I found the most horrifying aspect of the entire book was when the other tribe ate one of the Sawi's peace child as a way to keep the peace lasting. It made sense in a sick, twisted kind of way; eating the child made the child a part of everyone in the community. At the same time, what kind of sense is it to eat a baby?
The next part of Sawi culture that interested me was how it was possible, after so much fighting, for someone to give up a child and BAM, instant peace. I dont think I've ever seen people get nearly mad enough to think about killing someone. The Sawi people go from knifing and shooting each other to complete peace. After all, it is part of their society to betray other people. It just interests me how quickly feelings can change.
The next part of Sawi culture is pretty normal in our society today. People dont go looking for change. The Sawi culture just took it to a new extreme by refusing to do anything different. They believed doing things different would result in, put simply, bad things happening to them. The Sawi even had a tradition to ingest some of the corpse after it had rotted a few days. Believe it or not, the Sawi were pretty excited to hear they didn't have to do that anymore after the missionaries came. Another part of change to Sawi had a hard time coping with was when the missionaries were trrying to revive a Sawi tribe member. Even though the man had not stopped breathing, the Sawi tribe wanted to bury the man because the witch doctor told them his soul had left his body. Even after days of the man living, the Sawi did not believe the missionaries. After the man was finally brought back out of a coma, they Sawi tribe's trust in the witch doctors was severely weakened. After reading through then entire book, it seems obvious the Sawi tribe did not like change, and until faced with a better option, they Sawi stuck with what they knew.
