amyasleigh
Abominable Snowman
- Joined
- Nov 3, 2009
- Messages
- 813
I would seem to be at a bit of a loose end: am submitting thus, an item which I’ve found intriguing, since first coming upon it some years ago.
This is a thing which I feel definitely classes as Fortean: am submitting it first to “Cryptozoology – general”, largely because of my having spent a good deal of time on the FT Cryptozoology section, in recent years. If mods were to judge that it more properly belongs elsewhere on the site: please move.
A passage in the book, published 2004, At The Tomb of the Inflatable Pig by John Gimlette, about the author’s travels in the strangeness-filled country of Paraguay. (Fascinating subject-matter, rather spoiled for me, by the author’s regrettable in my perception, extreme tabloid-journalist-like propensity to wild generalisations, and overall up-himself-ness. He has written further books about travel by him, to potentially interesting places; but his style and attitude grate on me, to the point of my having renounced his writings.)
In one episode in At The Tomb..., the author finds himself – through unfortunate circumstances – alighting from a bus in the east of Paraguay, very late at night, eleven kilometres from his destination for the day -- accommodation guaranteed there, he just has to reach the village: walking through the dead of night, is his only option. He walks along the country road in the pitch-darkness, accompanied by mildly disquieting sounds made by (mundane) wildlife. He gets to thinking about encounterable real nasty creatures of assorted species, including homo sapiens. I quote from here on: “Paraguayan mythology contributed some unnecessary embellishments. This was not the time to be thinking of the mboya-jagwa, the huge dog-snake that eats travellers, ravishes women and yelps like a puppy. Or the carbunculo, a revolting carnivorous hog that disguises itself as a trough to engulf the unwary drinker. To the [late-19th-century, here] settlers, these creatures all seemed real enough. [ Others such]: a bird that shone in the dark, a giant bisexual ant-bear and a sabre-toothed sheep of uncommon ferocity named – a little ineptly perhaps – the ow-ow.
There was heavy breathing in my face. The thought of ending my days savaged by a sheep or violated by a giant ant-bear was more than dignity could bear. I untangled a flashlight from the soppy dishcloth of my shirt and shone it in the monster’s face. In confronting my fears, I’d confronted a cow...”
Spookily interesting lore, I feel – even if totally and completely the product of people’s vivid imaginations.
This is a thing which I feel definitely classes as Fortean: am submitting it first to “Cryptozoology – general”, largely because of my having spent a good deal of time on the FT Cryptozoology section, in recent years. If mods were to judge that it more properly belongs elsewhere on the site: please move.
A passage in the book, published 2004, At The Tomb of the Inflatable Pig by John Gimlette, about the author’s travels in the strangeness-filled country of Paraguay. (Fascinating subject-matter, rather spoiled for me, by the author’s regrettable in my perception, extreme tabloid-journalist-like propensity to wild generalisations, and overall up-himself-ness. He has written further books about travel by him, to potentially interesting places; but his style and attitude grate on me, to the point of my having renounced his writings.)
In one episode in At The Tomb..., the author finds himself – through unfortunate circumstances – alighting from a bus in the east of Paraguay, very late at night, eleven kilometres from his destination for the day -- accommodation guaranteed there, he just has to reach the village: walking through the dead of night, is his only option. He walks along the country road in the pitch-darkness, accompanied by mildly disquieting sounds made by (mundane) wildlife. He gets to thinking about encounterable real nasty creatures of assorted species, including homo sapiens. I quote from here on: “Paraguayan mythology contributed some unnecessary embellishments. This was not the time to be thinking of the mboya-jagwa, the huge dog-snake that eats travellers, ravishes women and yelps like a puppy. Or the carbunculo, a revolting carnivorous hog that disguises itself as a trough to engulf the unwary drinker. To the [late-19th-century, here] settlers, these creatures all seemed real enough. [ Others such]: a bird that shone in the dark, a giant bisexual ant-bear and a sabre-toothed sheep of uncommon ferocity named – a little ineptly perhaps – the ow-ow.
There was heavy breathing in my face. The thought of ending my days savaged by a sheep or violated by a giant ant-bear was more than dignity could bear. I untangled a flashlight from the soppy dishcloth of my shirt and shone it in the monster’s face. In confronting my fears, I’d confronted a cow...”
Spookily interesting lore, I feel – even if totally and completely the product of people’s vivid imaginations.