This state is almost impenetrable, surrounded by dense vegetation and steep mountains, it is difficult to reach due to the almost absence of asphalted roads. Isolated for years, it seems a nation in its own right. Except in the capital city Kohima, and in the largest city Dimapur, in the rest of the state, most of the population live in poverty in bamboo huts, with roofs in banana or palm leaves. ( 70% of the population lives in rural area)

This mountainous region is the home of a multitude of tribal population. 16 are the recognized native tribes among them Ao, Konyak, Rengma, Lotha, Sumi etc.

Anungba, 85 years old, portrait in front of his hut, decorated with many buffalo bison skull heads. Is one of the last witnesses of a cultural tradition that will probably disappear in the next 10 years. Are very few the Konyak remained tattooed in face, guardian of the head hunter's days, when this hunters and warriors, in clashes between tribes and villages, beheaded their enemies and carried away their heads as trophies of war.

This remote area, difficult to reach, with almost impassable dirt roads, seems to have been completely forgotten by both nations (India and Myanmar). For this reason the district of Mon has been chosen for traffickers as the point of entry for drugs into India. The couriers arrive from Burma on foot, along paths that wind over the mountains and pass through the dense vegetation of the tropical forest, at the mercy of monsoons, insects and wild animals. With no prevention or control over the territory, the consumption of opium has spread so rapidly that many men and boys have become slaves to the drug. In some areas a third of the men are addicted and slaves to opium, they do no work, and squander the family’s patrimony on the substance. According to estimates, one-third of the men in this area is addicted to opium. The smoking hut is one of the poorest houses of these men, with no floors and with the bamboo walls. The roof is made by banana or palm leafs. While women are work in the fields, men gather in these houses for smoking.

The opium is melted and then mixed with a hand-made tobacco obtained from dried leaves found in the forest surrounding. Gathered around a fire, scrupulously perform everything as a ritual.

Men, now addicted to opium, no longer works and waste all the money to buy their own doses. While the women go into the fields to work, labouring all day in whatever climatic conditions, the men gather in a hut to smoke opium and lose themselves in the ‘apathetic high’ that this drug produces.

First the the substance is boiled, then the resulting liquid mixed with a tobacco made from the dried leaves of a plant that grows in the surrounding forest. Lastly, filling wooden pipes they carve themselves, called “bong”, they begin to smoke with the first light of day. Disappear all the physical pains present in their body, and all the anxieties, worries and daily fears which are present in their mind. Unfortunately men also involve the youngest and spend all day to smoking inside the hut, some of them.

The newly acquired Burmese opium before it is melt.

They accompany almost every shot, with a sip of tea, to sweeten the bitter taste of opium, and to hydrate himself, one of the side effects of this drug. The same tea that women cultivate with great effort all day in the fields.

Tea leaves are the most important crop production. They grow and take root easily in Nagaland. The production of tea is constantly expanding thanks to the influence of the richest and most famous neighbouring country, Assam (one of the biggest producer and one of the most appreciated varieties in all the world).

Tea is one of the oldest and most widely consumed beverages in the world, second only to water. Its story began 5.000 years ago. India is the second largest producer after China. Tea plantations are the principal agricultural product of the area after rice, and also the main source of work for almost all the women of the surrounding villages. the same plant can produce for 5 years, depending on the soil, after it is interspersed with a different plant that will serve as soil fertilizer.

Lalita, proud look, tireless worker. At home she has three children waiting for her, she lives in a village near the plantation. Glad to work in the tea garden, for only 1,50 $ per day.

The women wake at dawn in order to spend the whole day barefoot in the fields. They provide the sole economic support of the families in these villages. The men, by now addicted to opium, have stopped working, hunting and providing food.

A group of women come back exhausted at home after a full day of work in the fields.

Armed control outside a smoking hut. The situation is always at risk and constantly evolving. Drugs, money and people in an altered state of consciousness may change the balance at any moment.

A sense of lightness overcomes them, of isolation from reality, a psychological flight from the world and the poverty that surrounds them. Sounds become muffled, minutes pass slowly, they feel happy, in peace with others and with themselves. Since opium is a powerful analgesic, all physical pain disappears; anxiety, and everyday fears and worries are alleviated. They flee far away from the reality of their condition, a life of extreme poverty. The awakening from this state of altered consciousness is accompanied by great confusion and bewilderment. Between one dose and the next they live in a state of great depression. Drug addiction leads to intoxication and a continual increase in dosage can lead to death.

Eyes half closed, a stupefied smile, slow movements: these are the first signs of the effect of “Kani”, as opium is called in the local dialect.

Inside the smoking hut generally five or six people gather to smoke, lights are very low and smoke lays an acrid smell that makes the air unbreathable. The children are left in the house which is being used as an opium den, under the eye of sisters little older than themselves or in some fortunate cases, in the care of grandmothers who are no longer able to work in the fields.

Forgotten by both states, India and Myanmar, with no support, checks or preventative measures, one-third of the men of these villages have become addicted and slaves to opium. The adults stop working and the young quickly abandon school as soon as they first experience the drug, entering into a tunnel that will abruptly destroy their dreams and their adolescence. The situation is really dramatic and critical, even though it is almost unknown outside the area. But what will happen in a few years from now? Without some form of concrete intervention, in a short time whole villages will be inhabited solely by men and boys completely addicted to opium, generations of ‘zombies’ who will leave their families to sink into desperation, and their region into absolute poverty.

Longmo, 17 years old.

Children play while adults smoke, the acrid smell of opium and its fumes are being spread in all the house, even in the room with no door where are the kids.