Witch Doctor

(PICTURE: The local Witch Doctor.)

In Part 1 of my South Africa series, I'm gonna recount my trip to see an African Witch Doctor:

One of the cooler things we did during our safari was to take a trip to a local village. Sabi Sabi donates a lot of money to a village where the majority of their local workers are from. While visiting the village we went to a small hut and met with an African Witch Doctor.

To communicate with deceased ancestors, the Witch Doctor used a series of different items. Some items you might expect a Witch Doctor to use (lion/impala/rhino bones) and other items you wouldn't (dominoes and dice).

(PICTURE: The Witch Doctor throwing all of his future telling items.)
(PICTURE: The domino has spoken.)

The Witch Doctor would do his thing and begin to explain what the spirits told him. This was translated to us by the Sabi Sabi worker who was in charge of bringing guests to the village. The translator told us that the first thing the Witch Doctor was going to find out was what the score of the South Africa and Mexico game was going to be (remember, we went on this safari before the World Cup began). Well, the Witch Doctor did some chanting and dropped the bones/dice/dominoes on the floor. He quickly glanced over what his ancestors were telling him and decided he didn't like the outcome of the game...so he chanted again and dropped the items once more. Well, the ancestors were stubborn and were still predicting a Mexican win. The Witch Doctor -- clearly a soccer fan -- wasn't ready to accept this and once again dropped the bones/dice/dominoes. The third time was the charm and the spirits predicted a draw between South Africa and Mexico. Personally I'm not a believer in astrology or fortune telling but a couple of days later Bafana Bafana tied Mexico 1-1.