Chambers of the Occult - Episode #4 Vanished Voices and Medieval Moves: Unraveling the Shadows of Alexandra & Luiza's Disappearance and the 1518 Dance Plague

Episode Date: February 27, 2024

Join us on this episode of the podcast as we delve into two perplexing cases that have captivated the world with their enigmatic twists. First, we explore the chilling tale of the kidnappings of Alexandra Măceșanu and Luiza Melencu, two young women whose disappearances sent shockwaves through their community, leaving behind unanswered questions and a desperate search for justice.Then, journey back in time with us to the year 1518, as we uncover the bizarre phenomenon known as The Dancing Plague. Discover the eerie events that unfolded in Strasbourg, France, when hundreds of people inexplicably succumbed to a frenzied dance, sparking theories ranging from mass hysteria to supernatural forces.And for our bonus segment, we venture into the heart of West Virginia to explore the legends of three cryptids that have long haunted the Appalachian wilderness. From sightings of strange creatures to whispered tales of the unknown, these stories add an extra layer of fascination to our exploration of the unexplained.

Chambers of the Occult may contain content that might not be suitable for all listeners. Listener discretion is advised. Welcome back! Welcome back! Welcome back! Episode 4, here we are. Hello. I'm Jay. I'm Kai. I'm Alexis.

And we are Chambers of the... No, I'm just... Yeah, do it, do it, do it, do it, do it. And we are Chambers of the Occult. Okay, we can get some more energy in that, guys. We'll practice that later. We'll practice that later. Yeah.

I was doing finger guns. You just... You should be in jazz hands. Oh. And kind of girl. What? Act man? What? Axeman? What?

Oh, man. By the way, you guys should listen to our previous episodes. We have three episodes out, and I talk about an axeman that likes people who listen to jazz. No way. No way. That's crazy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's kind of crazy. You should crazy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of,

it's kind of crazy. You should listen. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. If you're starting with episode four, great. Uh,

just letting you know, um, it's going to, if you go four, three, two, one, um,

we're not getting better as you go backwards, but from one to four and we're getting better. Yeah. So if you're listening and this is the first time you're listening, don't listen, go back to episode one. Um, welcome. And're listening and this is the first time you're listening, don't listen. Go back to episode one. Welcome.

And then progress from there. Do listen, please. Don't listen to Alexa. Listen, listen, listen, listen. Don't listen to this one as your first episode. They can. It might be a good one. Yeah, that's true.

I don't know where you're coming from. Of course it's going to be good. Why? Because I'm starting it off. Oh, you're so right. You're so true crime right i am doing a true crime case wow so i know i know i said this already when we weren't recording but just for the listeners, I am not going to pronounce all of these names in the correct way. Because they're Romanian names. They literally are.

They literally are. Are they? Yes, they literally are. I'm not even joking. Just a reminder, like, we don't discuss the cases we're doing with each other before. It's like, we don't know. So that's actually funny. No, yeah cool yeah and also just to kind of like keep up with everything that i've been doing in the previous episodes um josh hutcherson

okay if you know you know can we cut that out no no no no keep that in keep that in jay keep it in anyways i'm just kidding anyways so if i don't she's gonna like i'm gonna have little breadcrumbs throughout the show i'm gonna tell josh i'm gonna tell you no no please i'm going to bleep that word out. Yeah, yeah. And it's going to sound like Alexis cussing at everyone. Oh my god. Yes, do that.

Okay, care to take us off to Romania? Yeah, let's travel to Romania, guys. Specifically. When and how are we getting there? 2019. Oh, wow. This is pretty recent. To be specific, July 25th, 2019.

So my case, I'm going to talk about the kidnapping of Alexandra Misesinu and Luisa Melentiu. Sounds like the doctor's last name. This took place in Caracol, Olic County, Romania on July 25th, 2019.

And this case pretty much made Romanian history. It, the police department of Romania, like overall got a lot of extreme criticism due to this case and how they handled it. extreme criticism due to this case and how they handled it it took them 19 hours to locate and search the building that alexandra was held captive in wait wait okay tell us what happened because now i'm curious yeah that's what i'm gonna get into so uh this starts off with alexandra a 15 year old girl who had went missing on july 24 2019 at the time she was hitchhiking now one thing i do want to put out there in romania the transportation system overall was very poor so hitchhiking wasn't too out of the norm

it was very common yes very common and honestly feel like european hitchhiking is very common but i might just be making that up or not i am it probably is this seems like relatively safer than american hitchhiking. So, yeah. Yeah. I mean, we do have a high rate of serial killers. Fuck, go on, Alexis. Romania has a high rate of human trafficking, which is another thing I want to put out there. But at the time, Alexandra was hitchhiking from her village, Dobro Sloveni, to Karakol.

And she was picked up by this man in a gray car. He went by the name of, it's spelled kind of like George, but it's pronounced Gorgay. Gorgay. Gorgay Dinka is his name he is a 60 or was a 65 year old man um and he had taken alexandra to a house in caracol now alexandra was held captive of course in this house and she tried to find ways to communicate with anybody. And she managed to find his phone. Why was she going to that town or city? Yeah.

She was going to her hometown. That's her hometown. So she was just coming back for her family. Okay. And she managed to find his phone in the room that she was in. And she called Romanians 911-112 three times. So the call logs were released publicly on Facebook by Alexandra's uncle, Alexandru. Did he work at the station?

Or the call center? No, he did not. No, he was a businessman and a former talk show host so like how he got these was um simply by like getting her call records um and also oh yeah so he had written them down and he had published them on Facebook. And he, Alexandria, her uncle wanted to show. Yeah.

Quote the rottenness of a murderous system and the courage of this incredible child, end quote. So the first call log was on July 25th, 2019, again, at 11.05 a.m. And when Alexandra made this call, she had stated that she had been kidnapped and was being held captive in a house and car call. Now, the operator had asked if she had been raped. By the way, trigger warning. And unfortunately, she was. So she revealed that information to the operator.

Which means the one that heard the call on Facebook heard. Yeah, but the operator had told her that they needed more information to know exactly where she was. Okay, yeah. So she called again at 1106 and she told the operator that she had been kidnapped, just to repeat, again, in a great car, then blindfolded and locked in a room. But she did remember passing by a dam, which led her to believe that she was in a district in Caracol called Bold. And so she had also found this business card in the room. And on the business card was the name Lucien Gabriel Popescu. And she wasn't sure, but she revealed that information to the operator just in case it was the perpetrator. But again, she wasn't fully confident on this.

But on the business card, there was an address and she had given that address to the police. Now, I am going to switch from the operator to the police because when I mentioned the police, that is when I'm talking about when the police officers took over the call. So they took over the call. Go ahead. But the police had taken over the call and they had tracked down the address to an apartment. Unfortunately, Alexandra was not held in an apartment. She was held in a detached house. So that was a miss. At 11.12 a.m., Alexandra had made her third and final call and asked if the police were on their way to her now during this call all these three calls actually it was said that the police had spoken to her in a condescending manner and yeah she was begging

for help and she was just simply trying to talk about how scared she was and hoping that her being extremely scared as a 15 year old child being abducted yeah would make them be more urgent about the situation i mean and she called them three times she called them three times yeah like that's more than enough for you to be able to come on track her down like you literally 2019 track the phone exactly to be fair i don't know what technology like in mania but still it's like come on yeah you would also think like 2019 people or at least the cops they would be a little bit more professional when it came to people or at least the cops they would be a little bit more professional when it came to situations

it kind of broke my heart when they said that they were kind of being condescending towards her but the calls were made on July 25th and at 2am the next

day police had finally identified her location. But they waited four hours before using a search warrant that wasn't required by law to have. So, like, they could have been to that location right then and there and not needed a search warrant at any point but they decided to wait for it and so they went and the police had finally arrested dinka and at wait so it was the name that was on the card right no um no like they arrested to take them for the questioning and stuff yes um okay and then gorget was the man who had Alexandra. And he confessed to the murder of her as well as a 18-year-old girl, Louisa Melentiu, who had disappeared back in April. So he committed to both of those crimes. And the agency that had

The agency that had investigated this case, their kind of like abbreviation is D-I-I-C-O-T. I'm going to call them DCOT. DCOT had announced that Alexandra's DNA had been found in dental pieces in a barrel on Dinka's property. Now, the thing is, is that there were multiple teeth. Some of them did not match with Alexandra's. But... I thought there were more. But the forensic specialist had failed to note that. So they examined the teeth again but when they

examined it they did it in a destructive method which led the results to be inconclusive and then there's nothing left to test yes yeah that's sketchy. Was that done, like, just out of ignorance or out of, like... I'm not sure. I don't know if it was simply because they didn't know how to do their job or because they really just did miss it. a death certificate but the family did not want to accept it they didn't believe that their niece daughter had a valid yeah yeah and so the families of alexandra and louisa they didn't believe that they were both murdered but instead trafficked like i said in the beginning of this, human trafficking, unfortunately, very common in Romania. And so it wouldn't be impossible. It really wouldn't be. But again, it was just a theory that they had.

And what really led them to believe that they were being trafficked was how easily that Dinka had, like, confessed to these crimes. And also the delay from the police. Like, they believe it was intentional. Oh. That taking so long to... Someone in the police was involved? I don't know.

I know that, like... Like, I honestly don't really know where, but I feel like it's kind of a common thing for, like, somebody to, like, sacrifice themselves and, like, take the blame for, like, murder in order to cover up the actual trafficking ring. No, yeah, like, I, there's, like, doppelganger like uh copycats there's like people that copy other people's murders or like people that you know take cover of their friends or whatever and so like i don't know what to believe like i can't can't trust Dinka's word, you know? Like, I can't...

And I'm sure the family couldn't either, which led them to believe all these, or, like, come to the different conclusions, you know? Yeah, and they didn't find bodies. They just found, like, the teeth, right? Yep, they did not find any bodies. That's what made it worse, you know? Not only for, you know the the police department but

mainly for the families like there's no bodies left for them to even thought could the police have like planted the teeth or something if somebody was in on it it is possible you know like there are some you know because it took them four hours to get a search warrant that they didn't need and with four hours you can get someone out of the country that is more than enough time yeah and they're police officers they know the law they know they should have known that they didn't need that. It's not their first rodeo. Like, literally.

You should have known to go to this location and get this girl. Like, she was begging for your help and you took 19 hours. But they did find her, right? Like, she was able to get out and, like, go back to her family? No. Or she wasn't there and like go back to her family? No.

Or she wasn't there? She wasn't there. No. She was never found. I think that's like mainly, I don't know. This case was really hard to do research on because like, I don't know. There's so many unanswered questions. Yeah. I don't know. There's so many unanswered questions. And I'm like, and even to this day,

there's still some things that they never even went over. I mean, I, I, it sucks that it's so recent, but I guess it gives you a little glimmer of hope that some technology in the future might come along that might locate them or their bodies, you know, give the family some peace.

Their actual child or like their child's body. It's also really sad to know that this stuff still happens. Yeah. Oh, it's huge. Huge. Now, the prosecutor, his name was Vasilescu Liviu. Dope name. He was working on Luisa's case, which again, was back in April. So he was the prosecutor of Luisa's case, and he actually found surveillance footage of Dinka's car.

And that essentially just linked Dinka to Louise's disappearance. The thing was, Vasilescu didn't actually reveal this evidence until the morning of July 27th. But when he did show this evidence, all he did was show a still photo. And in the photo, no, not the video. And in the photo, the license plate wasn't visible. Oh, my God. And this was three months later right so april he found it he found it in april and then he found it in april and then presented it in july yeah and let me guess like they couldn't find the video after that um no they still had oh no the only person that technically had access to the

video was him himself yeah like nobody else knew what this video nobody else knew that it was a video right because yeah nobody showed the picture it was just a photo and on on that same day, another prosecutor, Papaskew, Christian Ovidiu, had argued that Alexandra was murdered at 2 a.m. due to strangulation, despite the fact that there was no body found. Thank you. I was going to be like, there is no body. How can you say that? Like, how did he put that together? Was the guy's name Gorge? Yeah, Gorge. Did he ever say

what he did to the bodies? Yes. I am going to get to that. Okay, sorry. I'm a little impatient. No, you're fine. I'm trying to be like i want to build up the anticipation i want to make you guys really want this information out of me but um so that was

like one thing that really blew my mind is that everyone just believed this guy saying that she was murdered at 2 a.m which was actually the time that they discovered where her location was um and you know declared that it was strangulation but there was no body found like you literally have no physical evidence saying anything like that so this this was actually also days before dinka's confession so it wasn't like they had any evidence that she was murdered in the first place yeah like they didn't it wasn't like the first thought to be like yeah she was murdered because the first place. Yeah, like, they didn't, it wasn't, like, the first thought to be like, yeah, she was murdered because they could have, like, come through to saying that she did. I mean, I would imagine they're like, she's still alive, she called three times,

but we've got to get in there. I know. Like, that's one, that's, like, the main thing, is that this girl was so smart to find this phone, That's like the main things that this girl was so smart to find this phone. She risked her life to call 112 three times begging for help while she was being held captive. She was, again, trigger warning, raped and abused. Like she was 15. She was just a little girl and she was just trying to get to her hometown. She was just a little girl and she was just trying to get to her hometown.

And yet the police department did not even take it as seriously as they should have. So I can completely understand why this made Romania history. Yeah. They're like, she was a baby. She was an actual baby. She still is. Yeah, she still is. be she was a actual she still is yeah she still is but it's like how could you as a police officer you are supposed to protect and serve you are supposed to be there for your people how could you not take it seriously they were in on it they were they probably in on it. That's like, honestly, I wouldn't doubt it.

I wouldn't doubt it. Ever an investigation on the cops? No. No, not at all. No cops were questioned. I don't know what the equivalent of the FBI in Romania is, but they need to get involved. the FBI in Romania is, but they need to get involved.

That's like one tricky thing about this case, is that I can say whatever I want, but I actually don't know what the system is like in Romania. Yeah, neither do I. We don't know. So walk your mouth, they might come after you. I love Romania.

So it's okay. Romanian FBI. If they take me to Romanian jail, I'd be so happy with that. Well, not really, but just to be in Romania? You know what I'm saying? They do have the Romanian Intelligence Service.

Oh. Oh. Alexis is not smart enough for that. Oh. Oh my god. You're but like why would you say that i was so rude so rude you know what what what are you gonna say kyan uh nothing i'm just i'm just watching this unfold okay well you're listening to it unfold i stop unfolding it

all right onwards and upwards okay okay now to continue um so Um, so for each of the girls, again, Alexandra and Louisa, shortly after each of their disappearances, they, the, they, the families had actually received phone calls from different men, basically just reassuring them that they were safe. One, or like, there was phone calls made to Alexandra's mom, specifically after they found out that she was supposedly murdered. And they do believe that one of the phone calls was made by dinka um gorget again um and in this phone call he said she alexandra as well she got married and ran away to work abroad and of course being the mother she was shocked she was confused was this man ever prosecuted yes he he was um the the thing with the prosecution is that like they didn't have as much evidence so like basically it was all things that the call is coming from within the house three times yeah

and we find teeth but it wasn't good enough if you know what i'm saying um he did pass away uh he he was 75 and it was um hopefully he's somewhere a little bit warmer but um so the mother had received that call and then they would also make the same phone calls to Louisa's family again back in April. But during the investigation, Dinka had claimed that he actually incinerated Alexandra's body. So that would make sense, you know, they didn't find a body. But the thing was, of course, Dinka had neighbors and these neighbors gave testimonies saying that they never saw smoke or smelled anything strange coming from his house so like if he had incinerated her it wouldn't have been in his house it would have been somewhere elsewhere but it would have taken approximately eight hours so it's highly unlikely especially

if he was trying to get away with this said murder like it is highly unlikely that he did it elsewhere and that he even incinerated them you know i mean i'm also gonna just come out and say it's highly unlikely that he was working alone it really is yeah yeah um now the agency that i had mentioned before decot they had referred to alexandra and louisa's case as murders there's something strange about this because they addressed them as murders but they didn't address them as kidnappings it was never confirmed really that they are dead you know like yes they found teeth but that doesn't necessarily mean that they are gone they could have easily just taken out those teeth and planted them there and you know i hate this because now my mind is going in wild circles that they've been kidnapping young girls they've been

like removing a couple one two a couple teeth from them using them as quote-unquote evidence that they're dead and then they're like human trafficking this poor children yeah like that's that's also another thing like they're made out to to be seen as dead so that yeah people stop looking for them and it just makes the trafficking easier it sucks because it's like it's it's it was never confirmed it probably never will be confirmed that they are truly dead or not you know like yeah like they could still be out there it was five five years ago. Yeah. That's not long. I can only imagine what the families are going through. I wouldn't find it comforting at all getting a call from that man saying, hey, your daughter's alive and she got married and is working abroad.

Literally. Like, I don't know. It's just these girls are so young 15 and 18 like i yeah i can't even imagine what these families are are still going through you know five years later i bet they're still holding on to that hope and And I hope they are. I hope that they do find some evidence that they are still alive and that they are okay and that they are safe. Is there any, like, record or documentation of, like, the families now? No. That they've dealt with it? No.

Like, they haven't talked to the press or, like, media or anything like that? They haven't really wanted to talk to the press just because they've been wanting to yeah uh of course you know like wanting to grieve if they're grieving and just simply be spending time with family you know um i bet they're still doing things on their own just probably not not documented, you know, for the pilot. Do you know if she was a single child or if she had siblings? To my knowledge, there was no, like, evidence saying that she was

a sibling of another. So to my knowledge, she is a single child. Okay. Now, so another thing is that Okay. Now, another thing is that Alexandra's uncle that I had mentioned earlier,

Alexandru, he had actually allegedly obtained information relating to his niece's whereabouts. He revealed this information about a week after the kidnapping. And of course, this required authorities to take immediate action. So they did that. But one person that Alexandria had specifically reached out to as well was President Klaus Ioannis.

And you guys want to know what his response was? Yeah. Not like we have a choice, but yes. It makes me nervous. I will analyze. End quote. That's it.

Huh? What? I will analyze. That's so cold. It's not even a full sentence I mean it is but like technically it is technically it is but coming from a president

dude no it is Romania coming from a president. Dude. No, I was like... I mean, it is Romania. Is he still the current president? That's a good question. How do presidents work in Romania? Because if he is...

Have you analyzed? It's been five years. Speaking of which, when he said I will analyze, after this, after Alexander's plea, they still haven't addressed it

to this day. Yeah, okay. Time for a follow-up, Mr. President. And he is still president. Yeah, perfect. time for a follow-up next what do they call it like media conference or whatever media conference i don't know what they're called what are they called press conference there we go yeah there you go there you go you got it yeah. You got it. Yeah.

I just want to raise my hand and be like, have you analyzed? That's it. Just go to Romania. Literally just go to Romania. You should go. Just talk. I should go. I'll go. You won't go by yourself after this story. Go to the forest.

Go to the Romanian forest. We should go to the Romanian forest. We should go to all the places in Romania. We should. And we'll do like part twos to all of our episodes. Yeah, follow up. I'll have videos. Yeah. Check our YouTube.

Yes. Please, I need you to go to Romania with me. This is mandatory. It's strictly business. I mean, this is technically your second story in a row about Romania. Yeah. Yeah. Not a bad thing.

It's a thing I just noticed. I felt it was appropriate because, you know, Romania. That's all I need to say, really. You just didn't want to, you know, take a train or a plane anywhere else. Yeah, literally. Just take me to Romania. Romania and the Maldives. Anyways, back to the case.

Yes. On July 27th. Back to the case. Yes. On July 27th. So people took this case very tough, of course. Like it was heartbreaking, not only for the families, but for literally everyone. And so the reason why I say this made history in Romania is because over 2,500 people had protested in Bucharest.

So a lot of people were against how the police department had handled the situation, understandably so. I You would be protesting. I would have.

I honestly would have. I would have. I honestly would have. I would have fully supported this decision. So after this, the. Newly appointed interior minister, his name was. I'm going to butcher this so hard. Nicole Moga had officially dismissed the National Police Chief, Iowan Buda, the Olet County Prefect, Petra Niasiu, the Olet County Police Chief, Christine Boyk-Koleskiu. Sorry, I'm pronouncing this so bad. And after he had taken office, he had dismissed himself.

He what? So he did all these acts and he just quit. Oh. Okay. Sounds like he found something he wasn't proud of or okay with.

I don't know. It just, something seems so shady. Not only with like the police department, but with like everything else, you know? Like why are there so many connections to this case to the police department? Like why is this... I want to see your receipts.

Where are you getting your money from? Ballot, yeah. Where is it coming from? Yeah. Someone needs to audit this country. I'll do it. No, you don't have the qualifications. No, I got it. I'll get the qualifications. No, I got it.

I'll get the qualifications. Okay, that's fair. Easy. In my sleep. Now, during this time... We'll see about that. Yeah, you will. Give me a couple months.

So the Prime Minister, during this time, he had also dismissed the minister of education um ekaterina androniskiu after he had made a remark saying quote young girls should know better than to get in cars with strangers end quote strangers should not kidnap little girls exactly yeah don't do that don't do that don't do that no it was so literally that quote made my blood boil because i was like why do you expect these young girls to just like know that they're gonna get kidnapped you know like they're young girls 15 years old very trusting you know the last thing going through their head is i'm gonna get human trafficked. Literally.

At least I would say the average little girl would not think I'm going to get human trafficked. And I get it. Like we're taught now stranger danger. But like. In 2019, same thing. People got taught stranger danger. I think it goes a couple decades back. But I just, I don't know. I think if you grow up in an area that you know is saving

you know hitchhiking is pretty common i literally just came back to mexico um it's so simple for people i mean we were driving a truck most of the time and on our way to town there's like there's bumps everywhere so we slowed down for a bump and like there's like field workers and they just hop hopped in the trunk. And like we gave them a ride to town. Like it's no big deal in some parts of the world to just give strangers rides. Yeah. Oh, my God.

Transportation in Mexico is. Oh, my God. Beautiful. Wonderful. OK, I wasn't sure where that was going to go. I was like, it's one or two things. Sorry. Because you took a pause. You were like, transportation in Mexico.

No, we need it here, dude. I don't know. I can't ride in the trunk here. It's so fun riding in the back. Yeah, the back of a truck. It is. Yeah. That's the true way. America no step your game up america

in hawaii it's legal um so yeah every time i'm like in hawaii it's really fun to just ride in the back of the trucks it's nice it's also because the speed limit is like max like 40 over there because yeah they just they don, they don't need to get anywhere fast. You're in an island anyway. Yeah, exactly. Fair, fair. I can actually comprehend that. It's true.

It's true. You were saying that. um you were saying the and like i said before the public transportation was very insufficient so it it was really completely fine to hitchhike yeah i honestly still think it's fine to hitchhike it's just aware of the situation I can't trust that I don't know isn't it like the statistic you just need to be aware

I mean yeah but like I don't know isn't this a statistic that there's anywhere from like 40 active serial killers in the United States at all times like something like that I don't know that's really close to one serial killer per state yeah that makes complete sense to me no no she said at 40 and i'm like that's really close

to 50 like really close to one per state and i'm like i don't like that no me neither not a good thing um now another thing you guys remember how i brought up the name uh lucien gabriel yes he was the man on the business card just to kind of like, you know, go over it again. So he had actually came out and he had claimed that he only met Dinka once while working. But he doesn't actually know him. Kind of sucks. This poor innocent man. He just gave this card.

Kind of sucks. This poor innocent man. He just gave him this card. Well, yeah, if you're working and you're working. They were working in a local office. So, like, it's, you know. I'm not saying it's a bad thing. I'm just, like, he kind of just gave him a business card. And that's how his name ended up with the cops.

Yeah, but he and his family were very strongly affected by this. He and his family were very strongly affected by this. So, like, he ended up having to ask the press to not contact him. That's what I was going to say, because probably, like, the press and public... I mean, it was probably the only lead they had. Yeah. Especially after that man died. Yeah. after that man died.

Yeah. But the public had a very strong reaction to this, of course. And so that's how it really made Romanian history. So

there's not many answers to this case. I think that's what really sucks about it the most is that... You mean there's not a single answer? Not really, no. Like, the police won't give out that much information. Like, I've literally explained throughout this case that... Hold on, hold on, hold on. Is it still an active case or has it been, like, archived or closed?

Still technically active, but they're not... That's why they're not giving information. True. They don't give out information. They've also, like, withheld a lot of information as well. Like I said. That's the excuse they can use. Yeah, yeah. It's so tough. I'm not saying it's right or wrong that's the excuse they can use yeah yeah yeah that was sex they find it

right or wrong but i'm just no no literally but they like find the loopholes to make it so that it's like not wrong i guess you know i don't know but um another thing that I kind of wanted to go over a little bit. You got time, right, listeners? Yes, I do. I do have time. You want to hear more of Alexis talk about Romania? I love Romania. What are you talking about?

Romania is the best, but like not actually. Don't take my word for that. Everyone. I was going to be like, you'd literally just covered two cases in Romania. Yeah. I did two in Canada.

So yeah. Yeah. I was going to say, but Canada is a lot more bigger than Romania. That's true. Romania is underrated. That's why you're talking about it. Yeah.

To bring it to light. But, like I said, there's not that... Unfortunately, there's not that much information on it. So, like, the case is still continuing, but there's no information that's being addressed or announced to the public, at least. I don't know if they're even proactively focusing on it right now. I don't really think it's their main focus to try to figure out what happened to these girls. But there wasn't, although there was a lot of evidence left behind, there wasn't any evidence actually taken into, I guess, consideration,

into, I guess, consideration, at least on the police officers end. And so, although there are a lot of different theories that we may have, like how they may have been human trafficked instead of murdered, um, or different things like that. We'll, we won't have an answer, at least not for a very long time. Yeah, of course. And I do hope that the families do get some sort of clarity or some sort of answers that they need, anything that can lead them to these girls. I hope if the girls are still alive, which I hope they are. I hope if the girls

are still alive, which I hope they are, that they're safe and that they're okay and that they'll be able to make their way back to their families again. But that's all that I really have on this case. There's a lot of information, but a lot of information that's

like also... So as of February 2024, there's no updates? Nope. There's a lot of information, but a lot of information that's like... Also... So as of February 2024, there's no updates. Nope. No updates. Which really, really sucks. I can only imagine what happened. Yeah, of course.

And this was the story of... This was the story of the kidnapping of Alexandra and Louisa. In Romania. In Romania. Thank you guys for listening to my story. If you have any questions... Thank you for sharing this all. Yeah. You did great.

I'm clapping. I don't know if you can hear it. I think we might keep you in the front from now on. Yeah. I would like to attest to that. Okay, okay. Listeners, should we, like, rotate or, like, should we have, like, set

positions or, like... Yeah. We rotate the people that tell the stories, like, in the order they tell them, but we always keep it the same. True crime bonus mystery yeah let us know how you feel about the formatting of it yeah yeah if you guys have any feedback um anything that you want to hear in the future we have our website for you guys to you know put anything that you would want on there we're more than happy to do that for you this is not only for us but for you guys to you know put anything that you would want on there we're more than happy to do

that for you this is not only for us but for you guys as well so like reach out with anything we're like if there's a story that you want to know more of but like you don't want to research it on your own let us know we'll research it for you we'll tell you the story yeah we definitely will and or we won't because it's a podcast we're so famous and you know we had so many no no no we're so amazing like yeah we're just yeah we are like we might just decide oh you want us to tell that story i guess we can tell you that story i won't No but either Kai or I will If your story doesn't take place In Romania Alexis will not do it

I won't I refuse If you want her to do a story Send her to something for Romania and she'll tell it Yeah I'll do it But anything outside of Romania I refuse For now Okay I'll do it. But anything outside of Romania, I refuse.

For now. Okay. Well, that was my case. Thank you guys for listening, both of y'all, and the listeners as well. But we are going to move on to Jay. Jay.

Pew, pew, pew, pew, pew. My case. What do you got for us, Dre? Your paranormal, right? I got for you a plague. Ooh. A plague? Whoa.

Okay. Now, it's not like one of the plagues that the deadly horsemen bring with them. Sorry to disappoint. We're not talking about them this time. What the heck? We're disappointed. No, no, you're actually going to say what the heck when I tell you what plague we're talking about. I don't even know how to tell you what we're talking about.

Okay. I'm concerned. Because I see the word document right here and I'm like, okay, cool, whatever. We're talking about the dancing plague.

Oh. I got that. You got that? I'm sorry. What are the screenshots like? The bo that? I'm sorry. What are the spin-trips like? You boogie? Doing the jazz hands. Did you say I boogie?

Yeah, like did you boogie? I get down, you know what I'm saying? Okay. But yeah, we're talking about the dancing plague. Now, when you hear dancing, you don't think of death. You just literally think of dancing. Yeah. I think of the hoedown.

Go on. We're going to take a quick pause. No, we're good. Oh, no, we're good? Okay, we're pause. No, we're good. Oh, no, we're good? We're good. That was a while ago. Yeah, I just realized that was a while ago. Anyway, when you hear of dancing, you don't think

of death. You think of Footloose. You think of musicals. You think of Dance Class and Breakdown. High School Musical. Footloose. break down high school musical um and any idea when the dancing plague took place

or where the 70s in my backyard in romania i'm not gonna ask you where you think it was alexis um the dancing plague actually it's not recent. I mean, otherwise you would have heard of it. It took place in 1518.

Whoa. Over 500 years ago. Damn. Yeah. Yeah, it was a while ago. It was a while ago. Yeah. yeah yeah it was a while ago it was a while ago yeah um so we're heading to strasbourg france in 1518 okay listen last week this time we just moved neighbor to the neighbor you guys i'm i'm getting a lot about romania but are we going to discuss about how much Jay loves France

no we're not anyway continue Jay that's what it's all about France anyway so it's Strasbourg France the year is 1518 and we're in the town the town at the time was part of the Holy Roman Empire but

nowadays it's France modern France and we're going to talk about Roman Empire. But nowadays, it's France. Modern France. And we're going to talk about a very... I mean, the only person that's actually named in this story. Love her or hate her,

you're not going to hear about her later. Oh, wait. What is... Go on. So, German housewife oh wait what is what is go on so German housewife Frau

Trophia wow okay Frau simply means miss we don't know her first name

so we know her last name is Trophia so it's Miss Trophia Miss Trophia Trophia is a German housewife okay So we know her last name is Trofia. So it's Miss Trofia. Miss Trofia. Trofia. She's a German housewife. Okay.

And what ended up happening was that Frau, I'm just going to call her Frau, Frau Trofia started dancing on July 14th on just a simple narrow cobble street outside of her home. She stepped outside and she began to dance for no apparent reason. Now, she ignored her husband, please, to stop dancing. And she just simply continued dancing onto the evening. There was no music. There was no reason for it. It's like I

records are not consistent, but one record says that they were walking down this, you know, street or garden or park and like the husband asked her to do something and she didn't want to do it. So she just started dancing. Oh, Valen.

She doesn't want to listen to her husband husband I would do the same so what ends up happening is that she starts dancing and she dances well into the evening but then her face is kind of like showing distress and pain

and as she continued dancing she eventually collapsed and she ended up, she eventually collapsed. And she ended up just on a party. She danced too hard. Yeah, yeah, a party. Party central. She danced, you know,

for a long time, and then she passed out. She fell asleep for a few hours. And the next day, early in the morning, no food, no drinks. She was back out dancing and her feet

were swollen bloody and bruised oh yeah so this little dancing spectacle you know of photography just dancing for no apparent reason um

was not so lonely for too long because within a week a single week there was about 30 people that had joined her. Wow. That's a lot. Wow. Yeah.

So within one week just 30 people decided to jump on and start dancing with her. And by the end of the month, how many people do you think were dancing with her? 100? 400. 400. Damn.

They were really having a party. I'm telling you, yeah. so they were really having a party yeah so it went from one housewife and a trophy to 30 people to around 400 people reportedly just dancing uncontrollably there was no music just dancing now of course a week is going to happen with 30 people dancing. It turns into a month and there's 400 people dancing. The city council took notice of it. And of course, they don't know how to handle it. It's not a riot. It's not an invasion.

It's not a plague. I mean, technically, it's a plague, but it's just dancing. So they didn't know how to handle it. And of course, they were concerned because people's feet were bloody and blistered. And there was pain in their faces. So they were concerned because people's feet were bloody and blistered and like there was pain in their faces so they were concerned and confused um the dancers were in obvious pain and also crying in agony so it's not like this is fun it's kind of like they just jumped on it but like they were in pain yeah now it wasn't all just fun and games and dancing and bloody feet because as the summer carried on um depending where you look at the records and i did not look

through them because they're very old and i cannot read that i'll be cursive um but the records that up to 15 people were dying per day whoa god damn they were like passing out and they were dying 15 per day average yeah that's a lot yeah that is a lot so the city council talked to his physicians um and of course because all physicians um they ruled out astrological causes and supernatural causes how did they rule those out yeah good i would love to know that 500 years ago i'm just like you're a physician is this an thing or a supernatural thing no um no okay it was a case of hot blood what does that even mean no it's a good thing that i did a little bit of digging into that because I'm like hot blood.

Yeah. Yeah. So the term hot blood refers to a historical or like a historical medical concept that was rooted in the theory of the four humors or fluids, which uh dominate the framework of the human body um and the framework for understanding human health disease um and it was very common in you know during the renaissance time Yeah. You have fluids and four different kinds. So according to this theory, the human body was governed by four humors or fluids. So those are the four.

There is blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile. So that's what humans were made of. out of those four things well i mean those were the four things that ruled the human body um okay yeah yeah each humor um was associated with specific qualities of a person's self and temperament um that were believed um to kind of like help the balance or imbalance of those humors so um blood um symbolizes air spring warm and moist oh um and blood was associated with um asuine temperament characterized by qualities such as cheerfulness, optimism, and predispositions to blood-related conditions. If you had an excess of hot blood, it was thought that it would be the result of... It was thought to result in sanguine excess, so leading to an overly enthusiastic and impulsive temperament. Now, phlegm, that was phlegm's the second one.

That one symbolizes water, winter, cold, and moist. second one that one symbolizes water winter cold and moist and phlegm was linked to a let's see if i say this right i completely forgot like phlegmatic temperament i think that's right okay okay um and it was marked by calmness really uh real ability and a passive demeanor demeanor demeanor um and over abundance of phlegm could lead to um lethargy and lethargy uh and a lack of motivation and a lack of motivation now there's also black bile bile and that symbolizes earth autumn cold and dry now black bile was connected to melancholic temperament associated with uh introspection seriousness and a predisposition to melancholy or depression.

So if you had an excessive amount of black bile, it was thought to cause overly melancholy. What Alexa said. Melancholy. And last but not least, yellow bile. So that one symbolizes fire summer warm and dry and yellow bile was related to a um choleric temperament characterized by ambition energy and irritability irritability

what alexis is gonna do with ability thank you english is not my first you knew i was gonna say it because you're an english major in another world okay i was gonna say i was like what no she's not which isn't even my first language i know um anyway so yellow bile um so an excess of yellow bile could result in aggression or short temperament so technically it's like there you have this four different fluids in your body and like you gotta keep them balanced otherwise like something's gonna go wrong like it's your attitude like you got too much blood or something

it almost like i don't know why but this like kind of reminds me of like divergent in a way i don't know like the different what i don't know why like like like like the different vials or like the different liquids causing different emotions. Like, they have those. Anyways, go on. No, no, no. You're good. Keep going.

Keep going. Tell me. No, because in the movie or in the book, for anybody who did either, there's, like, these little things each. We'll call them sections. I forgot what they're called. we'll call them sections. I forgot what they're called.

They have like these vials of liquids that can make you either be honest or you can be kind or you can be smart. You know, the different personality traits, but they're all in one. Okay.

Okay. Okay. Just go on. Who's got a battery in your head? And one. Okay. Okay, okay. Okay, no, okay. Just go on. Just go on. Just go on. You said it better in your head. Yeah, I did.

I did. Oh, you're good. Okay, so I was saying that the physicians ruled the case of people dancing as hot blood and hot blood was thought to lead to a range of different symptoms and behaviors including an overly sanguine temperament characterized by optimism passion and in some interpretations um what the heck is this oh erratic behavior what oh it's because it was cutting it off. Erratic or excessive behaviors. Now, there's a cure for hot blood. Quote, unquote, cure. This was the medieval times.

Let's not forget that. Yeah. It was bloodletting. Oh, that's not good. You have an excess of hot blood, so let's get rid of some of that hot blood. Oh, gosh. I don't want the dancing plague anymore. No, no.

So this is what normally would be the cure for hot blood, but since people couldn't voluntarily stop moving, the town, the city council, they resorted to something else. What do you think it was, you know, what do you think they prescribed? Drugs.

What did you say, Kyle? I don't I don't They were crazy back then They could have prescribed literally anything Okay so People are just dancing They prescribed more dancing What?

Yeah You know what? We're going to prescribe more dancing to hopefully burn them out. What? So we're hoping that by prescribing more dancing, they would be able to burn the people out and, like, eventually it would stop dancing.

Okay. And they'd, like, get it all out of their system type of thing yeah i think that's what they were kind of like hoping for um so they opened up guild halls they made wooden stages um they also hired a band to play so wow they got they got a concert they got live music yeah so um as you know people continue dancing of course people are passing out um i don't know why but as people start to pass out the musicians start to play their music faster oh god which they're going down Now, the strange and relentless

dancing continued for days with some participants like dancing to their deaths from exhaustions, strokes, or heart attacks. Wow. Wow. The dog says,

wow, wow. Wow wow wow this this whole dancing plague thing is kind of scary kind of kind of kind of scary but like cool if uh if that's appropriate to say scary cool yes what's so interesting is like people didn't know if it was contagious or not because like that was their theory at first because people started dancing and that Cool. Yeah, so what's so interesting is, like, people didn't know if it was contagious or not. Because, like, that was their theory at first, because people started dancing and that. But it turns out that there's records of some people joining into dance, and, like, they would, you know, they would go on with it. So some were, like, with swollen feet, passing out and dying. Other people were just, like, partaking in the dance. Uh-huh.

So, like, who was actually afflicted by whatever was happening yeah now versus them just wanting to dance or something yeah yeah especially when like they bring music and open up guild halls and all that stuff now the event was going on for months and months at a time, so the city authorities and the region, everyone was taking note of. And they couldn't find a cure for whatever was causing this. So

when more dancing didn't work, they did Footloose and they banned all dancing. No way. Yeah. So I don't know if it's like the original footloose here if there was a case before but they banned all dancing wow now there was a fine if you were caught dancing and they would charge people 30 shillings if they were caught dancing. 30 shillings. Yeah. Now, I was, like, literally trying to figure out

how to convert shillings into money nowadays, and I'm just like, how do I do this? How do you do that? Yeah. He honestly probably did something... That's probably not right, but we'll see. So, 30 shillings. Most of the time, they were made of um silver but it all depends on like the purity of the silver and if they haven't been clipped but 30 perfect shillings

they're about 17.5 grams um per shilling um for a total of 525 grams of silver now i'm just trying to figure out how much silver is worth nowadays so one gram of silver nowadays is worth 85 about 446 dollars with 25 cents wow so 30 shillings is about 450 dollars wow okay so like a decent fine yeah yeah close to like 500500. It took place in France, so then it transferred it to euros, which is 412 euros. But it's still a lot of money. Do you imagine like dancing and then like just getting fined almost $500 simply for just moving and grieving? I mean, I assume that when they implemented this the people that were willingly joining stop willingly joining and the only people dancing were the ones that could not stop yeah yeah i i have i have i have an illness. It's called the dancing plague.

I've got a doctor's now. Oh my god, I'm so excited. That's how I'm going to call out tomorrow. I've got the dancing plague. I can't come in. I can't come in. Because technically you wouldn't be able to drive. Yeah, exactly. I'd just be dancing in my car and cause like an accident.

Exactly. And then you'd get out of your car and start dancing during the accident like um so during this whole time the town started to believe that you know they were um cursed yeah um so the town started to do everything they could to like maybe like cleanse themselves for their sins or whatever was causing the curse. So they tore down those wooden stages. They closed gambling houses. They closed brothels. And the prostitutes were kicked out of town.

Those poor prostitutes were kicked out of town. Those poor prostitutes. What was that? Those poor prostitutes. It's not their fault. They got kicked out. They weren't dancing, so it wasn't their fault. Yeah. And some story, this is where I couldn't find it, but I heard it somewhere.

So take this with a grain of salt. But the town even donated, take this with a grain of salt or a handful, a hundred pound candle to the cathedral. Wow. Wow. How do you even create a candle that large? You get to do a lot of candle makers. I literally put the thinking emoji next to that 100 pound candle because I'm just like, records vary on that, so I'm not sure if they did or not.

But apparently that wasn't enough. Eventually the city's strategy... What am I saying? Not tragedy. I'm trying to combine strategy with tragedy. The city's strategy shifted towards seeking more of divine intervention for relief. So the people that were suffering from the dancing plague, they were taken on a pilgrimage to a shrine dedicated to St. Vitus. And the shrine was located in a nearby mountain. Just a shrine there? Damn. and the shrine was located in a nearby mountain. Now...

Is there a shrine there? Do you know anything of St. Vitus? No. No, I don't. Neither did I. And not many of the podcasts and places I read talked about him, so I had to do some side research on him.

So St. Vitus was usually invoked because of his association with dancing disorders like epilepsy okay yeah um it was it was common to attribute health conditions to the supernatural causes um or to divine punishment and saints were often invoked for protection against specific ailments. You know, some of them are still done to this day. Now, there was also a thing known as St. Vita's

Dance. This was a term that was applied to several conditions that just caused involuntary movements. Nowadays, we know that it's actually known as, whoa, let's see if I can say this, Sidenhas Cornea.

So now we kind of know what St. Vitus' dance was back in the day. I mean, it's kind of like an umbrella term, like a lot of things fall under that. There was the belief that invoking St. Vitus or making a pilgrimage to the shrine dedicated to him could cure or mitigate the disease.

However, this disease is not contagious. So it was ruled out that that was what caused the dancing plague. The disease is actually like a contagious yeah so like it was ruled out that that was what caused the dancing plague um the disease is actually like a neurological disorder that typically occurs um when you have like a high fever or from like a streptococcus bacteria or like you have um what's that other freaking fever called ah i would have lots of fevers i know i know um

where is it blah blah blah blah blah not that not that not that oh a scarlet fever okay so technically even nowadays if you get a fever like which is caused by like this uh a group group a streptococcus bacteria um and you're not talking for it um you can start to develop some of the symptoms that are like characterized by like uh rapid and voluntary movements of the face limbs and muscle weakness um and emotional instability so like there's sort of an actual kind of scientific explanation behind it well just to this disease itself not to the actual dance in play yeah like this is nowadays what we consider the saint vita's dance but the Vita's dance, but the St. Vita's

dance wasn't what was affecting the people with the dance and plague. Uh-huh. Because there was another condition known as St. Vita's dance. Nowadays we know that it was caused by that scarlet fever,

symptoms if they were not treated well. But it wasn't the dancing plague. There was lots of theories of what the dancing plague was. But none of them stick to nowadays, which is 500 years ago. I believe that it's

going to be a little hard to have something that people can agree on. It definitely will be yeah it's okay i thought i muted myself don't get the dancing blade um now saint fetus also known as v2s in english um is a venerated... What am I saying? Hold on. What am I reading now? Oh, I'm trying to tell you his legend. I'm trying to tell you who he was. So he was a Christian of Sicilian origin. He was a Christian of Sicilian origin who died as a martyr during the early Christian persecutions.

So according to tradition, St. Vitus was the son of a Sicilian senator. His name was Hylus. And he converted to Christianity from a young age. And he was known for his miracles, including healing people and casting out demons. Now, during times of persecution, he was subjected to various tortures, included being thrown into a boiling pot of oil. Damn. That's painful.

He emerged unscathed. Like, you just threw him in water. According to legend. Yeah. Now, eventually, Vitas, along with his tutor, Modestus, and his nurse, I like her name, hold on, I want to say her name right, Crescentia, who were also Christians, they were also martyred. So St. Vitus' feast day nowadays is celebrated on June 15 in the Roman Catholic Church

and on June 28 in the Eastern Orthodox Church. church and on june 28th in the eastern orthodox church now saint vitus became one of um one of the 14 holy helpers which is a group of saints uh venerated together in roman catholic catholicism because of their intersection was believed to be what am I? Hold on. Was believed to be because their intersection was believed to be particularly effective. Especially against various diseases because

he was considered the patron saint of dancers, actors, comedians and epileptics. That's such interesting things to be a patron saint yeah dancers actors comedians and epileptics epilepsy that should be your patron saint alexis hold on listen listen um so over the centuries uh the cult of St. Cult, not like an actual cult. It's what they used to tell like religion and like church and all that stuff.

Now it has a different meaning. But the cult of St. Vitus spread through Europe and his relics were said to have been transported to various locations, including. And this is where I get excited because I'm like, oh, the more you know. this is where I get excited because I'm like, oh, the more you know. St. Denis in Paris and the Abbey of St. Vitus

in Prague, which is in the Czech Republic. The two places I want to visit both have the backs of St. Vitus. I can't believe you. Honestly, I did not search for this. It kind of just came up on its own so

now i know where i want to go next so true yeah but they went on a pilgrimage to saint vitus and sorry i just gave you a history lesson of who he was and like religion okay but i'm just like i don't want you to just be like they went to some random shrine and like this happened no so that's why they were going there because they thought that saint vitus might be able to either help with the plague or he caused the plague so they have to go repent and he will take the curse away that's just so funny to me i don't know oh and it's so interesting because depending on where i went some people believe that saint vitus caused the dancing plague and some people think that saint vitus did not cause it but that he

cured it so um remember how i talked about um phatropia yes yeah okay so very little is known about her what's what we have on record is that she started dancing people joined her and a couple days after she started dancing she she danced away she like left town um and she made her way to the saint vita shrine um but as soon as she makes it there like we got no more records of her whether she was cured or not whether she died on the doorstep or like whether she continued in and out like no yeah wow That's crazy. Like, they, like, the historical records don't provide much detail about, like, her identity, background, or, like, the aftermath of her actions. Yeah, this was 1518, right? So, like, not much of anything. Yeah, you got it.

Yeah. So, there was multiple theories of what caused the dancing plague one theory was it was toxic mold that grows on damp rye that was used for bread at the time that can cause hallucinations or convulsions but everyone seemed to dance

like not I wouldn't say like unison but like they knew that they were dancing like it looked like dancing not like convulsions. Oh. It wasn't like you were walking down the street and you see people getting like epileptic attacks. Like they were like dancing. Yeah.

Like they were not dropping to the floor and shaking. Like they were dancing. They would pass out. Yeah, there's a clear distinction you know yeah so there was really no there was a theory that it was like mass hysteria or like stress induced psychosis but like none of them really make sense yeah now that's all i got for you on the dancing plague of 1518. But I just want to let you know that this was not the only dancing plague that happened in the world.

No way. Wow. So this was this dancing plague in 1518. There was two records of dancing plagues that happened before this dancing plague so in achten i think that's what it's called germany in 1374 so in 1374 it's one of the earliest and most well documented uh documented instances of dancing mania. It quickly spread to France, Italy, and the Netherlands with the participants

claiming to be possessed by spirits or in trance-like states dancing uncontrollably through the streets. So that was like one of the earliest and like the most well-recorded cases of like the quote

unquote jansen plague 1374 that is insane like people existed back then literally yeah now there's also another case in germany i'm not gonna try to i'm not going to try to, I'm not going to pronounce them right, but it's like Erfurt and Goldbeck, Germany in 1237 and 1247. So 10 years apart from each other, 1237, 1247. And then in this case, these groups of children were reported to have danced uncontrollably. Kind of like, you know, like the Pied Piper situation. Yeah. It was in this situation Pied Piper situation. Yeah. In this situation, it was just children.

Yeah. The incident in Irkur saw a group of children dance all the way to the other town, to Arnstad, which was about 20 kilometers away. Oh my god. So the kids just danced from

one town to another one you're just like i'm just picturing in my head they're just like line dance they're like in a line just making their way over to the next town if they had line dancing back in the day oh my god now i can see that too as well though. Now, there was also a few more incidents of another dancing plague after 1518. There's so many. That's

what's crazy about this. It's not the first one and it's clearly not the last one. So people are like, what's causing this? What's happening? We might still, you know, future dancing plague. We gotta get are like what's causing this it's like what's happening we might still you know future dancing plays because we got to get ready i was doing this research i'm like what's the next one in my head i'm just like and will it be like it's like how california is like due for uh for another earthquake it's like we're due for another dancing plague as well

It's like we're due for another dancing plague as well. 2024. Here we come. Okay. Okay. 2020, right? It was presidential election, Biden versus Trump. And then we had COVID.

This year, it's 2024. It's Biden versus Trump. But we're missing a pandemic we're missing a plague you know who knows we're gonna get the dancing play yo someone please tie me down to my bed if this happens i am not blistered feet and bloody feet i will do anyone see how bad I look dancing? I will do the Macarena. That's it. But yeah, so there was another case in Germany again. Madgeberg, Germany. Okay. And Strasbourg, France.

So this was in 1537 and 1551. were smaller outbreaks not 400 plus people um smaller out i mean 400 in the month after a month it was clearly more than 400 but this was our outbreaks that were recorded in the areas um show that the phenomenon didn't entirely disappear from the strasbourg event because it came back. Yeah. And then later in Italy, and it happened for quite a while in Italy from the 15th century all the way to the

17th centuries. Such a long time. For like 200 years, there was several instances of like just dancing, like a similar phenomenon where individuals just dance supposedly to cure

the cure was the bite of a tarantula yeah humans are so weird yeah that's the dancing plague for you um as i was doing all this and i literally thought i was like we're due for another dancing plague i'm like what if it like already kind of started but just didn't take off it's all the tiktok dancers yeah do you ever do you remember like a couple years back on tiktok how there was like the serbian dancing lady yeah yeah what yeah you don't know where it's like no like she's like on her tippy toes and she's like going

left and right and she's like moving her arms no it's like a very simple like tap a dance she's doing it's not like break dance or intense it's simple yeah do it now so we'll send it to you but it's like definitely it was or like yeah and then like after we send it to you do some more research on it just on tiktok and see like the crazy stories about it because of course there like, parodies done and all that stuff after. But I'm like, what if that was kind of like the start of the dancing plague?

Like, just a single lady, you know, like Fred Trofia, out there dancing. And then within a week, you get 30 people who join you and do the same thing. Clearly, people didn't join and didn't catch up. But there was, I don't know if there was records or it was like a tale or not because this dancing play was 500 years ago um but the 30 people-ish that started dancing like if you came up to them they would like go up to you and they

would not that it wouldn't go up to you but they would try to convince you to like join and dance dance with them and then if you didn't they, they would get angry or a little bit violent and push you away or shove you things. But there's no clear record of that. Yeah, I wouldn't really expect there to be. Yeah. That was a few years ago, you know. Anyway, that was the dancing plague.

We don't have a horseman for this plague. Ooh, dancing. Thank you for sharing. Horse of the Apocalypse for the dancing plague. I'm so excited. It's like, I'm going to, like, dance my way into heaven, hell, the afterlife, nothing, whatever's there. Dancing plague.

And remember, if you have the urge to dance, don't resist. It might not end well. Yeah, you might get a $500 fine. I don't got that kind of money to just give up. That's the real reason

why I don't dance. That's fine. It's so true. You don't want to rest dancing and not stopping. Nope. It's scary. I don't have the endurance for that.

Hey, if you don't have a fear for dancing, now you do. I wonder if that's an actual phobia, like fear of dancing. Oh, that's a good question. I would imagine. I wouldn't think it'd be like a super... Phobia is the color yellow, so I would be honestly...

They just have a lot of phobia. Defied as an irrational fear of dancing. Yeah. Well. There's a phobia of a duck watching you. Alexis, stop it. I have that.

I'm going to get a duck and I'm going to make it watch you. What? I don't think you can force a duck to do anything. I can. I am the duck. I used to want ducks when I was younger. I still do.

I had ducks. Okay, well, I don't. No. But I do. But I don't. I had geese and then I ate them. You ate them? What?

Not my choice. It was my mother. Oh. Those poor geese and then I ate them. You ate them? Not my choice. It was my mother. Those poor geese. Yeah. Were they tasty at least? I would imagine so because I ate all the soup. Wow.

I've heard duck is like not bad. But like gameyy duck is really good I'm thinking of foie gras I'm thinking French duck but I'm duck is really good let's go to a French

restaurant and try duck can we try escargot escargot I will try escargot? Escargot. I will eat escargot any day. I want to like eat like like eat like a spider or something. I don't know.

You know how like in some like Asian countries with like the street foods and they have like the big skewers with just a bunch of fried spiders on them or whatever. Oh, for sure. This time when I went to Mexico, I had some crickets again.

And I'm just like, they're good. I've had crickets, I've had cockroaches. What did you say? I've had crickets and cockroaches. Girl, it doesn't count when they crawl into your mouth in the middle of the night. It's so true.

I've been with you, but... Anyways, we do have our third and final case given by the wonderful Kai Kelly.

Thank you for the introduction. We'll put a little bit of a curtain opening and people talking. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Alright, alright. So, my story today, we are going to be traveling to the beautiful state of West Virginia.

Yeah. I'm out to mama. I'm out to mama. I'm out to Hawaii. No, maybe I'll cover something at a later time. Yeah, so West Virginia. cover something at a later time yeah so west virginia now surprisingly there are lots of strange occurrences that have happened over the years in west virginia and i'll talk about a couple of them today

so in in the dark of night in the town of flatwoods west virginia on the evening of september 12th 1952 7 15 p.m to be exact there were three children uh 13 year old edward may 12 year old freddie may and 10 year old Tommy Heyer. They were playing football outside of Flatwoods Elementary School when suddenly they noticed a bright light flashing and streaking its way across the sky. That bright light had seemingly crashed into a hill nearby on a farm. So these kids looked up and they saw this bright flashing light and they were like, what the heck is this? So of course, you know, startled, excited, scared. The boys, they ran over to the May family's home and they told their mom, Kathleen May, what they had seen. So of course, Kathleen, Mrs. May, she jumps into action. She gets into her protective

mode. She gathers her boys, as well as a couple of other local children, Neil Nunley and Ronnie Shaver, and also a national guardsman, West Virginia National Guardsman. His name is Eugene Lemon. And so the group of them, they all made their way over to the farm to go investigate. Now, on this journey, some accounts do say that they even brought a dog along with them, but that's not quite confirmed. But this group made their way over to the farm. They eventually reached the hill and the site of the crash. And they had a dog or not have a dog. Yeah. So we're not too sure. Some accounts of the story do say they did, some don't.

But yeah, they made their way over to the crash site. Once they got there, that's when they saw a pulsing red light just emanating from that crash site. They were smoothed by it. It was almost like up in the trees. They didn't really know what it was. But Lemon, the National Guardsman, he pointed his flashlight up the hill. And that's when the group witnessed a 10 to 12 foot tall uh almost humanoid figure with its round head surrounded by a hood shaped like a spade and it was wearing a dark metal

almost dress is what it's described as okay but real quick was the officer's name Lemon? Eugene Lemon. Yes. I knew you were going to comment on that. Eugene Lemon, yes. Name though. Cool. Okay, now back to whatever that figure was.

Yeah, 10 to 12 foot tall? This tall, 10 to 12 foot tall humanoid figure had like a shade shade a spade shaped head like a spade on a deck of cards and it was almost like metallic its body um now this creature it had small twisted claw-like hands that portraited out of the front of its body um people don't really think it had arms it had just these claws that were coming out front of it. Some people even describe it as having a red face and wearing green clothes. It also had orange glowing eyes. Sorry. No, no, no, no, no, keep going.

I've never heard of it before, but I don't know the name. Yeah, and it had orange glowing eyes that were just seemingly staring directly at that group. Now, that's not the only thing that they noticed. When they walked up to the hill, the crash site, they noticed a pungent mist around them, and it almost had a putrid, like, metallic, rotten scent. Some recounts of the story do say that this kind of scent induced some nausea in them, and even for a few days after, they felt symptoms of their dry throat or dizziness or other things like that. It's not quite confirmed. But after they had got there and they, they reacted to this figure, um, it was levitating

off of the ground. The creature glided toward the group, which made Eugene Lemon scream. He dropped his flashlight and the group ran away to safety. What year was this again? 1952. Yeah. Everyone's going to freak out. Yeah. Yeah. Um, everyone's gonna freak out. Yeah.

Yeah. Solid. So yeah, this creature, it goes by many names, actually. It's called the Flatwoods Monster, the Braxton County Monster, Braxy, the Phantom of the Flatwoods, and even the Green Monster because of its green clothes. I love Brax. see the phantom of the flatwoods and even the green monster because of its green clothes but after this one sighting here tonight the creature was never seen again but yeah i really like braxy i think braxy's kind of cute yeah i like that one as well so um it's kind of it's kind of interesting looking at pictures of this because there

have been like you know mock-ups like artists that draw on pictures, and it's just so funny. It's kind of creepy, but I don't know. I'll send you guys some pictures in a bit. But yeah, so they saw this thing in the hill. It was the dead of night and the dark in that forest. They must have been terrified seeing this thing um that's why they ran away yeah that's so hot though because the claws and like people were sick after this right for a couple for a while that's what the some recounts of the story do say it's not like fully confirmed but yeah makes me think of like radioactivity like yeah so yeah those symptoms though of like scratchy throat hard breathing dizziness, nausea. Those are actually all kind of symptoms of mustard gas.

Oh, you meant gas. Yes, some people think that could have been like a mustard gas, like something that was released, and that kind of works its way into people thinking it could have been a government conspiracy or something like that. So this was really the only sighting of this monster. But after that group ran away, Mrs. May and Lemon, the National Guardsmen,

they reached out to the local authorities. The police searched the area that night, and they claimed to find nothing whatsoever. The state police were notified, of course, and they laughed at the story. They just called it hysteria. So nobody really took it seriously. But this story did, of course, make the local news. It moved on to like the national radio. Newspapers all over the country covered it. And then the Air Force even did a UFO investigation on the area, but they didn't really

come up with any findings um if we're the first ones to see this right like what it felt yes yes so they were the first and only people to to see uh it at the sites but multiple people did see like that like fireball in the sky yeah oh okay um so you know after it was a weather balloon so after more investigations um lots of people like currently like theories sort of say that like they believe that the flashing light in the sky was just a meteor. I think it's on record that that night, September 12th, there was a meteor that could be seen flying through Wyoming, Illinois, and West Virginia.

So it very well could have been just a meteor. They say the red light that was flashing on the ground at the crash site could have just been an aircraft like navigation beacon um there but also kind of funnily enough a lot of people think that that creature could have just been a startled barn owl that was perched in the tree um 10 to 12 foot 12 no it make no but it kind of makes sense because the spade-shaped head, like in the way that like how an owl's head kind of looks. Yeah. And they said that like the shadows that were cast around the owl as well,

like mixed with the panic just from the group, it could have made it look like it was a much larger humanoid figure that was there. Okay. I don't know. People think this might have been a hoax or just to do a little scare, and at the time it was very easy to, because 1952 was the

midst of the Cold War. Everyone was on edge thinking, you know, what would happen with Russia? So it was really easy to scare some people, really easy to prank them. But that also maybe puts a little more, I don't know, validity into like the mustard gas theory type of thing. But I'm not too sure how much I believe that.

So that was really the only like sighting of the Flatwoods monster but sort of later on there was like another sighting of a creature that was similar to this description but not quite um reported by a lady named audra harper um and so this was actually this sighting was reportedly seen like before the crash and the first sighting that i just talked about um audra said she you know claimed to see the monster while she was walking through the woods near her house and that they noticed like a ball of fire on one of the hills that they were passing they just assumed that it was like a neighbor fox chasing um but audra like glanced back at it the fire had vanished and then in its place there was a tall dark silhouette of a man-shaped figure um of course you know audra and her friends she was

with like ran away they were terrified um so there's been other like similar sightings but nothing quite of the same caliber of this of this one of the flatwoods it was seen once and never again and then yeah uh what is it called like versions or varieties of something similar. Of course. It had children. That's what they are. Yeah, yeah. No, literally. They were like all 12 and under who originally saw it, but I mean, there was Eugene Lemon, the National Guardsman,

he was only 17, so he was also a kid. The only adult there was the mom, Mrs. May, so who knows what she could have really seen how many kids did the mom have um she only had two she had ed and freddie edward and freddie that's too too many for her i mean the story is so it's so funny because she brought edward freddie their friend tommy they're playing with, and she also gathered

two other kids from the neighborhood to bring with her. Yeah, that's what I was asking, because you said she brought other kids, and I'm like, wait, so how many of them are her kids? Yeah, so there was seven of them. Yeah, I know. And the reason why I said

some, like, recounts of it tell the story of a dog being there with them. It's because it's been said that like the dog died because of the like the mustard. Yeah, the mustard and things that were around. But that's really not confirmed at all. I hope it's not true. It's not true. Me too. So the Flatwoods monster, though, has now become like a local legend in Flatwoods, West Virginia.

Their welcome sign to their city says home of the green monster. So like they've, you know, they've like taken pride in it, essentially. Yeah. They have an annual festival called Flatwoods Days. And so, like, they commemorate the legend of the Flatwoods Monster. They even have a Flatwoods Monster Museum. What? Which we should definitely go to. Yeah.

Yes. Yes. I mean, no one, technically no one got attacked by it. So. No, yeah. It was just there. I'd be okay with that. Is it really a monster then you know

i mean i don't know we label everything we don't understand as a monster it honestly kind of looks like something from like like an old like computer game like i don't know i guess like wizards 101 comes to mind or something like that or like like like a roblox character yeah yo okay we're gonna play sometime okay i still have my account cool that's crazy so that's not where the monsters end in west virginia though um so perhaps a more well-known creature in West Virginia found just two hours east of the Flatwoods Monster in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, is the Mothman. Have you guys heard of the Mothman? I have heard of the Mothman.

Yeah. I have heard of the Mothman. Yes. I would say I have seen but i mean like online i have seen pictures yeah i have seen plushies of the mothman i have seen tattoos of the mothman i need a tattoo so the mothman has another humanoid creature that was reportedly seen about 26 times from november of 1966 to december of 1967 so oh crap so yeah 26 times over the span of a year um yeah and that's kind of a lot of sightings. Not a lot of them have been fully detailed, but they're like little reports from people over that year. So I guess the first major

sighting of it, first documented at least, was on November 15th of 1966. So two couples, Roger and Linda Scarberry and Steve and Mary Mallette, they were driving together down the road when they had reportedly seen a large, dark humanoid figure with glowing red eyes standing on the side of the road. So, yeah. So Linda, she described it as being a slender, muscular man who was about seven feet tall with white 10-foot wings and its eyes having a hypnotic effect. So she couldn't really distinguish its facial features or anything like that. Which is kind of crazy to think about. Yeah. That would be so... Trippy.

Trippy, yeah. Like the glowing effect. I don't know. Kind of cool, actually. Yeah, it is kind of cool. So yeah, the couples quickly sped away. They drove away as fast as they could, but the creature actually was said to have

flown after them it started pursuing them and it was making a loud screeching sound as it flew and it followed them as far as like the the city limits so it followed them for a while before it finally let up that's scary though yeah the fact that something is flying behind you like as you're driving away from it for so long no seriously um yeah uh after after this sighting from the cup from the couples like the mothman he would be seen many more times like i said 26 times over that year um people were reporting similar settings left and right there were firefighters from point pleasant that described it as a large bird with red eyes um the sheriff actually blamed the sightings on just like a large heron bird that was flying throughout the city.

Totally a bird. But then also, totally a bird, yeah. So there's also a contractor in that city, though. He had claimed in Point Pleasant, he claimed that the Mothman was responsible for buzzing noises coming from his TV set. No, sir, that's not TV. That's just your TV, man. You won't blame Mothman for your TV.

Just get a new TV. Like, put the antennas properly. You probably didn't set them up, dude. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But also, he said that the Mothman was responsible for the disappearance of his German shepherd. The Mothman even was killing dogs, yeah. But also he said that the Mothman was responsible for the disappearance of his German shepherd. So the Mothman even was killing dogs, apparently.

That is a big dog. There's a big dog, but they're also curious dogs. And, you know, they could have just ran away. Or because the Mothman saw a dog with like seven kids, he thought, I like that animal. He saw the German shepherd and he's like I'm gonna take it maybe he did actually he needed a friend he was welcomed by like

a teacher a 15 year old kid and like seven kids not a teacher a mom and then a dog and the dog was the friendliest of all. Yeah, so he was just like, actually, yeah, I'm pretty lonely out here. People hate me for no reason.

So true. He's misunderstood. He really is. He's just like me, for real. Anyway. So it was, like, later said, and kind of, of yeah it was kind of later said that the creature was just a big um sandhill crane so it's like a really big bird that fits the description of the mothman but it's not native to like west point or pleasant, Virginia, or really that area. So, um, like scientists would ever think it could have just migrated away from its native places. And since it was completely

unfamiliar to the people in Virginia, they just saw it as this like creepy mothman encrypted. So I'm not sure, but yeah, over that year there were, you know, a lot of sightings. But the last sort of sighting of this Mothman happened on December 15th, 1967. And it actually had collapsed. It killed 46 people in that collapse. So it was catastrophic. And people kind of like blamed the Mothman for it. Like it was said that the Mothman was seen sort of to be connected to the collapse of that bridge. But then from that day on, there were never any more sightings of the Mothman. Stop blaming him. It's because he was so sad that people would think of him that way yeah he heard the blame and he decided to fly away yeah they shamed him out of the city i would have done the same so like you mentioned earlier you've seen like you know statues and shirts and plushies of him

like yeah he's he's become super popular um in point pleasant they have a mothman statue that they've put up yeah they like they kind of take a lot of pride in in in this guy and it's so funny because like west virginia you guys really like your your monsters. Yeah. I wish we had monsters like that here. We have one in Tahoe. Well, not in California. Lake Tahoe is in California.

Oh, yeah, you're right. I'm so sorry. Well, it's like half in California, half in Nevada. Yeah. Remember, she's not a geography major. She's an English major. Yeah, it's so true. I'm an English major. In another world. In another world.

But wait, there's more. If you call right now, you'll get three for one. F-R-E-E, that spells free. That's great. Creditmeboard.com, baby. Okay, don't sue us.

So, there's another little guy I do want to talk about. And I do mean little. His name is bat boy bat boy bat boy wait we're still in the same state we're still in west virginia yeah we're we're a few more hours east huh i want to know more about Batboy. Yeah. So the first, like, reporting of Batboy was on June 23rd, 1992. Batboy was said to be, like, discovered in a previously uncharted cave that was, it's closer to the eastern or, like, the southeastern border of West Virginia. like the southeastern border of West Virginia. Some, like, recounts, some stories say that he was found in a cave next to Seneca Rocks, West Virginia, which is more east. But it seems more commonly recognized that the Lost World Caverns

are the home of that boy. And so the Lost World Caverns are, like, closer towards, like, the southeast kind of border of West Virginia. But it's said that that's his home. The Lost World Caverns. I'm pretty sure the Lost World Caverns are still open and you can go into them and tour them.

West Virginia, we're coming for you. We gotta go. Yeah. So Batboy was said to be a human child with large amber eyes, ears like satellite dishes, quotes on his head, fangs, and was raised by bats inside the complete darkness of that cave. Oh my god, it's like Sharkboy, but like... It's like Sharkboy, but that's what And when I say boy, I mean it He was described as being

Two feet tall And weighed 19 pounds Whoa How do they know how he weighs? Yeah They captured him, I guess The story says that he was taken, he was captured, but he

managed to escape from the people that took him. Now he's on the run still to this day. People are still trying to find him in the Lost World caverns. But yeah, people weren't scared of Batboy. He was just this little Batboy, and he quickly gained lots of popularity. He had a cult following. It's really funny, actually.

It said he was captured, and then escaped, and then recaptured and he escaped again. Who's capturing him? And having fallen in love. Apparently. Apparently that boy fell in love. Love in the air. This is a whole movie. Funny you say that. Yeah.

Funny you say that because the story of that boy was turned into an off-Broadway musical. Yeah. Called Batboy the Musical. I was going to say, I think I heard of that. Yeah, that was a musical that was made after him. When did this musical come out um it's i'm not sure when it came out but it ended it ended its run in 2001 so not like super super old um

so now i'm just upset my high school didn't do it. Bat boy. I would have loved to do that. You know how obsessed I would have been like? I was like, what was your musicals in high school? Bat boy. Bat boy. Apparently they use like, you know, they use like, know like helmets like cave

diving equipment and stuff like in the opening number of the musical to like set the mood for discovering Batboy it seems really fun wow yeah they went all out

it caught my eye my ear as soon as you said bad boy yeah it's just i was like yeah i was researching like you know cryptids and and and things like that and i was like i just kept finding more about west virgin. It was like, dude, there are so many here. My God. Okay, now I'm going to see where that boy, the musical, is playing and go see it. No, literally. It ended in New York in 2000. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Like, it made its way to New York. But I mean, like, smaller theaters. I'm like, where is it now? We got to recreate it. We'll recreate it we'll make it yeah yeah we'll bring everyone together for batboy the musical yeah we will man so auditions for batboy the musical i would go i don't know what the cast is like but i just want to know more like i went on like google maps and it's like a it's like a five hour road trip to get from um like point pleasant where the mothman is all the way to uh the lost world caverns where batboy is said to be and like on that route as well is Flatwoods, West Virginia.

So we could have Alexis gone. Yeah, I think her battery died. Oh, she's back. Oh, she's here. They're like, yeah, sorry. She doesn't. No, you're good, you're good. But yeah, we could go on on a five-hour road trip.

We could hit up Point Pleasant and the Mothman stuff. We could go to Flatwoods and go to the Flatwoods Monster Museum and go spelunking in the Lost World Caverns. Honestly, yeah. West Virginia.

Why have you not made your song until now they really meant it in that song take me home mountain mama take me home country roads and that's are the cryptids of

West Virginia thank you I don't know if I should say but I'm like I'm proud of you West Virginia I know right it's not a good choice to have cryptids but like you embraced them

they really did proud for you embracing them that's what I meant to tell West Virginia. I wish we had more encrypted to be proud of. We've got Bigfoot. And then we got the Tahoe. I forgot the name, but we'll cover it at some point. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We'll go to Tahoe.

Yeah, we will. I'd love to. Wow. I like that. I would love to. Wow. I like that. Yeah. I'm very happy with that. Thank you, guys.

Thank you. Thank you for showing that. Thank you. No. No, thank you. Is this where we end the episode hi see you guys wait what

yeah I'm just gonna leave now yeah you already left earlier you should just like not come back so yeah she's done her stuff she's said her stuff she She's said her stuff. She's out. I did my due diligence. Yeah.

Good stories. Thank you. Thank you. We all had very good stories today. We did. It was fun. Proud of us. Proud of you. Episode 4.

Episode 4. Episode 4. proud of you episode 4 episode 4 episode 4 thank you everyone for listening along and if you have any stories that you would like us to cover send them through the website or just email us at chambersoftheapult at gmail.com

yeah definitely looking forward I am planning on maybe looking into some of these and hopefully covering them I don't know about you guys as well I looked at them I think yesterday or today

also if you have any stories of your own paranormal or true crime with either one of them if your shoulder bumped against a serial killer or something. Or, you know. What if we brought them on?

On to the podcast. Oh, I was going to be like, the serial killer? Yeah, the serial killer. Paul from jail. If you have a cool enough story, maybe we'll let you on to the podcast. You know, and join the cool kids if you personally know us yeah

actually if you personally know us reach out to us that way we know you listen to us yeah please but yeah write your stories in we want to do a listeners episode where we cover y'all stories and the more stories you write in the more you hear from us

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yeah awesome our youtube page which we haven't posted yet so honestly we're getting there yeah um awesome thank you have a good night listening have a good night or day or whatever you're if there's anything left. Bye! Bye! Thank you.