Ever heard of "Steam" ?

smokerscully1 · Post by **smokerscully1** » Wed Jan 30, 2008 7:15 pm

Just saw something neat here on the boob tube --Discovery channel--
some guy is spending some time with a tribe of natives somewhere in PuaPua New Guinea. These people have only recently been in contact with white missionarys and are trying very hard to keep to their original subsistance lifestyle. Besides hunting for wild pigs and harvesting Sago Palm these natives show this guy how they make "steam". It showed the Natives boiling wine they made from Palm juice in an old outboard motor gas can--wood fire underneath and just a small piece of some kinda coiled pipe for a condenser. Looks like it tastes pretty bad but was prolly very strong. The commentator asks the chief how long they have been distilling "steam" like it was some kinda ancient custom or something. The chief tells the guy one of their young men showed them how to do it 2 years ago when he came home to visit after he had been away at school.

I found that segment of the show very educational on many levels--I'm a little disturbed by it also.

Anyonelse see it? I didn't catch the name of the show.

alice · Post by **alice** » Wed Jan 30, 2008 8:02 pm

Olgeta man i callim 'stim'. Yumas wokim bia long saksak, na kukim long pia insait long tin wantaim tuptup . Sapos stim i kam ausait, you baim long paip i tainim raun planti. Putim paip insait long narakain tin pulap wara......

Been a while since i spoke Tok Pisin, might be a bit rusty...

Old_Blue · Post by **Old_Blue** » Wed Jan 30, 2008 8:13 pm

Alice wrote:

Putim paip insait long narakain tin pulap wara

I believe you meant:

Putim paip insait long narakain tin paulep wara

Smokerscully1 wrote:

these natives show this guy how they make "steam"

That feller needs to stuff some copper mesh in the tube and then he can call it "drip".

alice · Post by **alice** » Thu Jan 31, 2008 12:52 am

Old_Blue wrote: I believe you meant:

Putim paip insait long narakain tin paulep wara

Nah, I got it right the first time. For those who are totally lost, Tok Pisin (or "Talk Pidgin") is the lingua franca of PNG. It's one of the most phonetically-derived languages on the planet for an english speaker (since that's where it came from).

Anyone who thinks the paragraph I posted earlier is gibberish could easily translate it by simply sounding the words out and looking for an equivalent in english. Like "pulap" = 'full up"

For example the sentence you quoted: "Putim paip insait long narakain tin pulap wara" translates to:"Put the pipe inside another kind of tin that's full up with water"

I learned Tok Pisin long before I spoke english, one of the benefits of being raised in a jungle village I suppose.

/ linguistics lesson
/showoff mode

Post by **HookLine** » Thu Jan 31, 2008 1:42 am

The (non-distilling) skills you find in this little community boggle my mind again and again.

Butch50 · Post by **Butch50** » Thu Jan 31, 2008 9:03 am

I hope hard liquor doesn't affect them the way it did the Native Americans.

smokerscully1 · Post by **smokerscully1** » Thu Jan 31, 2008 12:47 pm

Thats what bothered me about it too Butch.

We had a real sad thing here happen last nite in southern Saskatawan--Yellow Quill Reserve. Young guy gets drunk picks up his 2 daughters only 3 and 1 years old and decides to go visit the nieghbors--walks outside and falls down passed out. Temperature was minus 46 with 30mph winds--they found the guy frostbitten bad--but the 2 little girls died.

alice · Post by **alice** » Thu Jan 31, 2008 1:20 pm

Butch50 wrote:I hope hard liquor doesn't affect them the way it did the Native Americans.

Sadly, it has. Even when I was a kid you couldn't buy any alcohol (including beer) on Thursdays - that was the day most employees in the towns got paid, and before they stopped sales on that day, thursday night was an orgy of drunken violence, murder, thievery etc.

Butch50 · Post by **Butch50** » Thu Jan 31, 2008 1:54 pm

smokerscully1 wrote:Thats what bothered me about it too Butch.

We had a real sad thing here happen last nite in southern Saskatawan--Yellow Quill Reserve. Young guy gets drunk picks up his 2 daughters only 3 and 1 years old and decides to go visit the nieghbors--walks outside and falls down passed out. Temperature was minus 46 with 30mph winds--they found the guy frostbitten bad--but the 2 little girls died.

Aw no. That is a tragedy. My prayers go out to those children and their family.

alice wrote:Sadly, it has. Even when I was a kid you couldn't buy any alcohol (including beer) on Thursdays - that was the day most employees in the towns got paid, and before they stopped sales on that day, thursday night was an orgy of drunken violence, murder, thievery etc.

I have never heard a rational explanation of why alcohol is so difficult for some people to handle, and doesn't bother others at all - or why whole cultures/races have trouble with it. But it is a certain fact that there are entire peoples that can be ruined by it.

Old_Blue · Post by **Old_Blue** » Thu Jan 31, 2008 3:36 pm

Alice said:

For those who are totally lost, Tok Pisin (or "Talk Pidgin") is the lingua franca of PNG.

Well, I am (was) totally lost. Almost makes sense now.

I wasn't trying to make fun...actually I was... but I now stand corrected. Either way I didn't mean no harm. Hell, after a half century I still have problems with regular english or at least the american version of it.

That's sad about them children. Just breaks my heart.

Post by **blanikdog** » Thu Jan 31, 2008 3:41 pm

Butch50 wrote:I have never heard a rational explanation of why alcohol is so difficult for some people to handle, and doesn't bother others at all - or why whole cultures/races have trouble with it. But it is a certain fact that there are entire peoples that can be ruined by it.

One reason given for this problem is that some cultures on this planet have been drinking fermented beverages for some 10,000 years since 'civilization' began in the fertile crescent and have evolved to handle it.

Other folk had never had the stuff until we introduced it to them when we first invaded them several hundred years ago. Just as we introduced many other very nasty diseases which decimated many of those cultures.

blanik

Post by **blanikdog** » Thu Jan 31, 2008 3:44 pm

Nice pidgin, Alice.

blanik

alice · Post by **alice** » Thu Jan 31, 2008 4:12 pm

blanikdog wrote:Nice pidgin, Alice.

Tenkyu, wantok.

smokerscully1 · Post by **smokerscully1** » Thu Jan 31, 2008 4:28 pm

Blanik is right--A book by Dr Jared Diamond explains it rather well--"Guns, Germs and Steel"
The native people here in the Boreal Forest evolved with very few carbohydrates--they are used to assimilating only fat and protien and booze is mostly carbo.
I'm only part Indian and I have the same problem--if I drink I'm all Indian and I have one brother the same way. All six of my other brothers enjoy a good drink now and then with no problem at all.
I live in a very isolated place with very few people--I know virtually everyone who lives within a hundred miles of me--many of them are Indian and all of my employees are Indian and I know which one can handle a drink and which ones can't.
I have noticed that the drug of choice among the younger generation is either weed which I don't have a problem with or oxy-contin which I have a big problem with. Thank God, Meth hasn't made it here yet--hope it stays that way.

zymos · Post by **zymos** » Fri Feb 01, 2008 7:21 am

"I have never heard a rational explanation of why alcohol is so difficult for some people to handle, and doesn't bother others at all - or why whole cultures/races have trouble with it. "

Other than cultural reasons, there are genetic ones as well-different levels of alcohol dehydrogenase or other enzymes...

Butch50 · Post by **Butch50** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 10:49 am

I guess it is biological then? Whole ethnic divisions that don't have alcohol in their background and can't handle it, and then individuals in alcolhol cultures who have a biological susceptibility?

Chev · Post by **Chev** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 12:35 pm

Different races can be affected differently by consumption of alcohol:

Example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol_flush_reaction

Post by **rad14701** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 2:56 pm

zymos wrote:"I have never heard a rational explanation of why alcohol is so difficult for some people to handle, and doesn't bother others at all - or why whole cultures/races have trouble with it. "

Other than cultural reasons, there are genetic ones as well-different levels of alcohol dehydrogenase or other enzymes...

It's the same basic concept as bacteria and viruses... Like not drinking the water when you visit third world countries due to diarrhea causing bacterium... Or like how Cortez is blamed for killing off the Mayans with smallpox... Call it immunity, tolerance, or whatever... But, alcohol or no alcohol, I'm not gonna be drinking anything fermented from peoples spit any time soon...

Post by **blanikdog** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 4:07 pm

alice wrote:Tenkyu, wantok.

No problems, mate.

blanik

Butch50 · Post by **Butch50** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 8:19 pm

Call it immunity, tolerance, or whatever... But, alcohol or no alcohol, I'm not gonna be drinking anything fermented from peoples spit any time soon...

Stepped in what?

Post by **Dnderhead** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 8:32 pm

Never mind spit, just think of first runs "gasohol" yummy

alice · Post by **alice** » Sat Feb 02, 2008 8:40 pm

You just gotta be an ex-expat, blanik. Bepo yu stap long PNG?

Post by **schnell** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 3:29 pm

yupela got save long tok pisin!

mipela come long hap. (PNG)

and the pigs aren't "wild". they're definately owned by someone...

Post by **blanikdog** » Tue Feb 12, 2008 7:45 pm

alice wrote:You just gotta be an ex-expat, blanik. Bepo yu stap long PNG?

Not an ex-pat alice. My trade is an archaeologist and my wife is an anthropologist. We sorta just picked up stuff - so to speak - doing our research.

blanik