Category Archives: Myths

Sacred narratives

The Garden Shed Behind School

Background information: My brother is currently a sophomore in high school in Alameda, CA. He can still recall folklore he heard as an elementary school student at the school we grew up going to.

Brother: Behind our elementary school, there was a shed like right on the grass after the playground. It’s like a gardening shed, but I remember hearing a lot of different things about what people thought might be in there. Kids made up a lot of things – um, some said there might be a monster or some kind of evil creature, and other people said there was like a killer guy living in the shed, and that’s why you could sometimes see chainsaws in there. I don’t think there were actual chainsaws, it was more like leaf-blowers and gardening tools. I remember hearing different things from lots of different kids though, in all the different grades too.

Me: Did you ever go near the shed?

Brother: Yeah, I looked in one time and thought I saw like…a glowing red light? Like, I thought for a second that it might be an eye but it was probably just something reflecting or something like that. And other than that I just saw gardening stuff. I don’t really know what’s in there.

Hearing my brother talk about this garden shed was somewhat shocking, as I was surprised at how well I remembered what kids would tell me about the shed, and how eerie it seemed to me when I was a child. Folklore like this, one that is so widespread and widely talked about within your own community, can become so salient that, even years later, I could recall how scary the garden shed seemed to me and my friends – so much so that children rarely ever went near it.

Spanish Moss

Context: This story is meant to be told as part of a performance. Usually children or campers, the group will all collect a piece of Spanish moss. They will then slowly start peeling off the layers of the moss, eventually revealing the red strands mentioned in the story.

T.A. : Okay so going up there’s a lot of Spanish Moss around where I lived and I was always told that story behind Spanish moss. And this is like a campfire story that we would always tell. You would pick up Spanish moss from the ground end and um when youre telling the story, you’re peeling the Spanish moss. You can get to the center of it. And I’ll tell you the secret now. And you peel the Spanish moss, and in the center it looks like a piece of red hair. Like Red hair at the very center of it, and that’s, so you peel back. The stuff and it looks like, uh, a strand of hair. It’s red, it’s like very red. Spanish moss isn’t red, it’s like green. Um, but the story that’s told with it, it’s like this Native American girl who’s, who is the daughter of a chief. And she had this gorgeous, long red hair. It was beautiful, it flew in the wind and she was very much desired. Um, but she was in love with this other man, and she wanted to marry this man in the tribe, but um, all these other guys wanted her and her father was like no, you need to marry this guy, dah-duh-duh-dah-duh, basically, and, um, so then one day when she realized that she, like, would never be able to be with the love of her life, that she was, you know, too beautiful, or her hair was too luxurious. Like, she, she didn’t care what she looked like, she just cared that she loved this man, and was tired of other men being like, ‘no, like you’re mine because of this.’ So, yeah, basically she was tired of being, of people being like ‘no, you have to marry me because you’re so beautiful,’ dah-duh-duh-dah-duh, and all this stuff, and her dad was like ‘you have to marry these guys that want to marry you.’ She just wanted to marry the one that she loved. And so she goes to the edge of this cliff. Um, it’s like a plateau. So there’s like a valley underneath it. And she takes her hair, and takes like a stone or something like that, like a sharp knife—
P.Z. : Something sharp.
T.A. : Yeah, and she grabs her hair and cuts it off. And all of her hair falls into this valley and onto all these trees. Right? And she throws herself off the cliff and kills herself. Um, which is tragic end to the story. But also, but she cuts all her hair off, throws it into this valley, and then at the end of the story, at the end, by this point you see the red strand of hair and it’s now —
P.Z. : Under the moss?
T.A. : Spanish moss. You see all of her beautiful long red hair still in the Spanish moss today.
P.Z. : And it’s like the original story of —
T.A. : Yeah, of like why it’s there.
P.Z. : And you heard this in your hometown?
T.A. : Um, so like whenever, my family’s a big camping family, and like going through summer camps and stuff too, it’s a campfire story people tell. So you’d pick up Spanish moss off the ground, and you’d go oh have you ever heard like the story about Spanish moss? And then you tell it.
P.Z. : And Texas… What part of Texas?
T.A. : I’m from southeast Texas.

Thoughts: This was the first time I encountered a modern myth. It was also one of the only pieces of folklore I collected that included a sort of performance with the story telling. I thought that this was fascinating because it took an everyday item found in the area and transcribed deep value to it based on this creation myth. It also was fascinating that it remains popular for people of all ages to hear and tell this story, as it can be used in any group setting when one is outdoors and encounters this very common flora.

The Ghost Lady in the Dome

Informant: The informant is a very good friend of mine. She and I met in my sophomore year of high school. She is currently an undergraduate at Cal State Dominguez Hills. The following transcript is a retelling of a ghost story that she heard from her mom and that has been passed down by the family due to very weird circumstances. 

Context: Informant’s mom heard this in the late 1980’s, on a day that her mom was coming back from school in Jalisco, Mexico. However, this ghost story dates as far back as the early 1900’s. Informant states, that she doesn’t believe this story because it wasn’t something that her mom experiences herself, but a story that has been passed down by those in the small town.

Story: “In my mom’s small town there was this big house made of stone. In one of the corners of the house, on the outside, there was this small tower-like structure also made of stone. The top was covered by a dome-like thing, which was also made of stone. Everything was made of stone. It was said throughout my mom’s town that there was a woman who would appear in that tower. Just a woman who would walk out from that tower. There was no way into that tower or out of that tower except through the inside of the house. At that time, there was no woman living in this house, but just a man at that time. This story was told by my mom to me, but it was originally an experience and tale that happened to my grandma’s acquaintance. For when he saw this woman, it held his arm and walked him home.”

Present Day of the Famous Dome where the lady appears from at night. Place Jalisco, Puebla. Picture taken in 2021 by informant’s aunt.

Analysis: This ghost story wasn’t terrifying at all, but rather a bit questionable because no one else had seen this ghost lady other than the man who claims to have seen it and spread the story around town. I think when it comes to the context of the story, the person who first experiences such paranormal events should be reliable in order for something to be believed. This mans who claims to have seen the ghost lady and have walked him home, might have been possibly drunk or extremely tired. The fact, that there is very little details to this story, demonstrates how details of such experiences over time lose detail little by little. Because again, this story told by my friend has now passed around through the mouths of about 5+ people. Mayble if the man who experiences this where still alive, or met him in person, he would be able to explain the events of what specifically occurred on that day.

The Chinaman’s Hat

T is 70 years old. He is a retired teacher. He was born in Southern California and raised in Hawaii. He was 7 years old when his family moved there in 1959. He is very animated and speaks very quickly. As he explains in the piece, he likes it because his father worked for a tour company on Oahu and it is one of the stories he remembers the tour guides telling tourists. He told it to me in conversation.

“It was one of the small islands, Oahu, where we lived… but um… one thing dad was, was he worked for Trade Wind Tours and because… we didn’t have a lot of money but we did go on a lot of tours, so we went on bus tours… like Pearl Harbor tours… there was one called Circle Island Tours… it was boring but they had free food, so… The tour guides would tell stories and one was the legend of the Chinaman’s hat. There’s a Hawaiian name for the island but I don’t remember… but people call it Chinaman’s hat. What the legend is, is that there was an evil Chinese giant that ruled over the menehunes… they were like elves or leprechauns, and he ruled over them and was mean and the menehunes got together with Pele who was the goddess of the volcanoes… she was not a happy woman… anyway she got together with them and the Chinaman liked to eat turtles, so there’s an island across the way and they tricked him into going out into the ocean and it was further away and deeper than the Chinaman could swim, so he sank and drowned. Anyway his hat is still there sticking out of the water.”

There is an island off Oahu that is known as the Chinaman’s hat. The island’s name in Hawaiian is Mokoli’i. According to www.haaiian-culture-stories.com/chinamans-hat.html, “Pele’s sister, Hi’iaka, slew a giant lizard and threw its tail into the ocean… the island of Mokoli’i remains a remnant of the lizard’s back, poking through the water.” The same site references a 1983 painting by artist Dean Howell showing a cross section of the island and the Chinese giant below the ocean. A google search revealed Dean Howell was born in Salt Lake City, Utah and studied art at Brigham Young University in Hawaii. He also have published a book called The Story of the Chinaman’s Hat in 1990. A 2007 article published in Pacific Business News https://www.bizjournals.com/pacific/stories/2007/05/07/story9.html cites a failed resolution to discourage the use of “Chinaman’s Hat” to refer to Mokoli’i which means “little lizard” in Hawaiian according to https://www.to-hawaii.com/oahu/attractions/chinamanshat.php.

Menehune are a mythological race of diminutive people who live in the forest and stay hidden, coming out at night to build temples, roads, houses, etc. According to Wikipedia, Folklorist Katharine Luomala posits that “the Menehune are a post-European contact mythology created by adaptation of the term manahune (which by the time of the colonization of the Hawaiian Islands by Europeans had acquired a meaning of “lowly people” or “low social status” and not diminutive in stature) to European legends of brownies.” Brownies being household spirits of Scottish folklore. So it’s interesting that T recalled the Menehune as elves or leprechauns.

The story T remembers hearing tour guides tell illustrates the history of colonialism, Asian labor migration, and touristic exploitation in Hawaii. Efforts to discourage the use of “Chinaman’s Hat” in favor of the Hawaiian name Moloki’i, show the role and power of folklore in terms of national identity and culture. The elements that make up the story show the complexity of folklore as a living tradition that can resist easy definition as well as how fakelore (assuming the tour guides simply made up the story for tourists) can become disseminated and accepted.

Whistling witches in the trees

Nationality: Mexican
Age: 55
Occupation: Waitress
Residence: Texas
Performance Date: 2021
Primary Language: Spanish

A. is a 55-year-old mother of two in San Antonio, Texas. She grew up in San Luis Potosi, Mexico, a small town nearing the center of the country. She immigrated in her mid-twenties to join her husband in Chicago. She claims in this story that she saw a witch and describes the personal experience in detail every year near Halloween or Dia de los Muertos.

This performance was over the dining table. I was bringing her family conchas and other traditional Dia de los Muertos’ breads like pan de muerto.

Intv: Ok entonces, puedes reiterar ese cuento que siempre me contaste? / Ok then, can you reiterate that story you always told me

A: Claro, claro. Primeramente, el cuento tomo lugar en San Luis Potosi, mi hogar. Allí, viviamos en este casa de dos niveles y dentro del centro habia un patio real lleno de arboles de fruta. En el segundo nivel habia un pasillo que siempre recuerdo nuestro perro, Willie, corria por para saludar visitantes, tambien se podia ver los arboles de nuez que crecieron alrededor de la casa y tambien la entrada de la casa. Claro que esos arboles crecieron un poco mas alto, y por ese pasillo dormia Willie anoche. Acuerdo este noche donde cual Willie no tranquilizaba. Le invite dentro mi cuatro que mi mama, la abuela de Mili, prohibia pero sabia que ella pusiera de peor humor si le deje ladrando. Willie no quizo, y finalmente sali a media noche en mis pantuflas para ver que se notaba Willie. Al abrir de mi puerta escuche un silvando. Acerce al frente del pasillo y vi una figura donde escuchaba el silvando. De repente acorde de un cuento de mi ninez del vecindario. En las noches acerando la noche de todos los santos salian sombras en los arboles que silvaron. El cuento seguia que esos fueron brujas o gente embrujada invitando ninos para sequestrar.

//

Of course, of course. First, the story took place in San Luis Potosi, my home. There, we lived in this two-level house and inside the center there was a courtyard full of fruit trees. On the second level there was a hallway that I always remember our dog, Willie, ran through to greet visitors; you could also see the walnut trees that grew around the house and the entrance of the house. Of course, those trees grew a little taller, and willie slept down that hallway at night. But one night Willie wouldn’t calm down. I invited Willie into my room, something that my mother, Mili’s grandmother, forbids but I knew she would be in a worse mood if I left him barking. Willie didn’t want to, and finally I went out in the middle of the night in my slippers to see what Willie saw. As I opened my door, I heard a whistling. I approached the front of the corridor and saw a figure where I heard the whistling. Suddenly I remembered a story of my childhood. In the nights approaching the night of all the saints, shadows came out in the trees that whistled. The tale followed that these were witches or haunted people luring children to kidnap them.

This myth seems closely linked to the myth of La Lechuza, the bewitched owl women. As aforementioned in the annotation for La isla de las munecas, cultural syncretism plays a large part in La Lechuza’s etymology as well. Owls interestingly are a shared omen amongst many cultures, often developed worlds away from their parallel symbols. This bird of prey with empty black eyes and a scientifically proven silent flight brought chills to dozens of indigenous cultures, being cited as an omen of death repeatedly. La Lechuza moved into Tejano folklore easily with the frequent migration between Mexico and Tejas. As a tejano, I’ve encountered many barn owls near the Gulf of Mexico that glide atop the coastal winds and seem distinctly out of place with their white feathers and habit of flying at eye-level of humans. La Lechuza’s mythology capitalizes off the owls’ nocturnal habits and follows the myth of a persecuted witch that shapeshifts in the night hours and perches in trees as a 7ft tall woman with an owl face luring children. Rumors also dictate the unlikeliness of surviving an encounter with La Lechuza, once again solidifying it as a death omen. Some of her rumored powers are controlling the weather, causing supernatural accidents and deaths and amidst many other claims, gripping a child with their talons and flying off.

To read more about La Lechuza, see “Owl-Bewitchment in the Lower Rio Grande Valley.” Humberto Garza in the Celebrating 100 Years of the Texas Folklore Society 1909-2009 Page 38. https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc271470/m2/1/high_res_d/9781574413601.pdf 03+