A Karo girl with the ringlets of her hair caked with clay and red ochre _ an unusual hairstyle but not uncommon along the Omo River. It is customary for teenage girls to make a hole in the flesh below their lower lips into which they put an ornament; this girl has used a small nail. The irregular black 'beads' strung on one of her necklaces are the seeds from a wild banana plant.The Karo are a small tribe living in three main villages along the lower reaches of the Omo River in southwest Ethiopia. The largest village, Duss, is home to almost half the population of around 3,500 people. Once solely agriculturalists, the people now keep livestock as well.They are Omotic people and speak a dialect of their larger and more powerful neighbours, the Hamar, from whom they originated in the distant past.