MALI: Mystical Amazing Land of the Inscrutable

Another Volunteer mentioned the other day that Malians know about things like mermaids, vampires, etc. To verify this I recently asked my village counterpart if there were any magical beings in Mali. His response was an emphatic "yes". Apparently there are a whole host of spirits wandering around as well as mermaids, vampires, and leprechauns. (I have a feeling these concepts are still strongly tied to remnants of animist beliefs that are still widely prevalent here.)

So... spirits. I've been told they're all over and you typically can't see them, but if you see a small whirlwind... that's actually a spirit making it's way through the neighborhood. A lot of times they will "possess" people or try to scare people.

Evidently mermaids aren't the friendly, topless half woman / half fish creatures that Walt Disney would have us believe. Depending on who you ask they live in rivers, oceans, and possibly even ponds or wells. They're quite unfriendly when it comes to humans and are known for taking away people's air while they're swimming, which leads to drowning. My counterpart says its very dangerous to swim in bigs rivers or oceans as that's where most mermaids are. Apparently these harpy-fish never went on play dates with Ariel.

The vampires in Mali do not originate from Transylvania. Rather, they come from the Sikasso region of Mali and northern Côte d'Ivoire, which is where, I've been told, they prefer to stay. (Don't worry mom, I'm not at risk of attack by vampires in my current location.) They tend to stay in trees and will descend down on people and then kill them and drink their blood. Not entirely sure if they can change into bats or not. People don't know a ton about them in Segou since they're not up here.

Leprechauns seem to be the worst of the bunch, and the most understood in my corner of the country. They're really short, have dark skin, beards, may have backwards feet, and can't really be seen by people. They only come out at night and love to jump out and bash people on the head as they travel on roads. And... if you are lucky enough to catch one they will give you lots and lots of things and lots of money. My counterpart says he's seen one or two before and knows someone who caught one once and now is really rich. He also refuses to leave village at night and has forbidden me from traveling on the road to my market town once it's dark out.

I've explained to my counterpart that I think he's totally full of crap and that these "beings" only exist because he thinks they do. His response was to say that the Volunteer who lived in my village in 2006 went up to Bankass once and while there another Volunteer and a bunch of other people saw a giant spirit on the road that was scaring the tô right out of people. "So there!" he declared. My retort was that in America lots and lot of people swim in the ocean every day and we haven't found any mermaids yet, nor has anyone drowned as a result of a mermaid... to which my counterpart replied, "How is that possible?!"

So, either spirits, mermaids, vampires, and leprechauns don't exist, or they are just as geographically uninformed as most Malians and haven't figured out how to get to America yet.