Veni Vidi Vivi

Nine monsters down, 22 to go. Good thing there are lots of monsters.

Today we have the bunyip of Australia.

According to Wikipedia:
The bunyip, or kianpraty, is a large mythical creature from Aboriginal mythology, said to lurk in swamps, billabongs, creeks, riverbeds, and waterholes. The origin of the word bunyip has been traced to the Wemba-Wemba or Wergaia language of Aboriginal people of South-Eastern Australia. However, the bunyip appears to have formed part of traditional Aboriginal beliefs and stories throughout Australia, although its name varied according to tribal nomenclature.

Descriptions of bunyips vary widely. However, common features in many nineteenth century newspaper accounts include a dog-like face, dark fur, a horse-like tail, flippers, and walrus-like tusks or horns or a duck like bill.

Here is a delightful site from the National Library of Australia with some of the Aboriginal stories about this monster. Oh, it's for kids, but that's never stopped me before.

I am filled with dismay and rage at the hatefulness of what seems to be the population at large. GRR ARGH!!!!! Stupid Internet. Use your power for good.

Anyway. Monsters. YAY MONSTERS! (They are supposed to be scary and mean, unlike the majority of the Western world at the moment.)

Since I spent the day driving into the Eastern plains of Colorado (where the landscape is not pointy in way) including zipping about back roads between two small towns (on roads that were basically asphalt with no stripes or shoulders!), I thought I'd do some local stories about "monsters".

Or, you know, aliens.

Earlier this year, there was a rash of cattle mutilations around here and further south and west (mostly in the San Luis valley). This is not the first time these reports have surfaced; they pop up sporadically (and there are enough sighting of UFOs in the valley that I do think something is up phenomena-wise. Either that or folks have access to some excellent hallucinogenics... which could also easily be the case.

Anyway, read for yourself.

Near Trinidad, UFO expert investigates Colorado cow mutilations.

Video footage of same article - WARNING for semi-graphic images of dead cows (who have been taken down by natural predation, say sorry, UFO fans.)

However, a vampire caused a car crash in Fruita (which west of the spooky San Luis Valley). So who knows? Maybe that was an alien, too.

Yama-uba (mountain crone) is a yōkai ("spirit" or "monster") found in Japanese folklore. The name may also be spelled Yamamba or Yamanba. She is sometimes confused with the Yuki-onna ("snow woman"), but the two figures are not the same.

Yama-uba looks like an old woman, usually a hideous one. Her unkempt hair is long and golden white, and her kimono (usually red) is filthy and tattered. Her mouth is sometimes said to stretch the entire width of her face, and some depictions give her a second mouth at the top of her head. She is able to change her appearance, though, and she uses this tactic to great success in capturing her victims.

I have to tell you, I love crones. Crones rock. Crones that eat people with their second mouth rock even harder. Of course she uses this tactic to great success. I would expect nothing less.

In addition to killing adults, Yama-uba is often blamed for missing children, and parents use her as a sort of bogeyman.

Well, duh. Om nom nom. Children are delicious.

(Did you really think this countdown was going to not favor the monsters sometimes?)

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I'm doing a combo post with a meme I owe. If anyone hasn't received a color or wants to know which color I associate with them, let me know!

Comment and I'll give you a color that I think represents you, and then you list ten things you like in that color!

agonistes gave me "black... like my soul!".

( Ten things )

By the way, I use the term 'monsters' loosely. My countdown might include mysterious creatures, too. FYI!

This is a Melanesian myth, specific to the Solomon Islands and information is from here:

The Adaro and the Aunga are believed to be the two parts of persons soul or spirit. When death occurs, the Aunga, or the good and gracious part of the person moves on. The malevolent part, Adaro becomes a spirit.

Adaro are half-man and half-fish. They have the body of a man, gills behind their ears, tail fins for feet, a horn shaped like a shark's dorsal fin, and a sword fish or sawfish-like spear growing from its head.

Wikipedia adds:
Adaros live in the sun and travel to and from Earth by sliding along rainbows. Unlike the renowned mermaid, they are dangerous to humans and can kill them by travelling along rainbows and shooting them with poisonous flying fish. They may also travel in waterspouts.

Yes, that's right. Kickass mermen who ride the rainbows and kill you with fish. That is hard core.

This is a wooden carving of an Adaro as found in the British Museum collection (and taken from this article):

Oh, um, look at that! It's October 1st already... for about two more hours. Oops!

So this year I am doing the 31 Monsters of Halloween. Do not expect long posts. There will be cutting and pasting (which I will link and italicize!). However, there will also be interesting facts about all kinds of monsters!

We'll start off with the Wild Man of the Navidad.

The Wild Man of the Navidad (or the Wild Woman of the Navidad) is believed to be one of the first sightings of Bigfoot in Texas.

It was first widely reported in 1837 throughout the early settlements along the Navidad River bottoms, circa the modern-day town of Sublime, Texas, in Lavaca County. Slaves along the Navidad called it "The Thing that Comes," for, though no one saw it, there was always evidence that Something had come. On moonlit nights from as early as 1836, people would find food missing from their cabins, even though an intruder would have had to step over sleeping dogs to reach it.

Bigfoot stories come from all over. Nearly every region has a variation of a bigfoot or Lake Man or wild thing. Anyone know of one from where they live?