In the Indonesian village of Kepuh, volunteers dressed as ghosts were hired to fight quarantine breakers during the coronavirus epidemic
In the village of Kepuh on the island of Java in Indonesia, the police decided to use local superstitions and attract young people dressed as ghosts to patrol the streets during the quarantine period. Residents of the village believe in the spirits of the dead, and “ghosts” should force them to stay at home during the epidemic, authorities believed, according to Reuters.
The police hoped that the “ghosts” would make a frightening impression and people would observe quarantine for fear of leaving the house at night. But in the early days of the experiment, the opposite effect occurred – locals massively ran out into the street to look at the “ghosts”.
A few days later, when the number of “ghosts” increased and they suddenly began to appear in various places, “jumping on passers-by”, people on the streets became much smaller, the newspaper said. According to the head of Priyadi village, the locals “lack knowledge about the coronavirus,” so they “find it difficult to understand why they should stay at home all the time.”
According to Indonesian folk beliefs, ghosts wrapped in white burial shrouds – “pokongs” – symbolize the souls of the dead remaining in the bodies of the dead. If for some reason the soul of the Indonesian after death cannot leave the body, the deceased turns into a “Pokong” and wanders around the world in search of peace.