[gatagato]

Nationality: Haiti
Citizenship: Haiti
Known for: Being a zombie



On a brilliant day in the spring of 1980, a stranger arrived at L'Estère marketplace in Haiti's fertile Artibonite Valley. The man's gait was heavy, his eyes vacant. The peasants watched fearfully as he approached a local woman named Angelina Narcisse. She listened as he introduced himself, then screamed in horror—and recognition. The man had given the boyhood nickname of her deceased brother Clairvius Narcisse, a name that was known only to family members and had not been used since his funeral in 1962.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...952208,00.html

According to reports, Clairvius was poisoned with a mixture of various substances to simulate death. The instigator of the poisoning was alleged to be his brother, with whom he had quarreled over land. After his apparent death and subsequent burial on May 2, 1962, his body was recovered and he was given a paste made from datura which at certain doses has a hallucinogenic effect and can cause memory loss. The bokor (sorcerer) who recovered him then forced him, alongside many other zombie slaves, to work on a sugar plantation until the master's death two years later. When the bokor died, and regular doses of the hallucinogen ceased, he eventually regained sanity (unlike many others who had suffered brain damage from hypoxia while buried alive) and returned to his family after another 16 years, only after finding his brother had died.

Narcisse's story was popularized in the book The Serpent and the Rainbow by researcher Wade Davis, which met with some criticism in the scientific community.

The story of this man, thanks to the studies, gave to us a brand new perspective on the phenomenon known as zombies. Thanks to this case, we know that zombies are NOT just some legend, but also that there's something mundane behind it. It is also important to point out that Vodoo is some very respectable religion, which has almost nothing to do with zombies. Or better, a BAD use of it has. Poison, drugs and some strong mental influence (made possible thanks to the local's beliefs) are the mix.
References:
The Serpent and the Rainbow

Hines, Terrence (2008), “Zombies and Tetrodotoxin”

Davis, W. (24 June 1998). "Zombification (Letters)"

http://zombie.wikia.com/wiki/Clairvius_Narcisse
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clairvius_Narcisse

Hope it's not a repost: if it is, then feel free to trash it.

[hal0mega]

i dont get this, he never really died, yet they keep calling him a zombie. today it's common knowledge almost that there's plenty of drugs out there that'll do this to you.

[Gh007]

Puffer fish liver is the only thing that induces this ^

[carkees]

I had heard of this before. I think there's a documentary about it. Very scary....

[vnathan]

Doesn't look like he ate his sister's brains. He just awoke from a dead state. But cool.

[Psychonautical]

I want the book.

[NaTaS]

"Yeh I be vodun zambie, 5 dollar americano fer autograph"

[Maoh1349]

Pretty interesting,not a zombie in the typical umm hmm myth (would that be the right word?) sense,but one can definitely see how people with bad intentions can abuse superstitions and use medical means to create "zombies"