David Choe Went Baboon Hunting with the Hadza People of Tanzania

So I'm in my fucking underwear and I'm living on top of a rock in this cave. And the oldest guy in the village is, you know, when he starts talking, it's like I'm in like Lion King. He's like, when I was young and all, you know, I have a translator with me. He's translating Hadzabe to Swahili to English. He's like elephants, lions, hippos, like everywhere. And like it was like a buffet. We just wake up. We could kill anything. And in my lifetime, that has been gone. It's gone. It's like there's very few animals left to hunt and the ones that are like they're endangered. You can't kill them. So life there is very, very hard. And they go, you want to hunt with us? And I'm like, dude, look at my body. Do I look like? And there was like a Catholic priest that set up a mission in that area. And he's been I met him. He's been trying to convert the Hadza to Catholic Catholicism for 20 years. And he's like, they use the Bible pages to smoke weed. So what do they hunt with bow and arrow like homemade bow and arrow homemade bow and arrow like like just they take this wood. And they spent all day making the arrows. Yep. They use their show you. Yeah. I'll show you how they learn how to make it. And then they use their teeth to get know that guy. That might be Rasuli. And then they there's a plant that they they harvest and they do all this stuff to it. And then that's the poison that they put on the tip of the arrow. And these guys. Yep. There it is. How crazy it is to think that this is how people hunted. Dude, I live long as time. I live. I live like this for fucking months, man. It was like so you did this as well. Dude. So first first day of the hunt, they're like, do they teach you how to shoot a bow first? Dude, my bow shooting is so off. And yeah, so we practice had you had shot a bow in the past. I've never shot a bow in my life. There's one of these one of these guys. See it. It almost looks like a toy. Like you think it wouldn't work. There's one guy in the village, Shawnee, that's so strong that he could shoot the arrow through the fucking kudu. It was up. And I was like, you're fucking a super back muscles in that mother. Oh my God. They're fucking ripped, dude. My God. That guy is Jack. They're ripped. They have six. So they have really very strong bow. So pulling them back is probably tremendous. Like back muscle. Everyone knows how to hunt. The kids know how to hunt. They use them for the feathers at the end of. I know. The one that's. Which guy? No. Down. Yeah, that guy. Yep. I stayed with that guy. Whoa, really? Yeah. He's older now. See the cuts on his face. I have that. They cut my face. Yeah. I asked them to because I like pain. For real. But look at that guy. Where's your cut? It's almost gone now. This was a. Damn, dude. But don't they look like supermodels? Like they're like really powerful. Yeah. I'm like just. And also you got to think of the amount of effort that they're doing crossfit classes every day. Right. I mean, think about just getting by as a hunter gatherer with their crazy bow that you have to pull back and you're running through the woods all the time. Like you have to be fit. It's unbelievable. What a crazy way to live. Yeah. Look at that. I mean, what's what are they using for the feathers for the fletchings? Do you know? Dude, these motherfuckers are so in tune with nature that they'll go. They'll make a bird sound and they're talking to the bird and the bird will show you where the honey is. What? Like and then there's a pack of 50 dogs following us and the dogs aren't pets. They're hunting tools. Right. The dogs are the first line of the defense. They sniff it out. And I'm like, this is this is mental. Right. It's like, oh, like I'm on a fucking insane experience right now. Never did I thought I would just wait. Why am I going home? So if I walk with one of the kids, who put an amazing it's a clicking language. It's like, like that kind of language. Did you learn any of it? Tiny bit. And of course I did a podcast where I speak. No more. No more. Imagine if they take that out of context. It turns out you're saying some really fucked up shit. I try. You got to be careful, right? If you're making up a language, like you might accidentally hit on some real shit there. I tried. I tried. Just say one or two forbidden words. So if I walk with one of the kids and it's like him giving me a tour of his house, like, oh, come to Joe's warehouse and he's showing me. He's like grabbing a snake and biting his head off. Oh my God. He's like, you want some thing? Being a tree. He just grabbed a snake and bit his head off? He takes out a slingshot, a pebble this big. Bam! Hits a fucking bush baby out of the tree. Breaks his legs, puts it here and it's like, snack for later. Everything is talking. It looks like they're just goofing off and playing, but they have like, must, they have some what do you call it? Microbes and gut biome kind of things in their stomach that no one else on the planet has. So the translator is explaining to me, Canadian scientists come and literally steal their shit. They find them and they steal their shit and I'm like, their actual poop, their actual poop, get their bio because there's biomes in there that don't exist anywhere. Secret to a healthier. They might have hidden in the Hadza diet. If you Google steal African shit, I bet you it'll come up. See, look, there it is. So this, see the bees on his fucking head. They're lighting him up and he's eating the honeycomb anyway. And it does nothing to him. Really? So we go climb, yeah, come on, climb the tree. Guy sticks his fucking hand in the tree, scoops that out, starts eating it like it's a fucking hamburger. Bees, and I'm like, bro, I'm cool. No, no, no, come on, come on. Like we've been, there's a kid doing this, right? That kid's, I go in, one sting. Ah! My fucking hand inflates to like a Mickey Mouse. Like it's just, I'm like, you've been getting stung. Since you were a kid, so you're like immune to it. And they're just. It doesn't bother them. It doesn't bother them. They're, they're fine with it and their body's also gotten immune to it. Right. That's crazy. They're biting that honeycomb like it's a snack and all those bees are on his head, his hands. And the thing you never see in all the National Geographic and all the nature documentaries is that it's always serious. And here's the Hadza warrior and here's, you know, whatever Nate. These guys crack, you know, they're like, do you want to, do you want to come with us tomorrow? Like none of your eating cliff bars and hanging back. Like you want to, I'm like, yeah, I'm in. Okay. We leave at first, you know, the second. How are they saying this all to you? I have the translator with me. Okay. Okay. He, he like works with them and the, you know, it's like worst case scenario when they, they don't do food. This is the sad part. They do the fake show for the tourists. Like the tourists come in, usually European, and then they put on the fake. It's not fake. It's real, but they dress up and do like dances and stuff and they give them money. So I wake up at, you know, five, five 30 first noise and then laughter. I'm like, are these fuckers doing fart jokes at five in the morning? And that's the thing that people don't realize is when you don't have TV, internet, entertainment, and you're just with your family and your homies all day, you're bored as fuck. So they joke morning till night. Like, I don't know what they're saying. They're like, after, after someone cuts a fart joke. And I'm like, all right, let's go. So you saw the pictures. They're ripped back muscles, six packs. The kids have six packs. I was very out of shape. I'm still out of shape, but I was the most out of shape. And think about waking up at five 30 in the morning. And the thing that's the final animal that's like kind of left is baboons. They call, they almost call them in that part of Africa, like the baboon men, because that's what they eat. It tastes horrible to me. Baboons look human. So we're in a cave. Men sleeping on the top, women on the bottom. We wake up, there's another cave and you see, oh, there's people in that cave. No, they're baboons. And they're pointing at us. They're pointing. They're like, look, they're coming. So I'm like, this shit is crazy. We're hunting baboons. They're like, there's tons of meat on them. We're going to, it's enough to feed our family. Think about like running again. I was pretty fast in high school. I could do the 50 pretty quick. I can't run at top speed for hours. And I got these. I'm drinking water. And in this environment, it's an advantage to have black skin because it's cooling. These guys aren't sweating. I'm like, what's going on? We've been running for five hours. You guys aren't sweating. The fuck? And they don't get tired. And they'll just start digging a hole and drink like a handful of brown water. And that's enough for them. And I'm like, dude, what the fuck? And they're telling the translator, this motherfucker looks like he's never caught anything in his life. And he's like, he hasn't. And to me, I'm an alien, right? They go, he gets his food from supermarkets. What's that? They hunt the food for him. They cut it up and package it and sell it. They don't believe it. Right. And they're like, hey, you guys, you look like a fucking supermodel. Can I bring you to America and do a fashion thing and get you guys paid? And why would we want to go to America? Tell me what you know about America. Isn't that the place where people jump off buildings to kill themselves? Like that concept is so foreign that when someone explains suicide to them, I was like, oh my God, they don't. And in the time that I'm there, like I said, that first week is withdrawal. I'm like, fuck, where's my phone? And then all of it goes away. Right. I'm not thinking about any of my addictions. I'm not thinking about like, I feel peace. I'm not, I'm not miserable. My depression goes away. And I go morning till night. You wake up, you hunt for food, you get home celebration. Everyone's happy that the men brought the food back. The women, you know, gathered the berries. We have a big dinner celebration because every meal you got to be grateful for. Dance party by the fire and you're out a couple of fart jokes and you're out. Repeat the next day. There's no time to be like bored and sad and upset and worried about some bullshit. And so I'm trying to keep up with these guys. You know, they're they're running at top speed. Like say this is say these are the baboons on top of the they're doing a perimeter. They're doing OK. We're going to come up all the sides and the and the and the dogs are on the forefront. Right. They're running faster. There's a guy named Ali Ali Ane. He's got some dreads. He's he's the the village, the tribe. We spot head. He's got the Bible. He's rolling joints for everyone. He's about 50 feet behind. You know, he's running at like a he's not doing this. He's like he's got I'm maybe like two, 300 feet behind this. So they're they're trying to like, you know, come on. So he's running and rolling joints. He's running, rolling joints and. You done any running before this? Not really, man. I'm a sprinter. I don't I can't I don't have any. You're doing this for hours. Oh, my God. I almost blacked out. How many miles you think you were running? Dude, because they're they're they're like going back and forth. We're like, I'm like, dude, I'm just going to chill here. They just run everywhere, run everywhere, just running. And, you know, they don't some of them have shoes like they make homemade shoes, but some of them don't. It's just barefoot. And I'm there run. It's the it's the dry bush. Right. So there's like plants that have like thorns and like it looks like this on them, just like that white scratch to me. I'm getting cut open. I'm like bleeding everywhere. Ah, their skin stuff. And they're just fucking just clowning me to it. They're clowning me. They're like, bro, how did you ever survive? And I'm like, I'm like, come on, come on, guys. I put a GoPro on the dog. So I go back and I watch it. The baboon is like a human, like it's talking. Get the fuck away from me. The fuck away. The baboons running the dog. Fuck you. They hunt him with dogs. He gets hit right here bleeding. So he's leaving a trail of blood that fucking hypes up the tribe. Let's go. We got him. He's hit. The dog gets his nuts. SAC rips his fucking dick off. I'm running. The guy holds up his nuts. He's like, look, we got the nuts. I'm like, why you show me that? We're getting close. They finally fucking hit the guy like sort of here. And you're saying the guy too. You're not just saying the baboon. You're saying it hit the guy. It looks human, man. God, it does, right? It looks real close. He backs into a tree. Like a dog human though. Yeah. And all the dogs, the dogs are dope. I love these dogs so much. They're all hunting dogs. So they all have scars and fucking tails missing. Because the baboons have fangs. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. They pick the dogs up and they rip a chunk off. Oh my God. And these dogs are so hardcore that there's a dog that had one leg missing. There's a dog that you could see his ribs and they're still down to hunt. Oh my God. Like they're in the back with me, but they're still like, I want to show value that, you know, because I talked, I interviewed each person in the tribe and I said, what is the happiest day of your life? And they all had the same answer. The day that I hunted the biggest animal and I got to feed everyone and I was the hero. So I'm one. These are all baboons for how long? How long have they been only hunting baboons? I mean, it's been for a few years now. I mean, they'll hunt anything. They'll kill anything. Right. And there's nothing left but baboons just recently. It's getting to just that and even even then, because this day, that that day that I was on my first hunt, because there was many days we hunted where we didn't catch anything. And that's like super downer for them. But this is my first hunt. I had the GoPro. The guy shot. He backs into a tree like his last stand and the dogs just start ripping his guts out and start fucking. You know, and I'm watching this and he's like and it's like he's going, fuck you. Fuck you. And he's just like he's like picking dogs up, throwing them. Oh my God. And then he just come up and they go right in his chest. He's dead. This is all on GoPro. I wasn't even close. I was like, I was like, wait up, guys. Fuck. They tie the foot and the leg and they make a backpack. That's how they carry it. So they caught four that day. So they bring it back to the village. I don't know if you saw that picture. I brought my top ramen with me. So I was like, they don't waste a part of this thing. The person that killed it gets to eat the dick and the balls. They eat the head. They eat the brains. They turn the fur into like jackets and they just ate the brains, dude. So at night, I thought dinner time was over. Think about it. How much protein and nutrition is in the brain, right? And it's the final thing, right? They stew the head that's in that pot. And so the brain gets cooked and then it's like a delicacy at the end. They like tap a hole in and it's, you know, they have black skin. Like I remember like it was fire. It was in the cave. It's nighttime. And I hear, I just hear eating. I turn my flashlight on and I see like the whole tribe just chowing the brains at the end. They're like, this is our favorite part. And they're saving for the end. Yeah. And they're just like, and then so it's all this white brains like streaked on their face. And I'm like, yo, you want to get on this? Give me some of that brain. So I had some brain and I ate everything. I mean, it's, there it is. Oh my God. Doesn't that look like a person? That's so intense. So once the fur is on the screen, just no. Yeah, good. Once the, the fur. Look this is fucking like, look, I have some trouble. This I'm just not going to for this. Okay. Well, let me just say this. If that's how hardcore this picture is, right? You can find it. Yeah. I can find it easily. Look for like, like you want to talk about this is life or death. This is, you know, I get it. I understand. So when, when, but I'm saying it is intense and there is a thing about primate brains, prions, prion diseases that you get, they find them in cannibals. So there's something about eating a human. I'm smoking. Humans eating human brains. Oh, so they did get a bird there. Yeah. So sometimes they get birds too. So I am, but they're eating mostly baboons. I eat, I tasted it. I wasn't eating it. I'm like, I have a million cliff bars in my backpack. I know that is so intense. There's the dogs. When that guy carry a baboon on his back, like the way you're describing it is so intense. They got a, some sort of an antelope or something there and then they're drinking out of that water. But they're smoking weed with the Bible. There it is. Dude, look at this fucking guy. So I pass out. There's nothing left in the gas tank. I pass out and the next day I'm like, okay, like, like I'm becoming a man. They're like, did you eat the actual baboon meat as well? I ate the baboon meat. It's not for me. It's and I eat everything. What it tastes like. I've never eaten a human, but I'm imagining that's what a human would taste like. It was just, I don't know, gamey. That's the only, it's, it was just, it was strong, but, um, well, you gotta think of the physical strength of those animals and how tough their meat must be and all the testosterone and everything is being released. It didn't taste good, but they loved it. So, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.