Black Magic???

The chief of police in Mairiporã, Cláudia Patrícia Dálvia, believes that the woman whose body was found with her face disfigured and eyes cut out was the victim of a macabre black magic ritual. Fifty-four year old, Geralda Lúcia Ferraz Guabiraba was found on a lonely stretch of road between Mairiporã and Franco da Rocha, in the Greater São Paulo area. The woman's disfigured body was found near a well known ritual site "Pedra da Macumba". It is interesting to note that she was a deeply religious woman, her death took place on Friday 13th., and that her personal habits seem to have changed over the past several weeks. The rest is mystery.

You say to yourself… “Can't be!” It is something so far removed from our [gringo] thought processes we just can't accept that it could possibly be true. Let's take a more in depth look. This is not an isolated incident by any means. There is at least one similar report of a death being attributed to black magic each year and many cases where children have needles or other pointed objects inserted into their abdomens or necks. Clearly, what few facts their are in this case seem to be sufficient to convince the police chief that black magic has something to do with it.

Macumba exists in Brazil and it is very strong and has a large, but secretive following. You needn't look too far before you will find one of the many typical ritual sites, identifiable by the wooden or terracota bowl filled with rice or farinha, eggs, dead pigeons or chickens, etc. This will almost always be accompanied by sacrifices of some alcoholic beverage (cachaça, wine or beer), cigars or cigarettes and there will also have been candles lit during the ritual. I personally have come across hundreds in São Paulo alone, not to mention in the other Brazilian cities where I have lived. You walk the streets and you can't help but notice the numerous posters stuck to lamp-posts throughout the city offering spells to seal love relationships or curses.

Macumba, voodoo or whatever you want to call it is woven into the culture of many countries. It is part of the popular culture here in Brazil. So, before you just discard the idea that this poor woman was, indeed, the victim of some such ritual remember all the things that we human beings do to one another in the name of some religion. My religion teaches peace and love, some do not. Living here in Brazil for the past ten years I have learned a whole new respect for the old saying, "truth is sometimes stranger than fiction".