Ho Van Lang, “real-life Tarzan” didn’t know that women existed for 41 years before he was discovered living in the jungle away from civilisation.
The 49-year-old man, now lives with his father in a small Vietnamese village eight years after they “escaped” their isolated life in the jungle.
According to Daily Star, the family fled civilisation when a US bomb killed father Ho Van Thanh’s wife during the Vietnam War in 1972.
Lang, his brother Tri, and his father Ho spent most of their lives deep in the Vietnam jungle.
Lang’s dad had a “profound phobia of returning as he did not believe that the Vietnam War was over”.
The family had to adapt to survive and became competent hunters living off the prey they caught in the jungle, Docastaway reports.
They ate monkey, snake, lizard and any other creature they could get their hands on.
Lang’s favourite was reportedly a rat’s head.
When questioned if he knew what a female was, he said that his father had never explained them to him.
Lang has now seen women in the village, but the family only ever saw five people through the entirety of their time in the jungle and hid from them every time.
“They always escaped when they saw people from a distance,” Alvaro Cerezo, the man who tracked the family down back in 2015 said.
A lack of social skills he has been able to develop has reportedly been one of the biggest hurdles for Lang since coming back into society.
Cerezo said “More surprising still is that today, despite being able to distinguish between men and women, he still doesn’t know the essential difference between them.
“I can confirm that Lang has never had the minimum sexual desire and his reproductive instinct has never shown its head in any of its many facets.”
The man has been described by his brother as a “baby in a man’s body” who “doesn’t understand many basic social concepts”.
He added: “If I asked Lang to beat someone, he would do it severely. He doesn’t know the difference between good and bad. Lang is just a child.
“He doesn’t know anything. Most people know what is good or bad in life, but my brother doesn’t.”
However, Lang is reportedly “happily adapting to his new life” and has particularly liked seeing “animals being friendly to people”, a huge change from his life in the jungle.
His brother concluded: “‘Lang was probably the most adorable human I have ever met in my life, he just doesn’t know what is good or bad.”
Discussion about this post