Tag Archives: night ritual

Scaring Sante’s Sedan Screwers

Text:
The informant and his friend group would often camp out in a specific friend’s back yard. Whenever they did, they would wait until it’s past midnight, then drive up a mountain in the area called Cap Sante, where they would find cars that are parked and shaking a bit. They would sneak up to these cars, which would be populated with other teenagers or people in their early 20s doing the deed, and flash their flashlights into the windows, then run away and do it to another car after a while.

Context:
The friend whose back yard they would camp in was Mormon, and his father was very strict with him about many things. One thing he wasn’t too strict about, however, was camping/outdoor activities. This is why they would camp out at that friend’s house a lot, as it was what they were allowed to do with that friend. The trips to Cap Sante began when they were in middle school, and only one of them could drive, and he only had a driver’s permit, not a license. When they went for a drive, they wanted to go far away so they wouldn’t be caught by the strict father, and they wanted to go away from the town, so they wouldn’t be caught by the police. This narrowed their possible destinations down to just Cap Sante. Once they got there, they noticed the cars that were shaking. They started shining in their flashlights to scare the people away so they wouldn’t use the mountain as their midnight sex spot again. They started doing this regularly, later going to the mountain to find those cars, as opposed to finding those cars when looking for the mountain.

Analysis:
I think a lot of this ritual stems from children enjoying the thrill of rebellion and disobeying rules. The initial drive at night when it wasn’t allowed did this, and shining their flashlights into cars gives a similar thrill to ding-dong ditching, both of which are things that are rebellious because kids are taught to be kind and mind their own business, and these things are neither of those. An extra thrill for middle-school boys is the chance of seeing people having sex, or naked, which they likely hadn’t yet in person at that point.

The Ritual Game: The Midnight man

Nationality: British European
Age: 22
Occupation: Student
Residence: Sherman Oaks, California
Performance Date: March 19, 2020
Primary Language: English

Informant: It’s some ritual that was apparently used to punish bad people somewhere in Europe. The ritual starts at 3 AM and you need a candle, a piece of paper, and your front door. You write your name on the piece of paper then put it outside the door under a lit candle. Knock on the door 12 times and make sure it is EXACT, and make sure to get the last knock to stop at 3AM. Then open the door, pick up the paper and the candle and the game has begun. It lasts until 6 AM, so it’s only three hours but you have to keep your candle lit for all that time. The Midnight Man will try to blow out the candle or scare you into dropping it. Your candle is your only source of light so it’s pretty easy to get super scared. If your candle goes out and you cannot relight it within 5 seconds then surround yourself in a circle of salt and sit there until morning. Do not under any circumstances turn on a light! Both of these things are ways of forfeiting the game but that doesn’t mean the Midnight Man leaves. He haunts you until you complete the game.

Interviewer: So what do you get for winning the game?

Informant: I think you get to make a wish and it will comes true.

Interviewer: So what happens if you lose?

Informant: He kills you, obviously. [laughs]

Background: My informant had done research into different dark ritualized games such as this for a film projection she was doing. She did not end up using this game as the final inspiration for her movie.

Context: My informant and I were staying up late on the night of the 19th, just finishing playing video games together. We were walking through the house in the dark and she tried to scare me with this scary ritual, saying that she was going to do it.

Thoughts: I imagine the combination of sleep deprivation, lack of light, and the general atmosphere of being in an empty house would make for a fun time. Apparently this can be played with multiple people at one time so you could probably mess around with each other a great deal. With that in mind, I suspect this actually could have been a punishment ritual, though I am unsure where it would be used. The game could be turned into a form of psychological torture to get people to confess to crimes by making them think a demon was coming to kill them anyway.