Pictures included in this album were shot during a weeklong journey into the heart of the Bawm territories. The rains were coming to an uneventful end after a relatively dry monsoon, it was the perfect time for harvesting the first Jhum crop. After an overnight stay at Faruk Khua, near Banderban, I was ready to move to...wards the distant Bawm settlements beyond Roangchari on the other side of the Sangu River.

The Bawm-zo, began settling in the central and South-Eastern part of Bandarban district, in the last sixty years or so after independence from British colonial rule. The placement of the settlements is roughly analogous to the placement of ridges and alternating valleys followed by the course of the Sangu River and its tributaries. Older Bawm settlements - according to accounts by several elderly persons in their 70’s and 80’s - were clustered in an area about 40 kilometers along the Southern edge of Roangchari. It is evident that Bawm settlements close to Ruma, Thanchi and B...