Saturday, March 19, 2016

Voodoo Ceremony

In Rio de Janeiro, in the Mid-1980's, about 20 of us were there for my brother's honeymoon (!). 

We had connections, and went to a real live (favela/SLUM) neighborhood on the steep side of a hill, 
and sat through the real services on a Friday night Mass...at a voodoo (Candomblé) neighborhood temple. 

We were seated in a large room, with a low ceiling, about 40 people  

The neighborhood Priestess was in charge.  

She spoke, a little sermon (in Portuguese, of course) and a small banda started playing music, mostly percussion instruments, some whistles and other fun things.

People started doing some rhythmic things, clapping, hooting etc. and the Priestess began to do what my sister and I had coined years prior, "Dancing and Trancing", since even atheists need this type release too!

At that point, the priestess tranced out, lit a big cigar, and took on a male deity personna, tossing back a couple of shots of Cachaça, the local rum (cheaper than bottled water, (for the masses don't you know)).

Her voice and body posture changed, and she took big puffs on the cigar, eyes pretty much rolled back into her head.

Then, a line formed, and one by one, the neighbors lined up to discuss things with God.

God listened, and whispered back.  We could almost hear them, there was no confessional or privacy, just the continued music and rhythmic accompaniment. 

(At that point, the "Catholic" part of the service was ending, and we were led outside to another altar, this one with devils and other interesting phantasmagorical items. 
Some of the elderly amongst us, the bride side of course, decided they had had enough, since the Devil side was frightening to them so we left.)

Basically, the ceremony allowed neighborhood disputes to be settled amicably, since mostly it was grievances like they stole my chicken...

It made everything more mellow, again that week, before the heavy drinking, knives and fire arms appear during the weekend...