As usual, the Maniq were nowhere to be found.
A group of anthropologists had hired a team of local Thai rubber tree farmers to roam the hills in search of the nomadic hunter gatherers, but no one had been able to locate them. Back in the village, Austrian evolutionary anthropologist Tobias Göllner waited impatiently with his two colleagues, Helmut Lukas and Helmut Schaschl. If they could not make contact with the Maniq in the next week, they would have to return to Vienna empty-handed.
