Bad Luck Stories from Taking Pieces of Lava
 

I know it's against the law, but apparently people try to take home souvenirs of lava or black sand. A program I watched on the Travel Channel yesterday had one fellow who says he's had sand and lava mailed back to him by someone who "copped" some when on vacation and took it home.

Anyone else have tales of bad luck? Or is this a good way to keep us all in check and less likely to walk away with lava in our pockets?

Oops, forgot to mention I was talking about Hawaii.

DD

Just look what happened to the Brady's after Bobby made that Idol into a necklace on their Hawaiian vacation!

Many many people have taken lava rocks and then had bad luck. Just as many people who have NOT taken lava rocks have also had bad luck. Coincidence? I think not!

While it's not ok to take lava rock, you can sure buy it. Retailers all over Hawaii sell lava rock, black sand, green sand etc. So apparently ABC Stores have cut some kind of deal with Madam Pele and are somehow exempt from this "curse".

That's not to say people should break the law.

We were on the Big Island several years ago when our kids were young, and one of our boys, probably about 10 at the time, picked up a piece of lava in his tennis shoe, discovering it when he got home. He was so concerned about it that on our next family trip to Hawaii he took it back with him (it couldn't have been any bigger than a pencil eraser) and put it carefully down alongside a road and felt much better. :)

Lol, tpatricco, I was just about to give the same exact response!

Well, considering that the story is just that--a story, that thought to have been made up by a park ranger to discourage visitors from removing rocks, and has no basis in Hawaiian beliefs, myths or legends, I would question the actual "bad luck" effects of lava rock. I'd attribute any bad luck more to power of suggestion, a self-fulfilling prophecy, or a guily conscious than the rock itself.

But, if the "curse" can prevent some people from taking rocks, then great. Some people have trouble with the concept of "leave only footprints, take away only memories."

inthechips - LOL! How refreshing to see such an honest youngster (even it was because he was scared of bad luck!).

You are obviously teaching him the right values - it is illegal for a reason! :)

Karen

This is a legend I have heard of for many years about rocks around the world. When I was in Ireland our tour guide insisted that if any of us took rocks from "fairy mounds" we stopped at we would have years of bad luck. He told stories about people who mailed rocks back and got rid of the bad luck. It was all a lie and a joke! Bus drivers don't like cleaning rocks out of their buses at the end of a tour and the tour guides love telling tales. There is no truth to these tales. Its an inside joke that tour guides around the world use.

Think about it. A Rock can give you bad luck? Only a fool....

I never said I believed the legend as I am not superstious by nature nor foolish. I just wanted to hear some tales from others and get to read the wisecracks such a post would elicit. I have not been disappointed!

DD

The funny thing is Karen, we didn't tell him it was illegal (I don't think), but I think he'd heard the folklore and believed it was bad luck. I just couldn't believe that he thought to take it all the way back, tiny as it was!

While it is illegal to remove any material from a beach, I doubt very much that it is illegal to take a rock on the side of the road. Is this another myth or can someone provide support for this?

Removing anything from a national park, I am pretty sure, is illegal. Same with natural reserve areas. If you stop along the road and remove a rock from someone else's private property, while they would have a hard time finding a police officer to take you into custody, technically it would still be theft, wouldn't it?

It’s considered extremely bad luck to take lava home from Hawaii. Madame Pele, the Goddess of the Volcanoes, doesn’t like it one bit. There’s a large display case at the Volcano House Museum filled with pieces of lava and letters from people who returned them. Like this one:

"Dear Pele," it began. "I'm a very scientific electronics technician and not subject to superstitious bunk, so I took a few rocks as souvenirs in the summer of '78. Since then I've had fires of my tractor, two cars and my house caught fire twice. I'm still scientific, but I can take a hint. Please toss these back in the volcano before someone gets killed around here," (May 25, 1980)... Enough said.

I hope Pele ((A))will forgive us for the small lava rocks wedged in our sandals after walking on her black sand beaches, or perhaps the bad luck is manifested by soiled carpeting((?))

ddcnga, I was not referring to you. I am referring to people in General!

BTW, I wonder where all that landscaping lava rock they sell at every garden store and Home Depot in America comes from? I heard Home Depot is doing quite well! The only problem with lava rock as landscape cover is that the wind blows it all over the yard.

It's all good, JOR.

DD

God help those who dare to collect a few sea shells !

This topic came up at a Grange meeting featuring a travelogue. My favorite Grange lady said she took some lava as a souvenier and never had any bad luck. Well, I'm not sure what she considers to be bad luck because since her trip to Hawaii: she has hit a deer with her car, more than once, her house was burned down by a pyromaniac neighbor, and she was rear ended by some out of staters who didn't notice the highway was ENDING and the speed limit had dropped to 35 mph. There's probably other evidence of bad luck but she just doesn't see it that way.

Many years ago, while working in the mail room of a marketing firm outside of Detroit, the woman who headed up one of the divisions of our company came down to the mail room with a lava rock and an address for Madame Pele. She embarassedly told me about the curse and instructed me to ship the rock back to Hawaii - which I did.

AAHAHAHH! So that is what has been going on w/me the last three yers since I took that rock from the peak in Sedona! It's been sitting on my mantle giving me the evil eye! I'm going to ebay right now to put it up for sale.

I'm wondering if this "curse" would also apply to the piece of the Berlin Wall my father brought back to the states and gave to my children back in the 80's? Lots '0 bad things have happened to all of us since then!!! But, we've also had a lot of good things happen!! Hmmmmm...

All those suckers who bought Pet Rocks in the 70's must be dead by now or at least burned out of their houses a few times.

I nicked a piece of <i>aa</i> lava (great Scrabble word BTW) years ago on the BI and got sciatica the next day. Didn't know about Pele's curse then. However, I put it on a windowsill at home next to a stone from Masada, and my back pain vanished. I do believe Pele's force has been well and truly neutralized. ;)

Speaking of the Berlin Wall. back in 1989 I packaged a Christmas gift for my boss with professional graphics on the box that said it was an authentic chunk of cement from the Berlin Wall. She opened the box in front of everyone and found an old red brick from my back yard stamped Alamo Brick Co. Didn't get fired. Got points for creativity!

Good story, Jor.

Mine (piece from Berlin Wall) is authentic. My father and step-mother moved to Germany in 1982 (my step-mother worked/works for the DoD. They just luckily happened to be (don't know exactly where) there when the wall came crashing down. They picked over the pieces and brought back several for us kids and our kids.

Mine actually is broken in such a way that the remnants of the graphitti and the way the chunk is shaped makes it look like a blue peace symbol. It's way cool.

Bad part is the wall contained asbestos, so I no longer openly display the chunk out in the open. Still, it's priceless to me.

DD

There is a pile of rocks and sand sitting just outside the mail room at the park, from people sending rocks back to Hawaii.

I don't keep any lava rocks, but I do have a piece of the asbestos Berlin Wall, and my husband's Pet Rock--still in the box, and I'm still alive!!!

I was born and raised on a working farm (not a hobby farm). There's this thing called &quot;rock picking&quot; that every pre-teen farm boy has to do. You drive a tractor with a little trailer behind it through the fields before planting and pick up all the rocks that surfaced that year and haul them off to the &quot;rock pile&quot;.

I am pleased to inform everyone that the family home has not burned down and that I which I would have thought of that Pet Rock thing and became a millioneir from all those rock picking days.

Any other ex farm boys out there will know exactly what I am talking about.

You can't take the farm boy out of the man even when he's been around the world.

LOL Jor!! We were in Volcano Nat'l park a few years ago and negleted to pick a rock for the same reason. I've bent down for enough rocks in my time!

I am leaving for Oahu tomorrow, and plan on only bringing back happy memories and many pictures.

The ABC stores do not sell real lava. If u ask, they will tell you it is clay made to look like lava. Also, the lava in Kona or Hilo or wherever you are on the Big Island is not yours to take. Why would anyone want to bring a rock home? I've never heard of the Berlin Wall curse...but I would keep a piece if someone brought me one.

It is not illegal depending on the location. http://www.state.hi.us/dlnr/chair/pio/piofaq.htm

aloha from Kauai...not just illegal(national park) yet immoral and bad manners. Sand too...can't take truck load of sand from a beach to fill in your garden here. or take live shells.coral,lava rocks,etc...

ABC stores/International market place/souvenir trinket stores sell Indonesian/Thailand/Philippines shells taken with unethical practices, ravaging their own reefs for profit isn't frowned upon. Very very few shells in stores are from hawaii. check mandatory labeling

We all find individual shells washed up at Polihale. Not allowed to scuba dive for live specimens offshore at your will.

The "superstitions" attached to lava rocks are in appropriate reverence to Pele. When building a rock wall, the contractors here need special use permits to "farm" first then utilize. Cannot just go dig up roadside lava rocks. Same adage...if all did as they pleased, we'd be like easter island= used up finite resources. although seemingly plenty around, just not good manners.
Its not just local folklore...plenty of stories throughout the years of visitors returning "stuff" back to the aina.

I can understand regulations about use of natural resources.

But what it has to do with fantasies about "good luck" - I just don't get. Who beleive in this nonsense. It's as bad as ghosties and ghoulies and fairies and thinking Freddy Kruger is hiding in your basement.