By Tiscon

Myth Origins: India

The Churel or Chudail or Churreyl, is one of the most famous myths you'll find in India, one dark and scary. The churel is a crude synonym of what—or who—is famously called a witch in English. But nope, she isn't a weaker, watered version of the cackling witch.

She's a ghost. And she's your worst possible nightmare.

According to famous nightly lore, a churel is born when a woman dies during pregnancy or childbirth, or when she goes through suffering at the hands of her in-laws. She's devastating in the latter case, and her malice targets the males in the household.

Accounts say that she resembles a hideous old woman with a pot belly, ugly through and through, but she's endowed with the power of shapeshifting, and she regularly shapeshifts into a beautiful woman to lure young men into the mountains. What she does up there is kill them, slowly sucking out every body fluid they've got. Churels love blood but the liquid spurts that give women pleasure.....that's their main craving. They'll have their fun and then they'll kill you anyway.

There's only one way to identify a churel. You must look at her feet. If she's your rare Aphrodite with backward feet, then beware. It's the one part of them that remains the same when they shapeshift. Feet turned one way, while your body's oriented in the opposite direction.

My own belief is that the backward feet symbolise a walk back from hell. Convoluted imagination, yeah, but I feel it's a mark of the Devil. Which is pretty reasonable, considering she's a female demon with a blown up libido. And vampiric tendencies.

I suggest that when you see the feet placed in a manner defying the laws of creation, don't believe it's a weird condition called 'Posthuma tibialis' or some rubbish along the lines. Run far away. Don't turn back.

If she was part of your family, and you treated her bad, then yes, sir, she's coming for you.

But of course, no one knows whether the churel's actually real or not. What I do know is that she's a very well-known myth, with several Indian movies devoted solely to her existence. Strange thing is that I've heard every myth arises from a truth.

And this one might stem from a horrifying truth. Who knows, maybe the truth's scarier than the myth?

Err...for your sake, dear men, to let you keep your virility and mental health, I fervently hope she isn't. But I'll tell you this.

The myth of the churel gives you one important lesson. One you must follow.

Men, men, married sirs...treat your wives nice.