 Bruce joins a village of the Suri, a particularly warlike tribe (belonging to the Surma people) of pastoral nomads in the Omo valley, in the Sudan-Ethiopia border region, which has long-running feuds with neighboring tribes in all directions, leaving them boxed-in in a rather poor territory of pastures. Since fire-arms spilled over from the Sudanese civil war, the area is dreaded even by the Ethiopian military. The favorite sport is donga: stick-fighting, which isn t ritualistic but often causes serious wounds, occasionally even a fatality, and yet is engaged without any protective armor, in fact even the fighters continue to be dressed extremely scanty, naked buttocks and/or genitals are often shown, adding to the sport s attraction as a way for bachelors to flaunt their virility. Bruce insists and ultimately gets permission to train for this highly unsafe test of manhood.