Disclaimer: This story is about to blow your mind.
Today i was at home between my classes checking email and resting up after four straight hours of teaching. Out of nowhere i get a call on my computer from my friend Stephen. Stephen is in Indonesia. He’s doing some filming for a project that i don’t have many details on. Instead of botching the details, i’ll just leave it at that.
So Stephen calls and says, “Guess what.”
“What,” I say.
“I’m sitting on a porch in the middle of the jungle with about 40 tribal men gathered around listening to your voice on my computer.”
“WHAT??!!” I say again, but much more enthusiastically than the first.
“That’s right,” Stephen tells me, “Say ‘Aba.’”
Hesitantly, i slowly say, “Aba.”
Then, out of nowhere i start hearing a bunch of voices shouting back at me, “Aba aba aba aba aba!”
This means “hello” in their tribal language. This was incredible. What a cool opportunity. Here i am in Beijing, China talking to a tribe in the-middle-of-nowhere, Indonesia. Most of the guys i was talking to have no concept of the outside world. I’m serious, these are the kind of tribes that you see on the Travel Channel. It was nuts!
After a few minutes of talking to Stephen he encouraged the whole tribe to sing one of their tribal songs for me. Are you kidding me? Is this really happening? I started scrambling for some sort of way to record what was going on, but i came up empty.
After a few more songs and some more small talk with Stephen we decided to cut it off. As we were saying bye i think the tribe guys figured it out because i started hearing all of these guys start shouting, “Aba aba aba aba aba aba.” I guess that means goodbye in their language too. So, while they are shouting, “Aba” at me of course i am sitting here on my computer shouting it back at them. It was unforgettable to say the least.
I just hope the Chinese guy that lives next door to me couldn’t hear me through the wall. They already think the foreigners are weird enough. The last thing they need to hear is a foreigner shouting, “Aba aba aba aba!!”
Here’s a photo of what the scene looked like on Stephen’s end:
Scott Fillmer
November 25th, 2008
WOW… I am blown away… that is really incredible. Guess you were glad you had your ichat up and running… lol
Dad
November 25th, 2008
That was sooo cool! Thanks for sharing it…wish you could have recorded it….
No Baby yet but she is getting there maybe in a few days. I’ll send you pictures!
Love you!!
Laura N.
November 25th, 2008
That kid’s eyes are so wide, I think it blew his mind too. And truly, it is übercool. I’m a little jealous. Talk about karaoke. Oh, globalization, you are so delightfully unpredictable.
Laura N.
November 25th, 2008
P.S. Are those bows & arrows? Really? BOWS & ARROWS. Whoa.
Mom
November 25th, 2008
Aba! Just the thought of that in my head brought tears to my eyes. From the picture, they are wide-eyed and totally in awe of technology. What a cool experience.
Jamie. =)
November 25th, 2008
The expressions on their face are PRICELESS! What an awesome opportunity to talk to those people…
courtney
November 25th, 2008
that is awesome! i love the little boys face!!
Matt Hux
November 25th, 2008
unbelievable. technology is awesome.
Bryan
November 25th, 2008
interesting，hope i was there to c it.
JohnG
November 25th, 2008
Awesome experience. Thanks for sharing.
J.
Patrick Hatcher
November 25th, 2008
If you want more of the story, check out the NTMfilms blog …
http://ntmfilms.wordpress.com/
proctor
November 26th, 2008
i think the actual word they’re saying is “Abba”. It’s the first thing they said to me as i got off the bush plane.
Pretty cool…it’s like they are crying out to “Abba Father” but they don’t even know it.
but the funny thing is, i found out later, that “abba” literally translates to “you’re poop!”.
yes, that’s the LITERAL translation and what it means! however, they’ve kind of lost the meaning over generations and just use it as a greeting.
i know…crazy.
the closest thing I can relate it to is when we say “hey, what’s up!” when we greet each other. some people might think “why are they asking each other a question instead of saying ‘hello’ and why are they asking each other what’s above them?”
make sense? maybe not.
just goes to show you how different God made us all.
vicky beeching
November 27th, 2008
Wow, wow, wow!
Blake
December 2nd, 2008
What a cool story. Apple should use that story in one of their commercials.
Will McClain
December 4th, 2008
“Indonesia! Git off those peoples grass!”
Had to say it.