That Voodoo You Do

I've been meaning to write about Voodoo for some time now. I don't have much to offer but the conversations I've had and things I've heard, seen, and read. I still haven't been to a Voodoo ceremony, though during my homestay, a couple times a week, I could hear those drums beating not far away.

The first thing I've observed is that everyone believes in Voodoo. Not everyone practices it, but everyone believes in it. Plenty of Haitians think it's evil and wrong and the source of all the country's problems, but nobody thinks it's untrue. So what does a Voodooist believe? To be very brief about it, Voodoo is the belief that there are spirits or gods called loas. They can possess people momentarily, and put them into a trance where they may not feel a candle held directly under the palm or even the chin, or perhaps the person would move around on the ground like a snake and even go up trees and walls in ways that don't seem quite humanly possible. Again, I haven't seen anything like that for myself here yet, but it's just a given for Haitians. Baptists missionaries believe it's devil worship in another form. But from what I gather, even though Baptist Haitians think it's evil, they're still operating from a worldview that includes the Voodoo gods and werewolves and all that.

Ah yes, werewolves, or lougawou. It's believed that some people slip out of their human skin to reveal a werewolf that can fly and shoot fire from its hind quarters. If a person who is secretly a lougawou comes to the house of a pregnant woman, he or she will ask the pregnant woman for salt. If the woman gives the lougawou salt, her child will be stillborn. Random, I know. The way to deal with a lougawou is, if you find the human skin that has been shed, put salt and pepper on it. When the lougawou returns, he'll put on the skin and start itching and eventually go crazy.

The roots of Voodoo are African animist beliefs combined with Catholicism. In fact there is a corresponding Catholic saint for every loa in the Voodoo pantheon. And practitioners, or houngans, will tell you that their spells and incantations have no effect on an unbaptized person. The memory of slavery is also a strong element of Voodoo. Old shackles are incorporated into shrines often. It was in fact Voodoo which inspired the slave revolt that led to independence in 1804.

Speaking of, here's an interesting tangent. Within twenty years of Columbus landing in Haiti, on Christmas Eve of 1492, the indiginous population was withering and on the verge of collapse from disease and abuse at the hands of the Spanish. The representative of the Roman Catholic Church was struck to the core by the disappearance of this beautiful culture. He begged the Spanish colonizers to leave the Taino and Arawak people alone -- but don't cheer yet. To placate the colonizers, this priest argued that they should bring slaves from Africa instead. The deeply ingrained racism of Europe had been directed specifically at Africa. Of course white people were superior to non-white people, reasoned Europe, but Africans weren't even considered human.

This conscientious priest helped kick off the international slave trave. And because of him, Haiti became slavery ground zero. Slavery made Spain and then France incredibly wealthy -- the single colony was more lucrative than the thirteen British colonies combined at the time of independence. Haiti was the place where the process of breaking the spirit of west Africans was fine-tuned into a science. It was a vast machine that chugged along for centuries, fueled by the blood of human beings. But under this incredible oppression the slaves would find ways to carry out their traditions the way they had in Africa. The network of people who practiced and officiated these rites allowed a level of coordination that would have been impossible otherwise. While the white God of the colonial overlords told these slaves that they deserved their lot in life, Voodoo gave an outlet for people to escape their suffering through ecstatic worship. And eventually, Voodoo allowed people to say that they deserved freedom, and would fight for it, possessed with the strength of the loas.

For these reasons, Voodoo is fundamental to the character of Haiti. It's been a force of inspiration, to be sure. But there are many problems that come along with it. There are two branches of Voodoo. Kind of a leaded and unleaded. White magic versus black magic. Many practice Voodoo to get in balance with unseen spiritual forces, to get answers to plaguing questions, no harm done. But it is also used for outright malicious ends. The acquired knowledge of Voodoo is immense. There are plenty of quacks among the bokors (witch doctors) as in any medical field -- but generally these are people with an encyclopedic knowledge of natural cures. But this goes both ways too. The knowledge also includes recipes for all sorts of poison powders and things like that, often used to exact revenge. An American woman I met here, who is very sympathetic to Voodoo, did tell me that these days Haitians go to church when they feel like being good and they go to the Voodoo priest when they feel like being bad.

Crossroads are very important in Voodoo. It's common to see Voodoo effects at a place where paths cross. Things like coins pounded into the soil. In Dezam there was a spot I walked by everyday where a path crossed a dry riverbed. One day there was a half of a coconut shell, filled with some kind of chopped plant matter. A lot of red and black (the unofficial colors of Voodoo) thread was wound around the half-shell so the plant stuff wouldn't spill out. Next to this was a wand of leafy twigs, wrapped in a sheet of notebook paper with handwriting on it, and also wrapped in red and black thread. I asked someone what it all meant and here's what he said was the most likely explanation: a person, let's say a man, went to an houngan (Voodoo priest) either because he was in love with or angry with some other person. The man brought some paper that the target person had written on, as well as some money, and told the houngan about the situation and where the target person would usually walk. The houngan then prepared these things and put them by the road so that a) this woman might fall in love with this man; or b) the enemy of this man might be struck down by illness.

There's definitely a lot of money spent in the practice of Voodoo that could be put to more practical uses; the same is true of all religions. Sometimes Voodoo is a source of solidarity; sometimes it will divide a community with vicious backstabbing or worse, where nobody gains except the houngan. Again, not radically different than any other main religion, in reality.

So what do I think? I have no idea. Haiti isn't going to get rid of Voodoo, no matter what happens. I'm a pretty skeptical person, so it's easy to brush off the idea of roaming invisible spirits. But the things I've read and stories I've heard send chills down my spine. Crazy things happen; whether or not there's a natural explanation for it is another question. I'm sure I'll continue to learn more about it, and when I do I'll write about it here. And if you have any questions, e-mail me or comment here and I'll see what I know.