Author Archives: Lauryn Soorani

The panty thieving ghost

In 2011 my informant published a the book, The Empire of Death: A Cultural History of Ossuaries and Charnel Houses. The book’s 260 photographs were gathered by Dr. Koudounaris over the course of five years, during which he traveled to 70 different locations around the world, studying, visiting, and photographing charnel houses.

Dr. Koudounaris’ travels took him to the Catacombe dei Cappuccini (the Catacombs of the Capuchin monastery) in Palermo, Italy. Part of his process of learning about the catacombs included talking to the various fruit and flower vendors who sold their goods across from the monastery. Because the fruit and flower vendors are directly across from the monastery, they know everything that went on there and were able to tell him a variety of ghost stories about the monastery.

“The fruit and flower vendors are an incredible source of information. It’s hard to understand if you live in our type of society. Ya know, a street vendor, in societies like this is a source of incredible information. The fruit and flower vendors are across from the monastery and they know everything that goes on in the monastery. And everyone goes—it’s not like they go to super markets, they go to these vendors—so they are an incredible source of information if you really want to know what goes on in societies like that.”

The story is as follows:

“This one—they call him the postman because he is a wandering ghost. El Postino. He’s not really a postman. All the people down there were high class. He continually returns to people’s homes like a postman and um… El Postino, it’s funny because a friend of mine is actually related to him. His last name is Spinoza and a friend of mine named Jean Spinoza is related to this mummy. He had apparently—this ghost had been sneaking into this beautiful girl’s house in the 20th century and stealing her underpants. He kept coming into her home making sexual advances to her and when she refused him, her underpants started to disappear so she told the monastery about this—that she believed he was a panty thief. Anyway, the public became very outraged as the story grew, that this girl’s underpants were disappearing and that this ghost kept coming to her house so the monastery was forced to allow inspectors to come in and check the premises and apparently behind the mummy in his niche they found some women’s underpants which—ya know the monastery insisted that someone had planted them there, but it seemed by accounts that the mummy had been stealing the underpants. So she was able to get a court injunction prohibiting the mummy, or the ghost more precisely from entering her home. Um… but he violated it because more of her underpants disappeared so the court demanded that the monastery rectify the situation, which… what are they going to do? How can they monitor this ghost? So they went to his mummy and threatened him with burial unless the woman’s underpants stopped disappearing and that apparently did it. He stopped harassing the woman after that.”

When El Postino was ordered by a court injunction to stop stealing the woman’s underwear, it is no surprise that his actions did not cease as any repercussions for violating a court injunction do not apply to the dead. What does apply to El Postino however is the belief of the Capuchin order that the body must be preserved for the coming resurrection. Thus it may be inferred that it was because of this belief that El Postino stopped stealing underwear only when threatened with a burial that may not preserve his body in the same way that his current entombment has.

Krampusnacht

Krampusnacht (Krampus Night) occurs on December 5th in alpine countries in Europe (primarily Germany and Austria). It occurs on the night before St. Nicholas Day which is a festival in which children are given presents by St. Nicholas.

St. Nicholas (as well as the Dutch Sinterklaas) is where the British figure of Father Christmas and the American Santa Claus was derived from. On St. Nicholas day which in most countries falls on December 6th, he brings presents to all the good children. His demon counterpart, the Krampus acts as his servant and while St. Nicholas rewards the good children with treats, Krampus punishes the wicked.

Young men make Krampus costumes that mimic the imagery of the demonic figure. They wear these costumes on Krampusnacht and roam the streets making loud noises with bells and rusty chains and cause mischief around the city. In some towns there are processions and parades where those who have made Krampus costumes can walk down the street making loud noises and spooking spectators. According to the mythos, the Krampus is said to appear the night before St. Nicholas Day and so this celebration acts as a reenactment of this.

” Krampus night is celebrated on the 5th of December. And on the 5th of December people celebrate Krampus day by making home made fur suits, they look like monkey fur but they are actually made out of sheep wool, and then they make hand made carved masks and uhh, the hand carved mask portrays a demon. After they make these, on December 5th, they run around and cause havoc usually in large groups. It goes from hitting people with bitch sticks, to now they have large parades, but ya know usually they get a little rowdy and break stuff—but it’s not really about breaking stuff, it’s more about causing mischief, so it’s a day of mischief and romping around and all that sort of stuff. It only really—the celebration really only exists in rural towns in the mountains of Germany and Austria.”

The Krampus

The following myth is that of the mythical creature, the Krampus.

“Ahhhh the Krampus is the demon servant of St Nicholas. He exists in some parts of Switzerland but mostly it’s in the Alps of Germany and Austria. Um, he really only exists today in kind of remote areas in the mountains of northern Germany and Austria.  The Krampus is kind of what they base a lot of modern devil themes off of but he has antlers and hoofed feet and he’s all red and has a big long black tongue, and obviously there has always been a kind of sexual connotation with him and his tongue.

Originally he was with the St. Nicholas mythos and he is the demon servant of St. Nicholas. Where as St Nicholas gives gifts to good children on Christmas, the Krampus punishes the bad. The original thing of getting treats and candies and little trinkets in your socks from St Nicholas originally came with a bipolar one where the Krampus would stick sticks and twigs and rocks in your shoes. And there’s three levels to it. If you were bad, he would stick sticks and twigs and rocks in your shoes and then if you were really bad he would beat you on the ass with birch sticks. If you were really extra bad he would take you in his basket that’s on his back to hell for the day and that was your treat for Christmas, but you had to be a really naughty person to get that. So there’s three levels to Krampus. There’s bad, pretty bad, and then ultra bad.

The Krampus has an affection for loose women—especially whores, it’s particularly hookers, and actually loose women like the Krampus. The Krampus disappeared some time in the early 19th century—more late 18th century, because they thought it was cruel, and then he kind of made a renaissance in the late 19th century in post cards where he became a really popular—pretty much one of the most popular things in print on post cards in late Victorian Germany and Austria. Then he died down and surprisingly recently in popular culture has made a minor come back so uh, yeah that’s the Krampus. In  German culture he has also recently made a come back slightly. Um, probably more because he’s just fun. For all us disenfranchised youth who don’t like Santa Claus… I mean, he’s a pretty cool guy. I dunno Lauryn, do you want to have sex with the krampus or do you want to have sex with Santa Claus? You have to answer that…”

My informant is of German decent and was told about the Krampus when he was a child by his father. The Krampus acts as a method of keeping children in line and making sure they behave. If children do not behave, not only with they not get presents on St. Nicholas day, the Krampus will punish them for their bad deeds. The severity of their punishment depends on how poorly they behaved. It can be seen as a much more severe version of the western myth of Santa Claus putting coal in the stocking of bad children in place of presents.

Annotation:

The Krampus has made appearances in popular culture over the years.

  • The Venture Brothers: A Very Venture Christmas. 2004. In the Christmas episode of The Venture Brothers cartoon, Hank and Dean accidentally release the Krampus by reading a piece of scripture from a book of occult magic. As a result he appears at the Venture family Christmas party where he wreaks havoc and attacks Dr. Venture for his bad behavior. Upon his intrusion, Dr. Orpheus explains the Krampus to Dr. Venture.
    • Dr Orpheus: “I’m afraid we are being visited upon by, the Krampus. The punitive spirit who once rode side by side with St. Nicholas each Christmas eve, delivering terrible punishment to wicked children as Claus bestowed his gifts upon the righteous.”
    • Dr Venture: “That’s ridiculous! There’s no such thing as Santa Claus!”
    • Dr. Orpheous: “Not since he was killed by a jet in 1963, no. Nor has there been a Krampus since The Pope cast him into purgatory during Vatican 2, but your boys seem to have inadvertently released him from his chains.”
  • The Colbert Report: The Blitzkrieg on Grinchitude – Hallmark & Krampus. December 9th, 2009. In this segment of the Colbert Report, Colbert states that he is going to combat the attacks on Christmas by celebrating Christmas the old fashioned way, “…with figgie pudding, and wassailing, and kindly St. Nicholas, and his demon henchmen Krampus. For members of my audience who aren’t familiar with centuries old Austrian folk legends, Krampus is a demonic creature who accompanies St. Nicholas and torments naughty children with bitch branches and rusty chains. Like they say in Austria, every time a bell rings, a Krampus torments a child with rusty chains.” He goes on to describe the celebration of Krampusnacht, and suggest that Krampus must be brought to America to help fight the war on Christmas. “The next time someone tells you “seasons greetings” instead of “merry Christmas”, remind them that Krampus knows when they are naughty, when they are nice, and when they are showering alone.”

Occupy Movement: Human Microphone

My informant was an active participant in the Los Angeles branch of the Occupy Wall Street movement that came to life in Los Angeles in October of 2011. His participation spanned from its first day in Los Angeles, to the beginning of December.

“Durring the GAs [General Assemblies] or at protests, we wouldn’t always have access to a microphone, so the human mic was our way of making it so that a large group could hear what one person had to say.”

To initiate the human mic, the speaker (or anyone who notices someone is trying to be heard) yells out, “mic check”. To let the speaker know that they have been heard, individuals around them yell back in unison, “mic check”. This is repeated two to three times until the speaker has everyone’s attention.

Once the speaker has everyone’s attention, the speaker says a short phrase and then pauses. Everyone within ear shot then repeats that phrase in unison. From there, the speaker continues this process until their speech is finished. This amplifies their voice so that their speech is not limited to those within direct ear shot.

Occupy Movement: hand signals

My informant was an active participant in the Los Angeles branch of the Occupy Wall Street movement that came to life in Los Angeles in October of 2011. His participation spanned from its first day in Los Angeles, to the beginning of December.

An essential part of the Occupy Movement has been its General Assemblies (GAs). As Michael explained, the GAs are “a decision making forum where we got together every night to address the current issues at hand.” Each night’s GA has a set agenda and last for approximately 2 1/2 hours. Though there are Occupiers who help to orchestrate the GA for the sake of organization, no one person is in charge. Decisions are made only once everyone came to 100% consensus so as he stated, it is often be a very long process.

To help keep the GAs organized and minimize interruptions, hand signals are used by the audience so that they are able to non-verbally communicate with the current speaker. Each city generally has the same hand signals with some variations. The ones Michael described are specific to Los Angeles.

  • Agreement/support: To signify that one’s agreement and/or support of what the speaker is saying, one  raises one of both of their hands in the air and waves their hands and fingers. This takes place of clapping which can easily drown out the voices of speakers who do not always have access to a microphone.
  • Hard Block: A hard block signifies your vehement opposition to a proposal. Because decisions are made with a 100% consensus (Michael noted that it might be changed from 100% at this point in time, but that was the percentage needed when we was involved), if you were to hard block a proposal, it would keep it from passing. “It was supposed to be used only for when you were so against something that you would leave the movement if it passed, but [in Los Angeles] a lot of times people would use it just to show disapproval.” A hard block is displayed by raising both arms in the air and crossing them to make an X. Unlike New York and other cities, Michael told me that during his time at Occupy Los Angeles, no one really used the “disagree” gesture. The disagreement gesture is different from the hard block in that it is used to show that one is not happy with what is being proposed but it wouldn’t make you leave the movement. “I think that’s why people would use the hard block, even when it wasn’t something that would have caused them to leave the movement.” Disagreement is signified by pointing both hands down and waving one’s hands and fingers (the inversion of the agreement gesture).
  • Point of Process: “People would stray off of their topics a lot, so yeah, point of process was used to let speakers know that.” Because GAs are formally only supposed to last for 2 1/2 hours and there are always a lot of issues to be attended to, it is important for things to happen in a timely manner. If someone  strays off of their original topic, fellow Occupiers use the Point of Process gesture to let the speaker know. It is made by forming a diamond with one’s index fingers and thumbs.
  • You are repeating/wrap it up: To inform a speaker that they are repeating what they have already said or that the need to get to their point and have been dragging on for too long, one orbits their hands around each other.