Now You're Afraid of the Dark

Kryziu Kalnas started out like any other old Lithuanian hill: green and hilly, not too creepy. But beginning around 1831, the mini-mountain somehow became a hot spot for remembering failed uprisings, lost independence and how much the Soviet occupiers sucked. After years of conflict with the Russian empire, the family members of fallen soldiers turned the little mound into a sort of memorial to their loved ones. And what do you do when you want to memorialize someone? You plant a cross, of course. Or two or three or four.

After 100,000 crosses and crucifixes, shit can start looking creepy.

Today Kryziu Kalnas is a home to enough religious imagery to resemble the universe’s cemetery. And the Soviets didn’t help matters when they bulldozed the place twice, guaranteeing the Hill of Crosses will be nice and haunted for all eternity. And every time the Soviets bulldozed, the Lithuanians rebuilt with a holy vengeance. Kryziu Kalnas ultimately became a symbol of enduring Lithuanian Catholicism, in spite of the heavy hand of the Soviets. In fact, in 1993, Pope John Paul II came out and blessed the place.
As if it needed it. 

Aokigahara, also known as the Sea of Trees, is a 35-square-kilometre (14 sq mi) forest that lies at the northwest base of Mount Fuji in Japan. The forest contains a number of rocky, icy caverns, a few of which are popular tourist destinations. Due to the wind-blocking density of the trees and an absence of wildlife, the forest is known for being eerily quiet.

The forest has a historic association with demons in Japanese mythology and is a popular place for suicides; 54 completed the act in 2010, despite numerous signs, in Japanese and English, urging people to reconsider their actions.

In 2002, 78 bodies were found within the forest, exceeding the previous record of 74 in 1998. In 2003, the rate climbed to 100, and in recent years, the local government has stopped publicizing the numbers in an attempt to downplay Aokigahara’s association with suicide. In 2004, 108 people killed themselves in the forest. In 2010, 247 people attempted suicide in the forest, 54 of whom completed the act. Suicides are said to increase during March, the end of the fiscal year in Japan.

The annual body search, consisting of a small army of police, volunteers, and attendant journalists, began in 1970.

Hans Ulrich Rudel, a Swiss politician and convicted murderer, is now accused of putting out an ad to attract potential cannibals interested in eating his pal’s wife and 12-year-old daughter.

The Local reports that Rudel, who co-founded the Embrachertal branch of the Conservative Party, is accused of putting the ad out in 2010 in an effort to get his friend’s wife “out of the way” during an ugly divorce.

The ad said the mother and daughter were “keen to meet gentlemen interested in slaughter and dolce who would like to roast us on a spit.” “Dolce,” as Rudel allegedly told police, was his word for cannibalism.

Source.

malformalady:

A glass jar of human teeth, found in the mass graves of the killing fields in The Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

Photo credit: Darragh Mason Field

Action Park was an amusement park, open from 1978 to 1996 in Vernon Township,New Jersey at the former Vernon Valley / Great Gorge ski area, now known as Mountain Creek.

Six people are known to have died directly or indirectly from rides at Action Park:

• On July 8, 1980, a 19-year-old park employee was riding the Alpine Slide when his car jumped the track and his head struck a rock, killing him.
• On July 24, 1982, a 15-year-old boy drowned in the Tidal Wave Pool.
• A week later, on August 1, a 27-year-old man from Long Island got out of his tipped kayak on the Kayak Experience to right it. He was electrocuted when he stepped on a grate that was either in contact with, or came too close to, a section of wiring for the underwater fans that was exposed. Several other members of his family nearby were also injured. He was taken to a hospital in nearby Warwick, New York where he died later of cardiac arrest from the electric shock. Accounts differed as to the extent of the exposed wiring: the park said it was “just a nick,” while others said it was closer to 8 inches (20 cm). While the park said it was vindicated, it never reopened the ride, saying that people would be afraid to go on it afterwards.
• In 1984, a fatal heart attack suffered by one visitor was unofficially believed to have been triggered by the shock of the cold water in the pool beneath the Tarzan Swing. The water on the Tarzan Swing and in that swimming area was 50-60 °F (10-16 °C) while other water areas were in the 70-80 °F (21-27 °C) range more typical of swimming pools. The Tarzan swing and the cannon ball ride in this area were operated by spring water.
• On August 27 of that year, a 20-year-old from Brooklyn drowned in the Tidal Wave Pool.
• On July 19, 1987, an 18-year-old drowned in the Tidal Wave Pool.

Source.