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 Untold Story of 4 Kids' Remarkable 40-Day Jungle Survival, Lost in the Jungle. Something Big Is Missing From Media Coverage.

Since their rescue on June 9th, the story of four kids who spent 40 days in the Colombian Amazon rainforest after a plane crash has captured the attention of the entire world. In the flurry of news articles, a crucial detail has been missed amid the admiration and surprise this story has attracted. While rightly praising the children's resiliency and resourcefulness, Western commentators frequently ignore or mock the Indigenous lifeways that gave them the tools they needed to accomplish such a feat. This oversight draws attention to the underappreciated abilities and skills of Amazonian Indigenous children, which do not align with widely held beliefs about "optimal child development" held by aid organizations and child specialists.

Members of the Huitoto Indigenous group living in the Colombian Amazon are Lesly, Soleiny, Tien, and Cristin Mucutuy, who are 13, 4, and 11 months old, respectively. Following the plane crash, they were in a desperate situation after fleeing their home region to avoid being enlisted by an armed group. However, this only scratches the surface of the complex abilities that allowed them to survive. Many people were fascinated by their factual ecological knowledge, such as what they ate or how they protected themselves from predators. Indigenous knowledge is an embodied orientation that lies between one's senses, surroundings, and own flesh; it extends beyond explicit instruction and procedure memorization.

To gain a better understanding of Amazonian Indigenous cultures, we must call attention to this intangible knowledge. It entails having an embodied moral perspective towards other people and being prepared to meet their needs. Lesly showed this sensibility by taking care of her siblings throughout their arduous ordeal. Lesly had frequently looked after babies while her mother was at work, so her grandmother Mara Fátima Valencia recognized her ability to do so. The role of changing diapers and appropriately responding to a baby's cries was emphasized by Lesly's aunt, Damari Mutucuy. Lesly's actions bring attention to the natural capacity for caregiving possessed by Indigenous children from the Amazon, a total frequently disregarded or undervalued in popular culture.

Children in indigenous communities in the Amazonia have a lot of freedom, autonomy, and independence as they grow up. Even 3- and 4-year-olds could be seen in Franks' childhood village in the Ecuadorian Amazon engaging in independent activities like fishing, climbing trees for fruit, and using machetes responsibly without adult supervision. This laissez-faire approach, which has been observed in Indigenous communities throughout the world, including the Amazon, is the result of a belief in children's abilities and the idea that failure and risk are necessary components of the learning process. This upbringing enables kids to grow up with a sense of social responsibility and autonomy.

In these communities, children are also expected to help with household duties like food gathering, dishwashing, clothes washing, and babysitting younger siblings. Children's moral growth, social responsiveness, and autonomy are all encouraged by such participation. However, a lot of middle-class people in Western societies think that these tasks are unnecessary or onerous for a child's development. Notably, UNICEF considers household work that lasts longer than four hours per day to be child labor. In contrast, Lesly's survival and the care of her siblings during those 40 days were greatly aided by the young age at which Amazonian Indigenous children learned to take care of themselves and others.

Taking into account the diversity of abilities children from Amazonian Indigenous communities possess challenges the dominant emphasis on literacy and academic success in mainstream cultures. In Latin America, where Indigenous children have long been stigmatized as being "behind" their non-Indigenous peers and in need of "correction" or "civilization" through formal education, this acknowledgment is especially important. Possibly the words of Colombian President Gustavo Petro, who described Lesly and her brothers as "children of the jungle" who are now also "