Your Bones Break First: The Man Who Survived Being Eaten Alive!

Quick Overview

Paul documented his first contact with the previously uncontacted Mashkapiro tribe in the Amazon, who emerged to ask how to distinguish between good and bad outsiders, revealing they are being hunted by loggers and narcot traffickers despite the ongoing conservation efforts by Jungle Keepers.

Key Points: Paul spent the last 20 years living barefoot in the Amazon rainforest, often with a machete, working with indigenous people to save the environment, enduring crocodile bites, snake encounters, and being shot in the head by a 7-foot arrow during an attempted peaceful contact. The Amazon rainforest contains one-fifth of the planet's fresh water and produces one-fifth of its oxygen, making it an "irreplaceably valuable" system, and humanity is the "last generation that can save it" before ecosystems collapse. Paul and his partner JJ, who leads the indigenous organization Jungle Keepers, have successfully turned loggers and gold miners into conservation rangers, protecting 130,000 acres of the river basin and working towards creating a national park. The uncontacted tribe, who call themselves 'No Mole' (Brothers), emerged from the deep jungle after years of isolation, asking the local indigenous community, "How do we tell the bad guys from the good guys?" The tribe's first demands upon making contact were for food and rope, specifically asking for plantains, and they expressed concern that outsiders "cut down our trees," stating, "Our trees are our gods." The contact was precipitated by external threats, as the tribe is being hunted by narcot traffickers, and a mass grave of a similar clan was recently discovered, underscoring the danger they face from deforestation and illegal activities.

Context: The interview features Paul, who has dedicated the last two decades to living in the Amazon rainforest, learning from indigenous tribes like the Seaha, and co-directing the conservation organization Jungle Keepers to protect the ecosystem from destruction by loggers and miners. The discussion centers on his transition from seeking personal adventure to finding meaning in large-scale environmental protection, culminating in the world-first footage of contact with a deeply isolated, uncontacted tribe known as the Mashkapiro (or 'No Mole').