Spooky stuff. I love the eeriness of all this, Christine. Santería is something the Cubans I know (i.e. my wife and her extended family) take pretty seriously. Definitely more than just superstition. My take is that the more you believe it has power in this world, the more it can actually affect you, not just psychologically but physiologically.

I find the whole idea of syncretism really interesting - mapping gods from one religion onto other figures with similar attributes from another.

It initially seemed so freaky to someone like me from the protestant tradition (though a lifelong atheist) - you grow up thinking that 'god' is just one entity, and pantheons are something from Greek and Norse legend.

But then the more contact you have with Catholicism, the more you realise that in fact it is a pantheistic religion, with different entities having power - and demanding veneration - over different aspects of our lives.

Santería takes that to a whole new level.

Like I say, freaky stuff.