Who doesn’t like weird

Here’s a really weird place I found in this weird book, ATLAS OF IMPROBABLE PLACES. It’s in Mexico, and it’s a little island called ISLAND OF THE DOLLS. Here there’s not a tree without dolls hanging from it. Some of the dolls are “strung from branches on ropes”, says the Atlas – umm…I wonder who thought that was a good idea. Anyway. On this island there’s a wooden shack, and on the side of this shack there are “naked Barbie dolls nailed by their hair”.

Dear Atlas of Improbable Places,

I think you should write a horror novel. You just scared me witless with this description.

Best wishes,

Misty

The story behind the dolls is weird. The hermit who lived on this island found the body of a small girl who drowned. The next day a doll floated to the shore at the same spot. Believing that the doll belonged to the dead girl, he hung it up in a nearby tree as a memorial to her. The day after that he found another doll – if it had been me, I would have started to freak out at this point. The hermit doesn’t freak out, he becomes obsessed with finding more dolls – Really? It sounds like the hermit was very weird. So he scoured around in the water and in rubbish bins for dolls and he decorated his makeshift shack with them. After years of doll-scouring, people found out about the weird hermit and his weird thing about dolls, so people came to visit and brought dolls with them – that goes to show that people can’t resist weird.

In 2001 the hermit died by drowning in the same spot of the waterway that claimed the life of the little girl – but that may or may not be true. It’s more likely other weird people, but weird in a different way, are making up weird stories about the weird hermit. And, apparently, people still stop by today and add new dolls to the trees.

People are weird!

See you,

Misty