My grandmother had a huge impact on my cultural identity, and when i was younger she always used to teach me that when you make a sacred prayer to the ancestors you need to do so with an offering of food or whatever little you have as a way to show that you are still thinking about them in the physical world and you care about their well-being. In that way they will also be able to bless you too.

My grandmother also used to tell me a story when i was younger about the river that was directly in front of our home. She warned me that there was a snake in the river that had the ability to shape-shift into a human, and that if someone played in the water or hung out by it, they would eventually vanish along with the river. She told me that a man was once tricked by the snake which he believed was a girl who needed help by the river, and when the man tried to help the "girl", he vanished with the water. After my grandmother told me that, I stopped playing the river and I never used it as a shortcut; I would much rather take the longer route to the stores. She also claimed that those who were bewitched or connected in some way to witchcraft would be the ones who would see it the most.