The origin of "simnals"

As we all know almost all Mustafian babies are given a “simnal” within the first month of their lives. A simnal is a red mark on the baby’s forehead, given by a special “birthman or birthwomen” to protect the baby from bad vibes. The entire family is present at the ceremony in festive clothes and sings the traditional song of Mufasa, “The Circle of Life”. Although every citizen knows about this ritual, not many know where it comes from…

A bloody ritual

A very long time ago the people of Mufasa strongly believed in reincarnation. They claimed that after death, you would become an animal. In these ancient times, every family used to have their own “animal totem” with its own characteristics. It was common to believe that you would become this specific animal after passing away. To make sure you actually became that animal, our “greatgreatgreatgreatgrandparents” didn’t come up with anything better than using the blood of their totem animal to baptise every child born in the family. And so the ritual of the red mark on the forehead, aka the simnal, was born.

The present

At this moment, Mufasians want their babies to be given a simnal as form of protection for the evil. Also, no animals are being hurt anymore to use their blood. The red mark is simply made out of the juice of acaï berries :).