If you_______you will DIE!!

Superstitions are a funny thing. But its even more hilarious when they cease to be deemed superstitions and become absolute truth. Through our travels we have found that certain countries are a little more prone to the transition from superstitions taken with a grain of salt, down a very slippery slope to absolute truth. It may sound like I'm making the following account up and, I wish I were...but...no such luck.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays I have a conversation class with Korean teachers. We usually talk about current events, and any topic that I choose to help with their vocabulary and the like. Chas had sent me an article all about superstitions and I used it one day in class. We talked about all the superstitions in Korea and America and like I said, with a grain of salt and a smile we agreed they were fun traditions, interesting to talk about but definitely not true. About five minutes before class was over I remembered the funniest one I had heard in Korea but had forgot to mention. Excited to see their reaction to it I said, "What about that one...If you go to sleep with the fan on you can die." They gasped as if they were worried for my life at not knowing the danger of this truth. "No no Lacey Teacher that is true!' "Every summer we see in the paper and on the news that people die that way, it is so dangerous." Thus were their exclamations and I could tell they were glad to set me straight before I was the next victim. I told them that I sleep with the fan on every night. Oh that's bad they replied. I asked what actually happens then, what does the autopsy say? what are the signs that it is because of the fan and not another factor? To this they had no answer but still did not budge. I asked where they heard about this being the cause and they all said TV. Chas had the similar response from his teachers class and he asked, is everything on TV true? This question was only met with confusion.

This is by far the silliest thing we have heard of in this country. All over the Internet there are Korean doctors who discredit this Superstition; I guess they are just not on TV. A friend of ours told us that in Paraguay if you eat watermelon with other food your stomach WILL EXPLODE. They found this out the hard way when they brought watermelon to a potluck in said country. If anyone has any other experiences with foreign countries and their common If you...you will die...superstitions feel free to contribute to the madness.

For more info on fan death go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fan_death