Most mental illnesses are found everywhere, whether in Europe or America, Honduras or Dublin. Of course, each culture has its own characteristics of symptoms — starting with the language in which the patient hears hallucinations, and ending with the characteristics of the content of delusions. But many cultures have something purely their own, internal, integral and characteristic only for this area and people in no less degree than the Eiffel tower for Paris, the Taj Mahal for India and the spreading cranberry for Russia. Such syndromes, which are not found anywhere except in a single human community, are called cultural. In some sources — cross-cultural or transcultural, as well as culture-dependent. In the ICD-10, most of them are considered under the code F 48.8 — that is, as specific neurotic disorders, but this is not entirely true, since the symptoms of some of these disorders are very psychotic.

Amok syndrome, or simply amok (from Malay. meng-âmok — to fall into a blind rage and kill). It is most common in Malaysia and Indonesia. In the development of the syndrome in three stages: first, depressed, melancholy mood of serious reflection, the appearance of the reticles in the eyes and gradual creep of toggle switch to “all kill — one remains”; and then a sudden flash, which can be provoked by the insult, with a sidelong glance non-fiction whistling or develops without apparent reason: the man is torn, kills and destroys everything that gets in the way; and finally, a way out of the painful state with complete amnesia of what happened and severe physical and mental exhaustion. Death is possible if the aggression was directed at yourself, too. The prevalence of this syndrome in the past forced local police officers to carry sticks with a loop of barbed wire to catch and hold such patients.

Dhat syndrome. This syndrome originates in ancient Indian tracts, according to which the body of each person contains seven vital substances, or dhata. In a very short and very simple way, these are Rasa (plasma, nutrient fluid), rakta (blood, life force), mamsa (muscle), MEDA (adipose tissue), asthi (bones, cartilage and ligaments), maja (bone marrow and nerve tissue), and shukra (sperm) in men and artava (eggs) in women. Here is with shukra something and released have men embarrassment. Not everyone, of course, but those who know what it consists of. And it has a thin and squishy mental organization. He goes, say, in Mumbai, inhales the thick aromas of his native metropolis and gradually Matures to the idea of getting rid of an extra half — liter of Mala in the form of a mutra-the bladder is not rubber! Does its job in one of the public urinals and suddenly-in the urine something muddy white! “Well, that’s it, a far-off Northern mongoose has crept up on me, now a paragraph to a Cobra! This OK from me shukra flows out with terrible force! I’m now five minutes away from Bhut!» It is in such anxieties, fears, and anticipation of the imminent funeral pyre that the next months of the poor man’s life are spent — until a good doctor or guru is found. In addition to India, this syndrome is found in China, Sri Lanka and the state of Taiwan.

Corot syndrome. It is found in India, China, and Southeast Asia, among Malays, Indonesians, Chinese, and Vietnamese. In the vast majority of cases — in men (fine mental organization, you already know). Got its name from the Chinese “Coro”, which means “head of a turtle”. A turtle in danger does what? No, it doesn’t turn on the first space speed and doesn’t go into geostationary orbit. It pulls its head and legs under the protection of its shell. There she has a bottle of rice vodka and a Smoking bamboo — everything a normal turtle needs to cope with stress. So, with Corot syndrome, the patient begins to think that his long-suffering Yeng could not stand the harms of work and the General injustice of the universe and began to shrink and shrivel up and soon spit on everyone and hide inside, like a turtle. And inside — the patient knows this for sure — there is no bottle of rice vodka, no Smoking bamboo. There is nothing to relieve stress with. And if so, Yeng will not only die himself, but the owner will ride to the other world on his own. And then, without panic and low morale well at all in any way.

Lata syndrome, or latah. It is common among women in Malaysia and Indonesia. This is so that men do not think that only they can learn something tricky. Manifests itself if a woman is scared or creates unbearable conditions for her. In response, she falls into a kind of trance, in which she either implicitly does everything that is asked of her (and here the main thing is not to ask for a splash of boiling water or bring coffee to bed), or simply repeats the gestures, actions and words of those around them, as if deprived of their own will. Periodically, psychomotor excitement breaks out — usually in the form of a good portion of selected matyugov: after all, swearing-they are firmly established in the very depths of the subconscious of any people, and even when the brain is almost completely disconnected — the remaining brain tissue is enough to Express a seven — story compliment to the universe.

PA-LEng syndrome. It is found in China and Southeast Asia. Remember, max Frei was a funny character — samanez rulen of Baghdatis, who believed that without a huge cap to go absolutely not — the brain the wind will blow? Now, it’s almost the same here. This syndrome is associated with the belief present in the local culture that the wind and cold are not just an abomination, snot and the potential to catch something cold. Wind and cold can dampen the Yang Yang in a person, resulting in Yin Yin prevailing and all sorts of crap coming out. You will walk all tired, lethargic and with a drooping Yeng. And then you will die completely. Therefore, you need to dress warmer and more layered. And sweat is not an inconvenience, it is an attribute of a real man. You could say chemical weapons. Suddenly opened ten clothes — and take the chosen one, while she is in a swoon!

Taijin kyofu-Shu syndrome (in another transcription — Tajin kyofusho). It is found exclusively in Japan and is associated with the culture of this country, where the role of a restraining, limiting factor in society is played by shame (in contrast to Russia, where the same role should be played by conscience). The syndrome manifests itself in a panic fear of “losing face”, losing a good attitude and favor from other people. Moreover, the patient is not afraid of the consequences of real actions — he begins to fear something is wrong to say, there is no smile, let the winds with so many people, to insult their breath — and anyway, you never know: suddenly the fact of the appearance of the street his face gets mavasi-giri’s sense of beauty? I’d rather stay at home, locked up. Again, there was a tingle in my side, and my heart ached, and sleep was gone…

Couvade syndrome. Previously, it was distributed among the population of Oceania, some peoples of the Caribbean Islands, as well as in Corsica and Burma. The name, according to some sources, comes from the French word couver, meaning “to hatch chickens”. It is closely related to the custom when a man during the pregnancy of his wife behaved as she did: went to bed, refused food, screamed as if from labor, and in every possible way imitated the process of childbirth. According to beliefs, a woman should have been incredibly relieved by this. Perhaps they were relieved. There may have been some inexplicable mechanism for sharing suffering. There is also a simpler explanation: the desire to get up and strangle the scoundrel was so strong that the pain receded into the background. Some of the men were so impressionable and so well was the character that really started to feel tazelenemedi: they had morning sickness, had lost his appetite, began to pull on something salty or sweet, there are a number of scents and dishes, which turned up from the soul and in every way felt sick, had pains in lower back and lower abdomen and all this was accompanied by moods, resentment, irritability and extreme bulging of self. Childbirth never ended, but with the forced evacuation of fecal masses in the process of attempts-no problems. It is interesting that now this syndrome is no longer characteristic of any one culture — it is found almost everywhere.

Syndrome offwire. It’s called SAC syndrome. Typical for women in South Africa. It is difficult to say exactly how strict their upbringing is and what terrible stories and legends they are told about men, but the trigger for this syndrome is most often the sight of an unfamiliar man. Apparently, the strangers must be indelibly impressed by the frenzied screams, sobs, shouting out some completely new words for the local dialect, Brownian movement with the speed of a mad tennis ball, followed by falling into a trance-either with complete inhibition, or with arms and legs falling away, or with convulsions, in the manner of an epileptic fit. And so for days and weeks. After that, a decent stranger is simply obliged to either marry, or get into a long retaliatory fit — they say, your indescribable beauty did not leave me indifferent either.

Susto syndrome (aka susto’s disease, aka espanto). This syndrome can be found in residents of another continent-among the Quechua Indians in Latin America. Why only there? It’s because we don’t have any demons, soul-snatching witches, or evil quechuan spirits roaming the streets so freely. Gopniki-this is please. Taking money and shooting cigarettes are common. Doing all sorts of unnatural things to the brain — as many as you like. But to take away the soul — we do not have such obscenity. But the Indians are suffering. He would go along the road, meet a demon or a witch, and be ready. Fell to the ground, and the soul, such a fool, there is no to go in the heels — it tries to sniff the ground. And they don’t just let you go back from the ground, it’s not a tour for fur coats with drinking “Metaxa” right in the sewing shop. And without a soul a real Indian is hard: he suffers, he doesn’t eat, he doesn’t sleep well, he gets thin and weak. And everything is waiting for death. You have to go to the shaman, so that he filled the pipe, scored the arrow and agreed with the mother earth, how much you can get your soul back.

Things are no easier for the ojibway Indians in Canada. Their misfortune syndrome vitiko (vindigo, vertigo). However, some unconscious researchers believe that this is not a disease, but just a bad temper and an attempt to justify their culinary preferences, but they are evil. The syndrome is manifested when the tribe has nothing to eat: the wild rice has run out or the food truck has forgotten to overturn. Less often-when there is food, but you want something delicious, but there is no or you can not. And I’m hungry. Right to death. Someone else’s. I’m already getting scared myself. And then the fear passes, and in its place is a giant ice-skeletal demon-Vitiko. He wants to eat even more, and any member of the Indian family is a friend, companion, and delicacy to him. To a sharp change in the diet of a relative, the family treats without understanding and sympathy: an Amateur cannibal is either dragged to a shaman (which is less common), or they decide that it will be cheaper and more reliable to kill. And the ish-demon possessed, human wanted!

Syndrome piblokto (aka Pabloites). It is found in Greenlandic fishermen. Begins, as a rule, either with the appearance of weakness, rapid fatigue, or against the background of a depressed, depressive state: cold, wet, fish are fed up, and in General-what kind of bastard called this land green? Then an astral icicle falls on his head, and the patient explodes: rips off his clothes, screams like a Seagull, snorts like a whale, cries like a seal, roars like a deer (Northern, not spotted — don’t confuse it!), dives into a deep snowdrift, and if he doesn’t stumble on a forgotten household appliance or a freshly buried snowmobile, swims and splashes in the snow. Under the influence of the moment, it is quite capable of demolishing a house on a log, or on a stone, or whatever else they make them out of. It can repeat words or gestures thoughtlessly. Then the charge of bad energy runs out, and the person is forgotten in a deep pathological sleep, after which he wakes up healthy, but a little weak and rumpled, looking at others with bewilderment-they say, why are you all so caring and cautious? Yes, I’m fine. Was there any reason to doubt it? It is very similar to the Arctic hysteria that occurs in the canadian Eskimos. Due to severe stress (for example, the deer is gone or geologists came), the patient is thrown in a hole or escapes into the tundra, and if it is trying to catch and not let go — it becomes violent, aggressive, sometimes gives a a seizure.

Syndrome Camarines. This syndrome is also found mainly among the peoples of the Far North, where the nights are not just long — they are polar, and the stories of shamans would have impressed Stephen king himself. Again, the wind that blows the soul out of you. Again, almost cosmic cold, which tries to take it along with the heat. And this heavy sleep in the heat and among the rushing fire glare, and it was time to go to bed not because it was dark — it was dark a month ago — just time to switch off for seven hours. In short, the situation is very conducive to the fact that when you Wake up one day (I almost said — in the morning) from some smell or noise, you suddenly realize that IT happened. There is no soul. Instead, it was either a sucking emptiness, or someone else had already settled in, someone else, uninvited and hostile. And there is something yourself repurchase in the opening of the breeding season and the development of a new body. Scared? You bet! To complete paralysis, to a clear sense of either someone else’s presence, or to the audible slight rustle of your own fleeing soul.

And a couple more imported syndromes before we talk about domestic ones.

The Jerusalem syndrome. It has spread mainly among tourists who came to worship the Holy land and look at the Holy places. If those who live side by side with shrines have already developed immunity — well, a place, well, Holy, well, two steps away, Yes, thank you, I’m happy by default-then new arrivals eating with their eyes everything so mystical and in such large quantities is not always good. Then, you see, Jesus will suddenly Wake up in a person, then Moses, then Abraham. As a result, in complete bewilderment as those who have woken up-they say, I have never spent the night here! — so are those who suddenly feel like them. The latter in particular. At once they begin to reveal and prophesy, or even make a March across the deserts, for about forty years, inducing some people for the company. It is encouraging that this syndrome lasts no more than a week and often passes on its own.

Stendhal Syndrome. It can be described in three words. Veni, vidi, phallomorphi. Stendhal had also, er, experienced a cultural shock when he saw Raphael’s Madonna and Michelangelo’s David. Even now, some impressionable tourists with a fine mental organization experience something similar when they see a particular work of art. And it doesn’t matter how the shock manifests itself: ecstasy, panic, or reverence for a painting, sculpture, or structure, when all other colors and impressions simply fade and become insignificant and vain, it is impossible not to notice it from the outside. As a rule, local residents and Museum employees do not experience anything like this — in fact, it would be strange to go to work every day for such a thrill. Again, desensitization, cultural mithridatism…

Now let’s talk about cultural syndromes that are common in Russia. No, this isn’t about delirium tremens. And not because we don’t suffer it so much as we enjoy it. As practice shows, alcoholic delirium is a phenomenon outside borders and peoples; devils are driven here, in Western Europe, in Israel, India, Africa and Australia, and this phenomenon is not alien to America — well, unless somewhere after a tequila binge, instead of a devil or a UFO crew, a local Chupacabra will appear, this is already a detail. We already have enough local exotics.

Hiccups (also called hiccups). It is more common in the Perm region and the Komi Republic. It is not the same action that occurs as a result of re-expression of the diaphragmatic nerve — everything is more complex, mysterious, and smacks of witchcraft. So we need to be on our guard against wizards and witches. And if suddenly on a hot summer day you are offered kvass from birch bark tuesca-refuse. Like, thank you, like, I’ll get by on vodka somehow. And then you take a SIP — and there is already a Hiccup (or as it will be called) a piece of mold sitting on the food specially grown. He is a hyperactive demon: go to a new place of residence. Some of them have been in prison for thirty years, or even longer. And it’s okay to just sit in your stomach, so no — it must be made known. Not only to the host — who will not miss the appearance of such a guest — but also to everyone around them. So he does not sit silently-he foreshadows. It can, of course, and just howl, growl or bleat, but more often — something says. Mostly offensive, scary, or abusive. And forces the host to do what the imp wants. Usually something obscene: slap of wine (red, white and because vodka is abhorrent to him), to eat something inedible, but honey, garlic, radish, pepper and sage to shy away like incense; to strip naked when people day to sit in the dark — well, the devil, he is the devil, they’re all character pathology and disorders of the instincts. Well, hiccups are also present — most often, everything begins with it.

Hysterics. Currently, it is not so common, but still occurs throughout Russia to the West of the Urals. The overwhelming majority of hysterics were women. It is difficult to say why the demons that cause klikushestvo are so picky about gender-maybe the reason for this is the peculiarities of the female psyche, or maybe the usual physiology. Maybe they don’t have a place to sit at men’s houses, but it’s inconvenient to sit on what they are offered. In many ways, the behavior of demons is similar to the behavior of Hiccups: they sit inside, make them broadcast (click) on their behalf, do something obscene; being overshadowed by the sign of the cross or the aiming application of the censer, they fall together with the bearer Aki thunderstruck. The carrier, as a rule, has a memory for all obscenities that is completely rejected.

Oracene (also maracena, Emiratele). Its name derives from the Yakut word menarik — “make strange”. It is distributed mainly among the peoples inhabiting Eastern Siberia. However, people who came from other places and settled there for a long time are also not immune from this scourge. In many ways similar to the Malaysian Lata syndrome, but not so gender-sensitive. Kind of reminds syndrome piblokto. You can achieve symptoms of the syndrome by frightening a person with words, your appearance, a sharp sound or a flash of light. Less often, it develops independently. The patient seems to be in a trance-he copies the movements and words of others, obediently performs whatever he is ordered. Sometimes meryachenie covers an entire group of people, in this case it turns out an improvised flashmob.

And finally, three syndrome, which occur in the Siberian Tatars and described by H. M. Mukhamejanova in 2000.

State of “KUEK-ut”. Fire, in addition to running water and other people’s work, is included in the list of things that you can look at indefinitely. Just do not do it too closely — from the OTHER side, we can also be admired. The Fire spirit is not only a curious being, but also, unlike the one who plays peek-a-Boo with a fire, an active one. He sensed a weakness and immediately moved into the gaping hole. Imagine the leap of living fire under the skin, which begins to walk busily around the newfound body? In General, the spirit burns as it can, but the person suffers-it burns, it is hot, he feels pain, he sees the dance and the terrible faces of the spirit of fire, he rushes, not finding salvation. And here the choice is not rich — either a shaman, or a psychiatrist.

The “isce” state. This is when a person suddenly understands: everything, the soul in the morning dressed, gathered a bundle with things and left. And with it went the joy and interest in ordinary pleasures and Affairs, the colors of life, and life itself flows away in a thin trickle. But the Spirit of fear has come to an empty place, and it, unlike the soul, does not stand on ceremony with the owner. Hence fear, anxiety, loss of appetite, confusion, and a complete lack of visible prospects.

The state of the “Cam-Bashan”. There is a strong belief among the Siberian Tatars that shamanic items should not be taken. Well, that is, taking someone else’s is generally not good, and shamanic-in addition, it is also deadly. They even have a tambourine on a special anti-theft device. And curiosity and parses. Touched-nothing. Knocked, rattled-the current does not beat, the siren does not howl. But then… Then comes the fear, the depressed state and the understanding that the anti-theft was shamanic. It would have been better to have been killed on the spot. And so the weakness of some, and the potency is gone somewhere. And yet — comes a solid understanding of the inevitability kirdyk, but it is unclear what he would be immediately if all happens like an accident or will first severe illness.