Interesting Superstitious Belief Of The Filipinos
It's a beautiful day, sorry I have been busy , today I will be writing about the myths, legends and superstitious belief of the Filipino, which is our heritage from our ancestors.
Its true every culture has its own belief and superstitious, like the bad lucks that happens from walking under a ladder or biting of the tongue which shows that someone is thinking of you.In Philippine it is known as "pamahiin" .
Let's be realistic before I dive into our collections of superstitious belief, do you really have this feeling that our superstitious belief has anything to do with our real world ? Why am asking that is because of our Filipino pamahinn Which says breaking a mirror attracts 7 years of misfortunes, is still believed by most Filipinos. They fear breaking any of the rules and it has helped in maintaining orderliness.
It's amazing how these beliefs hasn't been countered till date, as they are being handed from one generation to another, it will delight you to know the Filipino culture is more about status quo than revealing the truth.
Let's begin with Focus on children;
Every Pregnant Filipino must have heard of the fetus eating monster called "Aswam", this spirit is said to disguise as a beautiful woman, who follows the pregnant woman, then at night, I will change to a big monster with a long tongue, which crawls into the woman's bedroom and feast on the fetus, causing the lost of the pregnancy. The only way, this demon is put away, is by surrounding the pregnant woman with garlic, this will mask the taste of the fresh fetus. But surrounding yourself with garlic at night kind of looks creepy, so it might also turn me off.
New born babies are still prone to magical forces, in my country you don't compliment a child too much or looking too much, you will make the child fall sick, what we call 'Usog' , chuckles! I know it sounds funny.
So before complementing a Filipino mother of how adorable, her baby is, make sure you say a counter spell "pera Usog" to create a shield over the baby, but if by chance the shield doesn't protect the child and the child gets sick, gets a friendly adult to smear their saliva on the forehead of the baby, Falipino's believe the way to cure a sick child is by spreading your body fluid on their face.
Also allowing your child play near a dirt in the afternoon, is also dangerous as the elves which live in the dirt may like your child, make it fall sick and die then they will steal the child's spirit, maybe that was why I was not always allow to play in the dirt.
How about the urban legends we grew up to hear, in building bridges, it is advicable to put the bodies of dead children mixed with concrete in the foundation to make it stronger and they will be no accident on the bridge, as the blood of the children protects every vehicle and people using the bridge. In such cases, the children are taken from the local population and killed.
I still remember when a certain bridge was built how children got to miss, it was scary, as mothers prevented their children from playing outside until the bridge was finished.
the Next is superstitious belief about Death and the departed
When attending a wake keep, it is advice you don't go home with any food taken from the place, because if you do, you will be taking a truck filled with trouble home.
Thats not just it, when leaving a wake keeping, it is believed the spirit of the departed will be following you home, so it is said, you need to go to different destinations before you get home, so as to distract the spirit of the departed. Also you need to change the clothe you wore to the place, before entering into your house.
And you may think, our superstitious belief only covers sad events, even in marriages we have our set of Do's and don't.
To avoid being doomed, the bride is not permitted to wear her wedding dress until the day of the wedding, it sounds silly right, I mean, why won't I put on my wedding dress to check, how it will fit me.
Trust me, I will wear my wedding gown before my wedding day, because I don't want to look scary on my wedding day, because of some superstitious belief.
No sharp objects as gift on a wedding day, as it is believed to cause the marriage to fail.
I still have more bizarre beliefs for you;
• If you jump up and down on new year's eve, you will grow taller and faster. I still remember when my mom, will force us to jump for hours on new year's eve, which I guess it's why we are taller in my family.
• You are not permitted to smile on Good Friday, because if you fall and have a wound while smiling, it will not heal.
• If you get lost on your way, its because elves are teasing you, all you need to do, is to turn your clothes inside out and you will find your way home.
• If you go to bed hungry, you spirit will leave your body and wander looking for food, it could be trapped by a wicked demon.
• When visiting a Filipino, make sure you say 'Ta hupo' before knocking on their door, this gives them the impression, that it is a human and not some wandering spirit.
• Going to sleep with wet hair, will cause you some mental problem.
• Taking a picture with three people, the middle person will die.
• A pregnant woman is meant to look at pictures of only beautiful people, else her baby will be a monster.
• Stepping on a sleeping person, will limit them from growing.
• Don't cut your hair or nails when it gets dark, else you will experience badluck.
• If a cutlery falls off your hand to the floor, it means someone is visiting, a dropped spoon indicates a female visitor while a fork indicates a male visitor.
I know to readers, this just sounds so unrea, but to a lot of Filipinos they are real and people are still scared of this things till date.
I hope you all won't be scared to visit the Filipinos, we are adorable people and we are accommodating. I will find time to write about interesting places in the Philippines.
Thanks for reading....... I love you all....
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We have also those superstitious beliefs in my place. But sometimes I broke some of it. In fact I don't believe them also. We're now on the new generation. We have consulted that to our priest, and he also doesn't believe those superstitious because they are all unbiblical.