Thread: Local Superstitions

Originally Posted by mhailey

i don't see how it mutates? They seem to be the same thing.

Matt

I grew up in Southern Ontario and was told as a child that if you kill a spider it will rain. Is that one common?

X

Same story here X, with the exception that it had to be a Grand daddy long legged spider.

we were always told that if you kill a cricket in the house his friends will come to the funeral and eat your socks!

Since my day job is at a casino, I see crazy/unusual/cultural/funny superstitions all the time.

Here's just a couple that I have found interesting:

• In some cultures, it is considered very bad luck, and insulting/threatening, to give a time piece as a gift, especially as a birthday gift. It's supposed to signify that "your time is running out"
• Not tipping is bad luck.
• If there are multiple doors to an entrance, you should always enter through the one closest to the center.
• You should never exit a building through the same door your entered because bad luck might follow you.
• You should always exit a building through the same door you entered, because otherwise good luck can't follow you.
• If somebody dies while gambling, it's lucky to play from the same position they died in. (I wish I was joking, but we've had people drop with a heart attack at a slot machine, and had people fighting over their machine before the paramedics could move the patient or body)
• In many east-asian cultures, 8 is a lucky number. Sort of like lucky 7's here, but a much more widely, and firmly, held belief.
• In some cultures, a whole family will pool their extra money, and a family elder will pick the "luckiest" member of the family to take all the money to gamble with.
• I have seen so many crazy gambling rituals and lucky charms I don't even know where to begin. There's one woman who sits at a machine right across from the counter my office is hidden behind, and she waves her right hand back and forth 3 times across the face of the machine before every spin.

Being of Italian (among other) descent(s), superstition is an every day thing. I don't buy any of it, nor do I participate, but I'll go along with it.

1. In every car I have ever owned, my mother has to put a red ribbon in the trunk for good luck.
2. In ever car I've owned since being with my girl, she's thrown loose change in my back seat (I hate this one - dirtying up the new car).
3. I know an Italian lady who will not get out of the bed from the opposite side from which she got in.



Also, for a laugh -- go back and watch the "Sea Bass" scene from Dumb & Dumber.

Eating black eyed peas on New Year's Eve will leave you healthy, wealthy, and wise. Having done this with my older family for a while, I can either say it's not working or I could be really sick, poor, and dumb. I never liked black eyed peas anyway...

I was told as a child if someone handed you a knife, always return it to them in the same conditions as it was handed to you.

Old Railroad Superstitution. Train wrecks happen in threes.

An old panhandler told me never to try and hustle a man wearing a red tie.

A Gypsy told me that a man wearing a red tie was easy to fool because they had big egos.

An old man told me that if you bring a puppy home, cut off the tip of its tail and put it under the backdoor step and it would never leave home.

In the military it was common not to accept the third light for your cigarette as it was bad luck.

A friend of mine ran a variety store and he had a slight stroke, an ambulance was called and he was loaded onto it. They started moving him out the door with his head going first. An old black lady stopped them and would not let him go out unless he went feet first. She said if he went out feet first he would live and be able to walk back in. If he went out head first he would die.

There are countless superstitions i have heard and it amazes me that some people believe them. You are never free from surprises.