Author Archives: Lindsey Joost

Toenails and the Rats that Steal Your Soul

Jean is an international student attending USC. She grew up in Korea and moved to the United States when she was 12.

 

Informant:

“Hmmm…….the first one that comes to mind is that my parents used to say don’t cut your toenails at night or else rats will come eat them and turn human.. Apparently the mice/rats will take your form and even steal your soul. It’s a pretty common Korean superstition that my parents told me since I was young. I don’t even know what the point of it was. Probably just to scare kids away from them – there’s tons of rats all over Korea. I mean obviously I knew it wasn’t true but I remember being terrified of rats because of it.”

 

Analysis:

I found this superstition to be particularly strange and interesting. Maintaining good hygiene leads to rats stealing your soul? It seemed very counter-intuitive to me. From what Jean described, it seemed like a useful fear tactic used to keep little kids away from rats – instilling a deep fear that they would take over your body, it ensured that curious little kids wouldn’t be playing with gutter rats and picking up germs – but I didn’t understand the connection to the toenail cutting in the dark. So I did a little background research.

Apparently this superstition goes back to before Korea had electricity, so at night it would be hard to see something like nail clippings in the dark. It was ill-advised to trim your nails at night because, with the prevalence of rats, while trying to collect the clippings in the dark you might run into one and pick up diseases.

The Troll in the Woods

Josh is my best friend from high school who now attends Florida State University in Tallahassee. He related to me a neighborhood legend from his childhood – the troll under the bridge.

 

Informant:

“When I was little I was basically traumatized by this story my dad always thought it was funny to torture me with. In Virginia, especially where I grew up, it’s pretty forest-y. There’s woods literally everywhere and around my house they’re pretty dense. There was a paved path that ran right up against the fence around our backyard that led to a creek which was about a half-mile down. When I was a little kid I used to love to play in the woods, climbing trees and playing hide-and-seek and building dams and splashing around in the creek and all that kid stuff. My parents were pretty lenient about letting me and my sister go off on our own – as long as we stayed in the neighborhood and were back by dinner. Whenever they would come out with us though, to go on a walk or whatever, my dad would tell a story about this troll. There was a bridge, this little wooden bridge that went over the creek bed kinda at the point where Oakton Glen turned into Clearfield which was the other neighborhood where we weren’t supposed to go by ourselves. So whenever we got to that part of the path when we were on walks with Dad he would tell us about this troll that lived under the bridge. Apparently this fat wart-covered green stinky creature that somehow lived in the concrete base of the bridge and would come out after dark and eat kids for snacks. I don’t remember exactly the story of what it was supposed to have done besides that – he made up a million different stories about that freaking troll cause – I mean I was like five or six but I completely one hundred percent believed his dumb stories and I think he got a kick out of watching me squeal and cry like a little [baby] whenever he would try to make me walk over it or whatever. It kinda spread throughout the neighborhood – all the kids knew about it, but no one was more spooked by it than me. Later, whenever my friends would want to go down there during high school to get away from parents for a little bit at night or whatever I would either make up excuses not to go or just be [pooping] my pants the whole time. All my friends would be laughing and call me a little [baby] and all I had was this stupid troll to blame. It still freaks me out. So yeah. Thanks Dad.”

Analysis:

As traumatic as the urban legend of the troll may have been, the story served a deeper purpose than simply to scare the living daylights out of little kids. The place where the bridge was located (and the troll was said to live) was at the boundary between the neighborhoods – the place where his parents explicitly stated they did not want their children going. As well-behaved as they may have been, children are known to disobey, and rather than risk their children roaming too far from home, it seems as though his father used the story as a way to scare the children into obedience. It came from a place of good-intent – if the desire to stray no farther than the bridge and to get home plenty before the sun set came from the children’s own fear rather than a nagging parent, it would be a more effective way of maintaining discipline. 

The Old Man and the Children who Flew

Shannon is a senior at James Madison High School, a friend of my little sister’s, and also has participated in the drama department there since freshman year. She was able to relay to me the legend of the Old Man, which my sister described as an inherent part to the pre-show rituals.

 

Informant:

A long long time ago there was a little fishing village by the sea. It was a beautiful little village. They didn’t have very many belongings, but they had loving families and food to eat and that was enough. While the Mothers and Fathers worked on their boats and in the fields and around their little homes, all the children went to school. All the children went to see the wisest old man of the village. The children loved the Old Man. He taught them everything. They learned about the bugs and the birds and the sun and the moon and stars, the trees and the rain and the sea. He taught them how to make a fire and tie their knots and how to fish and he taught them how to love. He taught them about how to love and respect each other, and he taught them how to respect themselves. And all the children loved and respected and trusted the old man. One day, the wise old man gathered the children very early in the morning, and they set out into the forest. They hiked for miles. Finally, just before sunrise, they reached the high cliffs that overlooked the little village and the very big ocean. “Come closer” the old man said, as he stood at the edge of the cliff. “We’re scared” the children said. The Old Man insisted “Come here! Come closer, look out over the edge!” The children shuffled closer to the edge and peered down the cliff. Their fishing village looked so small from up there, and the ocean looked so big, crashing against the giant cliffs with each wave. Eyes wide, the children held each other, scared. “Alright” the old man said. “Now jump.” The children said “What? what do you mean, jump! We CAN’T jump, we’ll die!!!” The old man slowly shook his head. “No” he said. “If you jump…you will fly.” The children looked at each other, trembling, holding each other. “Trust me.” The old man said. And since the children loved him, they trusted him. So they jumped…and they flew. —Fly tonight

 

Analysis:

While this story is only a fragment, it serves an important part of the Madison Drama department’s overall pre-show ritual. Shannon made no claim to any explicit symbolism in the story, but the analogies are apparent. The Old Man represents the department’s drama teacher Mr. Henderson who is, in fact, an old man who has taught at the school for years. Jumping off the cliff represents the major transition from rehearsal to the first performance: while the drama teacher has taught them everything he knows and has done his best to prepare them for the performance, once the curtain rolls back on opening night the kids have to trust each other and ‘jump’ free from his guidance. The story is told before opening night in order to quell pre-show jitters by inspiring confidence in each other and all the hard work that they have put into the performance.

After relaying the legend, Shannon told me a little about its evolution within the drama department, which was perhaps even more folkloric than the story itself. She said, “It’s supposed to be orally passed down, but in the four years that I’ve been here it kept changing, getting worse. We only tell it twice a year and not all of the kids participate every time. So I wrote it down. So that it’d be told the right way.”

While the original intent of the story was to pass this legend down through oral tradition in order to create a sense of unity within the drama department by only sharing it with those involved, the modern mindset of one ‘true’ author creating one ‘true’ story had Shannon believing that the inevitable variations that arose from the oral passage were a ‘false’ version. I thought it was funny that she described these variations of the ‘true’ story as making it “worse” and that putting the story down on paper, to her, would solve the issue. This, in general, is reflective of the mindset of the modern era, one that has been changing as we move further and further into the Digital Age. 

“So yeah, you could say drama kids are pretty superstitious.”

Erin, my little sister, is a senior at James Madison High School where she has participated in the drama department since her freshman year. Along with the universal ‘Macbeth’ superstitions of the general theater world, her high school’s department has its own set of practices and superstitions surrounding shows and opening night in particular. In preparing for their upcoming spring musical, she shared with me many of the rituals that are an inherent part of Madison’s drama department.

 

Informant:

” Well, first of all, there’s no bows before opening night. Like you know at the end of the show people bow in a specific order? You can’t practice that order until the night before ‘cause until then we’re ‘not ready’. But that’s like an everywhere theatre thing – not just Madison. But stuff that’s MadDrama specific? Before every show we have this thing called ‘circle’. We hold pinkies and talk about our feelings. No, no, seriously, we sit in a circle and link pinkies and everyone goes around and shares their memories about preparing for the show and all the time spent together and shit. It’s a lot of telling people they’re the funniest person they’ve ever met, which is cool I guess. After that we pick someone to tell the legend of the old man, which is kind of strange and I can never remember it right, which is why I’m never the one to tell it. After that we pray to St. Genesis, who’s the patron saint of theater. He’s on this little gray pendant that someone always loses and then someone always has to find before showtime. The chanted/shouted phrase is “St. Genesis pray for us, one, two, three FUCKKKK.” It’s sort of a contest who can hold ‘fuck’ out the longest. It’s really nothing to do with St. Genesis, it’s just so if we mess up we don’t curse on stage. Then later during “break a leg” circle which is the lamer, Henderson (drama teacher) sponsored circle we cross our hands right over left and hold hands and send a squeeze pulse through the entire cast for bonding and unity and all those happy things so yeah, you could say drama kids are pretty superstitious.”

 

Analysis:

I have never participated in a theatrical production, so I can only imagine the buildup and stress that surrounds opening night. I imagine it’s similar to taking finals in college – a whole semester’s worth of preparation for an hour or two where you have to prove that you can do it, or where you fail. Many of the rituals my sister described seem to serve as both a comfortable distraction from the inevitable nervousness and as a manner of building up good vibes between the cast members right before the show. The pinky-circle where everyone shares good memories from all the rehearsals serves as a way to shake nerves by laughing at funny memories, but more importantly the multitude of stories also serve as a reminder that they did rehearse every day for the past couple of months, that they are prepared. The losing and finding of the St. Genesis pendant similarly serves as a distraction: if the cast is too busy hastily searching for the pendant before the curtain rises, they won’t be sitting around worrying about forgetting lines or about missing dance steps. The cursing-contest is probably extremely cathartic for whatever pent-up nerves are still present, and following that with the final hand-squeeze circle replaces those nerves with more happy feelings and excitement. 

Beauty is Pain

My mother took a gap year between high school and college to live as an exchange student in Sevilla, Spain where she stayed with a host family. This eventually grew to become a lifelong friendship, and because of this she has traveled back and forth to Spain many times throughout her life. She shared with me her favorite ‘folk saying’ from the Spanish culture.
Informant:

“A common saying that was often tossed around and that my abuela often quipped goes:

Para presumir, hay que sufrir. Meaning: In order to show off, you have to suffer.

It basically means that in order to be beautiful, you have to spend long hours, or go to painful extremes.”

 

Analysis:

Because my mom kept up contact with the family throughout her life, I was lucky enough to spend every other summer in Spain since the age of twelve. Because of this, I was able to witness first hand exactly what was meant by this phrase. While I never heard that specific phrase uttered, immediately upon my first time traveling to Spain I noticed that the Spanish, particularly the women, are hyper-concerned with appearances – more so than Americans or any other nationality I have ever seen. They get their legs waxed weekly, their hair dyed at the first sign of exposed roots, and makeup is an art-form all girls are taught at a young age. It is considered improper to go out wearing anything but heels and staying on top of the latest fashion trends is a worthy investment. All this time spent on appearances seemed like wasted effort to me, yet to them, all this is worth it; the beauty necessary to ‘show off’ is worth the suffering. As I spent more time in the country I realized this obsession with maintaining a beautiful exterior went far beyond personal vanity. In the Spanish culture there is a deep appreciation for beauty that extends to all aspects of their lives, from architecture to Flamenco dance to how they present themselves.

I thought it was interesting that my mother sited this as her favorite Spanish saying because in general she is a woman who doesn’t worry herself much over how she looks. While to the Spanish, the phrase implies the meaning of “you can’t just look this good without putting in a little work,” I think for my mother, the phrase carries more the meaning of “if you care that much about what people think, you‘ll have to put yourself through hell” which, to her, is not worth it.