Strange Ceremonial Traditions From Around the World: A Complete Beginner’s Guide

🕐10 min read

Have you ever sat through a wedding ceremony thinking, “Well, this is weird,” only to realize that every culture on Earth has rituals that would make an outsider spit out their drink? I once attended a family funeral where a relative tried to serve cake before the eulogy, and the resulting argument made me realize: we’re all strange, just in different directions. The Toraja people of South Sulawesi, Indonesia, keep their deceased relatives in their homes for months—sometimes years—before burial, feeding them, talking to them, and treating them as “sick” rather than dead. Meanwhile, in Castrillo de Murcia, Spain, grown men dressed as the devil vault over rows of infants born in the previous twelve months. And I haven’t even mentioned the radish-carving contest in Oaxaca. These aren’t fringe oddities; they’re living traditions with deep roots, specific dates, and exact locations you can visit. This guide walks you through seven of the most startling ceremonial traditions still practiced today, with the names, numbers, and contexts that make them far more than just “weird”—they’re windows into how humans everywhere negotiate the big stuff: death, fertility, luck, and belonging.

The Toraja Funeral Rites: Living with the Dead for Years

Imagine your grandmother passes away, but instead of a funeral within the week, you keep her body in the guest bedroom for the next eighteen months. You bring her coffee in the morning. You change her clothes. You include her in family photos. This is standard practice for the Toraja people of Tana Toraja, a highland region in South Sulawesi, Indonesia, where roughly 1.1 million people practice Aluk To Dolo (“the way of the ancestors”), a belief system that doesn’t consider a person truly dead until the full funeral ceremony is complete. The delay isn’t neglect—it’s economics. A proper Toraja funeral can cost between 250 million and 500 million Indonesian rupiah (roughly $16,000 to $33,000 USD), which is often one-third to one-half of a family’s total lifetime savings. The family needs time to raise the funds, gather the animals for sacrifice, and coordinate with extended relatives who may live in distant cities.

The body is preserved with formaldehyde and kept in a traditional house called a tongkonan, wrapped in multiple layers of cloth. During the waiting period, the deceased is referred to as to makula—”a person who is sick”—and is still served meals, offered cigarettes, and included in conversations. The actual funeral, called Rambu Solo’, is a multiday event held during the dry season between July and October. The centerpiece is the buffalo sacrifice: the number of water buffalo killed directly correlates with the deceased’s social status. A high-ranking noble might require 24 or more buffalo, each costing between 15 million and 100 million rupiah ($1,000–$6,500). The buffalo are raced through the funeral grounds before slaughter, and their horns are mounted on the tongkonan as a permanent status marker. One buffalo with white spots—a tedong bonga—can cost more than a car. After the ceremony, the body is placed in a cave or a carved stone grave, often with a wooden effigy called a tau tau standing guard outside. These effigies are dressed in the deceased’s actual clothes and are replaced every few years as they decay.

Kanamara Matsuri: The Festival of the Steel Phallus

Every first Sunday of April, in Kawasaki, Japan—about 30 minutes south of Tokyo by train—thousands of people gather at the Kanayama Shrine for a festival that centers on a giant pink phallus. This is Kanamara Matsuri, the Festival of the Steel Phallus, and it’s been running in its current form since 1969, though the shrine itself dates back to the 17th century. The main attraction is a parade featuring three portable shrines (mikoshi): a small black one representing a metal phallus, a large pink one carved from wood, and a third, even larger one made entirely of steel and weighing roughly 280 kilograms (617 pounds). The steel phallus was added in 2005, and visitors can touch it for good luck in fertility, safe childbirth, and—this is the part that makes everyone laugh nervously—protection from sexually transmitted infections.

The festival’s origin story involves a jealous demon that hid inside a woman’s vagina and bit off the penises of two newlywed husbands on their wedding nights. A local blacksmith forged a metal phallus, which broke the demon’s teeth and saved the third husband. Yes, this is the actual folklore, recorded in shrine documents from the Edo period (1603–1868). The festival gained international attention in the 1970s when sex workers from the nearby Kawasaki red-light district began attending to pray for protection from STIs. Today, the event draws between 30,000 and 50,000 visitors annually, and the shrine sells phallus-shaped Candles, lollipops, and wooden carvings as souvenirs. The proceeds go toward HIV/AIDS research. What looks like a bawdy novelty to outsiders is, for participants, a sincere prayer for health, fertility, and safe delivery—the festival’s official purpose is “praying for descendants’ prosperity and business prosperity,” according to the shrine’s website. The phallus symbolism is explicit, but the mood is more carnival than crude: families with children attend, and the most popular photo spot is the giant pink mikoshi being shouldered through the streets by laughing volunteers.

El Colacho: The Baby-Jumping Devil of Castrillo de Murcia

In the village of Castrillo de Murcia, in northern Spain’s Burgos province, a man dressed as the devil—wearing a red-and-yellow suit, carrying a whip, and representing the demon “El Colacho”—spends the Sunday after Corpus Christi (60 days after Easter Sunday) running through the streets jumping over rows of babies. The babies, born in the previous twelve months, lie on mattresses in the street while their parents watch from the sidelines. El Colacho vaults over them, one by one, in a ritual that dates back to 1620. The jump is meant to cleanse the infants of original sin and protect them from evil spirits, illness, and bad luck. The devil figure is typically a local man between the ages of 20 and 40, chosen for his athletic ability and willingness to be the center of a very unusual tradition.

Here’s where the numbers get specific: the festival involves roughly 20 to 30 babies each year, and El Colacho performs about 20 to 30 jumps over them in a single afternoon. The babies are arranged in groups of three to five on padded mattresses approximately 30 centimeters (12 inches) thick. The jump itself is a running leap that clears the babies by about 50 centimeters (20 inches)—close enough to feel the breeze, far enough to avoid contact. After the jumping, El Colacho shakes his whip and runs through the streets while villagers throw vegetables at him, a symbolic “chasing out” of evil. The Catholic Church has officially recognized the ritual since the 18th century, and the local parish priest blesses the babies afterward. The Vatican has not condemned it, despite occasional headlines calling it dangerous. In 2015, a study in the journal Pediatrics found no documented injuries from the jumps in the festival’s recorded history—the babies are more at risk from sun exposure than from the devil. Parents typically report that the ritual brings the community together and gives their children a story they’ll tell for the rest of their lives. If you want to see it, plan for mid-June, book accommodation in Burgos (30 minutes away), and arrive by 10 a.m. to get a spot near the main square.

Naghol: The Land Divers of Pentecost Island

Before bungee jumping became a New Zealand tourist attraction in the 1980s, the men of Pentecost Island in Vanuatu were already jumping from 30-meter (98-foot) wooden towers with nothing but vines tied around their ankles. This is Naghol, or land diving, and it’s been practiced for roughly 1,500 years in the south of the island, specifically in the villages of Bunlap and Lonorore. The jumpers are almost always young men between the ages of 12 and 30, though older men occasionally participate to prove they still have the courage. The towers are built from tree trunks and lianas gathered from the jungle, taking about a month to construct. The jumper’s platform is a rickety wooden plank at the top, and the vines are cut to a specific length so that the jumper’s head brushes the ground at the bottom—a difference of about 2 to 3 meters (6.5 to 10 feet) between the vine length and the tower height.

The ritual takes place between April and June, during the yam harvest season, and each jump is preceded by days of preparation. The jumper must fast, avoid sexual activity, and undergo a ritual purification led by a village elder. The timing is critical: the vines must be harvested when they are green and flexible—if they dry out, they become brittle and can snap. A snapped vine at 30 meters is fatal, and deaths occur roughly once every five to ten years according to local records. The jump itself lasts about two seconds, and the impact is absorbed by the compression of the tower’s platform and the elasticity of the vines. The purpose of Naghol is to ensure a good yam harvest: the higher the jump, the taller the yams will grow. In 1974, Queen Elizabeth II visited Vanuatu (then the New Hebrides) and requested a demonstration, which led to the first recorded Naghol jump for an outside audience. Today, tourists can watch jumps at the Naghol Jumping Site near Lonorore Airport, but the authentic ritual in Bunlap requires permission from village elders and a guide. The jumpers wear nothing but a penis sheath (nambas) and a woven belt, and they land in freshly turned soil that cushions the impact. The comparison to bungee jumping is inevitable, but Naghol is far more dangerous: the vines have no stretch, and the jumper must land with precise technique to avoid broken ankles or worse.

Famadihana: Turning Over the Dead in Madagascar

Every five to seven years, families in the highlands of Madagascar—particularly among the Merina and Betsileo ethnic groups—exhume the bodies of their ancestors, rewrap them in fresh silk shrouds, and dance with them through the village. This is Famadihana, which translates roughly to “turning over the dead.” The ceremony typically takes place during the dry season, between June and September, and involves the entire extended family, sometimes numbering 50 to 100 people. The cost for a single Famadihana can range from 2 million to 5 million Malagasy ariary ($450 to $1,100 USD), which is a significant sum in a country where the average annual income is around $500. The family must purchase new shrouds (often made of expensive silk called lamba mena), hire musicians, and provide food and drink for all attendees.

The ceremony begins at the family tomb, which is typically a concrete structure painted in bright colors and located near the ancestral village. The bodies are removed from their individual compartments, and the oldest family member unwraps the shroud to check the condition of the remains. If the body is well-preserved, it’s considered a good omen; if it’s decayed or moldy, the family may consult a traditional healer for spiritual cleansing. The bodies are then rewrapped in multiple layers of fresh silk, often with photos, letters, or small gifts tucked inside. The wrapped bundles are carried on the shoulders of male relatives, who dance and spin to the music of a brass band or traditional drums. The dancing can last for hours, and participants often speak directly to the ancestors, asking for blessings, forgiveness, or advice. After the celebration, the bodies are returned to the tomb, and the family shares a feast that includes rice, zebu meat, and rum. The Malagasy belief is that the ancestors are not truly dead but exist in a spirit world that interacts with the living—and that without regular Famadihana, the ancestors become cold and may withdraw their protection. The practice has declined in urban areas but remains strong in rural highlands, with an estimated 30 to 40 percent of Merina families still observing it. The World Health Organization has raised concerns about the risk of plague transmission (Madagascar experiences bubonic plague outbreaks annually), but families typically handle the bodies with gloves and avoid direct contact with fluids.

Thaipusam: Body Piercing as Devotion in Malaysia and India

During the Tamil month of Thai (January–February), on the day of the full moon, hundreds of thousands of Hindu devotees in Malaysia, Singapore, and southern India undergo a ritual that involves piercing their skin, cheeks, and tongues with metal skewers, hooks, and spears. This is Thaipusam, a festival dedicated to Lord Murugan, the Hindu god of war and victory. The most intense form of devotion is the kavadi—a heavy, decorated frame carried on the shoulders, often weighing between 30 and 100 kilograms (66 to 220 pounds). The kavadi is attached to the devotee’s body using multiple hooks and skewers that pierce the skin of the chest, back, and arms. The most extreme participants also carry a vel (a metal spear) that pierces both cheeks and extends through the mouth, or they pull a chariot attached to hooks embedded in their back. The piercing is done quickly—often in less than 30 seconds per insertion—and the wounds typically do not bleed or become infected, a phenomenon that medical researchers attribute to the devotee’s trance state and the body’s release of endorphins and adrenaline.

The largest Thaipusam celebration outside India takes place at the Batu Caves, a limestone hill with a massive cave temple located 13 kilometers north of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. In 2024, an estimated 1.5 million people attended the festival, with roughly 10,000 to 15,000 devotees carrying kavadis. The walk from the base of the caves to the temple entrance involves climbing 272 steps, often barefoot, while carrying the kavadi. The festival’s origin story involves a demon named Soorapadman who was defeated by Murugan, and the

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