tourists buy tickets for a glimpse of these exotic women. "Padaung" is another name for their neck rings. I couldn't tell if she was joking. Unless she wishes to risk suffocation the Most of Chiangmai's trekking tour agencies displayed the women's pictures in front of their offices to attract tourists. [Source: National Geographic, 2008], Amit R. Paley wrote in the Washington Post, Some trekking companies and human rights groups consider the Padaung villages, which stretch across northern Thailand, to be "human zoos" that exploit the women. Since World War II, as the Padaung have become less isolated from neighboring Karen and Karenni, the neck spiraling process has been on the wane. For Thailands Padaung women, the choice is very narrow. The women were as breathtaking as I imagined. Because long necked women can't lean their head's back, they drink from straws. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). [1] They also face a plan to move their villages to a remote location on the border with Burma, where they believe they will be at risk from bandits. The Padaung, commonly known as the long-necked women, are refugees from Myanmar (formerly Burma) who are famous for their giraffelike appearance, which is produced by brass rings coiled around their necks. It does severely hamper mobility in conjunction with brass coils wound around the ankles and calves up to the knee. It is usually only removed to be replaced by a new or longer coil. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. Learn how and when to remove this template message, The clothing and accessories of the Ndebele, February 2017, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Neck_ring&oldid=1149426697, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles needing additional references from April 2023, All articles needing additional references, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 12 April 2023, at 04:56. As of September 1989, the Burmese Army on the Pai River has been getting its supplies from Thailand - trading for rice with Thai merchants and upgrading their arms with purchases from Thai black market weapons dealers. Answer (1 of 2): Not all Burmese females wear neck rings like this: They are a subgroup of Kayan people (Myanmar) (aka: Padaung which means copper neck) living at a small border town of Myanmar and Thai. When the news came out local business was outraged, the police were summoned and the Long Neck fugitives were brought back under arrest. There are about 7,000 Padaungs in Burma. Occasionally one or two Padaung women were brought to a town where tourists were permitted, such as Kalaw or Taunggyi in Shan State, so that tourists could observe and photograph them. Padaung women has always been punished by the removal of the rings, a fate almost literally, worse than death. It's that simple! Although many of the Kayan still participate in these traditional festivals, in the 19th century Italian missionaries worked amongst them for many years and today the majority of Kayan and Kayaw people are Roman Catholics. Many cultures and periods have made neck rings, with both males and females wearing them at various times. You feel very light and you have a little headache, like youve been wearing a heavy backpack and you suddenly take it off. The women also wear more brass loops around their legs which weigh up to 30 pounds. The custom of wearing neck rings is related to an ideal of beauty: an elongated neck. KAREN LIFE AND CULTURE factsanddetails.com ; TREKKING IN NORTHERN THAILAND, HILL TRIBES, ELEPHANTS AND LONG-NECKED WOMEN factsanddetails.com; KALAW, TAUNGGYI AND SOUTHWESTERN SHAN STATE AND KAYAH STATE factsanddetails.com, The Padaungs famous long-necked women wear brass coils not rings around their necks. Anthropologists have hypothesized that the rings protected women from becoming slaves, making them less attractive to other tribes. We prefer to live here rather than being sent back to MyanmarWe want food, clothes and other necessities. One woman who had worn the rings for over 40 years removed them. When Burmese military forces took control of Burma(now Myanmar) in 1962, they hoped to help modernize society there. After X-raying several long-necked women in Rangoon he discovered that the neck was not expanding. The weight of the brass pushes the collar bone down and compresses the rib cage. A symbol of wealth, position and beauty, the coils can stretch their necks over a foot and weigh over 20 pounds According to the Guinness Book of Records, the world record for longest neck 40 centimeters (15 inches) belonged to a Padaung woman. Additionally, the collar feels like an integral part of the body after ten or more years of continuous wear. The trekking tours then visited the Padaungs on Thai soil. Questions or comments, e-mail ajhays98@yahoo.com, Ethnic Minorities - Hill Tribes from the Golden Triangle. The chief of the village, a 52-year-old named Nanta Asung, told me that Thaijun was the only woman in the village who did not wear traditional dress and that her choice was unacceptable. Dont be quick to judge, thoughshe ultimately just did something other people use exercises and surgeries to achieve. All Rights Reserved. Rather the chins of the women are pushed up and their collarbones are pushed downwards by the weight of the coils, causing the shoulders to slope. Helen "Lee" Jayu, a Lisu shopkeeper from the same tribe as U Dee, said that all the Padaung are in Thailand under U Dee's patronage and that there are no problems as long as no one leaves the area. Parents of girls are often very happy and men like to marry long-necked women because of the money they will bring in. "This is a must. It didn't look like a village at all. At first glance, the Padaung appear to belong to a different continent than Asia, their green and purple headresses, white caftans and shining ornaments suggesting some African tribe or even the Plain Indians of old. The Padaung are an ethnic group related to the Karen and Karenni, indigenous only to the Kayah State of Burma. They also use dreams to make predictions. If you want to see them, you have to go to them. At the height of the tourist season (winter and spring, before the monsoon rains) several boatloads arrived at the Karenni base each day. [Source: Amit R. Paley, Washington Post, August 23, 2009 +++], Eventually we arrived at our main destination, the village of the long-necked women. In fact, one of the main reasons why some tribes choose to begin the practice when girls are young is because their bones are more pliant, making the desired results easier to achieve and with less pain. At the age of 5, girls in the Karen (or Kayan) and Padaung tribes of Myanmar are fitted with their first rings. The Padaung men were conspicuous by their absence, out in the fields tending crops. The coils, which are typically made of brass, weigh around four-and-a-half pounds to start with, and then more coils are added over time. If the girl accepts then the couple are now engaged. "He is very worried that visitors will stop coming," my guide, who served as my interpreter, told me as we left and headed to our own hut. "Padaung" means "long neck" in the Shan anguage. Marriages with in-laws or conflicting clans who have sworn not to marry for several generations is forbidden. This is a cruel punishment, as the cervical vertebrae become deformed after years of wearing and the neck muscles atrophy. Women are never supposed to remove the rings. It's becoming their own standard of beauty. The first brass rings are put on a young Padaung girl's neck at about five years of age in an important rite of passage which - in the case of non-Christian Padaung - is supervised by a village shaman who casts chicken bones to determine an auspicious date. Corrections? They don't speak any English so come prepared with some game or activity to keep them amused. Kayan Gebar, Kayan Kakhi and, sometimes, Bwe people (Kayaw). The coil weakens the neck muscles and often bruise and discolor the collarbone. [13] It includes the belief that the Kayan people are the result of a union between a female dragon and a male human/angel hybrid.[14]. All products featured on Urbo.com are independently selected by our editors. +++, After a dinner of chicken curry, raw pork and a jungle delicacy identified as minced mole, I asked our hostess if she felt forced to wear the costume because of visiting foreigners. Many women have removed the rings for medical examinations. When a young man has decided upon a girl, his parents will approach her parents with a gift. It is the reason why Kayan women have earned the moniker " long-necked women." Kayan women barely feel the weight of the brass since the ring feels like part of the body after several years of wear. "Padaung" are the rings they use. One 12-year-old girl told the New York Times she started wearing the coils when she was six and had 16 around her neck that cost $160. The first spiral, put on a girl at the age of five or so, is usually about four inches high; in approximately two years, another coil is added. They also wear coils on their legs. The Kayan residents in Mae Hong Son Province in Northern Thailand refer to themselves as Kayan and object to being called Padaung. The discoloration is more persistent. The Padaung women live in special villages in reasonably nice huts. Most agree it is a form of adornment and may have been a way of saving and showing off family wealth. Necklace Found On Ocean Floor Reveals True Love Story From Titanic, Origin Stories Of Your Favorite Holiday Figures: How We Got Cupid,The Easter Bunny, and Santa, How To Spot Multi-Level Marketing Scams, And How To Avoid Them, Caring For Houseplants: Tips, Tricks And Products You Need, Salvation Mountain And The Last Free City. The weight and pressure of the leg spirals can make walking slow and stiff, and the Padaung women have to contend with the challenges of steep mountain rice fields and ladders leading to their stilt-supported houses. This seems to have be a myth. In the mid-1980s, the Karenni rebels maintained a headquarters on the Pai River, just across the border from the Thai provincial capital of Mae Hong Son. Buying the coils is regarded as an investment. Some of the bamboo walls were stained blue where cloth had been hung to dry. Among the students from Kayah State in the refugee camp is a young Padaung man who has reportedly won a scholarship to Cambridge University and obtained the travel documents necessary to get there. In person they looked less like giraffes than swans, regal and elegant. +++, See Separate Article TREKKING IN NORTHERN THAILAND, HILL TRIBES, ELEPHANTS AND LONG-NECKED WOMEN factsanddetails.com. They did needlework and studiously ignored the fairgrounds who bought tickets to enter the enclosure and observe them. They are still featured in Mae Hong Son Resort advertisements, on Chiangmai trekking tour posters, and on Thai postcards that claim "the longnecked hill tribe is a minority that lives in the north of Thailand's mountains." The women told the local Karenni villagers that they would not continue the neck spiraling custom with their daughters - possibly influenced by Christian Karennis' opposition to the practice. She is the youngest of the three. [8] The alternative, an accelerated process at around the age of twelve, when girls first begin to compete for the attention of boys, is painful. One woman told the New York Times, It can be a bit boring and hot and it hurts when you first put it onWhen you take off the brass youre a little dizzy, and for one or two minutes you shouldnt walk. The process would continue with successive ring being added every two years. Some Padaung women have removed their rings after converting to Christianity, and others have simply rejected the practice as antiquated and cumbersome. Arrangements were made with Thai companies that ran "tribal trekking tours" out of the northern Thai city of Chiangmai. the Padaung women and their children could stay, however. She was even featured on an episode of the show My Strange Addiction because of her obsessive interested with neck elongation, though she eventually did have them removed. The tourists rarely stayed overnight, the usual visit to the Padaung camp consisting of a photo session of fewer than 30 minutes. One of the most striking of these groups is the Padaung. One Padaung woman told AP, It is not comfortable wearing these coils even while sleeping. Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings. There are about 10,000 people in the tribe. The first set of coils have a break at about the seventh rung above the clavicle to permit head mobility. Thai shelling drove the Burmese intruders back into Burma, but there were friendly meetings between Burmese and Thai officers at the time of the withdrawal. Wearing the rings doesnt just affect the collar bones, though. One woman who had worn the rings for over 40 years removed them. The length of the coil is gradually increased to as much as twenty turns. In southeast Asia, historians have been able to date the practice of using neck rings all the way back to the 11th century. Something of a tourist craze followed, and the Karenni rebels acceded to the demand by foreigners to see the Padaung women. We are denied education and the authorities will not let us go abroad, although some of us have been invited to leave for Finland and New Zealand. Without work papers or citizenship, the Kayan have little say over what happens to them. A study conducted in 2020 by researchers from Otsuma Womens . The Karenni base was easily accessible from the Thai side of the border by narrow, wooden motor boats. None of the Padaung I spoke with wished to return to Burma, but several expressed a desire for more freedom of movement. The Padaung women of Myanmar were famous for stretching their necksby means of coiled brass neck ringsto a length of about 15 inches (38 cm), pushing down the collarbone, compressing the rib cage, and pulling up about four thoracic vertebrae into the neck. The neck is a fairly sensitive area to begin with, so adding that amount of weight and pressure to it doesnt do great things for it. Unlike other tribes these Long-Knecked Karen rarely leave their villages. Many women have removed the rings for medical examinations. The article on the Kayan people states that this is "nonsense", and gives examples of accounts of when the rings are removed. From the craziest myths in human history to real stories that expose the untold truths behind married life and so much more-our mission at Urbo is to create intriguing content that youll not only enjoy reading, but want to share with the ones who mean the most to you. Although the Karennis retook the headquarters camp, some of the civilians remained in the refugee village on the Thai side, including the Padaung women. These were worn by various early cultures but are especially associated with the ancient Celts of the European Iron Age, where they were evidently a key indicator of wealth and status, mostly worn by men. [Source: Amit R. Paley, Washington Post, August 23, 2009 +++], Describing a trek that climaxed with a trip to a Padaung village Amit R. Paley wrote in the Washington Post, In the morning I scrambled up on an elephant for an hour-long ride that left me sore all over (pachyderms, in case you were wondering, are not ergonomically designed) and a hour-long trip down the Ping River on a bamboo raft precariously held together by strips of rubber tire (I thought all was lost when the raft guide fell into the water after we bumped over some nasty rapids, but he recovered and got us to shore). The Karenni rebels' introductory lecture tried to give the affair a political overtone, but when the boat tourists came ashore at the Padaung camp there was no pretense of "cultural exchange" or learning experience. Any content older than 10 years is archival and Cultural Survival does not necessarily agree with the content and word choice today. If we leave, we will be arrested," she said. "If you do not wear the rings, your soul will get ill and you can die." One of the Padaung women had gone back to her home area, but the two that remained were on call for tourist arrivals throughout the day. (We quickly returned to explain to the tribal chief that I was asking questions, not complaining, but, unsurprisingly, he did not issue a correction over the village intercom.) Inspired by a National Geographic documentary, a Los Angeles woman named Sydney V. Smith decided to have a set of neck rings fitted just for her. They call themselves Kekawngdu or Kayan, but other ethnic groups in Burma and foreigners know them as Padaung. Sign up today to stay informed about the latest news, Cultural Survival program updates, events and MORE 2022 Cultural Survival. ", In February 1989, following heavy fighting between Karenni rebels and the Burmese Army, which sent Karenni civilians over the border to Thailand in large numbers, Mae Hong Son's assistant governor, Somprath Saowapaiboon, announced that the Karenni refugees would be repatriated - by force if necessary - in March, along with student dissident refugees who had joined them on the border. Each home had a spacious, open terrace where the Padaung sat in the shade in front to their looms, spinning and weaving cotton textiles, blankets and tunics. If you are the copyright owner and would like this content removed from factsanddetails.com, please contact me. She takes off the rings once a year to clean the brass and her neck, but that's it. The Padaung have said that this practice originated to protect women from tigers, which often attack a victim by biting the neck. Most women prefer to wear the rings once their clavicle has been lowered, as the area of the neck and collarbone often becomes bruised and discolored. 1973 Peoples of the Earth: Southeast Asia. There were no men in sight and only a handful of tourists during my two-hour visit. Women of the Kayan Lahwi tribe are well known for wearing neck rings, brass coils that are placed around the neck, appearing to lengthen it. My head aches, and I feel like my neck can't support my head. Women of the Kayan tribes identify themselves by their forms of dress. Yes, people are being more reckless on the road, and no, youre not wrong for noticing. In their most distinctive custom, beginning at about five years of age, many Padaung . They also extend the necks of the women, making them very long. [3] Among the refugee camps set up there was a Long Neck section, which became a tourist site, self-sufficient on tourist revenue and not needing financial assistance.[4]. The rings are given to the women by their husbands and worn as a sign of faithfulness, and were once removed only after the women diedtoday, however, the women dont tend to wear them permanently. According to U Aung Roe (1999:21ss) Kayan number about 90,000 in Shan State (around the Pekhon Township area) about 20,000 around Thandaung kayin state, and 70,000 in Kayah State (around Demawso and Loikaw). It was just a tradition, they said. Download this stock image: Thailand: A Padaung (Long Neck Karen) woman after removing her neck rings for cleaning, village near Mae Hong Son. The upscale Mae Hong Sin Resort began to advertise "Padawn Hilltribe now available. In present times, the annual Kay Htein Bo festival is always accompanied by a reading of the chicken bones to predict the year ahead. She is also adorned with jewelry and ornaments of which the most outstanding and unusual are the thick rings of bronze around her neck, worn right up to beneath her chin. One of the ways they planned to do this was by eliminating what they considered to be primitive aspects of the culture, including neck elongation. During this festival, held in late March or early April, a Kay Htoe Boe pole is erected and participants dance around the pole. Thai and tribal entrepreneurs based in Chiangmai promoted visits to peoples such as the Lahu, Lisu, and Akha as an affordable and exotic travel experience. Most distinctive are the dozens of rattan rings that circle their waists. Men wear the basic Southeast Asian longji. Trekking was quite a growth industry at the time; small groups of tourists were crisscrossing northern Thailand on foot, in all-terrain vehicles, and even by elephant in order to visit the mountain villages of tribal people. That night an Australian family was paying $15 to sleep in his hut. Their only option is to stay or pay U Dee money to be returned to Burma. Mu Tu is one of the few women who knows how to . "We do it to put on a show for the foreigners and tourists!" The custom is dying out in traditional Pandaung villages in Myanmar, where people are so poor they prefer spend their hard earned money on rice rather than brass, but it is gaining new convert along the Thai border. As a result, the Burmese troops have been able to occupy the Karenni base instead of the usual burn-and-retreat strategy. As the coils are added they push the collar bone and ribs down, creating the appearance of a longer neck. Huai Seau Tao is a commercial village opened in 1995. With the takeover of Burma by General Ne Win's military dictatorship in 1962, however, insurgency flared in Kayah State, and raids by mountain-based Karenni rebels caused Loikaw and its environs to be closed to tourism. Another says that it was to protect women from being taken by men of rival tribes by giving them a less-appealing look. Reckless Drivers On The Rise Since The Pandemic Started. It is also an opportunity for Kayan from different villages to come together to maintain the solidarity of the tribe. Most women prefer to wear the rings once their clavicle has been lowered, as the area of the neck and collarbone often becomes bruised and discolored. [5] About 600 Kayan reside in the three villages open to tourists in Mae Hong Sorn, or in the Ban Mai Nai Soy refugee camp. Only married women are allowed to wear the rings, called dzilla. The custom requires that the girls who wear the neck rings start before puberty, in order to get the body used to them. The rings may appear cumbersome, but the Padaungs believe that beauty lies in a long neck, which is regarded as graceful as a swan's. The cushions were removed later on. We were ushered into a 50-square-yard collection of shacks where two dozen Padaung women sat and sewed or tried to sell their wares. In this way, the couple will love each other forever. Read More Mae Hong Son officials were not unaware of the Padaung women's worth as a tourist attraction. Due to the duration of their wear, the neck must be propped up with a brace until the muscles can recover their strength. It appears to lengthen the neck by deforming the clavicle. The custom is more than just a rare and strange expression of feminine beauty, the number and value of the rings confers status and respect on the wearers family. The town of Mae Hong Son and the surrounding province are inhabited mainly by Shan and tribal people related to ethnic groups of Burma, but there is a large Thai Army presence and a provincial administration that is mainly composed of ethnic Thai.