My Hong Kong | Magic, mysterious illness, and Chinese superstition: warding off the coronavirus with a ‘little person’ curse
- Fortune-teller uses chants and waving fingers to add extra ‘defence power’ to face masks to make them more effective
- But the concept of evil forces causing misfortune or bad luck is deeply rooted in Chinese culture
I recently came across a YouTube video of a famous local fortune-teller showing how to add extra “defence power” to a face mask to make it more effective in warding off the coronavirus.
In the video, Master Edward Li Kui-ming lifts his right index and middle fingers and moves them around in a combination of powerful up and down strokes, and then over and under turns as if he is doing invisible Chinese calligraphy in mid-air.
While doing his calligraphic strokes, he is also muttering chants and mantras as a way to ward off “the curse” of the virus.
He has produced a series of similar videos, which have apparently made their rounds on the internet and have now gone viral.
Many Chinese people, superstitious or not, tend to believe that some illnesses are caused by bad luck or misfortune and that diseases, especially those of mysterious origins, are curses inflicted by evil forces or even people with feelings of hatred towards them.