Doing a dark deed

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When Rita couldn't fly out with me to Hong Kong, she gave me a mission (should I choose to accept it!). The mission was to contact one of the city's infamous 'villain-whippers'.

These sorcerers are known for putting spells on villanous people - and Rita had a certain person in mind (think politician - not mentioning any names in an open forum!)


Coming to Hong Kong, the question was, how to find these three sorcerers in a city of almost 8 million?

Well - this IS magic, and last night, I just happened to walk past them. Purely by coincidence!

There they sat. under an overpass in the Causeway Bay neighborhood. Three elderly women, doing the 'Da Siu Van' - whacking paper effigies of bad guys with their slippers. 

Surrounded by candles and burning sticks of incense, they looked like the three witches of 'Macbeth'.


I sat down on a rickety plastic chair. Presented one of the women with a copied photo of the particular villain, Rita had given me - and she started to ply her dark trade.

She presented the photo to the paper tiger of the god Bái Hu, sacrificed a small piece of meat soaked with pig blood and then wrapped the photo up and began hammering on it with her one slipper..

She whacked and whacked until the photo turned to shreds - and finally she burned the remnants on a small, makeshift alter while uttering mystical-sounding words and incantations


When the mission was accomplished and I had paid for the deed, I actually felt quite miserable.

For me, the whole thing started as a whimsy, but she seemed so earnest and  actually quite scary.

I couldn't help thinking: What if?

What if something truly awful happens to this person within the next few days? I almost felt, as if I had hired a hitman to do an assassination!

　

　

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