me'en

Would you ever choose to insert a metal plate in your lower lip to express yourself? Or cut patterns into your cheeks? People all around the world use body modifications as cultural self-beautification, for reasons that seem foreign to outsiders. Nowhere are these practices more deeply ingrained than in Africa, whose multiple tribes' unique cultures, traditions, and body modifications symbolize this rich history. Just in Ethiopia, the Surma tribes use body modifications to define themselves as an individualistic group of people.