BEAUTIFUL CULTURAL TRADITIONS

 BEAUTIFUL............


In 2003, a German film crew followed a nomadic family in Mongolia's Gobi Desert. The film, The Story of the Weeping Camel, was nominated for an Oscar.

A mother camel had rejected her newborn after a brutal two-day labour. Without her milk, the calf would die.

The family knew one option. They sent their two young sons on a journey across the desert to find a musician who could perform a ritual called Hoos, a chanting ceremony passed down for centuries specifically for this moment. The musician came. The ritual was performed. The mother camel wept real tears and turned to her calf for the first time.

The film crew had gone to document a way of life. They had no idea they would capture that.

The Mongolian "Hoos" (or Khuush) ritual is an ancient, unique musical tradition practiced by Mongolian nomads to help a mother camel accept a rejected or orphaned calf. To save the calf, the nomads perform a "coaxing ritual." A musician plays the morin khuur (horsehead fiddle) or a flute, while a singer repeatedly chants the word "Khuus, khuus, khuus" in a rhythmic, soothing melody.

UNESCO added this ritual to its list of "Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding" in 2015.

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