Category Archives: Folk Beliefs

Protection from Garlic Clove

The informant speaks on a superstition they practiced whenever they left their house. His parents always said that whenever they went to a party or event or if there were a lot of people, they must carry a garlic clove in their pocket. The informant stated that his mom told him it was meant to prevent mal ojo, the evil eye, or bad juju. His mom would state that by the time they came back home, the garlic would be dry and shriveled. The dryer it was, the more it had protected you from evil and bad that was wished upon you.  He also stated that el mal ojo was explained to him as someone envying you and wishing bad upon you. Garlic keeps vampires away so it is probably something similar to that notion like religion or just good at keeping bad energy. 

The informant comes from Veracruz, Mexico and believes that it is practiced a lot there. Veracruz is believed to be the place where there are the most witches, so lots of superstitions and white magic, black magic come from there. The informant  mentioned a similar thing is putting a whole lime in your bag, letting it absorb all the negative energy, then at the end of the week you throw it away. 

This seems to be similar to other rituals and folk beliefs that people use for protection. They are rooted in protection from stuff that hasn’t happened or doesn’t necessarily exist. The protect people from stuff they can’t explain other than something they attribute to as the “evil eye”. For example, the informant stated that they would use the garlic whenever there were a lot of people so their family was expecting that they would receive the evil eye despite not knowing any of the people. This reflects a view of others in a negative light, most likely due to unexplained illnesses and mishaps in life and blaming others for these unexplained things.

Duendes in Mexico

Text:

The informant heard this story from his grandfather four years ago. The informant stated that Duendes exist where his grandfather is from because he lives in a more pueblo area in Veracruz, Mexico. On a regular day, his grandfather headed to the “terrenos”, large plots of land, to check on the cattle to make sure they were doing well. The informant stated that in order to get to this specific plot of land, you need to go through other people’s lands but that throughout his grandfather’s years, he had built a mental map of how to get to this plot of land. It was later in the day at 4 pm and suddenly, his grandfather felt like he was walking in circles and circles. The next day he woke up in a small passing river as if he had been carried and placed there, not drowning or anything but just there. The informant stated that duendes are kinds of spirits, a sort of energy, that guides you away from where you are going, luring you in to kill you.

Context:

His grandfather said that when he explained what happened to his family and the pueblo, or town, they all told him it had to have been duendes. This legend is only told in the town if it happens to someone. The informant does believe his grandfather because it is interesting but perhaps it is just some spirit leading you astray, or maybe he did something to anger the spirit.

Interpretation:

Duendes are believed to be goblin-like creatures that can do good or bad depending on the person. In this case, the informant’s grandfather experienced an unusual feeling and memory. When he approached those around him, they imbedded this legend of duendes into his memory thus resulting in a memorate. Some believe duendes to be physical creatures but others view them as simply spirits as the informant does. In order to help explain this weird phenomenon where the grandfather got lost in a place where he had been so many times before, the people in this story begin to attribute and explain every detail with duendes. For example, the setting of this story is said to be with lots of lands, greenery, some trees, and a river. Many of these attributes correspond to the legend of duendes as they are said to live within forests by small houses in the area. Additionally, they explain this memory loss and confusion to duendes taking the grandfather by confusing him and leading him astray.

The Magic of Vicks VapoRub

Text:

I: Whenever someone in my family was sick or feeling under the weather, the usual go-to before any over the counter or cough medicine was Vicks VapoRub. It wasn’t necessarily a solve-all, but it was known in my family to make things feel a lot better and it would help you breathe better if you were congested. Funny enough, if I was only feeling a little bit sick, putting some of it on my chest before sleeping would make me feel better the next morning.

Context:

The informant is 48, was born and raised in the United States, and whose parents were born and raised in the Philippines. The informant isn’t sure where the use of Vicks to “cure” illnesses came from, but knows that it is a somewhat widely held belief in Filipino culture, and popularly satirized by Filipino-American comedians like Jo Koy. 

Analysis:

Within the informant’s family, the use of Vicks VapoRub is both a cultural inside joke while also acting as a type of folk medicine. While there is no scientific evidence suggesting that Vicks has physical benefits to ailments, the widely held belief that it is soothing during the healing process is passed down between Filipino family members. The reliance on the mentholated ointment may stem from a cultural stigma surrounding healthcare and accessibility to healthcare within Filipino communities. A sentiment shared by our elders was usually: “if you could fix it at home, there was little reason to seek help outside”. Though the sentiment remains, it’s relevance has faded with the newer generations, who look to Vicks not as a miracle drug but as a home remedy that soothes and is nostalgic, but does not necessary solve the problem.

Pag Pag

Text: 

After a Filipino funeral or wake, it is a widely held superstition that the mourner does not return immediately to their home, but instead stops at another location before returning home. That way, the spirit of the deceased cannot follow you home.

Context:

The informant is my 67, and was born and raised in the Philippines, and still continues to live there. After the funerals she attended in her youth, she was told by her parents and other elder family members that they had to go someplace else, and could not immediately return home. Usually, this other location was a restaurant, where family members shared a meal before going home after the funeral.

Analysis:

The term “pag pag” literally means “to shake off something”, usually used in the context of dust or dirt. In other contexts, this term could refer to dusting off your shoes before entering the house. However, this “pag pag” is more meaningful and symbolic in that the thing you must shake off before entering the house is the deceased spirit from the person laid to rest at the funeral. Filipinos have many superstitions surrounding the dead, pag pag being one of them, and act as a means of warding off evil spirits or malevolent forces. By stopping at another location before going home, you avoid leading the spirit of the dead directly to your home, which Filipinos believe will bring bad luck.

Funeral Headbands

Context:

H is a pre-med Biology major at USC who grew up in Vancouver, Washington. His parents immigrated to the US from Vietnam.

Text:

H: “For funerals, you have to visit every day for the first week after the funeral and then once a week for seven weeks. And then, on the hundredth day since the funeral, everybody comes back to the temple. It’s like, the biggest day for them (the dead). You pray for them, wish them well at the temple. The hundredth day is when you have everybody together and you have a big feast. You have these white headbands that you wear and on the hundredth day, they chop off the headband.”

Analysis:

Since H was raised in a Viet-American household, he and his family’s celebration of weddings is similar to an Irish wake funeral, but also adds cultural specificity to Viet customs. For example, it is common in Irish funerals to throw a party on the deceased’s behalf, not only as a celebration of the deceased when they were alive but as a re-engineering of the domineering sorrow of a funeral. H’s feast on the hundredth day pays homage to the one who died without inviting negative emotions into the celebration of the individual.

Funerals are a liminal space, as Von Gennup puts it, lingering between the stages of life and death in a person’s existence on Earth. Rather than using funerals as a chance to mourn, H and Irish funeral traditions connect with members of their community and pray for safety into the next part of existing for the dead. This acceptance of death, the massive respect and commitment to the dead after the funeral, seems cultural, as does the white headbands and time. There is an acceptance of death as time marches on, not a denying of it. Rather, H’s family seems to come to terms that nothing can get in the way of death but glimmers for an appreciation of life and the one the once dead led.