TRAVELS w/P: Tales of Adventure Here & There

Voodoo? Who do?

Continuing car stories. Gotta jot these down before they’re forgotten.

About ju-ju, I begin, how can you be affected if you don’t believe? In unison Mr T and Double-O chorus “I’m Christian, of course I don’t believe,” but then their stories begin.

I don’t believe, but… when I was a child someone was accused of stealing. He denied and denied and denied.  So they tied a rope around his neck and forced him to lie upon the ground. If he was telling the truth, nothing would happen. If he was lying, the rope would pull into the ground.  I saw with my own two eyes, I saw the rope pull into the ground. I was so scared that night I could not sleep.

Een henh, I don’t believe either, but…what they do in my village is they pick these special leaves and they coat them with a mixture, and then another leaf, and more mixture and another leaf, and more mixture.  They ask the person who is in the wrong to answer a question. If that person lies, the leaves go hard.  So they take a long pipe, a bamboo pole and they take some pepe and blow, just like that. They blow. And even though the person is sitting far across, they feel the pepe in their eyes, and they confess.

And then once, I had a headache, a migraine. It was very bad. I was telling someone about it and a girl heard me.  She told me to come, come with her. I followed her to a little boy, maybe two. She tells him my problem. He goes away and comes back with some leaves he picked and he mashes the leaves together in his hands then places the pulp onto my head.  My headache goes away just like that.  I think, “oh I must stay with this boy. He knows.” So I go to bring him a toy. They tell me he is not coming out today. If I want to see him I must go inside.  I see him sitting. Doing nothing. I tell him I have brought a toy. He laughs, “ I know, I saw you buy it from the big lady. I know that you bring a toy.” That frightens me. How does this small boy know? He sees my past and future.

On the plane from Abuja to Uyo my seat mate is Pastor Excellence.  He’s an evangelical zealot who speaks in tongue (I love that! he gushes). The kind who insists women enter marriage “intact. Virginal blood binds the two in a mysterious but undeniable way,” he explains.

So are you encouraging your son to marry as a virgin too? 
No response; he’s in pathological preaching mode. 
His faith, he asserts, is deliverance based; in other words Satan is behind all of life’s foibles and woes. Deliverance based faith is about casting out ju-ju demons to rid life of bad influences. It’s about removing the curses and evil others have brought upon you via the power and magical guidance of traditional healers.

PastorE is the kind who believes the Bible is the one and only true word of God. 

Have you read the q’uoran? What about Judaism acknowledging only early biblical parts?  Have you explored other religions to assert your own conviction? 

“No, I don’t need to.  I know I have the word of God. See how quickly I answer you? That is because I KNOW!”  

But how do you know that without asking questions?  Are you saying your God is different and better than the God of Islam or the God of Judaism?  Silence. 

Uncertainty.

“You ask difficult questions,” he says, slumping slightly into his seat and answering with more of the same blind faith.

For the flight’s duration I listen wearily to his sermonizing, wishing I could sit in quiet meditation reflecting on everything and nothing in my own dogma-free way.