Lo que le Pasó a un Hermano Mio, or What Happened to my Brother, is a folktale that originated in the Spanish province of Galicia. It relates the unfortunate incident suffered by the narrator's brother. I found it written in the first person. The story opens up with the brother, who remains anonymous, walking to work. It takes place before cars were invented, and the brother had to walk many miles each day to reach his remote job. Everything was going fine when, suddenly, he heard footsteps on the road. However, when he looked behind, he discovered there was no one on the road. Starting to get freaked out, he tried to step off the road. However, when he attempted to move, he discovered that a mystical energy field was holding him rooted to the road! Things were starting to look bad for our favorite relative, pinned to a road out in the middle of nowhere by what he assumed was the Devil. However, just when things started to get hairy, the brother managed to somehow wrench himself free from the Devil's evil grasp. Wasting no time, he immediately began running back home. But, this wasn't the end of his problems; in his way was a very large river. While it was usually safe to cross, the river was at high tide. However, hearing the footsteps closing in behind him, the brother decided to risk swimming across. Luckily, he got across safely, and the footsteps stayed behind on the opposite bank. After all, evil creatures can't cross running water. When the brother got home, he was quick to tell the entire village what happened. The story was supposedly passed down by the narrator and eventually became the version that it is today. The moral of this story is to use public transportation. note: If you want to read more Galician folktales, see Las Brujas y el Cura and La Manzana del Enamorado. For an example of a Mexican folktale, see El Virrey y el Azteca. | 
