Calling All Diva-Worshippers of Southeast Asia

We wanted to post this long long ago to settle the score who got the highest tone. Mariah worshippers, Lani Misalucha defenders -- here's the singer who can whistle an ENTIRE song...

Georgia Brown of Brazil


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INDONESIAN FOLKLORE: Ibu Gogo

These little guys were sighted in Flores, Indonesia, from ancient times to the 19th century. They’re described as hairy and short with big guts. They walk like humans. They are said to have mimicked the words people said to them.

Australians and Indonesians found skeletons of a new species of human at an archaeological site. They were believed to live over ten thousand years ago. The skeletons were about a meter tall.

These skeletons were thought to possibly be the Ibu Gogo of Indonesian folklore. The Ibu Gogo have been used by Indonesians as a scare tactic to get their children to behave. The term “Ibu Gogo” means grandmother who eats anything.

Legend has it that the ebu gogo and the people lived in peace… for a while. The Ibu Gogo started killing crops and the humans’ animals. They fled to caves when the humans started killing them. These caves were eventually set on fire after the Ibu Gogo stole a baby. Some were said to have fled to the Liang Bua caves, which is the cave where the archaeologists found the small skeletons.

Explorers Discover Spectacular Caves in Vietnam

For decades, geologists have known that Vietnam is home to some of the world's most spectacular caves, many of them largely unexplored. Now husband-and-wife cavers have documented perhaps the world's largest: Hang Son Doong, big enough in places to accommodate a New York City block of skyscrapers.

The cave in the Annamite Mountains contains a river and jungle (its name translates to "mountain river cave") and even its own thin clouds, and its end remains out of sight. It's part of a network of about 150 caves in central Vietnam near the Laotian border.

Many more photographs taken in Hang San Doong and other newly explored caves have been published in theJanuary issue of National Geographic and on its website, where you can view larger images. The site also has an interactive graphic of the river cave's path.


By Brett Michael Dykes