Culture and traditions of an indigenous group

As Taiwan is a country with rich culture, there are many different indigenous groups. There are total 14 indigenous groups. They are Saisiyat,Rukai,Puyama,Atayal,Amis,Bunun,Paiwan,Thao,Tsou,Kavalan,Truku,Sakizaya, Seediq and of course Yami.

Many of then maybe many people do not even have heard of, it can be cause of some of the groups are really small, or cause indigenous groups are not something the locals proud of, thus many of them want to hide their real identities, however now many young Taiwanese find the rich culture and heritage is their roots and important history of who they are, thus it have been slowly open up nowadays.

I will focus on introducing one of the indigenous groups to you, Yami, as Yami Tribe do have some relationship with me. My grandma herself is one of Yami tribesmen, since young she tells me lots of interesting stories that I have never heard of, it remains as a precious memory of me. Yami people are the unique indigenous group among all. The total population of Yami in Taiwan now is only 2,900. They name themselves ‘tao’ which means ‘people’.

Most of the Yami people do not live on Taiwan Island itself, many of them live on Taiwan’s south eastern coast, the Orchid Island. As Orchid Island is a small Island near Taiwan Island, and it’s surrounded by sea, Yami people have a culture called ‘flying fish Culture’. Every March flying fish will be sent to the sea near Orchid Island by the turning ‘kuroshiro current’ (black tide), thus fishing become the way of how Yami people survive. Many cuisines related to flying fish have also become the representative dish for Yami people. Yami people treat Flying Fish as a gift from heaven and they classified the fishers into three categories. According resources, they are:

“Old people fishes (only to be consumed by elders)

Men fishes (smelly, sandpaper like skin, prohibited to women)

Women fishes (tender texture flesh, for all to consume) “

This also shows the tradition of Yami people, in traditional family of Yami; man is the one provides food for the whole family. man have to catch all three type of fish for families with different age and gender.

Other significant food of Yami will be taro and sweet potato.

As fishing is so important to Yami, Boat is another essential for fishing, building of boat is very important to Yami people, a size of 10 people boat can take up to 3 consecutive years to build.

Yami people’s signature clothing will be In white and blue as it reflects the sea and marine life.

Yami people are the peace lovers; they are the only one indigenous group that do not practice head-hunting. They will throw small stones at each other when having a conflict and the issue counted as over if one side gets hurt.

When I was young, I remember Grandma always keeps food separately in different kind of containers. This is also an tradition of the Yami, they will design different containers for all kind of food.