Travel And Photography | Mah Meri Tribe, Puja Pantai Ritual | Pulau Carey

© 2016 Wazari Wazir | Members of Malaysia’s Indigenous Mah Meri Tribe Walk On The Beach During Puja Pantai Ritual

Some of my photographer friends once said that we don’t have to travel outside Malaysia to get a great picture. Yes, it was true, I’ve nothing to argue, in fact we can get some good picture inside our home, or just within the boundary of our home. Take for an example, macro photography, I think you can find plenty of great creatures within the compound of our home.

We can also get world recognition by just photographing our kids close to our home, you don’t need a passport for that. Take for an example of Elena Shumilova, a Russian mother who took a photographs of her two kids just close to her home and becoming viral on the internet not too long ago, and now she is busy with her photography workshop all over the world.

If you like a documentary or travel photography kind of genre, you just need to travel within the boundary of your own country and I believe, you will have a lot of subjects to photographs.

The photographs above were taken during a “Puja Pantai” Ritual, or Oceanic Healing Ritual, where the Mah Meri Tribe will gather during low tide on the beach to honour their protector spirits, and they will cast rice into the sea as a symbol of offering.

The picture above were taken al the end of the ritual, where one of the Mah Meri tribe wearing a mask is making his way back to the shoreline after performing the ritual.

The Mah Meri is an ethnic group native to western part of Peninsular Malaysia. They are one of the 18 Orang Asli (Indigenous People)  groups named by the Malaysian government. They are of the Senoi subgroup. Most of the members of the Mah Meri tribe live along the coast of South Selangor from Sungai Pelek up to Pulau Carey.

Back to the topic above, so why do I have to travel outside our own country to take a good picture? Well, it depends, for some people they don’t like traveling here and there, it cost money, if they can make tons of money selling a photographs taken from their home country, why bother traveling. Yes, some of you guys have strong valid point.

For me, I like to see the world, I know my time is very limited on this earth, so I wanted to see the world as much as I can. If I use all my life that I have in this world to visit every corner of my home country, I think I’ll be long gone before I’ve a chance to see some other part of the world.

There is plenty of things to photographs here in Malaysia, we are proudly call ourselves as “Malaysia Truly Asia” we have mixed culture here,  Malay, Chinese, Indian and other tribe and ethnics as well, but on the other hand, I would also like to see the life of other people outside my home country, what’s their belief, their culture, religion, what’s their interest.

*On the side-note of my experience covering this ritual, actually the numbers of spectators, including the photographers, either using smartphone, compact camera, mirrorless, the tourist, people from the media agency are easily outnumbered the people from the Mah Meri Tribe, especially those who are involved directly during the ritual. Anyway it is great experience for me to witness the event unfolding live in front of my naked eye and this event were perform only once a year.

*Where is the rest of the photographs? Will be back for more…