Present from ground (2): Ideas from scientists

At the seminar “The Habit of Eating Earth in Vietnam - Facts and Scientific Explanations”, social anthropologists, ethnologists, archaeologists, sinologists, culturists and humanists recently shared information on the ancient phenomenon.

 

The eating earth in Pa Te Villagers.

Revealing of 

reporter

 

Researching a story once in the northern highlands, Lao Dong reporter Do Doan Hoang stumbled upon mature women in Pa Te Village, Tuc Dan Ward, Tram Tau District, Yen Bai Province, eating soil in a cave behind the village.

 

The villagers unanimously asked Doan to keep their secret from others, revealing also that all pregnant women there eat soil as well. This, as they enthusiastically took chocolate-dark soil on the spot from the smooth ground.

 

Nobody in the village remembered how many people have eaten earth at the cave, nor when the tradition began, generations ago, they said

 

Animals as well eat earth from the cave, they said.

 

But, eating a handful himself, Hoang said he understood nothing of the draw, guessing only that the soil must have some mineral benefits, maybe iron, for pregnant women.

 

He left the explanation to scientists.

 

A Social Anthropologist chimes in

 

As the first scientist to research eating earth in Vietnam, Professor Le Nham Tuyet has named her study of the subject “Married Began from Earth”.

 

According to Ms Tuyet, the habit comes from the Hung Kings era (2879 to 258 BCE). In betrothal ceremonies, brides would bring with them a box of earth for her family-in-law to be, as a dowry. The couple would then eat together.

 

Ms Tuyet also learned in Linh Nam Chich Quai (Linh Nam’s Strange Stories), a sort of Vietnamese Book of Kings, that sometimes the earth could be changes by a box of salt, improving digestive qualities.

 

According to the chronicle, both salt and earth are closely related to human life. Salt is as warm as human relations and Earth is the source of life.

 

Studying folk culture, Ms Tuyet also found that the habit of eating soil had existed in people for many years, and a large number of mostly in rural people carry on the tradition.

 

Minorities nationwide, such as the Mon, Khome and Bana people all eat soil. TheKhang, a minority in Thuan Chau District, Son La Province, located to the north-western region of Vietnam, go so far as to dry mud on a cooking-fire, preserving it as a food source.

 

Bana people as well eat mud that has stagnated on ground after rain or flood, calling ot “poc-co-top” and praising it as delicious.

 

In Lap Thach District, Vinh Phu, many villagers know the practise, calling their unusual snack “as delicious as pig’s liver”, adding they eat “basketsfull”.

 

To Ms Tuyet, the ancient habit of eating soil has survived as a cultural behaviour and should be researched and protected by scientists as it fades with economic and social development.

 

A Pa Te villager shows Do Doan Hoang the cave where she eats soil.

 

And

of the archaeologists…

 

According to Tran Van Tan, official from the Research Institute of Geology and Mineral Resources (RIGMR), the habit of eating earth is a relatively recent discovery in Vietnam, but it has been known all over the world for a long time.

 

It is most popular in Cameroon, Angola, Congo, Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania.

 

A survey in Kenya recently found that 73% of 285 surveyed students have eaten earth, and in pregnant women the average is 56%. Scientific conferences have even named the practice “Geophagy”.

 

For geologists eating soil is a simple matter of humans and animals needing some such basic elements as protid, lipids, vitamins and minerals, which all exist in trees, earth and water.

 

In fact, chemists have made some medicines from earth, such as bicarbonat natri and aluminosillicat to treat stomach diseases.

 

Still, Mr Tan said, elements in the earth are sometimes not so good for eating, especially with increased pollution. Eating earth, he said, should be researched and controlled by scientists.

 

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