#Ghede

[rockofeye]

Good afternoon, I want to thank you for share your knowledge and for your time. Can you please help me with some information about Demple lacroix, how to serve him, with Saint represents him, colors or wherever you can share. Thank you again

Hi there,

So, the Lakwa family is deep, wide, and full of Gede that may or may not appear in the broader regleman of the religion. It's not unusual for there to be Gede specific to a lakou or lineage, or even a region.

I'm not familiar with the this particular Gede. Did autocorrect maybe butcher the name?

All Gede are different and want different things. Piman is a good basic Gede drink, but not all Gede will accept it (and even get offended if offered!) Most Gede will accept black, white, and purple, but that can also vary. There are lots of different saints for Gede as well. Gede service depends on where you are from and how you have been taught.

If the name was reflected incorrectly, feel free to send another message and I'll see if I can help more.

[blackswanndraws]

webbinh..... also marketable plushie ghede/goede

[mytheralmin]

The first five slots go to my star Ghede a powerful ten cap with five superior disciplines, a cost reduction on serpentis combat cards, and an in built rush effect. The deck utilizes all five of his disciplines in full force with main focus on potence, presence, and serpentis. Fortitude is powerful for unlocking as always for single vampire decks and obfusicate though not as common as in earlier versions still has a few lost in the crowds and shadow boxings (a personal favorite.)

Second we come to Abdelsobek a five capacity Follower of Set with five inferior disciplines, four of which match with Ghede. Sporting serpentis, presence, obfusicate, fortitude, and necromancy makes him fine as a small actor but he is key to our strategy as he allows us to as a +1 stealth action unlock any other vampire or mummy we control. Almost always meaning Ghede gets 2 actions minimum every turn.

Third we pack two copies of one of the best cards in group five Andre LeRoux. A toreador with only inferior auspex he may seem weak but as with all our vampires up till now it’s all in the special text. “If a vampire you control would successfully bleed, you can reduce the bleed amount by 1 to give Andre +2 bleed this turn.” So you get to punish your opponent if they have no blockers. Great so do we play dreamworld to offset that bleed reduction? No he is here for two reasons. To do minor actions like take out army of rats, rescue abdelsobek, or block a bleed, and also to bleed for 6. Now how does he get to 6 bleed you ask, he can trigger on his own bleed action. This means you effectively have a +1 bleed 3 cap vampire that can increase that bleed amount further a great way to fill the hole in lower capacity.

Finally I have two one of vampires that while nice are generally unimportant and won’t see play unless you oust 2-3 opponents and have the pool to spare. My choices to bring are Clea Auguste d’Holford and Gold Pan Dan but I also suggest Andelino Da Silva if large agg damage is a problem or Paul Calderone if you need more vampires taking the same action often.

Moving on to the library cards it is a full deck of 90 playing 20 masters (5 trifle) which isn’t unusual and may be a bit light for a star vampire deck like this.

8 of my master cards are devoted to blood recouping and pool generation. With three blood doll, a classic card that has proven itself for 30 years now. Two copies of the trifle villein to help balance the lack of a Parthenon. One copy of temple hunting group, one copy of the trifle the coven, and one copy of giants blood each to regain blood on Ghede or his fellow vampires.

Beyond temple hunting group the deck packs two other location masters. Four copies of the stand out card from Fall of London is the British Museum and two copies of the only trifle location Filchware’s Pawn Shop both for important equipment synergies.

Finally the deck has six copies of the best acceleration card in the game besides perhaps information highway, it’s the Eternals of Sirius a 4 pool card that generates 5 blood on a Follower of Set 9th generation or higher. Meaning with two of these on then two in first position you can have Ghede and Abdelsobek flipped and ready to rumble.

Speaking of rumbling the deck packs 27 combat cards and 5 modifier/combat cards taking up more then a third of the whole deck.

With only 14 copies of typhonic beast it might seem low to you familiar with Ghede decks but the deck only needs so many of the all star that does everything. Increasing strength, soaking damage, and giving presses this card really does it all and playing one or more for free every turn has locked more then a few vampires out of the ready region forever.

Next up is immortal grapple, when you find yourself at close range or against a tricky enemy you gotta lock them in. Good luck using majesty or earth meld now unless your Stanislava or pack one of the three cards that can get you out of a grapple your out of luck today.

And just to make sure you get to close range we pack 5 of my favorite card in the game, shadow boxing. At inferior maneuver to close or press to continue, the best friend of !Nosferatu it works great here to close the difference or quickly make up a press dispute. But at superior is when it’s the most fun, after combat if your up and their not, burn a blood and continue the action as if unblocked. Call it form of fist because it breaks through to be devastating especially against blocked rushes or show of force.

Four copies of taste of Vitae are always good, if your a combat deck that isn’t diablerizing or stealing blood it’s a must have.

Finally three copies of the jones make a great catch all GOTCHA for when the malkavians think they can get tricky with coma or if the anarch ministry was packing a bit more wolf claw then you though.

Now for a deck called Ghede commits action fraud six actions may not seem like a lot but that’s because we also take eight equipments and an ally card as well.

Six show of force mean we can bleed with impunity. +2 bleed and +2 strength round one means almost no one show block us, and those who do quickly learn not to.

Six mokole blood form the code loop of the deck. With British Museum you can reduce the cost and unlock the vampire for the action as well as recur four typhonic beasts (or in some cases a the jones as well) from the ash heap or your library. And with Filchwares Pawn Shop not only can you steal other people’s miscellaneous equipment for a discount, you can recur the mokole blood with almost no risk as there are few decks that use Followers of Set and serpentis cards after the V5 decks came out.

Two cooler are currently the cards in contention. A steady supply of blood and a free actionfwith the museum yes but over all they may not be worth it and better used for out of turn master cards for protection (one direct intervention and one archon investigation perhaps) or protective allies (one Carlton Van Wyk and one Aranthabes, the Immortal.)

One copy of Mylan Horseed is played as a second unlock to Ghede or can free up an action with Abdelsobek.

And for the last 23 cards we have 18 modifiers, four reactions, and one event.

Six iron glare give us additional bleed when we need it, and enough juice to help close out tight games or bleed big.

Six freak drive give use multi action on our star vampire or with Abdelsobek after a crucial unlock, perhaps both.

Four lost in the crowds are essential as surprise stealth to get a final bleed or necessary mokole blood through.

Four orphidian gaze are the only fully defensive card besides the jones, letting me reduce a bleed by two or stop crucial vote modifiers namely voter captivation.

Two Enkil Cog are our favorite card to see. A unique modifier that sticks around it gives Ghede +1 bleed and allows him to act on others turn. Important that stops them from getting of archon investigation and other out of turn masters and let’s our star bleed twice per turn cycle.

Finally we have one NRA PAC a goverment event that lets anyone unlock at end of turn after equipping. With its nearly zero opportunity cost and high synergy with British Museum it can pull more than its own wieght.

So overall the deck plans to do two things punch out your opponents vampires then bleed, bleed, bleed. And if anyone gets in your way, well that’s what step one is for. Good luck and have fun.

[cafeconbrujeria]

[ishiganto]

The season has just begun.

[fula-ngenge]

Kwa

[bonesandpoemsandflowers]

After four hours, we’re still waiting on a possession, and I’m having doubts. loa are strongly tied to the land, the mountains and valleys infused with the spiritual energy of many generations. I wonder: can Ghede find this house, all the way up here in a Boston suburb, surrounded by the clutter and paraphernalia of American life, the discord of migration? This basement is caught between worlds, between Haiti and the States, between the divine and the mortal.

[toc-battlequotes]

[mambo-marie-laveau-voodoo]

Grand rituel cérémonie ghede #ghede #baronsamedi https://store-e-voodoo.net #magie #magique #initiation #mystique #sorcellerie #vaudou #rituel #rituelvaudou #pacte #mariage #vaudou #initiation #mystique #sorcellerie #benediction #degagement #rituel #occulte #marielaveau #mambomarielaveau #storeevoodoonet #evoodoonet (à e-voodoo.net) https://www.instagram.com/p/CmXne7pjvWV/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[nearlifeexperiencee]

Sorry for the late reply but a few things to correct:

Baron Samedi, LaCroix and Cimetière are 3 SEPARATE spirits. Mama Brigitte tends to be one of the only Ghede that does not appear as a skeleton. Together, Mama Brigitte and Baron Samedi lead the Ghede nanchon

Plenty of people serve the Ghede Lwa (including myself) and when possessed most will either act or dance inappropriately or try to eat a bunch of hot stuff but sometimes they just vibe and dont do much. Modesty is a human concept afterall and we all have different definitions of what that means. Ghede are not necessarily solitary they just have vastly different rules/traditions than other nanchons

The Ghede were people who were once alive and they tend to be vulgar and sexual but they do not hate or mock mankind in fact they love us and people usually go to them for healing. They're carefree after death but don't necessarily need or have the desire to "live" again

Otherwise everything else is pretty accurate!

Deadly fall: The Guédés

THE GUEDES

Category: Vodou belief

Freely translated from Heike Owusu’s “Vaudou: Rites and symbols”

 The Guédés

The Guédés are spirits tied to death and the defuncts. These “demons of death” usually appear at the end of every major Vodou ceremony, even if they weren’t invited. The members of the Guédé family are only invoked when one wishes to contact the dead, the spirits of their ancestors. They don’t have true worshipers, and they live a very solitary existence. They look with avidity and desire the lives of mankind, and they shamelessly mock it when they manifest themselves. They have in them the accumulated knowledge of many generations of defuncts, which makes them very wise and knowledgeable beings – they can act as counsellor if one asks for their help.

Le Baron Samedi, The Baron Samedi is the leader of the family. He appears under three different shapes: baron Cimetière (Baron Cemetery), baron La-Croix (baron The Cross) and baron Samedi (baron Saturday). He is manifested as a black cross on which a black outfit and a top hat are placed, installed near a fake grave and with a cane leaning against it.

Some members of the Guédé family walk around with shovels or pickaxes. Their outfits are adapted to the environment they appear in – but the clothes are either frightening, or ridiculous. They usually dress in mourning outfits, usually a worn-out frock coat or a top-hat who is out of fashion, with sometimes a purple veil. The idea behind their outfit is that they try to imitate either the undertakers, or the people that come to funerals. They absolutely love sunglasses, when they are black – they often steal those sunglasses to people around them, and can wear two or three pairs on their nose.

Other Guédés manage to convince the people they possess to disguise themselves in corpses and walk around publicly dressed like a dead body – they especially do that around Toussaint (All Saint’s Day). People might be scared by their corpse appearance, but soon the Guédés’s jokes and humor make everyone laugh, and so they are often invited to parties.

A characteristic of the spirits of this family are their nasal voice and their scabrous language, which is known to make even a whore blush. They often are tied to phallic symbols, because by wielding them they invoke the idea of the cycle of life : for a vodou adept, death is just a rebirth, a different form of birth leading to another plane of existence, a part of the cycle of life. The Guédés like to take possession of those that, in their every day life, pretend to be modest and moral, and they force them to do the “banda”, an exaggerated and comical mating dance. With all their erotic allusions, the Guédés are actually highlighting the fact that a new life can be created out of death.

Given they are very impertinent and allow themselves a lot of sexual freedom, those possessed by the Guédés are strictly and sternly checked and verified, to make sure that they are truly inhabited by a spirit, and not some simulator wanting to play. One really possessed by a spirit of death will start by holding his breath, before throwing himself on the ground. As soon as he is up, the vodou priests will make him drink a special type of brandy, made out of sugar cane and containing 21 types of spices – this very hot, very burning liquid, is either poured down the possessed one’s throat, or directly thrown into their eyes. Only someone possessed by a Guédé can actually stand this trial without bing harmed or bothered – in fact this extremely spicy drink is the favorite drink of the famly.

The Guédé possessed usually smoke cigarettes of cigars, chain-smoking them while drinking a lot of brandy and rum (when they don’t pour the alcohol into their ears). When you give them food, they eat it very quickly, and then they bury the leftovers in the earth – like that, if another day they are hungry they just dig it up and at it. By doing this, they want to represent with irony the materialism, greed and gluttony of humans. At the end of the ceremony, the Guédés sing the “undertaker song” with a nasal voice, and they end their possession on loud laughs.

The most famous female member of the Guédé family is Madame Brigitte (who is also the mother of most of the Guédés). She has a skinny and bony appearance that is perceived by everyone as repulsive. Another noteworthy member of the family is a baby Loa called Linto. The man possessed by him will act like a baby who just learned how to walk. The possessed usually is treated as a baby by the participants of the ceremony, and he is often given baby food.

- - - - - - – -

To better understand this article, two elements have to be explained: 1) The Loas/Lwas of Vodou, the great spirits who receive offerings and prayers and that interact with priests and sorcerers (who are often mistaken for the “gods of voodoo” but are not exactly gods), are organized into “families”. Here the Guédés is a vast category of death Loas that count as a “family”. But there are many other families of Loas  (sometimes also called “nanchon”, a deformation of “nation”, the same way “family” is called “fanmi”) 2) Possession. The Loas of Vodou, when invoked during rituals and ceremonies, cannot take physical form, because they are pure spirits : they need a human host to manifest themselves. And so the Vodou religion relies on trance-induced possessions where the loa will “ride” a human being (the same way one “rides” a horse, in fact the possessed are often called “mounts” or “horses” - the term is “chwa” or “chuai”, which is a deformation of “cheval”, the French word for “horse”).

[rockofeye]

Raising the Dead

I've been sitting with what I have learned and experienced this past Gede season and it feels strangely appropriate to write about that on a day given to Lazarus, the man who died and then lived again.

Gede and I have a long, LONG history. It was Gede who stood waiting for me to get myself to a fet and, as he put it, it was Gede who walked with me through my life (even when I didn't know it) and kept me alive to have the opportunity to step into the djevo. It is Gede who has been my foundation and Gede who has worked tirelessly in the background to help me consistently build myself back better than I was before; whether it was before kanzo or before maryaj or even better than I was last week.

Gede was the first lwa I encountered in Haiti, in the head of the houngan who would later become my husband, and that Gede has always been important to me. For quite awhile, I didn't understand and didn't look at the importance of the same Gede coming in the same head at very important times for me....but I get it now. S (my human husband) has a strong, STRONG relationship with his Gede and it was his Gede that gave me the opportunity to make the choice in Haiti before I entered the djevo: was I going to actually do all of it in the way it was intended, or was I going to shrink back and hold myself like and as an outsider?

I didn't totally understand that choice in the moment, but I did know that when Gede dragged me (kinda literally) into the middle of the temple during bat gè and demanded a gouyad out of me, the person who does not dance well at ALL. But, I had decided in the midst of my personal misery preparing for kanzo that I was all in and would do whatever was asked of me because, up until that point, my way of doing things was not helping me. That gouyad changed my life, honestly. The same Gede dragged me back for more gouyad after kanzo, and this time it was a literal dragging because I was very clear on the post kanzo instructions that I was not to interact with the dead for the period of my eprèv and I didn't know what to do. There is video of my sort of gesticulating wildly at my godfather and my friends as Gede took me by the arm, dragged me in front of the drums, and asked for a little more gouyad.

It was also that Gede who came to to my maryaj lwa and placed the rings I had bought for Gede on our fingers, and that same Gede who, when he comes down for his fets, has me running for him. He reminds people on the regular that I married him before I married the chwal/my human husband, and intercedes (without my asking) when other Gede start asking me for things and favors because it is he who takes care of me.

I also relate to Gede in a very different way than I sometimes see others relating to Gede. I find Gede to be very, very serious and I don't often get the dick joke kind of Gede that people most relate to. To me, Gede tells jokes to be able to say the things that people would otherwise be unable to hear, and I am a person who just gets confused by that, to be quite honest, because if I am going to hear hard things and someone is laughing about it, I get lost a bit...like why is it funny? That's not to say Gede has not done that; Gede in my husband's head is notorious for poking fun at me and at times exploiting the fact that, while I speak Kreyòl quite well at this point, I am not quite fluent enough for everything and particularly not for understanding the dialect that S's Gede will speak at times. It always comes with a blessing, even though I may not see it in the moment.

This year, I have been reminded just how close to me Gede always remains. That has been drastically underlined since S arrived in the US, and it has been kind of amusing to experience.

I work occasional overnight shifts at a side gig (because what houngan/manbo does not hustle for their lwa...), and more than once I have come home to find S not in our bed but sleeping in lwa room, which is not in and of itself weird. Vodouizan do that frequently as a devotion or to generate dreams or for any number of other reasons. It is, however, kind of strange to stick your head into the lwa room and see your husband laying on the floor like he is in the grave (arms crossed on his chest while he lays on his back) with a black moushwa over his face.

It's even stranger when your husband sits up and you realize it is your Husband who has come to see you and remarks that it is about time that you got back from work because he has been there waiting for you since before the sun came up. Having chats with Gede at 7AM after working all night is certainly a challenge but it is it's own blessing. He has detailed a lot of important stuff for both myself and my husband that needs to get done, and confirmed a lot of things that I had thought about before.

The confirmations are part of the lesson for me. I approach most things spiritual with a critical eye; I look to see if what I believe the lwa are telling me makes sense with what I already know, if it seems supportive of me versus undermining what the lwa have already put in place, and if it is going to harm me or other folks. Those are my basic guidelines for looking at what I hear or intuit, and even then my reaction is, unless it is something that has to be done immediately, I kind of put it on a shelf and just watch how things unfold.

It is absolutely wild to me to sit and chat with one of my lwa and have them declare the same things I have heard on my own and have not shared with others. To me, that reveals that my default is to sort of not believe what I am hearing and not give it the importance that it deserves. Like, Gede sat there and talked about one of my personal Gede whose name I have never spoken to another person--not even my husband--and spoke about them by name. He talked about other spiritual things that I had not brought up to anyone at all and just held to myself and my takeaway is that I need to trust what I hear more.

It reminded me of something I heard at Gede's fet at my spiritual mother's house. Ogou came to speak with his children, and I overheard something he told someone else: you can hear me in your head when I speak, so why do you wait to hear it from my mouth? Over the past decade my lwa have developed and refined me enough that I don't need to speak with them when they are in a head all that often. Sometimes it's useful to clarify something I am not understanding or in a very difficult situation, but by and large I hear them quite clearly, understand what they are saying, and have the tools to communicate with them. The first thing my mother taught me was how to pray and use my table, and I consistently do not give that the importance that it really holds.

The other side is that I sometimes don't pay attention enough to how they speak, in that after a decade of them telling me things, the way they speak has become more streamlined and requires very few grand gestures. Before it was them pulling out all the stops and sending very in-depth and detailed dreams. Now it is the things that occur to me when I sit and pray, or that occur to me when I am sort of contemplating a situation that I or someone else has been struggling with. They certainly do still send dreams when they want to underline something, but it has become much more of a ingrained process. In a way, it's been a manifestation of one of my most long term prayers: I want there to be no distance between myself and my lwa, and I do not want to be able to find the border where they begin and I end because I want them so enmeshed in my life and me so enmeshed in them that I move with them easily and fluidly.

And so it is.

This past season of a reinvigorated death has also got me rolling around with my ancestors again in a different-than-usual way. I have always had a complicated relationship with my ancestors because my relationship with my family is complicated, but they have gotten louder and louder, and that means it's time to take a deep breath and dig back in. In the last year, I uncovered a big giant gaping wound that has led to some of the problems my family currently experiences. Not a generational curse, really, but the reverberations of a massive tragedy that my ancestors were involved in that has never been addressed. Looking at what has happened in one branch of my family since that tragedy, and it's absolutely clear that the damage from that has radically changed the descendants. I don't even think most of my living family from that side have any knowledge of what happened; it took a lot of careful reading for me to get it.

I also visited the grave of a family member I was close to in life and that reawakened him. Standing in front of his grave and feeling his shock that I had come after being away for so long was kind of a shock to my system, and he's come to speak with me since and outline what he really needs.

The bottom line that my ancestors have highlighted is that my family is unwell because my ancestors are unhealed and problems have gone on for generations unaddressed. This has created a poison well of sorts, and here we are. Through probably a mix of accident and ancestral wrangling, I am the only living member of my family who hears (or knows they are hearing) the ancestors and so they have been clear that it is my responsibility to do the work to change things so that there is peace moving backwards in time and peace moving forward.

I am not exactly thrilled about this. It's not a surprise because I have been told this before and purposefully ignored it. However, life circumstances have changed and I am no longer in a space where I can ignore it. When I look at the scope of what must be done, I kind of look at my ancestors and ask where my staff is and how I am going to get paid for this, because it is A LOT.

I know the answer to those questions (I am the staff and the pay comes later), so I guess it's off to work I go? I don't know. I have a lot of personal background working with difficult ancestors, but I am going to be fumbling through how I address the ancestral weight of mass tragedy. People don't write books about that kind of ancestral veneration, but maybe that's also part of this work because I can't be the only one dealing with ancestral mess on a grand scale. Just another opportunity for personal growth and development, I guess.... These moments get tiring as I get older.

Now we are solidly in Makaya season, which closes out our year and dictates what our new year will be like. It is not gentle or nurturing; it is the expectation of rapid change and assertive (an understatement) presence of spirit. In common culture, this is the time of year that commemorates the divine taking on flesh, and in Vodou that is one of the most spiritually hot and spiritually significant events in our day-to-day. The lwa come into heads to bring us direct change, deliverance, healing, and hope. With the mess that the world is today, we need that and particularly the focus of healing and hope. Makaya's healing is not gentle and not without it's own kind of suffering; after all, the poto mitan is on fire and the Petwo lwa arrive screaming.

May the heat of the flames burn away all that I do not need and all that holds me back, and may the leaves and medicine find their way to the parts of me that need healing and wholeness. May I hold onto the hope that comes from the fire, because what is burned away will bear new life. May the soil be rich and may I be receptive.

[unfortunatetheorist]

What happened to the statue of The Bombinating Beast? - Part 2: Post-ASOUE

In order to understand this post, it's important to understand the Verifiable Former Discussion on the subject: (https://www.tumblr.com/unfortunatetheorist/758787979321950208/what-happened-to-the-statue-of-the-bombinating?source=share)

At the end of Part 1, we come to the ultimate conclusion that the statue of The Bombinating Beast ends up on the island, by the time the events of ASOUE are over.

We know that Lemony is narrating this story in the present, and that ASOUE occurred in the past. From this - in addition to the information in TBL - we know that Lemony went to the island after the events, and stayed long enough to gather fragments of what once belonged to the Baudelaires.

I think that it is not guaranteed, but entirely possible, that Lemony discovered the statue on the island. He is then direly haunted of his tragic past, and his usage of it to kill Hangfire/Armstrong Feint.

Then, Lemony makes the ultimate decision, and he is the only one on the island, so he can.

Everyone is free by the time Lemony meets Beatrice II at Old Ed's Soda Shop:

• Lemony is free from the authorities, else he would have told Beatrice to be quiet when referring to him as "Mr Snicket"... unless he poses as Jacques... (again...)

• The Baudelaires are not free, but safe, in the same way Lemony was when he was on the lam.

• Beatrice II is free (well, as far as we know) from the banking authorities; no-one is trying to force her to be with a guardian, as Mr Poe was with the Baudelaires.

• The volunteers and villains alike from the Hotel Denouement are (presumably) free from life itself.

• Ink and the other animals are free from being used by either side of the V.F.D. schism. Apart from, perhaps, the eagles when one assumes The Sinister Duo to be alive.

(• Even The Daily Punctilio is free from corruption, as Eleanora Poe has been jailed and the paper discontinued.)

The only thing that isn't free is The Bombinating Beast.

I think Lemony decides to change that - he irreversibly breaks the statue on the island, setting the animal free, and leaving the submarine to perish, just as so many other people, animals and objects have done in this miserably lonely universe.

Open to interpretation,

~ Th3r3534rch1ngr4ph, Unfortunate Theorist/Snicketologist

[jaymber]

"Get out of my body."

"And what makes you think this body's still yours?"

[afterthegreatunknown]

random but do you have any headcanons/theories about gifford and ghede?

I don't mind the randomness, anon! I like getting asks!

Gifford and Ghede are some of the characters in the series (ASOUE and ATWQ combine) I don't think much of. To me, because they were introduced as a duo, I see them as a 'two-in-one' deal of a character. So the headcanons I have of them is...short. Really short:

Almost never seen without one another in public. You think Gifford is alone eating lunch on a bench? Surprise! Ghede shows up with her lunch to join him. You certain Ghede is watching television by herself? Nope! Gifford jumps over the sofa to sit beside her.

Gifford takes very good care of his mustache (thanks ATWQ illustrations), and keeps a spare mustache comb on hand.

Ghede loves the hear the drama going on among associates. She's a nosy sorts; if it's drama about her least associates, she shares it.

Unknown to the organization, Gifford and Ghede know they're thought of as the worst volunteers of their generation, but they really do try their damn best to be volunteers of the organization.

I don't have any theories about them, honestly. I don't vibe with the theory that they're possibly TMWBBNH and TWWHBNB, even though I get the logic behind. Really I think Ghede and Gifford by ASOUE are in a nice little 'retirement' together because if they're to be lazying around with someone, they do it with their partner of many years (romantically? platonically? I haven't decide yet).

Thank you so much for the ask, anon! Do drop in whenever you feel like it!

[conjuremanj]

Gede Family (Haitian Vodou)

The Gede (French: Guede) Gede are the dead–spirits who were once human and have since been elevated (by Bawon) to serve as Gede. There are Gede of all genders.

The Gede are souls that never went through the funeral rites and became lost then Baron finds then and elevate them to Gede.

They are the family of spirits not Lwa, that represent the powers of death and fertility. All are known for the drum rhythm and dance called the "banda". Banda is danced at funerals to assist the passage of the dead to the world of the spirits within vodou thinking about death is the notion of rebirth. The dance is a sexual dance with grinding , cussing etc..

The Gedés are spirits and guardians of the dead. The dead reside in the cemetery, but so do liminal spirits who straddle the frontier between life and death.

Gede is born under the water, of souls that are unclaimed by families, usually. Bawon selects souls to serve as Gede and does whatever he does to make that particular Gede, and then the new Gede exists. Even very well known Gede like Gede Nibo or Gede Mazaka vary wildly from lineage to lineage.

The Barons are a family of lwa who are the aspect of life of death. They oversee the Gede.

In possession sometimes they can be the life of the party in most lineages it can be the exact opposite. In possession, he falls to the ground and is arranged as a corpse.

Baron Samedi.: is the leader of the Gede family, he's the lwa that represent death. He's the chief spirit of the dead, the Baron guards the veil between life and death, welcoming new souls into the underworld and deciding who lives and who dies. He is recognized as a man with a high hat on his head, sunglasses with one lens gone who likes to smoke cigars. Papa Gede- is a spirit who guides souls into the afterlife. He is a great healer when it's a life and death situation. can help with fertility and is fine if children.

However, he is also the patron of young children and a great healer, when there is a life or death situation.

Barons Cross in Haiti.

Maman Brigitte ("Mother Bridget") is the wife of Baron Samedi. She is syncretized with St. Brigid, perhaps because she is the protector of crosses and gravestones.

Now some may say that Gran Brigit is not presented as white and she may not be, some consider her to be a light skinned black woman. When you have a lwa spirit who embody death, such as her and her husband Bawon Samdi, sometimes they can often appear pale because they are deceased. They are other spirits that do portray themselves passing for white like Damballah Wedo, Agwe Tawoyo, Ezili Freda, Ogou Sen Jak, and others.

For practitioners of Haitian Vodoun and the New Orleans Voodoo religion, Maman Brigitte is one of the most important loa. Associated with death and cemeteries, she is also a spirit of fertility and motherhood.

She can be called on for a number of different matters. Like healing—particularly of sexually transmitted diseases—and fertility, as well as divine judgement. She's known to be a mighty force when the wicked need to be punished. If someone suffers from long term illness, Maman Brigitte can step in and heal them, or she can ease their suffering by claiming them with death.

"We here in New Orleans call upon Mama Brigitte to clear our path of negativity and evil, to help our memory and to bring us the protection and wisdom of our Ancestors and Spirit Guides."

Brav Gede: is the guardian and watchman of the graveyard. He keeps the dead souls in and the living souls out. He is sometimes considered an aspect of Nibo.

Gede Bábáco: is Papa Guede's lesser known brother and is also a psychopomp. His role is somewhat similar to that of Papa Guede, but he doesn't have the special abilities of his brother.

Gede Nibo (Haitian Creole) is a lwa who is leader of the spirits of the dead in Haitian Vodou. Formerly human, Gede Nibo was a young man who was violently killed.

After death, he was adopted by Baron Samedi and Maman Brigitte. Nibo wears a black riding coat or drag. He is a intermediary between the living and the dead. And is the patron of those who died by unnatural causes (disaster, accident, misadventure, or violence). He can help to give a voice to the dead spirits whose bodies have not been found or that have not been reclaimed from "below the waters".

"Baron Kriminals" is the enforcer of the Gede. He was the first person to kill another (probably Nibo). He's the second man to be buried in the cemetery. As the first murderer, he is master of those who murder or use violence to harm others. He's the guardian of the cemetery and watch over the tombs and what's in them. He has a skull painted face and smokes a cigar and rest under the tallest tree in the cemetery. He call sometimes captain zombi you'll see him in an image wearing a bottle around his neck which contains the zombies spirits in the bottle. He is called apon to help when the matter is serious not when ever you want to. The families murder victims and the abused pray to him to get revenge on those who wronged them. He's know to work with Met Kalfu. You can put a pic of him by the door to protect from criminals.

He is syncretized with St. Martin de Porres, perhaps because his feast day is November 3, the day after Fèt Gede.

Baron LaCroix, says to be Barons brother, but he's the cemetery groundskeeper and maintains the graves. He is one of the Gede, a lwa of the dead and sexuality along with Baron Samedi and Baron Cimetière in Vodou. He is syncretized with Saint Expeditus. Baron La Croix is also known as Azagon Lacroix. He's another aspect of Semedi not the same but similar.

He is generally not invoked unless under certain circumstances but people avoids him do to can try to kill and turn one to a zombi.

Baron Cimetière is one of the Gede, a spirit of the dead, along with Baron Samedi and Baron La Croix in Vodou. He is said to be the guardian of the cemetery, protecting its graves.

Ghede Masaka and Ghede Oussou Known as the twins, these two Loa are Haitian Voudou’s gravediggers gifted with divine insight. Masaka is depicted as an androgynous or transgender male who assists Ghede Nibo, while Oussou is his rum-loving brother dressed in opposite colors.

Baron Del Cementario: Although technically Baron Del Cementario’s name is the Spanish version of the French Baron Cimitière, (they are not the same spirit.) In the Vodou traditions of the Dominican Republic, the first man buried in a cemetery becomes that cemetery’s Baron Del Cementario. To identify or contact him, locate his grave. In Dominican tradition, Baron Del Cementario is the Baron with the closest relations with the living, perhaps because he, unlike most Barons, has had a relatively recent human incarnation.

JustBaron Del Cementario is contacted or invoked in the cemetery at midnight. Enter by one gate; make your offerings and petition, then leave by another gate, not the one by which you entered. Throw nine coins over your left shoulder (have them ready in your pocket) and then go home via a circuitous route without looking back.

[dragoneyes618]

Hi! Taking up your offer to ask you about your fic "The Wrong Answer" (Lemony Snicket)

- What inspired you to write the fic this way?

- What’s your favorite line of narration?

- What’s your favorite line of dialogue?

- What part was hardest to write?

- Where did the title come from?

- Is there anything you wanted readers to learn from reading this fic?

- What did you learn from writing this fic?

Hi! :)

The Wrong Answer

What inspired me? It was a theory I read a while ago that I can't find, pointing out that Gifford and Ghede had an elaborate fragmentary plot that I'm not quite clear on as revealed in Why Is This Night Different From All Other Nights? But if they were smart enough to have this whole plot, why would they try something as foolish as disguising himself as his parents? Because, since Lemony was taken as an infant, he didn't even know what they looked like. So of course disguising themselves as his parents would have had a chance of working. He had no memory of them. But then, how did he realize they weren't his parents? I figured one of his siblings, who did remember them a bit, would have told him.

My favorite line of narration is this: The youth standing there had one fist raised in the air to knock and a careful, blank expression on his face that showed nothing of what he was feeling. Lemony knew that look. His brother had taught it to him, after all.

My favorite line of dialogue is what Jacques tells Lemony: "But we believe in you. We know you can do the right thing. And remember..." we take care of our own. We take care of our own...Remember that."

The part that was hardest to write was how, exactly, the interaction with the four of them - Lemony, Jacques, Gifford disguised as Jacob, and Ghede disguised as E - went. Gifford and Ghede had to act like they were parents. Lemony wasn't sure if they were his parents or not. Jacques knew they weren't, but he had to act like they were so as not to give anything away.

The title came from the title of the series: All The Wrong Questions. This was the wrong answer. Answer to what, exactly? I'm not quite sure but it sounded good. ;)

I don't think there's anything that I learned or that I want other people to learn. Learn....to trust your brothers? Not to believe strangers who say they are your parents? XD I didn't really have anything in mind. I just wondered "So how did the Gifford-and-Ghede pretending to be his parents go?" and wrote that.

Thank you for sending this! I haven't thought about this fanfiction in a while, so this was fun to do!

( @accidentallylita I'm tagging you because I'm pretty sure you only follow me for ASOUE stuff, and I post little enough of that as it is, so here's this, at least? ;) )

Send me an ask about a fanfiction I've written!