Where Magic is Real. And Scary.

In Papua New Guinea, you have your sanguma man, your glassman, and your bigman.

Historically, a bigman was a final decision maker, hearing the opinions of all and stating the majorities stance as the decision. Now they're just people that others respect and listen to, less of a final decision maker. Also, historically, these men were sanguma men.

A Sanguma man is your run-of-the-mill assassin. Either with magic or more concrete means, he's hired to kill. If anyone ever falls sick, it was a sanguma man using magic. And you have to go to a glassman, a magic practitioner, to work magic to make the sickness go away. Now if you ever see a sanguma man, you'll probably die, because the sanguma man doesn't want a witness.

Now, while the Word of God is making a notable change in people's view on the spirits and their powers, it's still a hard concept to grasp that God is more powerful than anything else. So people typically delay quite a bit before going to Martha to get medicine, which, as you can imagine, is a great source of frustration for Martha.

Now, one night, after the boys Bible study, they prayed that God would protect them from the sanguma men. When asked, they said that there had been a number of sightings of sanguma men close to the area. This is not like "ooo, I saw Bigfoot!!!" This is like, "...I just saw a ninja." There are people who's intent is murder, who have been seen, multiple times, close to the village.

Well, of course, right in the middle of that fateful night, I had to use the facilities. ...or the bush due to the lack of facilities. So during this moonless night, I go out and use my torch (the aussie word for flashlight) to look in the bush for any sanguma men (like I would be able to see a native trying to hide in the jungle). Seeing nothing, I switch it off (so the villagers don't see me!) and the entire time, I couldn't help but think "A sanguma man is going to hop out of the bush and kill me with a machete!"

(Now before you think less of me for being afraid of the sanguma man, let me remind you: this is not a spirit, even evil spirits must obey God. I'm not afraid of them. A sanguma man is a man. And men have freewill. And this is concerning.) Well, I finish my business and turn on my torch and resume scanning the bush for impending doom as I walk back to our house. At the last second, I turn to watch where I'm going (smart move, I know) and quite unexpectedly THIS HUGE PIG APPEARS IN MY TORCH LIGHT. My heart definitely stopped, I was afraid it would forget how to start again! (It didn't forget.) When telling this story to Martha, she said that the nationals would say that the sanguma man turned into the pig! (She also said that there was a pig in the area prone to attacking people and that I should eye the pigs as much as the bush.)

So the thing I'm turning in my mind is this: Living in a world where magic is real, spirits aren't something to mess with, and sanguma men are out to get you, in a world where the supernatural strikes genuine terror in the hearts of all, how do I brace my children for Twilight? Harry Potter? The Lord of the Rings? The Chronicles of Narnia?