Bull jumping

Bull Jumping is the coming-of-age ceremony for the young men of the Hamar tribe in southern Ethiopia. The young man is challenged to successfully walk/run 4 times across the backs of a line of 7-10 cattle. His success determines whether he is ready to join the ranks of the adults in his tribal group, to own cattle and to marry. If he falls through the row of bulls he is required to repeat the challenge until it is completed successfully. The ceremony depends on the involvement of the community as a whole. The women of the tribe dance with silver bells around their legs and blow brass horns for a number of hours before the young man jumps the bulls. The men of the tribe organise the cattle and supervise the actual jumping which only takes about the last 30 minutes of what is a 3-4 hour (or possibly more) ceremony. The most upsetting part of the event, and one that was hard to watch (or to fathom from a 21st century perspective), was the ceremonial whipping of the tribe’s female members which left their backs bloodied and scarred. While this activity would make most of us cringe and must have been incredibly painful, the practice was embraced and encouraged by the women subjected to the beatings. In fact, the women taunted the men to strike their bodies with long and supple switches which appeared to have been made from the surrounding trees. Enduring the pain, amid dancing and cheers, is seen as a sign of love and loyalty toward their male relatives who are forever indebted to the women after the ceremony is over. Based on information at: https://newflowerethiopia.wordpress.com/2013/02/10/bull-jumping-ceremony/, http://www.refinery29.com/2016/04/107835/ethiopia-bull-jumping-ceremony-whipping and http://www.bbc.co.uk/tribe/tribes/hamar/. This bull jumping ceremony was held on Hamar tribal lands about 30 km from the southern Ethiopian town of Turmi (~50 km north of the Kenyan border). Our guide negotiated a fee with the family group to enable us to take photographs. We hired a driver and a 4WD to navigate the bush track which eventually petered out about 2-3 km from the ceremonial site. At this point, the driver took to the dry, sandy creek bed. Luckily there was no water coming from the other direction.