 |
Featured Articles
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Current Articles
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
News Articles Archive
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
| Update 1: Wild Cambodia Jungle-Girl (& Feral Children) |
1240 Views |
| posted on Monday, January 22, 2007 |
|
|
SEARCH ON FOR 'FERAL MAN'
AS MYSTERY DEEPENS OVER WOMAN LOST IN JUNGLE FOR 19 YEARS
By Ian MacKinnon, South-east Asia correspondent
The Guardian
Saturday, January 20, 2007
Original Link
When they found her last week, her father said, she was "bare-bones skinny" and shaking, scuttling like a monkey along the ground to snatch up grains of rice, her eyes "red like tigers' eyes". So when the first pictures of Rochom P'ngieng, the woman supposedly lost in the jungle for 18 years, emerged yesterday showing a calm and apparently healthy young woman rather than an emaciated, feral beast, the mystery surrounding her remarkable story deepened.
Sal Lou, 45, a policeman from a remote village on the Cambodian-Vietnamese border, told a local newspaper on Thursday that his daughter, who disappeared, aged eight, in 1988 while tending a buffalo herd, had mysteriously re-emerged from the Cambodian jungle. She was naked and unable to speak any intelligible language but unquestionably, he insisted, she was his lost daughter Rochom P'ngieng.
Yesterday, however, as further intriguing reports emerged of a mysterious naked man who had been spotted with the woman but ran off when challenged, the family began to close ranks. They have withdrawn permission to take DNA samples to confirm the woman's identity, and police have thrown a cordon around their isolated home, in an effort to keep at bay curious neighbours and the world's media.
The family of the woman, who would be 27 if she is indeed their daughter, say they want to be left alone in order to make up for lost time. But Sal Lou's claims are so remarkable that there is little chance that they will be left in peace. Pen Bonnar, a widely respected human rights campaigner in Cambodia, is due to arrive today in the Oyadao district where the family live, 200 miles from Phnom Penh, to assess the disturbed woman's needs and try to unlock the many puzzles surrounding her story.
The remoteness of the village, in the rugged mountain area close to the Vietnamese border, has made disentangling the woman's story all the more difficult.
Sal Lou says that he first heard the story last Saturday of a woman who had been captured after a farmer caught her stealing his rice. The naked woman was starving, with wild hair down to her face and a body blackened by dirt. Mr Lou says he travelled to the Rattanakiri area where she had been found and was immediately convinced she was his daughter.
The village policeman says that a deep scar on the woman's wrist exactly matches one his daughter had, sustained while she was playing with a knife as a child with her younger sister, who also disappeared at the same time. In addition, he insisted, she resembled his wife.
Mao San, police chief of the Oyadao district who ordered his men to provide the family with protection from prying eyes, described her initial condition as "half-animal, half-human". Despite the many questions that remain, he says he has no reason to doubt she is Sal Lou's missing daughter.
But there is no clue to the fate of the second daughter, Chan Boeung, who was six when she disappeared on the same day. Their father said he had believed them both to have been devoured by wild animals in the forest and had long since given them up for dead.
The woman's mother, Rochom Soy, 50, said she was just glad to see her long-lost daughter again.
"She is really my daughter, I am very happy," she said, adding that the woman was showing signs of recognising her and her husband.
She is able only to communicate in sign language - patting her stomach when hungry - and is apparently disturbed, screaming and shouting when her parents approach, which has led some to speculate that she is mentally ill.
One theory among sceptics is that the marks on her wrist are the result of years of being bound, common practice among peasant villagers in dealing with mentally ill people.
But with the woman now dressed in ordinary clothes, her hair cut to a neat shoulder length, the questions over her whereabouts for the last 19 years will only grow the longer she remains unable to tell her story.
...............
WILD CHILDREN:
- Andrei Tolstyk, Siberia, abandoned by his parents as a baby. When discovered by social workers in 2004, aged seven, he walked on all fours and bit people; they believe he was raised by the family's dog.
- Traian Caldarar, seven, Romania, found living on the streets in 2002, three years after fleeing his mother's violent partner. Still the size of a three-year-old and with no speech, it is thought he had survived with help from stray dogs.
- John Ssebunya was found in the forest in Uganda, aged six, in 1989. He had fled a violent father, and for two years a group of African Grey monkeys accepted him as a peripheral member of their group.
- Ramu, found in Lucknow, India, in 1954, aged seven. His mother said he had been snatched by a wolf as a baby. He lapped milk, chewed bones and had an affinity with wolves in the zoo. Died in 1968.
More information:
http://www.feralchildren.com
Excerpt:
http://www.feralchildren.com/en/physical.php
We know, from the keen sense of hearing that blind people develop, that human senses can become much more acute than is normal.
Feral children brought up by animals develop a particularly good sense of smell, keen hearing, and excellent sight -- especially at night. However, they are quite impervious to heat, cold and rain. Even Genie showed no perception of hot and cold.
Bizarrely, several children are reported as having an offensive odour that wouldn't leave them despite washing, and weeks or months on a normal diet.
Many physical changes that feral children genuinely do undergo are brought about by walking on all fours. Their muscles develop differently, they acquire callouses on the palms of their hands and their knees, and their ankles and other leg joints become accustomed to being bent most of the time. Even once taught to walk on two legs, Kamala would still resort to all fours when running, and in that mode would outpace people running on two legs.
Of course, some children were found walking and running about quite happily. Wild Peter, Victor of Aveyron and Memmie LeBlanc (who was said to "run like the wind") are three examples. But we know that Peter and LeBlanc could walk before their stints in the wild, and it seems reasonable to assume that the same is true of Victor. And, clearly, the various gazelle-boys could all run.
Feral children are usually both strong and very dextrous physically. They can run (on all fours), climb and jump very nimbly and with great rapidity.
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
............
In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. Unless the information in question has been written and/or published by NHNE, NHNE has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article. NHNE is, therefore, not endorsed or sponsored by the originator, nor does NHNE necessarily endorse, promote, or agree with the content. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
|
|
|
|